Customer Reviews

SanDisk Sansa Connect 4 GB MP3 Player (Black)

5 star:		(24)
4 star:		(19)
3 star:		(8)
2 star:		(9)
1 star:		(16)

 

 

I've had the Connect for about a week now, and have now acquired a library of about 600 songs, about half of which I had never heard of before. I'm totally blown away by its paradigm-shifting technology.

With a WI-FI connection the Sansa Connect plays Internet radio, and if you like a song that is playing, you can download that track or album, as well as make a playlist from other songs that are similar in style. This is my favorite feature--it has introduced me to music that I would never have heard of otherwise, in genres ranging from Ambient House to Uber Indie. Before I go to sleep, I initiate the download process from the genres I like, and in the morning, I have a bunch of new tracks to listen to, which I can then play without having a WI-FI connection.

The sound quality is very good. I believe it encodes the tracks at 192K. Not as hi-fidelity as a vinyl encoded at 320K, but almost as good as a CD.

You can also recommend songs, and that will affect which songs get downloaded, as well as which songs it plays on the Internet Radio.

The user-interface is very intuitive. I can now almost operate the unit with my eyes closed.

My only complaint is that the headphone jack is right next to the USB port, at the bottom of the unit, instead of on the side.

Much of the pleasure from the unit comes the discovery of new music. If you are a "Life is the Journey, not the Destination" kind of person, then this player is definitely for you.

Here are a two features that would be nice to have:
1. download a specific song
2. playlist management: move and copy tracks to other playlists

The firmware will be automatically updated through the WI-FI connection, so hopefully they'll add these features shortly.

About a year ago I got a subscription to Yahoo Music Unlimited To Go for my wife. She loves music and had started using iTunes, but at $0.99/song I could see the bill adding up fast. Yahoo's subscription model made sense financially, as she could copy most of their catalog to a portable device without paying to burn it to a CD (with cassette adapters and cars with built-in aux jacks who needs to do that any more?).

I bought her a Creative Zen Micro and had a little trouble getting it to work with Yahoo Music Unlimited, but eventually I got music transferred on to it. Since then it's been hit or miss. It seems that whenever she needs it most, e.g. traveling, there would be a license error. Same thing with transferring music...we've had to relicense music several times.

The subscription to Yahoo is nearly up so we've been debating whether or not to renew. To get every song in her collection on iTunes would cost well over $1000 so we were reluctant to switch. Still, she was tired of the hassle of getting music to play and I was tired of trying to get things to work together.

Then I happened to stumble across the SanDisk Sansa Connect. I read up on it and thought we'd give it a try before throwing in the towel. I'm glad we did - it works great!

Getting set up was easy. It took less than 5 minutes to get it connected to our wireless network and to connect my wife to her Yahoo account. The only trouble was the configuration of my wireless network. I had SSID broadcast set to off and the Sansa Connect requires it to be on, even after you connect to your network once. A small compromise - hopefully they'll address this in an update.

The interface is easy to use and intuitive. The scroll wheel gives positive feedback, unlike the touch slider of the Zen. The screen is bright and clear with large, colorful icons.

The Internet radio feature is very nice, with the ability to skip songs you don't like and save songs you do like. It's a great way to discover new music.

The integration with Yahoo Music Unlimited To Go is excellent. While you can't view your entire My Music collection, you can see all your playlists and browse through Yahoo's recommendations.

Viewing photos from our Flickr account was surprisingly easy. Sure, the screen is small but the pictures look quite nice on them. There's also a Yahoo Messenger client as well as other "friend" features but she probably won't use them, at least until I get one of these too.

4GB doesn't sound like much but it's a lot of music. The player can take a micro SD card if you need additional memory. I've seen 2GB cards for less than $30 so you can get 50% more space for very little money.

This device has made using Yahoo Music so easy to use - it's a brilliant little device. Once you connect using WiFi you'll wonder why every other player doesn't include it too. If you have Yahoo Music this is the only player to get.

Been using this device for about a month. Here's my summarized pro/con list:

PROS
1. Simple to setup and stream Internet radio
2. Two click download of songs/albums
3. Wireless license synch
4. Can skip songs heard on Internet Radio
5. Sign up with Mastercard on Yahoo and receive 2 years for the price of 1

CONS
1. Cannot create playlists on the device (must download from Yahoo either cabled or wireless)
2. Micro SD cannot hold Yahoo Music - can only hold your personal music
3. Downloads on player synch to desktop - but not vice versa
4. Deleting music on player does not delete on desktop and vice versa
5. Average sound volume


What I like the most about this device is the WIFI. I take my player to the GYM and it's great to be able to tune in to Internet radio which offers an endless supply of music.

I would really like to see a complete synch between the player and the desktop -- so that music I deleted on either device was reflected on both.

Update: 9/9/2007 - I've been using this device for another few months and still enjoy it just as much as when I first bought it. You must subscribe to Yahoo Music to really get all the benefits (use [...]/mastercard for a special 2 for 1 deal). As with all devices that use DRM, the player shows a tendancy to want to renew licenses at the weirdest time (as in when you are far away from a computer connection that would enable you to do so). There definitely needs to be a renewal date added to these devices so that we could synch them before leaving for an extended trip.

Edit to my previous review:

In the past, the Sansa Connect had the WiFi functions described in the product description. They have all been completely disabled. At one point it was possible to restore earlier versions of the firmware in order to access the WiFi functions that had been disabled in the firmware, and this is probably still possible, but the functions have now been disabled at the source (music, Flickr, etc.).

