The Creative Zen X-Fi WLAN 16GB is a small and attractive music and video playback device that offers some interesting features but also has some significant shortcomings. We like the support for wireless connectivity via Wi-Fi and appreciate the quality of the headphones included in the package. We found the interface and navigation a bit unintuitive, however. Instead of a standard directional pad the Zen X-Fi has an array of nine buttons that act as both a directional pad and keys for skipping through content. None of these keys are labeled, so figuring out exactlly what they do can be annoying.

Performance (read the full lab performance results at MediaPlayerInfo.com)
The Zen X-Fi's audio quality in our tests was reasonable. We did find that some frequencies at the higher end were exaggerated and cut off, but most of the frequencies were right where we wanted them so most of your music will sound just fine. What we didn't like was the significant amount of distortion we detected. One reason for this may be that the device outputs a lot of power through the headphone jack. The good part of that is that you can use a wide variety of headphones with the Zen X-Fi. The bad part is that you get some significant clipping and compression, especially at higher volumes. Apart from the distortion issues the Zen X-Fi performed well.

Comparisons (read the full comparisons at MediaPlayerInfo.com)
The Creative Zen X-Fi packs a lot of features into its small frame. Like any media player it competes with the almost ubiquitous iPod lineup and it certainly differentiates itself, sometimes in good ways, sometimes in bad. For example the user interface and controls are very different from any iPod, but we found that they didn't work very well at all. The Zen X-Fi does pack Wi-Fi connectivity on board, something you don't get form any iPod except the Touch. It's also capable of playing a wider variety of media including WMA and WMV content. The serious problems with distortion are worrying, however. This leads us to suggest that unless you really want to differentiate yourself from the rest of the iPod carrying crowd or need to play Windows Media content the Zen X-Fi might not be a good choice for you.