I’ll be waiting until version 2.0 with larger storage (which I have no knowledge of, but…it’s inevitable). I’ve got nearly 30GB just in MP3’s, leaving no room for Video/games.
Not available outside the US (reportedly because of the HD radio - US HD radio is a different, proprietary system than the two we have in Europe). No real verification that it will be, either.
Then there’s the lack of an SDK to make stuff, like what made the iPod touch so great. Too little too late.
Yeah, I guess I don’t get it either.
Zune users praise the hardware because the screen is awesomer and crisper and has blacker blacks…
…but really? Even old school Ipods did video decently well, while Ipod Touches go a little better…and both are very good. If I want the true hi-def experience, I’m not going to be looking for a 3" screen to deliver it in any case.
From what I can tell, the Zune HD gives you HD FM radio, which to me is like offering you 10 pounds of extra stinky fresh shit instead of offering you the same old shit. Either way, you get a heap of shit–that is, FM radio. The rest of the features (basically the screen) don’t separate themselves enough from the iPhone/iTouch to be of much interest at the exact same price point. For a gamer (and we are all that, are we not?) there’s even less attraction. There are some amazing iGames now, with more in the pipeline.
I praise it because I like the Zune Software (once they finally got it working) much more than iTunes, and I feel that the interface on the device itself is much better than that of the iPod.
I’ve been meaning to get another one, as mine died on me. (I don’t have high praise for the hardware.) However, the HD version is overkill for me. I wouldn’t use most of the features. I want a handheld device that I can put my ever-increasing library of CD’s on. That’s about it.
I use my PMP to watch video and listen to mustic at the gym, or to entertain my kid when we’re on long drives. For the App store stuff, I have my phone for that. I have a crapload of apps on my iPod Touch, and the only one I use is the stopwatch.
As for HD Radio, nah, I’m not going to listen to music on FM anymore, but it’s nice for NPR.
No, the Zune HD’s strengths don’t compete head-to-head with the iPod Touch/iPhone. But as a portable media player, IMHO, it’s better.
And Zune Pass is a HUGE differentiator. Every time you post a list of your “best tunes of the year,” Triggercut, I can head over to the Zune store and download 80 to 90% of the songs, all for my flat fee, and see which ones I like. Sure, it’s $15 a month, but you essentially get $10 of that back in permanent, unprotected MP3 download credit.
I love my poop brown zune, but mainly because it is HIDEOUS (I like fugly electronics) and it one was $80 and the other free. And it, uh, stores 30gb of music and plays hexic. I’m not sure what this one is going to do for me.
Say what you will about Steve Jobs, but he wouldn’t let Apple release an iPod with a free chess game that subjects you to a Kia commercial before you can play.
Too true. He would insist that apple charge at least 2.99 for it, and another 0.99 for each and every substantial upgrade. (Seriously, my iTouch came with zero free games; I’m not entirely convinced that no games is preferable to an otherwise well made game with an ad in front of it.)
Dude.
Who’s charging for upgrades, other than the Touch OS?
…by watching sales and grabbing freebies, I’ve got games like Spider: Bryce Mansion, Return To Mystery Island, Monkey Island, Peggle, UniWar, Puzzlequest, etc. etc. I haven’t paid more than $5.00 for any of them, and all updates to them have been free.
Sounds like that reviewer had a bad day. I’ve been up to my neck in Zune and iTunes stuff for the last couple days (reviewing it for Maximum PC) and I had no such difficulties. Zune software updated quickly, no hiccups or freezes, etc.
I have no idea why he calls the Zune software or service slow or difficult to use. It’s far more cleanly laid out and organized than iTunes. Performance of the online parts was middling on the heavy launch day (as expected) but has become quite snappy again. The actual app itself is more responsive and quick than iTunes.
I agree far more with Gizmodo’s review: Zune HD Review: The PMP, Evolved
Having now spent a ton of time with iTunes, Zune 4.0, iPhone, and Zune HD, I’ve come to the following general conclusion:
If what you care about is the media (music, video, podcasts) then Zune HD kicks the snot out of an iPod Touch. The interface is far better for finding and playing music and stuff. It’s attractive, easy to use (once you adjust from the iPod Touch’s way of doing things), and makes discovering new music easier. It also has no shortage of additional features you don’t get on the touch (whether you care about those or not is a matter of taste, of course). (HD/FM radio, wireless sync, more codecs supported, sending music to friends)
If what you care about is a pocket computer to run apps and games on, with playing music and video as a secondary thing you just sometimes do, then the iPod Touch is the clear way to go. The App Store is a clear and obvious winner there.
