VeeshanVault

Just read a review of the new Zune player from Microsoft.
Dont exactly sound like it something to go buy.

http://www.suntimes.com/technology/ihna ... 23.article

Ouch. I had been looking for more information after messing with one in the store yesterday. I am glad that I didn't go with the impulse to buy when I was there.

Yea it caught my eye as well, I've gone for years w/o an MP3 player but going to buy one this year... thanks for the info. I wasn't really considering a Zune but now I know not to consider it.

Marb

Typical 1st Gen Microsoft anything. It sucks.

I wonder if they did this on purpose to prove to the music companies that their idea of digital music business is wrong...

XBox/Zune/MS points I don't mind. Comes with the territory and are easy to use.

Wifi limitations are a PITA to be certain. No worky with Windows Media Player is beyond retarded. If you're going to have a platform for music, f'ing use it. This is why iTunes works. It's your storefront and your digital music player(at least on a Mac). A one stop shop for purchasing and consumption.

Apple is also right on the flat rate for the songs. One thing I'm interested in though is this: Are the points that you buy on your Xbox and through the cards at the store interchangable? If so then great because a lot of brick and mortar places offer great deals on those 1600 point cards, which makes for possibly cheaper music.

As for the Zune player installation, sounds like he had issues with his PC, not necessarily the software's fault.

Given the other choices out there, I'm uncertian why a Zune would even be on someone's radar...

As suspected. Chalk up the Zone software install problems on a quirky computer.

I was able to download it from MS and install it on my laptop without issue.

The software looks and acts exactly like WMP with a skin but is explicitly for use with the Zune and uses only the Zune marketplace.

This version of the Zune blows. The only feature that peaks people's interest (wireless) is severely crippled. Unless you want to transfer songs to people that will auto-delete after three days whether you created them yourself or bought them, I see no reason to switch from a Creative Zen Vision model to the Zune if you're looking for a hard drive based music/video player. All the useful wireless features like downloading songs in hotspots from the Microsoft Music service (if you paid for it) or transferring songs wireless from your computer are nowhere to be seen. It would rock if you could download new songs from the "all you can eat" service at any hotspot you found.

I've softened my stance on the smaller, flash memory based 2nd gen Nano mp3 players. If you like pod/netcasts like me, iTunes, along with a Nano handle them the best out of all players available.(although in typical Apple fashion, they can't let a good thing be and podcasters are starting to hate Apple for trying to copyright "pod", sending nasty letters to people that use "pod" in their names so, while everyone associates podcasts with Apple products, they'll soon lose that bonus free advertising out of greed as people start calling them Netcasts) If you still stick strictly to music, the flash based Creative players sound better and have more features of course.

Also, for smaller players, the SanDisk players are nice. I talked a coworker out of a Nano and into buying a SanDisk Sansa MP3 player which is the same size but has a better display, FM, replaceable (rechargeable) battery, videos, etc. unlike the Nano.

My wife wanted an MP3 player and we went with the Zen Nano Plus 1GB model. Nice little unit with a lot of feature and around the price we wanted to pay for the thing.