Creative Nomad
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The Creative Nomad is an digital audio player (MP3 player) series created by Creative Technology. Two different kinds of players exist: solid state memory (no moving parts) under the brand name Nomad and Nomad MuVo and hard disk based players under the brand name Nomad Jukebox. The Nomad Jukeboxes later forked off into a device series known as the Creative Zen line.
Creative's activity in the MP3 player field began with the Creative Nomad which was actually a value-added reseller product, a rebranded Samsung Yepp YP-D40. The Creative Nomad II also features an FM radio.
The compact MuVO models use the USB mass storage device class so that the device appears as a file system (keydrive) on the host system, while older devices and all Jukebox models use a custom protocol that require special USB drivers. Future versions will most likely support Microsoft's Media Transfer Protocol (also known as "PlaysForSure"), and some legacy devices will be supplied with firmware upgrades to support MTP.
The Nomad line was discontinued in 2004. Creative flash and hard drive MP3 players now fall exclusively under the MuVo and Zen lines respectively.
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Nomad (MuVo) models
- Creative Nomad (the original, from Samsung Yepp YP-D40, IEEE 1284 parallel port connection, custom protocol)
- Creative Nomad II and Creative Nomad IIc (USB 1.1 connection, custom protocol)
- Creative Nomad II MG (USB 1.1 connection, custom protocol)
- Creative Nomad MuVo
- Creative Nomad MuVo2 (USB mass storage device class)
- Creative Nomad MuVo2 X-Trainer
- Creative Nomad MuVo2 FM
- Creative Nomad MuVo NX
- Creative Nomad MuVo TX
- Creative Nomad MuVo TX FM
- Creative Nomad Muvo Micro V200
- Creative Nomad Muvo Micro N200
Nomad Jukebox (Zen) models
- For more detailed information on Zen models, see the Creative Zen main article.
The Creative Jukeboxes have appeared in different shapes:
- Creative Nomad Jukebox, also known as Creative Digital Audio Player (DAP) in Europe (USB 1.1 connection)
- Creative Nomad Jukebox 2 (USB 2.0 connection)
- Creative Nomad Jukebox 3 (USB 1.1 and IEEE 1394 (FireWire) connections)
- Creative Nomad Jukebox Zen (USB 1.1 and IEEE 1394 connections)
- Creative Nomad Jukebox Zen USB 2.0 (USB 2.0 connection)
- Creative Nomad Jukebox Zen NX (USB 2.0 connection)
- Creative Nomad Jukebox Zen Xtra (USB 2.0 connection)
- Creative Nomad Jukebox Zen Touch (USB 2.0 connection)
- Creative Nomad Jukebox Zen Micro (USB 2.0 connection)
- Creative Nomad Jukebox Zen Neeon (USB 2.0 connection)
A variant of the Nomad Jukebox is also sold as a OEM product by Dell under the name Dell Digital Jukebox (Dell DJ), a USB 2.0 device. The Second Generation Dell DJ and Dell Pocket DJ 5 are also OEMs from Creative.
Other Related Programs
Beside the Creative Labs included Nomad Explorer program that is use to transfer music and data, there are other transfer and track/file management programs:
- Free software:
- For the first players:
- For jukeboxes:
- Gnomad is a Jukebox Manager for Linux (homepage (http://gnomad2.sourceforge.net/))
- Neutrino is another Jukebox Manager for Linux (homepage (http://neutrino.sourceforge.net/))
- XNJB is a Jukebox Manager for Mac OS X (homepage (http://www.wentnet.com/projects/xnjb/index.html))
- Nomadsync is a Jukebox synchronization tool for both Microsoft Windows and Linux (homepage (http://nomadsync.sourceforge.net/))
- Creative Nomad Jukebox KIO::Slave is an integration driver for KDE (homepage (http://sourceforge.net/projects/kionjb))
- Proprietary software:
- Notmad Explorer by Red Chair Software (homepage (http://www.redchairsoftware.com/notmad/)) is a transfer program for Microsoft Windows. This program includes a file streamer and it can convert your MP3 player into a file server that you can access over the Internet. The price that is a maximum of $35, depending on which version you get.
Troubleshooting
- MuVo
- file system error - This problem has been reported (http://www.google.com/search?q=muvo+%22file+system+error%22) in several user forums. Some users say they've resolved the problem by reformatting the drive. If the device will not mount at all, however, a more drastic solution -- upgrading its firmware (http://www.nomadworld.com/downloads/firmware/) -- may help.
External links
- http://nomadworld.com/ - Official site
- http://www.nomadness.net/ - Fan site
- Linux and digital audio players (http://tuxmobil.org/portable_players.html)
- Creative MP3 Players (http://www.digitalmusicmuseum.com/creative/creative-mp3-players.php)
- We Test Drive the Creative Nomad Jukebox (http://web.archive.org/web/20001211141200/www.mp3newswire.net/stories/2000/nomadreview.html) - November 2000 MP3 Newswire review of Creative's first hard drive-based portableja:NOMAD