“Last year, when Microsoft Corp. introduced its Zune music player to take on Apple’s iPod juggernaut, the software giant struck out,” Walter S. Mossberg and Katherine Boehret report for The Wall Street Journal.
“But Microsoft is nothing if not persistent, and this week, the company is back with a second, improved round of Zunes,” Mossberg and Boehret report.
“Unfortunately for Microsoft, Apple hasn’t been standing still, either. It now has its own large-screen, wireless model, the iPod Touch, with a radical ‘multi-touch’ interface like the iPhone’s. The screen on the Touch is larger than the one on the bigger Zunes and is much sharper. Its Wi-Fi allows you to browse the Web, watch YouTube videos and even buy music without a PC — none of which is possible on a Zune — though the Touch is $50 more and holds much less content than the new full-size Zune,” Mossberg and Boehret report.
“Microsoft’s new Zunes are directly aimed at the iPod Classic, Apple’s full-size, high-capacity model, and the iPod nano, its compact version. But, here again, Apple has been on the move. The 80-gigabyte Classic, which costs the same as the 80-gigabyte Zune, is slimmer than the Zune and has a flashy new interface, if a smaller screen. And the eight-gigabyte nano, which costs the same as the eight-gigabyte Zune, now plays videos and is much smaller — yet has a larger screen,” Mossberg and Boehret report.
“In addition, Apple has spiffed up its iTunes software, adding various features, including the addictive Cover Flow, which allows you to flip through all your albums with just a flick of the mouse. Cover Flow also shows up on the nano, the Classic and the Touch. Even the new Zune PC software has no interface as compelling,” Mossberg and Boehret report. “And Apple still trounces Microsoft in the selection of media it sells. The iTunes store offers more than six million songs, about double what the Zune Marketplace offers, and dwarfs Microsoft’s selection of Podcasts and music videos, as well. Plus, Zune Marketplace still doesn’t sell any TV shows, movies or audiobooks, while iTunes does.”
“Microsoft has greatly improved the Zune hardware and software this time. But it seems to be competing with Apple’s last efforts, not its newest ones,” Mossberg and Boehret report.
Full article here.
I still think the Zune is a nice compromise between the iPod classic and touch.
It only pales in comparison to the iPod touch when most people will cross shop it with the classic. The larger screen will prove attractive against the smaller, dated one of the classic.
Now if Apple wouldve given us an HDD touch, the Zune wouldn’t stand a chance. Instead they’ve given Microsoft a window to capture the user who wants a large screen with high capacity.
Chris Stephenson, general manager of global marketing for the Microsoft
division responsible for the Zune, would not say whether Microsoft has any
specific goals for the Zune’s second year on the market, other than to be
“a solid No. 2” to the iPod.
Does this mean the Zune will still be available in brown? (Sorry, just
couldn’t pass that up.)
http://money.cnn.com/news/newsfeeds/articles/djf500/200711121722DOWJONESDJONLINE000538_FORTUNE5.htm
mw : “report”
^^^noticed that too..they’re rockin’ the doubl-macbooks pretty much all afternoon daily on FoxNews..
Microsoft isn’t even making any Zunes. They’re Toshiba Gigabeat players re-branded as Microsoft Zunes before they hit the stores. Microsoft has almost nothing to do with the design of this product.
MW: Half, as in Microsoft’s typical half-assed approach to product design.
How much does Apple pay Walt again?
I have to wonder who would voluntarily associate themselves with a Zune at this point. M$ just keeps getting smacked down over and over again.
Apple was an underdog with better products. M$ is an underdog with clearly inferior products. Tech writers claim then that M$ must be triumphant because they are underdogs. Amazing stuff.
Micro$oft is losing ground….and the Zune is just ONE indicator out of SO many.
Apple is the future! I am still amazed every day that most of our government is still running on stinking PCs. If there was ever a place I’d want a computer to be MORE secure it would be in a government office….yet they still insist on using machines that continually get hacked and infected!
Go Apple, GO! My personal philosiphy? “If it’s not a MAC, then TAKE IT BACK!”
@R2
The problem with the Zune is not the size of the screen. It’s the resolution. In the end, that is more important than size. According to Computerworld, who has a pretty leveled review, the pixels on the Zune are very apparent, not so on Apple’s wares.
Eventually though there will be less and less to innovate in the hardware and software.
Microsoft knows this and they probably expect that at that point in time their offerings be on par with iTunes/iPod.
Apple must know this too, I hope.
