SanDisk Sansa m250 2 GB MP3 Player (Black)
by SanDisk
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List Price: Our Price: $59.95 You Save: $90.04 (60%) Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days Buy Used: from $40.00 (click here) Category: Network Media Player See more product details |
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Digital Cameras Photo Reviews of SanDisk Sansa m250 2 GB MP3 Player (Black)
Customer Review: Works Great for Me
Summary: 5 Stars
I was shopping for MP3 players for my wife and I. We are new to this technology. After researching a great many players, including those with video capabilities, we decided on the Sansa m250. We would have liked a player with greater (than 2 Gb) capacity, but settled on this one for a number of reasons.
First was the fact that it uses an AAA battery, instead of a proprietary one. I found on-line videos and instructions about replacing the battery in i-Pods models, Zune's, and several others. Besides the relatively high costs of such batteries and tools one should have to replace the battery, the operations are so intricate and prone to risk of damage to the units, that we were dissuaded from buying a model with internal, rechargeable batteries.
Second was the price: less than $30 and with free shipping!
Third was the many positive reviews posted here.
I accidentally damaged the mini-CD that contained the manual when I was trying to open the #!%*$#@^ clamshell packaging. I went on line to Sandisk and tried to find the manual but didn't have any luck. I sent an e-mail asking for the url to download it. The first reply was one of those "knowledgebase" auto-replies that didn't address the specifics of my request and didn't help. I sent another request to customer service asking for a human to read my message. I promptly received a reply with the correct information and was able to download the manual. Great customer service is a forth reason to strongly consider this model if it meets your needs.
The player, including the radio, works great, and it was easy for me to figure out its operation and change settings even though I'm a novice and did not have a manual. The Quick-Start guide was adequate to get me started.
[added note almost two years later]. I see the product is still being sold, but at a higher price!! I use this player when I'm working around the farm. I play it for 1-4 hours most days. It is still going strong, despite some knocks now and then, including a couple of drops. I use rechargeable NIMH batteries, and typically have to replace them every couple of days. If I'd been buying disposables, I'd have gone through hundreds!! This is a great gadget for what it does. My wife has switched to an ipod--she has troubles keeping it charged when we travel, especially overseas. I just pack a few extra batteries and never have to worry about finding a connection and carrying voltage transformers, etc.SanDisk Sansa m250 2 GB MP3 Player (Black)
Customer Review: all function, no frills
Summary: 5 Stars
This mp3 player has everything I want and nothing I don't want in an mp3 player. No internal/unreplacable battery to die--it uses one AAA battery I can replace anytime. When the AAA battery dies, the music is still kept on the player; I haven't had to reload music or reset settings when changing out the battery. The player works just fine with a rechargable AAA battery. This player doesn't play video or other frills--just music and FM radio. The player has quick, easy transfer of files from computer to player through a standard usb cord. The cord that comes with the player is very, very short, but I use a longer cord that had come with another mp3 player I used to have (a Rio Nitrus which broke when its internal battery gave out (argh!!)). I suspect one could find a longer usb cord that would work with the player at most electronics retailers. The SanDisk mp3 player has no propriatary (in other words, have-to-use-it-to-make-it-work) music transfer/music library program required. Putting music files on the player works just like drag-and-drop through windows explorer (I have an IBM-compatible PC; don't know about Mac--I'd trust what SanDisk said about Mac compatibility). The player has straightfowrard controls and all the standard options like shuffle/random, equalizer, and a "hold" toggle button to keep my settings set while the player is in my pocket. I bought mine along with the silicone case (the $[...] one that you have to buy separately), and the case works perfectly to keep my player on my belt and protect it from nicks & dings while I'm listening around the house. The armband holder the player comes with fits snugly on my arm, and although I haven't tried to jog with it, I suspect it will work better than just having it hang on my pants or in my pocket while I run, as I had to do with my last mp3 player. In my opinion, the 2 gig model is very worth the money, especially if you are an audiophile enough to want large-bitrate mp3 files. In looking across the $-for-memory range on mp3 players, I am very happy with what I paid for this 2 gig model through Amazon. I never used the earbuds that came with the player because I've always been happy with my blue "behind-the-ear" sony earphones that can be found for $[...] at any wal-mart. In short, I am even happier with this SanDisk mp3 player than I thought I would be, and I highly recommend it to anyone who wants a great mp3 player without all the unnecessary frills that have recently become standard on most players/ipods, etc. If you want just great music, this is your player. If you want a razor-thin gadget that will make you a fashion hit with teenagers at a party, get an ipod.Customer Review: I remember this
Summary: 5 Stars
So it must have been 2006 when I bought this thing. It was my first MP3 player I ever had. It lasted two years before the screen broke. I used it without the screen for a while (because, at that point I had the interface memorized) and it was only when the screen actually cracked and leaked that I decided to finally throw it in the can and search for a new MP3 player. At the time I moved over to the just-released "fat" iPod Nano, which in many respects was a move forward, and in some a move backward.
As a cheap, disposable MP3 player running on a single standard battery, there's little that it left out of the feature list. It sounded great (even at high MP3 bitrates), was shaped perfectly for my hands and came with a voice recorder and FM radio. I listened to more podcasts on that thing than I care to admit. More headphones broke while wrapped around the neck of this thing than I should ever tell anyone. Music flew from the player, to and from the computer, first in bitty little WMA formats, and then in wonderous, variable bit rate MP3 files once I realized how horrible these files sounded.
