It's a lot better than people here are willing to admitt and is a good start for MS. Of course if Apple ever release a true video iPod and an iPhone they could make this product irrelevant.
"Overall, this seems pretty promising. I can't find any mis-steps or anything where I have to ask "wait, this is dumb, why did you do this?" in both the player and the software. The Zune itself is very sexy, and feels nice to the touch—not too heavy."
What? How about these:
•*you can't use it as a hard drive. At all.
• you have to disconnect and reconnect if you want to sync a second time.
•*it doesn't work with Windows 2000 or Vista. At all —*unlike iPod+iTunes, which works with both.
If you need to turn down volume in a hurry from deep within a menu, the Zune makes it easier than the iPod does: all you have to do is tap the Back button until you're at the top screen, then click the directional button down. (On an iPod, you'd tap Menu until you get to the top screen, scroll down to the Now Playing item, select it, and then scroll the volume down.)
If you need to turn down the volume in a hurry? When you're deep within a menu? Yeah, that's a deal breaker. Um, how about just hitting pause button until the crisis is over.
I don't think I've ever been caught in a situation where I needed to turn my volume down in a hurry and was somehow on some other menu screen. That's seriously an 0.1% usage incident. Using the iPod volume control is so thoughtless that I can't really remember even how it's done. I seem to recall reaching in my pocket, flipping the lock, scrolling, and flipping back the lock. I don't think I actually take it out of my pocket.
I don't really have anything against the Zune, but it's just too little too late. Pocket video hasn't really taken off, and audio devices seem to be converging with other handheld products and/or moving towards flash based memories. As a primary feature, pocket video will probably never appeal to more than a niche market; it requires visual attention, which tends also to be a requirement for navigating through life.
Watching last week's release of Zune, Microsoft's iPod-killer-wannabe, evoked thoughts of bad 1950s architecture, not images of futuristic design and musical sexiness.
Get this: Its signature colour is brown. Hot. So hot.
But that doesn't mean there isn't a positive paragraph we can pull out of there somewhere ...
Quote:
"The Zune has a few neat features in iPod absentia —— an FM radio tuner and a wireless feature that lets you send songs to friends —— at the reasonable price of about $250 U.S. for a 30 gigabyte model. "
holding the menu button down takes you back to the start of the menu.
dont have to click menu lots of times.
Or maybe thats a feature on only newer ipods?
Nope. Old ones as well. But regardless, it usually isn't to much to ask to wait a few sections until the song pops-up again automatically. The only time this circumstance would arise if you were already trying to do something on the iPod... in which case a few extra clicks is no problem at all.
Comments
"Overall, this seems pretty promising. I can't find any mis-steps or anything where I have to ask "wait, this is dumb, why did you do this?" in both the player and the software. The Zune itself is very sexy, and feels nice to the touch—not too heavy."
What? How about these:
•*you can't use it as a hard drive. At all.
• you have to disconnect and reconnect if you want to sync a second time.
•*it doesn't work with Windows 2000 or Vista. At all —*unlike iPod+iTunes, which works with both.
If you need to turn down volume in a hurry from deep within a menu, the Zune makes it easier than the iPod does: all you have to do is tap the Back button until you're at the top screen, then click the directional button down. (On an iPod, you'd tap Menu until you get to the top screen, scroll down to the Now Playing item, select it, and then scroll the volume down.)
If you need to turn down the volume in a hurry? When you're deep within a menu? Yeah, that's a deal breaker. Um, how about just hitting pause button until the crisis is over.
I don't really have anything against the Zune, but it's just too little too late. Pocket video hasn't really taken off, and audio devices seem to be converging with other handheld products and/or moving towards flash based memories. As a primary feature, pocket video will probably never appeal to more than a niche market; it requires visual attention, which tends also to be a requirement for navigating through life.
I love my iPod but the Volume is always a problem. I just hate having to hit back 4 times before I can turn the volume up or down.
edit: Um, yeah, what Splinemodel said.
What? How about these:
?*you can't use it as a hard drive. At all.
? you have to disconnect and reconnect if you want to sync a second time.
?*it doesn't work with Windows 2000 or Vista. At all ?*unlike iPod+iTunes, which works with both.
Or how about the fact you cannot listen to the radio while browsing pictures.
http://www.thestar.com/NASApp/cs/Con...l=991929131147
It looks like a brick.
Watching last week's release of Zune, Microsoft's iPod-killer-wannabe, evoked thoughts of bad 1950s architecture, not images of futuristic design and musical sexiness.
Get this: Its signature colour is brown. Hot. So hot.
But that doesn't mean there isn't a positive paragraph we can pull out of there somewhere ...
"The Zune has a few neat features in iPod absentia —— an FM radio tuner and a wireless feature that lets you send songs to friends —— at the reasonable price of about $250 U.S. for a 30 gigabyte model. "
See how easy that was?!??
dont have to click menu lots of times.
Or maybe thats a feature on only newer ipods?
holding the menu button down takes you back to the start of the menu.
dont have to click menu lots of times.
Or maybe thats a feature on only newer ipods?
Nope. Old ones as well. But regardless, it usually isn't to much to ask to wait a few sections until the song pops-up again automatically. The only time this circumstance would arise if you were already trying to do something on the iPod... in which case a few extra clicks is no problem at all.