And as Denny said, Zune Pass is a big differentiator. I just went and downloaded very song in Guitar Hero 5 and made a playlist of it. I clicked the Smart DJ feature on They Might Be Giants, and the service made a playlist of 30 items featuring TMBG songs from my library, songs from the service I don’t own (it just streams 'em all in high quality), and songs from my library and from the marketplace from other related artists. It was a great list, so I hit “save as playlist”, then told it to expand the list to 50 songs and to auto-refresh the list every 5 days. It downloaded every song I was missing, and synced all that stuff to the Zune HD.
I totally got $15 worth in, like, an hour. Later I’ll go pick the 10 songs I want to keep and download DRM-free versions of for the month and nab those for free.
I think the Zune HD looks awesome as a PMP. I’d totally buy one but for the fact that unlike my 3GS it doesn’t have a phone, video & still camera or GPS. Seriously, after the iPhone, I can’t imagine carrying a separate media player. It’s not a knock on the Zune, I think it beats iPods, but I’m not interested in them either.
I’ll be more interested if Win Mobile 7 ever hits with Zune media playback integration. I think most folks will be looking for more convergence of these features in their phones, and less interested in more limited devices.
That’s my sticking point for buying a Zune too. I already have an iPhone I carry around and carrying around another device for music and video, even if it is a bit better than the iPhone at those tasks, just wouldn’t make a ton of sense. And I even kinda want to get rid of the iPhone because I’m sick of Apple being such fuckwads with AppStore policy. I’d jump to a Zune Phone in a second, but Zune HD is a much harder sell.
I’m sure there will be tons of new games with the API out!
snicker
Considering that no version of the Zune has ever been released outside of America I call the HD radio thing a lame excuse… though I have no idea what the real reason is, either.
Yeah, I’m not the first person to tell MS in a Zune briefing “man, it’s too bad there’s no phone in there!”
I have an iPhone, but there’s just not enough storage for it to be my media device. My stuff doesn’t even fit on the 32GB Zune HD really, I have to make the software downsample some of my higher bitrate music. :( With a few gigs of apps on the iPhone, it’s just not going to serve as a PMP. There are also two other issues - I wouldn’t go for a run with my iPhone as a music player (the Zune HD is light enough to easily pocket while you go for a run) and the battery life is short enough without me listening to an hour or two of music a day.
Actually, the 2nd gen zunes went on sale in Canada. Does that count as outside America? It’s not the US, but I guess it’s technically North America. :)
If you dislike listening to the radio, then no. No one here can explain the appeal of a device that has a radio.
For others… yes, I would like a device that gives me the option to:
- Listen to the news as I drive to work
- Take a break from my collection and listen to new music on the radio
- Tag music that I like as I’m listening to it to download later
- Tune in to HD radio stations
Yeah, I don’t know. Making a dedicated PMP almost seems like a step back at this point. Sure, there is a market for them but I have to imagine it’s a shrinking market. I’m with everyone else in that I want to carry ONE device. Media player/net access/phone. At this point that device is the iPhone.
It’s classic Microsoft strategy, in that it’s befuddling.
MS keeps flirting with the Zune, but it never commits to any kind of serious push on it. The first gens got kicked out and then pretty much abandoned for a year, with no kind of hardware or software update to support them. “Oh,” the supporters said, “that’s because MS borrowed some Toshiba design to get the product out fast; wait for the second gen.”
Second gen arrives and the same story. They get kicked out, but no real big push on them.
I think there’s a third gen in there, too, but it’s hard to know because, again, MS doesn’t really push them.
Finally, they scrap all progress and here’s the great white hope, the Zune HD. Completely redesigned from scratch. The previous models all dropped. Let’s see what MS does this time.
If MS wants to make a dent, they need to pick a strategy and stick with it, support it with updates (and I don’t mean on an annual basis), and market the hell out of it. Something I’ve yet to see them do with the Zune.
Meanwhile, again, I’ve said this before about MS’s mobile strategy, but they’re operating like they’ve got all the time in the world over in Redmond, but meanwhile Apple is entrenching its already formidable position. MS needs some kind of App Store, and they needed to start one years ago, because by the time they do finally get around to Zune Mobile or what have you, Apple is going to occupy a high ground akin to an orbital space death platform while they MS starts at ground level.
And it will be interesting to see if the public XNA apps store for Zune does freebies too. But you’re mistaking what Microsoft provides (games with ads) with what apple provides (zero games, period). If you want to say “I don’t know if the Zune HD is going to be able to establish the same app presence as the iTouch/iPhone” that’s a wholly different argument.