Zune - Who is getting it?

A month wait? WTF?

I like the Zune, but since I barely use the iPod I currently have I can't justify buying one.

 

I bought my 30 GB Zune before last Christmas based on price ($87), and that it was going to get the same updates as the new ones. It's a little clunky vs. the 80 GB but works fine. I like the wireless sync. Bought my parents one for my Dad's 70th BD and they love it. If they can figure it out anyone can.

 

You're kidding right?

The ipod works just as wonderfully on a PC as a Mac. I can't find it right now, but there was a great story a while back about Micro$oft employees "hiding" their ipod usage by switching the headphones from "Apple white" to whatever it is the Zune uses......

As to "ease of use" there are reasons the ipod *dominates* the market and ease of use is just one of those reasons.

As always, Micro$oft was late to market with an inferior product.

The one month delay would also make me really nervous - Why? Seriously, I suggest you get to an Apple store and try out the ipods.

As always, just my 02c,
Cheers,
Ian

 

Neither, I like my Sansa Fuze.

 

You know the problem with ipods...... freaking itunes! Worst POS, big-brother, god-knows-what-its-doing piece of software ever!

If you can't manage the songs via a simple explorer window, then forget it.

 

i have an ipod classic for car duties and an ipod touch for myself (workout, study/read, whatever), though there are some things i really like about the zune. I would have gone with one, but the ability for me to hook it up to my car was a big thing for me -- do they have any direct-connect type things for the zune yet? i'm not talking about FM transmitters or AUX inputs, but where you cna actually dock and charge the thing when you use it in your car...

 

The thing that makes the Zune a piece of junk is the DRM.

Check into what you are and are not allowed to play before you take delivery. I haven't checked lately, and I know there was a DRM change, but it used to be that you simply were not allowed to play much of the music out there on your Zune because of DRM (piracy protection) issues. You couldn't even download a song from iTunes and put it on your Zune, nor could you just copy MP3 or WMA files to it for playback.

That sucks.

 

I have to believe that ipods have something going for them.
MS sold there 2m zune not to long ago, and apple sold over 5x that amount of ipods just in Q2 of 2008

BTW - I'm an ipod owner

 

i've been using iPod 80 gig since august last year. i listen to it every nite, and whenever i can. just a few days ago, got myself a shuffle. most of my family and friends uses ipod. partly because, Zune hasn't landed here yet. and i hope not too...

 

Zune blows.

 

How old are you? At least you used punctuation :Shrug:


I love my Zune 4 gig. I was a big iPOD guy until I found out that iTunes wouldn't run on a 64bit windows OS. (It does now, but did not at the time) I took a chance with the ZUNE 80 gig at that time. I loved it so much I got a 4 gig for running.

The best part about Zune is the subscription service. $15 a month and you get UNLIMITED downloads. I downloaded 90 gigs of music in 2 months. At that point I realised that my 80gig Zune would no longer hold my entire library so it was worthless.

I literally sold my Zune 80 gig (red version) for a profit on ebay! Now I have 150 gigs of music in my library and I am shifting it around daily on my 4 gig.

The Zune 4 and 8 are solid state btw. They are very durable. I really do like the touch interface pad on these.

-Luke

 

So you can't simply use windows explorer to drag files from your library to the Zune and expect them to play?
My library consists of 10-20 percent WMA files.... this DRM/WMA issue has me a little worried.

 

The only DRM that I'm aware of is on files that you transmit wirelessly. Other than that there are no restrictions. You can't open it up with Explorer natively but there is a hack out there that will let you do that. The majority of my music is in .mp3, with a few .wma, no problem. I use the Zune software to keep my library synced + load podcasts, it works just fine. In my mind, the thing that prevents me from buying an iPod is the DRM for anything you buy through iTunes. I won't buy any music that has DRM on it.

 

I know the original Zune would not let you play MP3 files you just downloaded, nor would it play songs you bought on iTunes.

The original Zune got a LOT of flak for overbearing DRM and did not sell very well.

Then MS came out with a revised Zune and it had "modified" DRM. I am not sure what or how it was changed, and what you can and can't do since the change.

 

Mike, the first statement is not true. You could always play MP3 files on them, no restrictions.

NO MP3 player will let you play songs you purchased on iTunes. They are in a protected AAC format that doesn't play on other devices. This is not unique to the Zune.

I think you are thinking of the restrictions on songs that you can send via wireless to other Zunes (worthless feature IMO). Those are restricted when you send, I think you could only play them something like 3 times on the receiving Zune. This limit was increased on the revised software. Still worthless, but it's there.

Best feature of the Zune is wireless sync. I can leave it in a dock hooked up to my stereo and it will connect to my PC and keep the library up to date.

 

By default, it uses the Zune software to synchronize to the device. There is a hack that lets you use Windows Explorer. My library is like yours, mostly MP3, some WMA. If the WMA files do not have any DRM on them already, there is nothing to worry about.

 

You're right, I stand corrected.

I don't know a ton about the Zune, I had looked into it pretty seriously when it first came out and it looks like I misunderstood the DRM issues surrounding it. There's a good Wikipedia page on it and this page explains it pretty well too:

http://blogs.law.harvard.edu/cmusings/2006/09/15/microsofts-zune-wont-play-protected-windows-media/

The issue with iTunes is they support FairPlay while MS went with PlaysForSure but they altered it a bit so it's not a vanilla implementation, leading to some PFS tracks not workng on the Zune. The only problem with that is Apple has something like an 85% market share and iTunes is the biggest eTailer of music online, and combined with MS's faux pas with their "DRM 2.0" attempt with the Zune could leave some legal downloaders caught out with tracks they legally downloaded that no longer play on some players.

I only use DRM-free MP3's though... I must have been confused because I thought I had heard in the pre-release hype surrounding the Zune that it would not support vanilla MP3 but you're right - it does - my bad, and thanks for the correction!

 

I know this thread is a little old but I have a friend with a Zune. He thinks its bad a$$, loves the way it works looks, etc. He also likes it because he has a seperate computer that he has no personal info on, practically nothing really, but he does have LimeWire. Well all the songs he wants are free. Unlike with the Ipod he doesn't have to pay for anything, just goes online downloads music and puts it on his Zune. I know all about the terrible stuff with Lime wire and those programs but it works for him.

 

Umm you know there is no reason you couldn't do that with an iPod. Your not required to buy anything from iTunes. Mp3's are mp3's, regardless of where they come from.

 

Zune is alright...It's just there marketing campaign is kinda terrible...at least for print ads.

 

Ok, I've had my Zune 4 gig for about a year now with ZERO failures. It this is about the point in the past where I would learn the quirks of my ipod and know how to recover it from freezing/locking. My zune has yet to fail me.