From OLED to Tegra: Five Myths of the Zune HD - Page 2

I'll make no denial that I am an Apple fan-boy.

I agree that this article is on the biased side of the argument. However, if you were to pull the statistics alone out of that article and compare them, the writer has a point.

I'm not saying that Apple's products are flawless (trust me, my MacBook overheats all the time), but they do tend to have a better grasp on what people want. I own a 2nd Gen iPod touch. I love it. It has everything I wanted in a player (honestly, I don't even listen to the radio).

I was one a Microsoft fan-boy... 10 years ago. Until I realized that Microsoft has no originality. Perhaps the Zune HD is a great device (assuming it's better than their last attempts), but the thing that pisses me off about it, is that once again, Microsoft has to copy what the other guy is doing to get a product to market. Would we even be having this argument if the Zune weren't made by a company with such a big name?

And now I get to sit back and watch MY reply get over-analyzed and hacked to pieces. Have fun!

Fanboi-ish indeed...

This is the key point. The new Zune thing is - except for the screen - conceptually a couple years behind the iPod and the iPod Touch. And, we know that, at some point soon, Apple will change the game again (after all, they haven't been standing still, I am sure).

While I think that he may have exaggerated just a bit, basically, he's right. OLEDs are the future, but they still have problems. Power consumption is one of them, and it's a real problem.

So is lifetime. While 17,000 hours looks good on paper, it doesn't mean that it's real. Sony's OLED Tv has seen its OLED screens fail much sooner than expected.

And brightness is a problem. The problem is that LEDs of all kinds lose lifetime based on heat. LED bulbs have massive aluminum heatsinks to cool them, and their use is proscribed as to angle lamp type etc. The old models with dozens of small LEDs don't have quite as much of a problem, but then, they don't put out much light either.

OLEDs are even more sensitive to heat. When the brightness is turned up, they get hotter, then their lifetime is reduced.

So the reason for the black backgrounds and fine type in the interfaces is not only for the purpose of power consumption, it's also for increasing lifetime.

That's also why they aren't allowed to run brighter than they are. They can actually run brighter, but then they will last for a shorter time, and consume too much power in doing so.

Also, in order to be seen outdoors a display must be brighter than the light impinging upon it. OLEDs are dimmer than sunlight, and even bright indoor lighting. A lot of LCDs are transreflective, so as Prince says, they reflect some light back at you outside. OLEDs can't do that.

While you've had some fun talking about "poor" Apple displays, this is different.

The thing is that it's expected that by this time next year, OLED displays will be at least twice as efficient, have at least 30% longer lifetime, and will run much brighter.

I imagine that Apple has tested enough displays, and talked to enough manufacturers and researchers to see that it's better to wait one more year. If they don't have an OLED in some of their devices next year, then I'll wonder why, but not now.

Ha! Hilarious. Dude, knock yourself out.

Time for a bit of honesty from someone who is an admitted Apple fan.

There are features on the Zune HD that I lust over. The OLED display will be wonderful. It will have amazing contrast and look good in both brightly and dimly lit rooms. It may not work as well out doors in direct sunlight but to be fair I don't use my iPod or iPhone outside.

Another Zune feature I really want in my iDevices is a radio. Even a standard FM radio is long overdue. I own a Zune 30 and its radio is the feature that I use the most. It looks like the iPod Nano has a nice implementation.

I can't say yet whether the Zune's Tegra is any better or worse than the iPhone 3GS or iTouch 3rd gen's hardware but HD out would always be a welcome feature. I am waiting patiently for some real hardware specs. For example, how much RAM does the Zune HD have? The latest apple hardware has 256MB up from 128MB in previous generations.

The one area I agree 100% with the article is that Apple deserves very high praise for their developer support. The few developers who have had trouble getting their apps approved really takes away from the truly amazing success of the app store for both Apple and its developers. I strongly suspect that Microsoft will be unable and unwilling to offer a similar level of developer support.

Yes, I am disappointed in the 3rd generation iPod Touch features. I was planning to buy one the day they were released. Now I am waiting for a possible mid-year refresh in hopes of seeing more features. Some I would like are: GPS, 3GS camera, HD/FM radio, OLED, larger battery. I would be happy to pay a bit more and take a thicker case to get these features.

So after one year if I decided to terminate my subscription for some reason I will end up keeping only 120 songs with Zune Pass and this is better that the 140 songs I get with iTunes or Amazon for the same amount of money paid?!

Yeah, 'cause in that time period, you got to listen to millions of tracks legitimately that you otherwise may not have had a chance to...

And here's another point - of those 120-140 songs - how many would you continue to listen to indefinitely? What's the point of buying music you will not care about in a year or more?

