Hello all... welcome to my review of the Sandisk Sansa E250 Mp3 player. I procured one of these the previous week and have worked on it for around 75 hours in all now... I think I have explored it in and out sufficiently to write this review.
FIRST IMPRESSION
The player looks stunning from any angle. It has a piano black front finish and a brushed aluminium back plate. This is a very thoughtful feature as it is highly scratch resistant and looks good for a much longer time. The scroll wheel on the front has a gear based mechanism and is not as smooth as the ipod’s click wheel, but nevertheless has a good feel to it. The player also has very visible 1.8" screen on the front which I must say is a really brilliant and vibrant screen (more about that later in the article). One more thing I must add is that the front part of the player is highly attractive to fingerprints, so always keep a soft clean cloth around to keep the front shining!
FEATURE LIST
>Plays MP3/WMA (drag and drop feature)
>FM radio plus FM recording
>2 GB internal memory plus expandable via a Micro-SD card slot
>1.8" Colour screen capable of playing videos as well as show pictures
>One button voice recording
>Reflective frontal finish + Brushed aluminium back plate
>Upgradeable Firmware
>7 Preset EQ
PACKAGE CONTENTS
With the E250, you get:
> The MP3 player (obviously!)
>A neck string
>Stereo Earphones
>A velvet carry pouch
>Software cd + quick reference manual
>Data cable (battery recharging as well)
THE PLAYER
It has a clear and concise interface. Once you turn it on, it asks you to select the language and well thats it, you’re all set to rock! The menus are extremely simple to navigate and should not be a problem to anyone who has atleast worked on a computer before. The music is categorized by artist, album, genre, song name, top rated songs, and also by playlists. There is a feature to play all songs or play the last song you listened to. Overall, extremely easy to operate, even by a novice.
The only glitch I noticed, if I must say, was that as I filled more and more songs in the player, it took a longer time to start up but that is tolerable. The sound output is just awesome, with a normal and high setting, in case you prefer listening to it on big DJ-like headphones. The EQ’s present do make an audible difference to your music but there is no option for a custom EQ. Another option that was missed was the presence of a dedicated volume button... this is a big sore as one has to go to now playing always to reduce the volume, just like in the iPod.
The radio reception was clear and it picked up around 5 of the 7 stations available in my city. The sound clarity depends again on the location of your player, how far away you stay from the broadcast station etc. The recording was of average quality.. but the bigger drawback was that the player records only in WAV and there is no option to record in MP3 directly. The same is applicable for voice recording as well.
The video format it plays is an antique MJPEG at 15 Frames Per Second. Although there is no excessively visible framing due to the lower FPS, it still is noticeable at some points. This feature is only for showing off to your friends and is not very useful as it takes 10 mb for a minute of video (approx)!! Besides, the screen is kind of small, at around 1.8". It still is a brilliant screen, and provides ample brightness anywhere required. Whites are however slightly washed out at low levels of brightness and tend to be fully washed out at higher levels.
The clarity of the pictures are really good and this is definitely a useful feature. It supports the JPEG format and there is a bundled software which scales down the photos you select to fit to the size of the player’s screen. This same software is used for video conversions as well.
VERDICT
After all the firmware revisions, modifications and alterations, the final product that is available is stunning! This player easily trashes the iPod Nano. Owning both of these, I can easily tell you that this player makes a whole lot more sense than the Nano. Besides, you even get FM and a bigger screen. Another big advantage is that the user himself can change the battery once its re-charging cycles are exhausted. This helps a lot as you don’t need to worry about going to the service centre for any minor problem. A definite must buy!
PS. To buy this in India, contact Rashi peripherals in mumbai. ( http://www.rptechindia.com)
>>>UPDATE<<<
The latest firmware even has custom EQ.. so thats one more con less overall. Plus, there are hacks available on the net that allow you to even theme the interface.. so that should definitely convince you to buy this, if you had any second doubts...:-)
As I have forgotten to mention in the article, I would like to add that the internal battery gets charged via the data cable supplied when you connect the player to a computer. Once fully charged, the playback time is a respectable 15 hours (rated 20 hours).