Zen:
1. Pros
-excellent sound quality
-cheaper
-very long battery
-intuitive menus and good scrolling systen (The touchpad is not as hard as it looks)
-no break between songs. this is good for albums that have songs that fade into each other
-you don't have to pay 50 freakin bucks for an additional phone call from tech support like you have to on Apple. Apple is very money hungry and people are stupid and will pay extraordinary amounts of money for stupid things from Apple. I'm not ranting against the iPod, just the Apple customer service.
-the player has separate volume controls. I prefer this over volume integration in the iPod's click wheel.
2. Cons
-bulkier (not a big deal - where do you think they put the battery?)
-much harder to synchronize (stick with the media source they give you with the player. the media source works well but other programs have crapped out when trying to synchronize)
-no dock. it has a simple cable. separate cables for usb and power. no biggie.
-not nearly as many accessories as the iPod.