I have a collection of music I've ripped from CD's into WMA format.  I
like to use a high bitrate when I rip.

I am also using a creative zen for running.  I want to store more
files on the zen by using a lower bitrate, since I'm not as concerned
with the music quality for running.

Is there a way to have files get converted to a lower bitrate at the
time of moving them to the zen device?

I don't want to have to store two copies of all my music or do a bunch
of manual steps for each song when I synch.

I'm looking for either an option setting buried somewhere in WMP or an
add-on tool that allows this.

If another media player (such as real player or something) supported
this capability, I would also be willing to use that for synching,
providing that it can co-exist with WMP as my primary media manager.

Thanks!

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Clarification of Question by keithc-ga on 11 Jul 2005 06:28 PDT

theone3-ga: You solved it!  Thanks!  Google - can you send the listing
fee over to theone3-ga?

Well, for the record, microsoft's lisence does not allow conversion of
wma to any other format(or that's what 'nero encode' says) I'd suggest
getting a hold of 4u wma to mp3 converter
http://www.wma-mp3-converter.net/

It will help.

Ah, this is a simple one. 

Firstly, you need to have windows media player 10 and the MTP firmware
installed on your device. The MTP firmware allows you to use the
'sync' tab in WMP to tranfer mp3/wmas. It also ads the player as a
hard-drive like icon in 'my computer'

You can get MTP firmware from the creative website. Follow the
instructions there. (The upgrade will wipe your device, but it sounds
like you want to do that anyway!)

After that, open WMP, go into tools>options>devices, select your
connected zen and click advanced. Set it to transcode to your desired
bitrate (id suggest 96KBPS, and VBR will decrease battery life). Now
when you sync via WMP, it will transcode the files on the fly!

Hope that helps.