Microsoft Zune

[hunnerbun]

<p>I am looking for some opinions on this. I know it isn't being released until Tuesday, but I was thinking about getting one for my b/f for Christmas.</p><p>I am not tech savvy at all but I do know that he HATES anything Apple related (go ahead throw your iPods at me) so I would never get him an iPod. Everything I have read about this seems to be fairly positive, other then the diehard iPoders opinions. But there are a few things that have me confused. Can you only load music that you purchase from their site, or can you load your existing library onto it? If the former is the case then this is useless as far as my getting it for him since he has a huge music library on his pc.</p><p>I also was wondering if the release is only in the US. I know I read on one site that the European release isn't until 2007 sometime but I can't find anything anywhere about a Canadian release date. </p><p>Any feedback would be appreciated. </p>

<span class=post_edited>This message was edited by hunnerbun on 11-11-06 @ 11:55 AM</span>

[ADF]

From what I've read, if you don't like the ipod then the Zune or the one of the players from Creative is the way to go.&nbsp; It will definitely play his music library assuming he doesn't use some weird DRM.&nbsp; As far as the release date, I dunno.&nbsp; I would imagine the Canadian release date will coincide with the one in the States.<br />

[johnniewalker]

The only negative going for the zune for me is that its a hard drive model versus a flash memory model. It depends how you are going to use it. Your not really going to want to run with a hard drive mp3 player, but if your walking its fine. I don't think its a real established market so just find the best capacity and price. Video capability is important to some people too, but most high capacity players offer that now.&nbsp; I guess i didn't notice the wifi for the zune, so you can possibly share files between other zune owners.<br />



<span class=post_edited>This message was edited by johnniewalker on 11-11-06 @ 12:40 PM</span>

[furie]

<strong>hunnerbun</strong> wrote:<br><p>I am looking for some opinions on this. I know it isn't being released until Tuesday, but I was thinking about getting one for my b/f for Christmas.</p><p>But there are a few things that have me confused. Can you only load music that you purchase from their site, or can you load your existing library onto it?
<span class=post_edited>This message was edited by hunnerbun on 11-11-06 @ 11:55 AM</span><p></p>

no you can load from your library

[Gvac]

<p>Screw the Zune...get the <a href="http://www.gizmodo.com/gadgets/portable-media/archos-604-wifi-ultimate-gallery-why-its-a-zune-challenger-213637.php" target="_blank">Archos 604.</a></p><p>&nbsp;</p><p><img border="0" src="http://cache.gizmodo.com/assets/resources/2006/11/IMG_4381WTMK.JPG" /></p><p>&nbsp;</p><p>&nbsp;</p><a href="http://www.gizmodo.com/gadgets/portable-media/archos-604-wifi-ultimate-gallery-why-its-a-zune-challenger-213637.php" target="_blank"></a>

[fohat]

<strong>hunnerbun</strong> wrote:<br /><p>I am looking for some opinions on this. I know it isn't being released until Tuesday, but I was thinking about getting one for my b/f for Christmas.</p><p>I am not tech savvy at all but I do know that he HATES anything Apple related (go ahead throw your iPods at me) so I would never get him an iPod. Everything I have read about this seems to be fairly positive, other then the diehard iPoders opinions. But there are a few things that have me confused. Can you only load music that you purchase from their site, or can you load your existing library onto it? If the former is the case then this is useless as far as my getting it for him since he has a huge music library on his pc.</p><p>I also was wondering if the release is only in the US. I know I read on one site that the European release isn't until 2007 sometime but I can't find anything anywhere about a Canadian release date. </p><p>Any feedback would be appreciated. </p>

<span class="post_edited">This message was edited by hunnerbun on 11-11-06 @ 11:55 AM</span><p>&nbsp;</p>Gah firefox 2 crashed and ate my post, but In a nutshell, adf is right: If he has purchase music from another service be careful buying the Zune.&nbsp; The &quot;Plays for Sure&quot; program is totally incompatible, and Microsoft is even closing its MSN music store because of this and opening a new store which will be compatible with the Zune.&nbsp; If most of his tracks are from his own CD collection, or the cd collections of other people, then youre probably fine.<br />

[hunnerbun]