I don't think you are going to win this argument. Zune pass is a nice option to have. It works really well for some people.

It's annoying, that's what.

There's nothing more pathetic and ridiculous than a loser of an article like this that does nothing but take shots at the competition. I'm not disagreeing or calling the facts presented into doubt, although it's obvious from a single read that it's excessively biased / fanboi BS.

I don't think I am understanding this right. With LCD if you had a solid white background it uses as much power as a solid black background, with OLED this is not the case. How would the OLED use more power?

Egregiously and demonstrably false:

Shooting video - iPod nano vs The Rest

It makes a lot of valid points, I wouldn't really say any of it is wrong, but it obviously only presents the negative aspects of each feature while mostly ignoring the positives. I learned a little from it, but it was heavily slanted against the Zune.

Exactly cmf2, depending on your music listening habits a subscription service can either be a waste of money, or the wisest money you've ever spent.

In my case I'm someone who loves listening to a wide variety of music, and prefer exploring new music more than repeatedly listening to old favorites. However Pandora et al are just too limiting, with either restricted skipping, or inability to listen to specific CDs/songs when I want.

Yes there are some true favorites I listen to alot, but those are covered for the most part by my 10 songs a month. I found that once I had access to that huge selection of music that I could listen to in exactly order that I wanted, both on- and off-line, that I then spent much less time listening to these old favorites and much more time browsing and exploring.

For someone with similar listening habits I'd strongly recommend trying out a subscription service. On the other hand, if you have a smaller set of favored artists/songs who you listen to more exclusively, and are happy supplementing that with services like Pandora, LastFM, etc., then it may not be as compelling.

I'm just asking. Honestly...

Why do people want this Zune device so bad? Apple's iTouch offers so much more value that I can't for the life of me see why someone is so against it. The iTunes store, 70,000+ apps, its a great iPod, plenty of memory up to 64 GB, its super thin, has bluetooth and a higher resolution screen. Do people just hate Apple that much? Seriously?

It's interesting that despite that, subscriptions are a failure, while Apple's model has propelled it into the largest music seller in the world. Yes, not just the US, but now the world.

Meanwhile, the Zune has sold less than 2 million units in two years. Sales were actually down 43% in the last quarter, and they're discontinuing all their players for the HD.

So most people say about the listening to millions of songsbig deal!

Oddly enough, my wife has an iPod touch purchased only a month or so before the new ones were available. I have an iPhone 3G. Her device seems to offer faster loading times and smoother graphics in all the game titles we've compared. I'm actually jealous of it.

That's kind of what Apple DID with the early iPod games. Game X worked on iPod generation Y and not the others. Didn't seem to catch on very well.

Think incandescent vs florescent light bulbs. Incandescent takes more power to reach the same brightness as florescent. Similarly, OLED takes more power to produce the same brightness as a traditional LCD. However OLED basically has the ability to selectively dim or turn off the darker portions of the screen (not really how it works, but it makes the simplest explanation). This allows OLED to have better battery performance if the screen is dark, but if the screen is brighter, it will fall behind LCD due to the increased power required to turn each pixel up to a similar brightness level.

Don't confuse the Zune with the XBox. We don't know what, if anything, will come of this. If it does, then you can tell us how great it all is. Right now there is nothing.

The XBox is only a success because MS had been willing to lose over a billion dollars a year selling it. No other company would have done that.

It's easy to spot a Microsoft/Zune troll. This is their typical signature when losing an argument.


"PWNED but thanks for trying
next time, try harder"

Tegra and HD output ?!!!!

NO. you are dead wrong here. Appleinsider would be very surprised by tegra in an apple product

and apple fanboy will say hd output is useless and then proceed to cry.

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about oled. I read disappointing story about what oled was supposed to bring to TV. It seems, not only with zune, than full-color ipod-like screen oled are NOT what technicals newspapers told me it would be. For TV, it's like a distant futur for better tv thanks to oled.

Classic Prince!

why are there so many microsoft fan-people on this forum with desperate attempts at damage control for the zune? they must be getting paid. i would expect some critical analysis of the article but this is just annoying, but it guess thats the point. well the zune apparently blows (as does just about everything microsoft touches) so the last laugh is on them.

Let's change that to say that you get a chance to listen to some of the millions of tracks offered. Maybe at the most, a few thousand. it's the selection, not the number that you can actually listen to.

But again, it's a failed model. People don't seem to want music subscriptions. All the companies that offer them are either now out of business, or are seeing their subscription numbers dropping. Why will the Zune's be different? What evidence that it's doing well?

