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Creative Nomad MP3 player: compatible with Mac OS X?

I won a Creative Labs Zen Micro MP3 player and am darn disappointed to find out that it appears to only be compatible with Windows XP, since I'm a Mac guy. It appears to be a problem with the "Plays For Sure" system, but I dunno. Anyway, is there any way I can use this device with my Mac?

Dave's Answer:

You're certainly not the first person to hit this wall with your Creative Nomad MP3 player. Pop over to the Creative Labs Discussion Forums and you'll find that Mac compatibility is a common topic of discussion.

All hope is not lost, however. It turns out that a member of the open source community, Richard Low, has built an amazing, highly capable Creative Nomad software interface for Mac OS X that goes by the rather unsexy name of XNJB.

What's extremely cool is that this program is free, open source and you can even download and read the source code, if you're a budding programmer interested in how things work. A caveat, however: XNJB only works with Panther and Tiger releases of Mac OS X.

Just to whet your appetite, here's a screenshot of XNJB at work:

XNJB Mac interface for Creative Nomad Zen MP3 players

Check out the project and if you do use this program, please, support XNJB by getting involved as you can. It helps us all get better software.

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Categorized: Mac OS X Help (Article 5892)
Tagged: creative labs, creative zen, zen micro, zen nomad
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Comments

Awesome advice, man! I'd love to buy u a chai but i'm only a kid and i don't have a paypal account so it's kind of impossible. Sorry!

Posted by: kid at September 10, 2006 12:46 PM

But this is for zen nomad is there for zen V plus or does this work for all creative zens?

Posted by: alex at March 2, 2007 2:37 PM

xnjb is alright. it doesnt play the music which is a major con. and you cannot edit a track, meaning you can't change the name or album. but besides those two irritants its awesome.

Posted by: Manthan at March 11, 2007 6:28 PM

Well, at least it's not working with the Zen Nano Plus, and I think that there is no proper solution for this problem, that is after Apple forced the iTunes Zen plugin off the Internet (as it was "using iTunes code illegally", yeah right). I thought I'd never say this, but here goes: $#@$#@ you, Apple.

Posted by: larppa at March 28, 2007 5:44 AM

Is it possible to obtain a list of MP3 players that are Mac compatible?
I am thinking about buying my first MP3 player.
Thanks.

Posted by: Bill at March 31, 2007 12:26 PM

Well, I've given up on iPod. 4 in two years is not good, they break when I use them vs looking really nice in the dock. I have a Mac (which I love) OSX, and am running Tiger. I really want to find a new MP3 player that is durable but am worried about the software compatibility. XNJB says that libmtp supports the Creative Zen Vision M... Do you, or anyone else out there, know if it does support this player on my platform? I'm willing to do whatever it takes to get rid of my diseased iPod forever, short of buying a PC at the moment. Maybe it would be better to buy a cheap Dell and then get whichever MP3 player I want and go from there!

HELP!

Posted by: pam at April 3, 2007 7:00 PM

THANK YOU!

I have been trying all day to get the music off my nomad and onto my kick ass new Mac, and it just didn't seem possible cause my old windows computer kept telling me it couldn't copy the files to my external hard drive...i was pissed.

got it!

Thanks!!

Posted by: Trav O Matic at May 16, 2007 11:14 PM

I run Mac OS X 10.4.10 and it recognizes Zen Nano Plus as an untilitled device on my desktop. From there you can use it to move mp3 files in and out of I tunes. Just drag the files that you want from I tunes into the folder desired in the Nano. It works well, I just did it. One more detail, no other device can be plugged into your USB ports. If something else is plugged in, the Mac does not recognize the Nano.
Good luck!

Posted by: Froggie at August 9, 2007 4:32 PM

I just downloaded the XNJB for my creative zen touch and it works freaking awesome! Thank you so much for the suggestion. I knowing nothing about coding, sent the program to all of my college budies, who are softwear and video game programers; just to see if they give anything back.

Posted by: Voar at September 20, 2007 12:38 AM

Will xnjb work with OS X Leopard?

Posted by: belcanto13 at September 26, 2007 11:21 PM

one word.. AWESOME!!

i'm running Mac 10.4.10 and i have a Creative Vision:M, so far XNJB works great. no problems at all.. before this i had to use my old peecee to sync up but not anymore.. in fact i think XNJB works better than the pc software that creative provided (LOL)

if you're a mac user looking for an mp3 player other than ipod, this is the software for you.. has lots of potential, fast, works great and its FREE!!

just wanna give a big thank you shout out to the dev team.. keep up the good work guys!!!

Posted by: ainin at October 1, 2007 11:46 PM

Does the XNJB work with the ZEN Stone Plus?

Posted by: Natalie Kolbeck at December 27, 2007 5:47 PM

XNJB works perfectly on with my Zen Vision:M 30GB, for music or even videos, I've used it with both TIger and Leopard without any problem whatsoever.

Posted by: Jack at January 15, 2008 10:35 PM

Hey, I just used XNJB to transfer some mp3s onto my Creative Zen V. I'm running Mac OS X Leopard, and I didn't have any problems.

Posted by: Amanda at August 21, 2008 7:31 PM

And how to use my Creative Nano PLus on my Mas osx 10.5.5

Posted by: dickdona at October 2, 2008 10:26 AM

i'm running tiger and it works perfectly for my zen v plus.

Posted by: Marcel at October 7, 2008 5:25 AM

I have a lot to say, but ...

I have a lot to say, and questions of my own for that matter, but most of all I'd like to say thank you for all your efforts on this Web site by buying you a chai!

I do have a comment, now that you mention it!