>>I've owned different versions of the Creative Zen MP3 player for almost 10 years, and have always found their sound quality to be much better than the iPod.
That's probably down to Apple's ear buds: pretty, but deficient. The player itself is excellent- consistently right up there in RMAA and non-subjective measures.
"... They ne'er cared for us
yet: suffer us to famish, and their store-houses
crammed with grain; make edicts for usury, to
support usurers; repeal daily any wholesome act
established against the rich, and provide more
piercing statutes daily, to chain up and restrain
the poor. If the wars eat us not up, they will; and
there's all the love they bear us."
-- Shakespeare: Coriolanus, Act 1, scene 1