An option proved to be a failure. The current music subscription model will not succeed.

I think many people find the initial argument of "but what happens if you stop paying" to be convincing at first. But, my experience is that skeptics can be won over if they actually try it out for a couple months.

On several occasions, coworkers have heard me speak happily about my use of a music subscription service (first Rhapsody, then Zune), and had initial worries like that. BUT, in every case, if they have actually tried it out for a month or two they've become enthusiastic fans just like I am.

Also, I think people have no idea of what it really would be like to have access to all that music to roam through exactly how you want, without being at the whim of a Pandora or Slacker or other music selection algorithm. They may say it's "no big deal", but as with my coworker friends I think that could change if they got a taste of it for a couple months.

When I first tried a subscription service it was on a whim. I didn't think it would be that big a deal either. Here I am years later, and absolutely love it, and couldn't imagine being without the flexibility.

For me that's the biggest selling point of the whole Zune platform. I love my iPhone, and think iPod touches are excellent MP3 players. (We have one of those too, but it's my husband who primarily uses it)

If Apple did come out with a similar service then I'd be very tempted to just stick with my iPhone. But, they don't, and Rhapsody for iPhone still is missing key features, so I'll be sticking with Zunes in the meantime. Fortunately for me they happen to be very capable too, so I don't feel like I'm compromising.

You got it right; "Some people." Just a few, really. Most just want to buy.

Because they actually think that their lame arguments will change people's minds.

Exactly. I am sure Apple can (and will) turn on a 'rent' feature overnight if they thought it made economic sense. That's a temporary competitive advantage that will last all of a nano-second.

That's why this is a rumor forum and you were gushing about OLED when you thought it was going to be in the tablet... If it's ever released.

And they can still afford to lose money on the Zune because of all the revenue they'll have coming in from Windows 7. Let's keep in mind...

Apple has been losing money on AppleTV for years.

What MS fans are hoping for is a combined solution for Mobile Media, Streaming Movies (already have it with XBox and Netflix) and WiFi to any computer in the house.

That with what's been rumored is sure to take to make the headlines tomorrow.

Wait, I forgot the "one more thing", it will integrate with the new Windows 7 Home Media Center for a complete entertainment solution.

Actually, no, I imagine most Zune-Defenders posting here have no illusions they will change anyone's mind on such an Apple-biased forum where people have very partisan views.

I'm just bored and making time pass on this night before my Zune HD arrives. I'm posting on Zune fan sites as well, but a little good-natured back-and-forth with skeptics can be fun too!

While I believe that there are some people who just love them, they are still a failure.

The fact is that many companies that offered them are no longer around. Some major companies. Even MS turned off the lights at one of their subscription services.

Rhapsody, which you like, has been losing subscribers for a long time. Real may go out of business, etc.

Why is that? If as you say, people just love it after trying it for a while they should be growing.

It seems that more people become disenchanted after a while with these services than like them.

I expect them to disappear.

You're seriously hoping for an answer from these guys to logical questions like that?

If apple provided the same service, I would consider it. I would be willing to pay $1.50 per song for 10 songs if it allowed me to preview entire albums before I purchased them. There have been numerous occasions where I've purchased an album and regretted it later. Zune pass doesn't mean that you can't buy songs at the same time, it could be used to supplement purchasing and prevent bad purchases.

Edit: The difference between Zune Pass and other models, as I see it would be the 10 songs you can keep. The downside of course is that you still have to pay the subscription fee even if you can't find 10 songs a month that you want to keep. However, the subscription stigma will likely remain with Zune pass and most people wont touch it, that doesn't make it a bad service, but it could mean it still fails in the end.

This is bit like comparing a Mustang and a Camaro... You're never going to get the GM guy to look at the specs of the Mustang, or the Ford guy to look at the specs of the Camaro. Get what makes you feel good, and have a good time with it - THAT is what makes it a useful gadget.

I had a piece-of-crap $500 Dell Axim... but with a bit of work it kept my life and music handy for a couple of years... Now, a $199 iPod Touch is a million times better... but either is just as worthless if you don't use it...

Well, Apple has now allowed Rhapsody's iPhone app into the store.

Why, one may ask?

Because if you like a song, you can tag it, and then, guess what, buy it from iTunes.

So why should Apple have their own subscription service?

One can always hope.

Because there are still serious shortcomings to Rhapsody's iPhone service that they could easily resolve for their own service to give it a huge advantage. (Allow local storage of subscription songs, better than 64kbps bit rate, presumably a larger selection to choose from too(?)).

Let's face it, if Apple did activate some subscription service tomorrow, everyone would be "Rhapsody WHO?!?!"