I expect Apple to take iTunes/iPod to the logical conclusion–become the de facto standard, even if it means licensing the system to third parties.
That would be in the future, of course, after Apple made all the money possible, but if Apple licensed iTunes/iPod technology to third parties (kind of what the tried with HP), it would definitely put the nail on Microsoft’s coffin once and for all.
At some point at some Keynote or Apple Media Event Steve Jobs quoted “The Great One” Wayne Gretzky:
“I skate to where the puck is going to be, not to where it has been.”
This is the essence of Microsoft’s problem…
Even with Steve Jobs coaching them in public, saying ,,this is what anyone’s going to have to do to match, much less beat us — develop the product that will beat our NEXT product,, Microsoft’s aim continues to be on last year’s product, not next year’s product.
Still, Apple needs to continue to be a moving target that no one can keep up with. The moment Apple falters in the lead, is the moment everyone else starts to catch up and have hope.
— Chuck
I agree with TM. The USG still wastes a lot of money on Windows, Dells and the like.
However, a few agencies that I know about embrace the Mac in a big way mainly of the security problem you mentioned. (They like to have the built-in cameras disabled though.)
Surprisingly, quite a few people in different agencies hate the hell out of Windows and request and get the Mac.
I still think of those poor souls at NASA that (still) have to suffer with Windows.
I actually saw my first Zune the other day.
A buddy of mine’s mom won it in a contest and gave it to him. We were sitting watching the Chargers/Colts game on a lazy Sunday afternoon. He’s my last close friend that hasn’t converted to Apple, and is wearing his MS loyalty with pride in our circle of friends. He’s from Indy, I’m from San Diego.
As a MS/Windows wonk he was real proud of his Zune and did his best to show me all of the features. While working through the music lists I saw that he only had 5 songs on it. I asked him if he was going to put his entire library on it and he quickly changed the subject.
His wife (a seriously computer challenged lass) overheard my question and chimed in – “oh – he can’t get more that 5 songs downloaded onto the thing. I told him to ask you to help him hook up to the iTunes thingy.”
Silence. Not a word spoken for about 15 seconds. Right then Peyton Manning gave up that third interception to Antonio Cromartie (the highlight reel one).
Priceless
@ Jim – TIV
Ouch!
A perfect article for a classic zune tang rant and he/she/it is nowhere to be seen.
Oh, the humanity of it all!
C1… it was a tough moment for him. Which made it all the better because he’s my buddy. It made me think of that quote from Conan the Barbarian… “crush your enemies, drive them before you, hear the lamentation of their women!”
@Reclaimer,
“I still think of those poor souls at NASA that (still) have to suffer with Windows.”
I still think about those poor astronauts at NASA that have their lives in the balance because of Winblows!!!
“The zune blows”
Not true. It squirts! … you know, like Genie’s magic bottle when you rub it
@ Jim – TIV
You should buy him a Nano for Xmas.
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@ Jim – TIV
Don’t buy him a nano at Xmas, buy his wife one. Even being computer challenged, she will force him to make all his wrongs right.
We are going to sell the Zune 2 like hot cakes – By the hundreds.
When was the last time you saw a hot cake stand?
It’s MS best plan yet.
bb
Wired said that Apple “hasn’t bothered to create iTunes widgets for increasingly popular social networks.”?
Then what is this? Chopped liver?
http://www.apple.com/itunes/myitunes/
Engadget is right on. Zune 2 doesn’t bring anything new or compelling to the table. Its basically the same hardware with reworked eye candy and hardware features from the original model finally enabled. Yet the Windows whipping boys all think its real new stuff and oh how lucky that are that MS allowed them to enable it on their original Zune. How pathetic and laughable is that! LOL
That damn Zune turd has been out for a year and I still have yet to spot one in the wild.
‘Nuff said.
Peace.
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Olmecmystic
The ‘lesser-spotted Zune’, indeed a rare beast, and on the verge of extinction because of man’s inability to accept or buy shit devices full of virus’s.
The Zune should be put on the endangered gadgets list along with the X-box, Origami and Windows OS.
@C1 and Buster –
Now if I was a real good friend, I’d buy him a nano for xmas like C1 recommends. But since I’m the buddy he’s had from high school, and he’s busted my chops about owning aapl on numerous occasions this past week, I’m gonna have to go with Buster’s idea and break his tiny little MS balls a bit. I mean, if HIS wife can get music on a nano – now that would be a great Christmas present for me wouldn’t it?
Do they sell pink nanos?