ZOMG New Zunes

BarlowBrad writes "From PC World: "Microsoft announced a new slate of Wi-Fi-equipped Zune players today, including $150 4GB and $200 8GB flash-based players, and a $250 80GB model that's slimmer than the original Zune. All of the new models feature touch-sensitive controls and wireless syncing with your PC, a much-demanded feature that Microsoft will also make available on the original 30GB Zune when the new models debut in mid November." Wireless. More space than a Nomad. But draw your own conclusions."

Still gimped "Squirt"...

[nweaver]

You still only get 3 plays out of stuff you transfer to friends...

Re:Draw your own conclusions...

[mabhatter654]

can't buy tracks from the largest online sellers that support windows OS.. napster, walmart, itms.... doesn't work on my mac.... no web surfing or 3rd party software hacks.

Re:Congratulations Microsoft...

[Anonymous Coward]

The currently-released iPods are plagued with problems [apple.com], so you might want to hold off on the sucking-up for a moment.

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[account_deleted]

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Re:what about the DRM "feature"?

[dedazo]

You mean sharing songs with people wirelessly and getting to listen to those songs three times? Which is three times more than the iPod? Does that make it "unwanted by many"? Because otherwise the "DRM" thing is applicable only to songs purchased from their online store. You can rip your song collection and put it in the Zune without involving any DRM whatsoever. Is this not how the iPod works as well?

Re:Congratulations Microsoft...

[brajesh]

they did something else which is noticeable too:
http://gizmodo.com/gadgets/zune/firstgen-zune-getting-all-the-new-features-this-is-how-you-treat-your-customers-306422.php [gizmodo.com]

All. Sure, the new Zune is more of a half step forward than a completely new design. But Microsoft's done something fantastic here by rewarding first gen buyers with cool new stuff that also happens to be free by software upgrade. And talk about spin-- Microsoft just took a middling jump in hardware and turned it into a genuinely good move for loyalists (as well as a PR miracle). Are you paying attention Apple?

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[account_deleted]

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Time restrictions gone, play restrictions still in

[SuperKendall]

You still can only play shared music three times, even if the limit is gone. And that includes DRM free tracks you buy.

Also note the post below about how wireless syncing requires the Zune to be docked!

Actually a lot of people complained

[SuperKendall]

When the Zune came out, everybody lambasted it for not having wireless syncing, even though it had WiFi (come on, this is a "duh of course you should have it" feature). Yet the iPhone came out and it didn't have wireless syncing EITHER. But nobody complained, heck nobody even MENTIONED this.

Just search back through any of teh 10k/minute iPhone stories from earlier in the year and you'll see this is not true. There were (and are) a LOT of people asking for wireless sync from the iPhone.

I would personally like wireless sync just for quick podcast updates, not for large transfers...

However, did you seee the story that offhandedly claims the Zune must be docked to initiate the wireless transfer?

Re:Congratulations Microsoft...

[Anonymous Coward]

No, in this case Microsoft has less market share than apple.

Re:But Does It Run Linux?

[Anonymous Coward]

http://www.barix.com/ [barix.com] - check out the "Exstreamer 100" Put it on your LAN, configure it by the web interface to aim it at a particular shoutcast scream and it'll spit out audio on a headphone jack or optical SPDIF. We got one of these in at work to test the RTP audio output feature of one of our products. That testing's done, so the Exstreamer is now the SomaFM box for the office. Only minus is that it won't do AACplus, FLAC or anything fancy, just MP3 and WAV. Who knows, maybe it runs Linux inside. ;)

Re:Microsostrich

[Space cowboy]

I don't know about that - it doesn't look like it is right now though. From Amazon's MP3 player list [amazon.com], ordered by best-selling:

#1 Apple 4G Nano (silver, latest)
#2 Apple 16G ipod touch
#3 Apple 80G ipod classic (black, latest)
#4 Apple 8G ipod touch
#5 Apple 160G ipod classic (black, latest)
#6 Apple 80G ipod classic (silver, latest)
#7 Apple 8G ipod nano (green, latest)
#8 Apple 8G ipod nano (black, latest)
#9 Apple 8G ipod nano (blue, latest)
#10 Apple 8G ipod nano (silver, latest)
#11 Apple 1G ipod shuffle (purple, latest)
#12 Sandisk 8G (black)
#13 Sandisk 4G +SD
#14 Apple 2G nano (silver)
#15 Zune 30G (white) (this is the V1 player)
...
#28 Zune 30G (black) (this is the V1 player)
#29 Sandisk 1G express
#30 Zune 4G pink (this is the V2 player)
#31 Zune 8G red (this is the V2 player)
#32 Zune 4G black (this is the V2 player)
#33 Zune 8G pink (this is the V2 player)
#34 Zune 4G red (this is the V2 player)
#35 Zune 80G black (this is the V2 player)
#36 Zune 8G black (this is the V2 player)
...
#54 Zune 30G brown

I gave up listing apple players after the first 15 or so. The majority of the missing numbers are Apple MP3 players.

What I think is interesting from this list is that all the top 10 (11 actually) players are the latest-generation players from Apple. The zune V2, even on its launch-day, is languishing in the #30's. It's not even beating the zune V1. I don't think that's a good sign...

Simon