How to Make the Creative Zen Micro Mp3 Player Work in Windows Vista
It's Better Than Buying a New Mp3 Player, but It's Not Fun!
This guide will show you how to make Windows Vista recognize your Creative Zen Micro, as well as explain how to copy music onto it and display correctly in the player. It's going to be a lot more hassle than what you're used to, but it's still better than buying a new MP3 player.
First, to even get Vista to recognize your Zen Micro, you will need to upgrade it to the current firmware version of 2.21.02, which can be downloaded from http://us.creative.com/support/downloads/.
Here's the bad news:
1. You can only upgrade the firmware from a Windows XP machine.
2. Upgrading the firmware requires you to erase the entire drive, meaning you'll have to copy all your music back on it after the update.
Now that you've upgraded the firmware, connect the Zen Micro to your Windows Vista PC using the USB cable. You're system will immediately recognize it as a portable device. This is the only way to even get the thing to recharge via USB.
You know all that software you used in Windows XP that let you organize the music on the device, change file names, and so on? None of it works in Windows Vista. Creative has a few programs you can download that supposedly work in Vista, but they wouldn't even recognize my player.
The only way I could get MP3 file copying to work was if I did it manually, as if I was copying to a portable hard drive or flash memory stick. Talk about tedious.
Furthermore, you need to make sure the ID3 tags on your MP3's are correct, because that's what the Zen Micro uses to display the file information when you go to play them. I've found the best program for editing ID3 tags is Winamp, which can be downloaded for free from www.winamp.com. In Winamp, just open the MP3, then right click on it in the playlist menu and choose View File Info. Make sure the Artist, Album, Track Number, and Title are all correct.
If you copy some MP3's to your Zen Micro and they don't show up in the Music Library when you try to listen to them, it means the ID3 tags are either incorrect or just blank. If you had to erase the drive in order to upgrade the firmware, good luck getting all the file names correct when you re-upload all your music.
That's pretty much it as far as making the Creative Zen Micro MP3 player work with Windows Vista. You can still make it work, but it's going to be a lot more effort on your part, especially when you want to add new music. If you've found a better way, please let me know!
Published by William Fulks
I am very proud to finally show the world my first novel, Katrina Wedding: How to Get Married in a Federal Disaster Area. It's about my experience dealing with Hurricane Katrina, but unlike most Katrina stor... View profile
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29 Comments
Post a CommentI was able to make my Creative Zen Micro functional with Windows 7. First of all, install the Creative Zen windows driver in a Windows XP machine. After, using that same Win XP computer, UPGRADE THE FIRMWARE of your mp3 player to the latest version available at Creative's website (2.21.02). After, your Creative Zen micro will work with Windows 7.
I am currently having the same problem as diarmuid, i would like to use this mp3 player but it does not show up on my computer any thoughts on how to make it work in windows 7
I have a creative Zen Micro in a drawer since 2005 and am now trying to set it up. want to start jogging and need music. When I connect the zen, it does not get seen by the laptop, I have windows 7 and am looking for drivers, firmware etc, but anything I download will not let me see the zen. any help would be great
I'm mad about Creative. I've got two old items: One Zen Micro Mp3 player and one Wireless 6000 keyboard. Meanwhile, I've installed Windows 7. Can't find any drivers! Must I put both devices to trash?
Hi guys, I have a new work computer and it does not recognize my Zen Micro. I am following the above instructions, however I keep getting the following notice:
'An application is interfering with the flash program. Please close all applications and all Explorer windows before proceeding.'
I have temporarily unblocked pop-ups as well as turned off the SmartScreen Filter. Neither of these approaches deals with the 'interference'. Hase anyone run into this? Know how to address it?
its the old nomad jukebox zem nx grrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr
this sucks i have 10gb of music downloaded through the years that i will totaly loose if i whant to get to put fresh music in it!! all the music copy protected so i cant do that !!!!!!!
I have had my zen player for years and wanted to use it again. Now I cant get it to work with vista. So Im hoping this will work! Thanks!
At first, my pc wouldn't recognize my Zen, which made me very nervous, because this is the only useful page I've found since a few hours.
So I installed the correct driver (obviously). This made everything better.
The correct firmware on the mp3 and now it totally works. Even with Windows 7.
Yay! o/
Thank you, William!
how can i download the driver for windows xp