Bests & Worsts Reviews from Amazon

I've been looking for a worthy MP3 player with tuner for a while now, but the odd assortment of feature-deficient units on the market vs. price has kept me away. This purchase attempt ended up being no exception. Pros: - Decent sound quality with good headphones (e.g. Sony MDR-EX51 9mm); not sure about included headphones, as I would never use the included pair anyway; this is one area where manufacturers can legitimately save money by skipping the cheapie headphones altogether. - The unit is small and lightweight. - Transferring files is easy, as Windows sees the unit as a flash drive. - FM Tuner with 20 presets Cons: - If you turn off the unit, whether manually by pressing and holding the menu button or automatically by letting it time-out based on the duration you've selected in the settings, when you return to using the player later, the audio starts playing at the BEGINNING of the last chapter you were listening to. This appalling lack of a memory placeholder even occurs if you were listening to the FM tuner and then go to the audio playback - it STARTS OVER. Since many of my MP3 Internet radio files are two to three hours long each, this is a FATAL flaw in the design of this unit. As another reviewer pointed out, you can pause the audio playback and resume it soon thereafter as long as the unit doesn't power off or you try to use the radio, but otherwise, the unit does not remember where you were. I've called Sandisk twice this week seeking a remedy to this product-killing bug, and they're well aware of the problem, but they're not sure if a firmware upgrade is possible or not to fix it. (I will say that their tech support staff did try to help and were professional and friendly, and they answered the phone within a couple of minutes.) Without a way to repair this ATROCIOUS critical design oversight, the unit is of little practical use. I refuse to try to remember exactly where I was the day or week before and then hold the fast forward or rewind buttons to try to get back in the file to where I was before the unit powered down and lost its playback memory. - When you transfer new files to the unit, all FM station presets are erased. Since I would be using the unit at my gym where the TV audio is broadcast via FM transmitters, having to reset the station presets every time after I've added new content would be extremely annoying. - When going from the audio playback to the FM tuner, the unit forgets the station you were last listening to and sends you to the bottom of the FM spectrum every time. Hiss, cackle, cackle... - The flimsy USB port cover on the top of the unit fell off repeatedly, even with gentle handling. You may as well tape the thing down until you need to transfer files again. - The volume control dial was very stiff and hard to turn. It also did not always seem to update the volume display in realtime, which made it difficult at times to tell if turning the dial was even working. - The button response time is sometimes slow or not recognized at all. - The clear case is a very tight fit and includes no belt clip. I have no desire to use the included shoulder strap, and given the reliability of one flimsy little snap button to prevent the unit from crashing to the floor, the case/strap combo is essentially useless. I suppose you could add a third-party belt clip to the unit with some super glue, but there's no excuse for not having one built-in given how small and lightweight the unit is already. - There is no AM radio or TV audio reception on the unit. I've seen a Sony AM/FM/TV/WB radio that is only a bit bigger, so it shouldn't be that hard to include the missing frequencies in a unit like this, as well. Overall, this unit held a lot of promise on paper, but it fails miserably to deliver a practical solution for listening to audiobooks or long MP3 files. There was no question whatsoever that I had to return it immediately given its dramatic drawbacks. Here's hoping that Sandisk uses this feedback to improve on the design of future similar products.