-----------------------------

Although you no longer have the ability to download songs with the Sansa Connect, you can still listen to Launchcast streams (now owned by CBS Radio instead of Yahoo), and view your photos on Flickr. The key is that you need to update the firmware, which can do via this tool:

[...]

I think the Sansa Connect is a great product. You can use a 16GB microSDHC card with it (maybe even 32GB, I haven't tested this) for a total of 20GB storage space. The Connect seamlessly integrates the songs on the card with the songs in internal memory, unlike many other players.

It has a beautiful display, which looks great displaying photos or my MP4 videos. You can operate it while charging. The firmware seems flawless. It has very good sound quality IMO.

Some people have complained about Internet Radio buffering issues, but that's likely because they have an underpowered Internet connection ... I've never experienced any problems.

All in all, I'd say that for the price, this is one of the best values on the market.

Pros :
1 . Very easy to Download songs wirelessly when you hear *that* song
2 . Awesome user interface ( lookswise)
3 . Lightweight
4. Pretty neat integration with yahoo music
Cons :
1 .Cannot charge while listening to music form your library( even though you can charge the device if you are listening to radio).
2 .Kind of expensive .
3. Battery life is not that great, I need to recharge every night.
4. Sluggish user inteface , music gets "struk" sometimes for a second or two.
5. Cannot search by artist.

FYI...Ive just learned that the Yahoo To Go service that is built into this device will be discontinued by Yahoo "Mid 2008". Other services like Rhapsody will stll be available but I believe you will need to connect to your PC via the USB instead of utilizing this items built in WiFi

I bought this on eBay truthfully. I paid all of $30. After a simple firmware restoration, the internet radio function makes it worth every penny paid. When you are out of a WiFi area, you simply flip over to your music library of mp3s. The flickr photo of the day is a nice feature, and after the firmware is restored, it also plays videos.. a function I don't really use.

The cons: The screen does scratch easily. Mine arrived with a scratched screen also but a little Displex mostly fixed that. The battery life is shorter than the other Sansa players at about 8 hours for me. I am currently tinkering with my settings (display brightness, backlight timer) to try to get a little more time out of it. My other Sansas run from 24-36 hours on a charge. BUT... you have to expect this battery life to be shorter due to the WiFi use. That's common sense!

If you should happen to get one with the WiFi disabled, there are good instructions at forums.sandisk.com to get you on the road to internet radio.

If you still don't think this is a good deal, just check out the prices for true WiFi internet radios! You'll come back and give this one a second look.

I bought this because I was interested in the WiFi feature. At the time I didn't know that the Yahoo music service was no longer available to use with the player. But it's all good because you can still listen to internet radio which is awesome. It is very simple to use. I bought an additional 4gb micro sd card so I have plenty of storage. This is a great little MP3 player for the price! The only reason I didn't give it 5 stars is because I had to download and run the Sansa Connect recovery tool to get the wifi to work, but it was easy to do. I would recommend this to anybody who just wants to simply play their mp3's and discover new music on internet radio.

Unfortunately yahoo has just removed the "Unlimited to go" option from their website unless you've bought a Sansa Connect. Based on that and reports in reputable sources such as the WSJ and other business based reporting it may be that the "To Go" option is being phased out.
Actually, IMHO, I think that Yahoo is coming to the realization that the Unlimited to go pricing model just doesn't work. It's based on the assumption that a person will only download about 8 - 9 new songs per month to their MP3 Players (figured as $.79 per song and the price differential between monthly Unlimited and Unlimited to go subscriptions). Most people, when they learn the potential for 'all you can eat music' download much more than that. From a financial point of view the $6.00/month "sample all the music you want on your PC" and then get a $.20 discount for buying the music makes much more sense. Unfortunately this will cause major problems with the Connect unless they can set up an option for an "Unlimited" account to be accessed on the unit and then you hit a "Click here to buy" function. This will also required them to allow for a wider access to their on-line store through the Connect something which may not be possible.
Oh well, I'm just glad that I'd found this out before I bought a Connect for my son for his birthday, I'll now consider a satellite radio/mp3 player (such as the Inno (we're XM fans)) or just get a something like a view or the E series unit. The only advantage I ever saw in the Connect was the ability to wireless transfer music and playlists and since that may be going away I'm going to stay clear of the device. Without the wireless download capabilities the device offers no advantage over the other Sandisk players and I'm not going to pay the premium for a functionality which may become useless in the near future.

I purchased this Sandisk Sansa Connect after a friend of mine showed me his. I really liked that it connected to Yahho Music Jukebox and would play Yahoo's radio stations and let you download songs you would hear,as long as you would purchase a montly subscription called To Go for $14.99! I already was paying for Yahoo Music Jukebox so I thought it would connect and download songs with my previous subscription! Wrong!! Yahoo Music would not let me upgrade my service to the TO Go service! I had to purchase a second subscription to do this($14.99)Even if you never have subscribed before,heres the kicker,Yahoo Music is discontinuing the service for this unit on June 1,2008 and this unit will no longer be able to download songs from WiFi. Yahoo Music has been sold to Rhapsody Music and this model(SanDisk Sansa Connect) is not compatable with their service!! You can still use the mp3 player to transfer songs directly from your computers mp3 collection and as of June 6,2009, the wifi internet radio stations still are working!