All his stuff is not purchased. So hopefully that will be ok. I just remember reading somewhere that even wma files won't play on it. But I think everything he has is mp3 so it should be ok. He has a mp3 player now but it is on its last legs....the battery case is held together with tape. The other thing he uses it for is podcasts. He subscribes to Coast to Coast so he dl's the shows and then listens to them at work. I don't know if this would work either. Thats the main thing he uses it for....definitely no running involved johnniewalker <img border="0" src="http://www.ronfez.net/messageboard/tiny_mce/plugins/emotions/images/happy.gif" /><br />



<span class=post_edited>This message was edited by hunnerbun on 11-11-06 @ 4:11 PM</span>

[PapaBear]

<p>My 16 year old plans on buying the zune today. I read an article about the zune in Sunday's Washington Post. It bashed it for the previous &quot;purchased downloads&quot; options. My kid doesn't tend to buy music online.</p><p>The Post article said...</p><p>Zune software and hardware only play &quot;unprotected&quot; MP3, AAC and WMA files, plus Zune Marketplace downloads.</p><p>My question is this....</p><p>Do you think that means you can play MP3/WMA files that you have on your computer, that weren't downloaded? I'm very confused by this.</p>

[BrownTown]

<strong>PapaBear</strong> wrote:<br /><br /><p>Do you think that means you can play MP3/WMA files that you have on your computer, that weren't downloaded? I'm very confused by this.&nbsp;</p><p>That would suggest that if you've purchased songs from iTunes (or any other music store) in the past, they won't be playable on the Zune as they are. There's ways around the protections, but it can be a pain in the ass depending on how big your file library is. All you have to do is burn your files to a CD, and then rip them as MP3's.</p>

[booster11373]

<p>The Rights Management on this device is so restrictive that I no longer would consider getting one. Microsofts own file format PFS wont even play on it WTF!!!!&nbsp;,any music you may have bought (online)all ready is useless on this thing, Its a shame because besides the Rights thing its a nice piece of hardware.</p><p>Stay away</p>

[HeyGuy]

so has anyone on the board purchased or used the zune yet? I'm looking to get a new mp3 player that plays videos too. I want one that is plug and play, you know i hook it up to my computer and drag all my music to the mps player. Any help on the zune would be great. And any other suggestions on mp3 players that play videos/music and have 30gb or more storage let me know. thanks guys!

[feralBoy]

<strong>Campo</strong> wrote:<br />so has anyone on the board purchased or used the zune yet? I'm looking to get a new mp3 player that plays videos too. I want one that is plug and play, you know i hook it up to my computer and drag all my music to the mps player. Any help on the zune would be great. And any other suggestions on mp3 players that play videos/music and have 30gb or more storage let me know. thanks guys! <p>I've played with the zune.&nbsp; It seems pretty cool.&nbsp; I've also heard great things about the creative zen.&nbsp; There is the zen M, which is ipod/zune size.&nbsp; And then there is the zen vision w, which is alot bigger, but has a much bigger screen.&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>

[PapaBear]

My son likes his. I was shocked that the AC adapter was 30 bucks, though.

[JimBeam]

<p>STAY AWAY FROM THE CREATIVE MP3 PLAYERS !!</p><p>I purchased a Zen Extra a few years ago because it's 60GB model was more affordable than the Apple one at the time ( 400 to about 600 ).</p><p>it&nbsp;was very simple when loading music. Drag and drop options and all.</p><p>At first it would just freeze up occasionally in which case I'd just have to power down and reboot it.</p><p>This didnt happen every day or anything like that but it did happen often enough.</p><p>Finally after more than a year but less than 2 years it completely froze and never came back.</p><p>I called them and they said that it was a harddrive issue and that it needed to be replaced.</p><p>I asked if I'd be able to keep the 5000+ songs I had on it and they said no.</p><p>I had purchased it through Dell so they told me they'd replace it w/out a problem.</p><p>But I said to them &quot; Why would I get another one of these with the chance that this will happen again in another 18 months ? I purchased your product because at the time it was more cost efficient but now the iPod is similar in proce and much more widely used.&quot;</p><p>Now I know that the iPod occasionally has its problems but I was completely turned off by the dealings with Creative so I'd never buy anything from them.</p><p>I also know they've made some improvements on their older models ( mine was the size of an old school Walkman ) but I'm gonna go with an iPod as a replacement.</p>