The product certainly had flaws. As I recall, the odd shape wasn't exactly pocket friendly - the flat iPods and smaller Sansa Clips fit into a jeans pocket far better than this little, 75% semi-circle-type thing. It looks more like an attachment for the Wii than an MP3 player. The buttons also wore out faster perhaps six months, and fast forwarding through podcasts became a slow, frustrating hassle that would often drop out for a second and then skip entirely to the next track. Transferring music through the USB 1.1 interface was slow and boring, and few pieces of software meshed with it well (Windows Media Player is still a bit annoying, and Winamp or Media Monkey are far worse). And lets not forget that I bought the thing in 2006 - the interfaces of 2006 haven't aged well. SanDisk has done better since then.
If you're in the market for a cheap MP3 player, I see no reason to buy this item, unless you want the consumer-grade batteries instead of a rechargeable one (though rest assured that the player will, in fair use, probably have a far shorter life than most rechargeable batteries inside of them). The Sansa Clip or the Sansa Fuse are both excellent successors to the Sansa legacy, and are just as durable, feature filled, and budget-minded.
Still, this is a dang good product, and SanDisk should be proud of themselves for coming up with my MP3 player of choice for two years. What a great little thing.
Customer Review: Fantastic features
Summary: 5 Stars
The SanDisk Sansa m250 2GB MP3 Player has 2 great features. The first is it uses 1 AAA battery that does last a long time. I use Energizer Rechargeable batteries. When I ride my Bike E recumbent bicycle for more than 100 miles at a time, you sometimes need to change the battery in mid ride. All I have to do is change battery. With the IPod and other units that use internal batteries the music stops until after the ride is over. So I won't buy an MP3 Player that doesn't use changeable batteries.
The other feature that I really enjoy is that you can put your songs into so many different catagories. When you hit the MENU Button, on the side of the player, Play Music, FM Radio, Recorder appear. Push the >>] button on the front of the player and it goes into the Play Music part. You have Play All - which plays all your songs in alphebetical order. Want to mix them up? Go to Settings > Playback and turn Shuffle ON, pretty cool. After Play All you can go to Artist and play just Beatles or just Hank Williams or just GoldFrapp, just the Artist you want now. After that you can use Album. I use my Windows Media Player to make up my own Albums. An example is all the songs from 1968 to 1974 go in an Album called Hits. I type Hits in the Media Player column for Album for every song 1968 to 1974, hundreds of songs. When I play that Album Those songs play, cool? Next is Songs which only plays one song. Next is Favorites which you can choose any 20 songs to play in Favorites. When a song is playing just push and hold the round button on the front center of the player. The player asks if you want to save? Push that round button again and it's saved in Favorites. Go to Favorites and play just them. Next is Genre which is also found in Windows Media Player, you can call any group of songs anything you want in Genre. Rock & Roll, Dance, Christmas, Stupid, Really Stupid anything you like. Then go to Genre and play your Really Stupid songs in that grouping. Next comes Year, on the Media Player you can find Release Date, that's Year 1999 maybe. Fill in the year the song was originally released on each Song, when you use Year you can play just the songs released in that year. There are features I haven't gotten into yet, Playlist, Spoken Word, Recordings.
It has an FM Radio, Recorder and Stopwatch features also. But I bought it for the MP3 Player part with these features that I really like.
Customer Review: Perfect for what I need
Summary: 5 Stars
I've seen several reviews for this player (a couple comments here, but mostly on other review sites) that have basically stated that it's "just not an iPod". Well, yeah..it's NOT an iPod. I don't think SanDisk is trying to be an iPod with this player, and I'm thankful they're not.
I wanted an MP3 player so I could listen to music while running. I needed something small, lightweight, easy to operate without having to break pace - especially when on the treadmill - and something that could take the bounces and jostles associated with running. I didn't care about the iPod brand, being able to watch TV/video, color screens, or having double-digits worth of GB memory.
This little SanDisk player is great for me. Within hours of it being delivered to my front porch, I had several CD's worth of music loaded on and I was listening with no problems. It was super easy to load music on it using Windows Media Player. It did take some reading to figure out how to work all aspects of it, but that rings true for almost any electronic device. I did the various functions while reading the instruction manual - the one on the included disk, not the super brief quick start guide - and was able to figure things out the next time with no problems. And with 2 GB of memory, I have plenty of room for my music. I've loaded probably 10 CD's on it already, and I have plenty of room to spare.
As for using it for my intended purpose - while running - it's wonderful! I used the included plastic cover and armband and off I went. I'm able to skip songs and change music while maintaining pace. The sound is great - even with the little foam earbud covers, even despite the noise of the treadmill. It's definitely much easier than trying to deal with a discman and one single CD. I've used it for probably 3-4 hours already, and the battery indicator has dropped just one section.
A tip for the instruction manual - pop in the little disk and use Windows Explorer to find the pdf file, then copy it to your computer. This makes it much easier to come back and look something up, rather than having to wade through the disk's contents.
If you want a very nice and perfectly functional MP3 player - and don't need/want the iPod brand and price - then this player will easily meet your needs. I wouldn't hesitate to recommend it to anyone.