Well, here's a bit of a surprise: a wireless PMP just showed up on the FCC, featuring a 30GB HDD, FM tuner and a strangely familiar 3-inch screen. And it ain't being manufactured by Microsoft. Instead it looks like Microsoft got their
good pal Toshiba to produce the
Zune, which not only saves Microsoft the job of gearing up some production lines for the thing, but seems to keep them from stepping on at least one PlayForSure licensee's toes. Things get more interesting from there, since the documentation refers to those other heavily bandied code names: "
Pyxis" and "
Argo." From the looks of things, Pyxis seems to be the name for the network which Zune devices will use to share content, since in the "DJing Content" section it states that "Pyxis allows you to stream music to up to 4 other Pyxis devices." A bit more confusing, however, is that "You can invite other Argo members that you meet to be your friends wirelessly." Of course, it's always likely that they hadn't gotten all the codenames smoothed out by the time they wrote that up, but it's clear that the Zune player as we know it is only a small part of the overall "Zune" plan. It's also clear that Toshiba is part of the party, so we'll be keeping our eyes peeled for any other manufacturers who might be hanging on to Microsoft's coat tails here. Keep reading to see the Zune cracked open, tested, and completely dissected...
[Via
MobileWhack; thanks
Sandeep]
posted August 25th 2006 9:21AM
ok devin how do you do math again i mean the nanos wayyyyy smaller this not that thats good or bad
but come on dude are you blind
I made a mock-up and it's nearly identical in size to the 60GB iPod.
Another thing about the Zune...it will be hacked to death with user-inspired functionality, including, no doubt, istructions all over the web on how to replace parts such as the hard disk.
Actually it looks very clean (in design), however obviously taking a cue from apple. My guess is that Argo is either the software that will be associated with the zune, and/or a friend network like myspace.
There wont be any confusion between the Zune and the next iPod. Just look at Microsoft's packaging design vs. Apple
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=36099539665548298&q=microsoft+ipod+parody
I dont think it will be an ipod killer, however i think it will told its torch pretty close, as they take the "listening to music and video" to another level, which seems to be the interaction with friends (hmmm the best marketing tool ever). Its going to be interesting!
lol just like the sony psp
It's da 'Tunes guys!
And Microsoft has by no means better (as in "better quality") marketing as Creative et al. There is only one small and rather simple difference: they have an unlimited amount of money they can throw at their marketing department. (But more money doesn't always equal better quality, especially when it comes to rather "creative" stuff like marketing. They reach more people. That's their advantage, and no doubt, it's a big one.) Apple cannot do that.
That's the only problem for the iPod when it comes to the "fight". The Zune isn't that much different if compared with other (now dead) so called "iPod-Killers". A whole lot of features, but not quite as polished (I suppose so, dunno, maybe Zune will be great, but I won't hold my breath) as the iPod.
Well I love it. And I'm king so there
didnt notice those laptop pictures. good point.
So what's the big deal about "Zune"?
Look... this is what M$ does. If you don't think they are going to hit the market hard and wrestle a big chunk of the market share from Apple you are insane. They can and will do it. With practically unlimited funds for marketing, there will be no stopping the M$ machine. BTW, I think the design looks fine (although a little large, but it the product is that damn good, it won't matter...) I laugh that people on here are like "It's ugly as hell, the iPod is way better" and then two posts later someone is like "It looks like they are copying the iPod!"
Don't worry kids, people will still think you look cool with your iPod. It'll be like driving a BMW compared to a Mercedes. You will still look better than those driving a more efficent and less expensive Honda (ie. Sandisk)
PS- I am not an "M$ fanboi" or whatever you kids accuse realistic people of being on these things... I own an iPod and a PS2. lol
Duh, MS is a software company. Why would they be the ones manufacturing it. I'll be in the market for a new mp3 player sometime next year and I'm looking between the Gigabeat and Zune (since I will NOT buy an iPod) and possibly something else.
There's already a complete line of networked high-end electronic gear named Pyxis, complete with full-color high res touch screens and biometric identification. They just dispense medications rather than music. I wonder if Microsoft has this angle covered?
http://www.pyxis.com/
Argos is obviously the tie-in to whatever new Windows Live music services will be available. Probably managed through Zune or PC's browser.
Ugly, and again NOT an iPod killer. When will they learn...
I've said it many times: There may be many PMPs that have more capabilities, more capacity, more speed, etc., but that isn't what a majority of customers care about.
They care that it is EASY to use. The key is the iTunes software. It is NOT the hardware.
Until Microsoft or Creative or SanDisk comes up with an iTunes killer, they will never kill the iPod.
This device will definitely not compete with iPod in areas like form factor, design, or maybe even price/performance. The features look like they are forging some new ground.
The main advantage of Zune is the competitive pressure it provides to iPod. iPod and Apple have enjoyed a relative monopoly for the ecosystem it represents. The only way to introduce real competition is through a similar full offering like Microsoft seems to be providing with Zune. I remember the same comments when the Xbox came on the scene but it has proven to be a positive addition to the console market. Zune provides the same opportunity. It won’t matter if you buy a Zune or an iPod. The result of competition will ultimately be better prices, more features, and more innovation.
With all of these posts about the chunkiness of the "ZUNE" it reminded me that Micro$oft has always been about "bloat" and never about "elegance" or "coolness"!
hooray for trademark violations!
Pyxis is the name(brand?) of a medical vending machine for hospitals, where frequently-used and disposable devices can be accounted for.
itunes sucks. the only reason I use it is becasue thats the only easy way to get music on to my nano.
the only reason I have a nano is becuase its the smallest one out there that doesn't suck.
itunes doesn't have gapless, doesn't support flac, doesn't support monkeysaudio, doesn't support anything.
if I had my way I would be runnin g my nano with foobar, but alas its too big of a pain in the ass and i sacrifice sound quality and codecs all becuase apple is too gay to make their players drag and drop.
fucking apple. smug bastards.
what the hell is monkeys audio and flac? who cares? why do you have an ipod if you hate apple?
atleast its not apple.
To me this looks like it borrowed a design element from my old Creative Nomad II MP3 player circa 1998...
http://pc.watch.impress.co.jp/docs/article/20000121/nomad2_2.jpg
That thing looks like my Prism Durosport!
I shall be dashing off an email forthwith to Vladimir Concescu, the lead engineer from the company so that they can file an injunction against Microsoft.
My chunky Durosport 6000 is a Zune-killer: http://www.prismdurosport.com/
MS just screwed themselves. If they had put some marketing $ behind the Zune and claimed it to be manufactured my MS themselves, they could have tried to go head to head with the iPod. Now with Toshiba taged on it, no one's going to take this very seriously. At this point in the DAP market, only a new player has any chance with a marketing blitzkrieg against Apple.
IMO, the Zune player will probably not be as "brick-like" as depicted.
Check out this review of the Gigabit S, keeping in mind that the review is definitely slanted to the Toshiba player.
Also, with MS' known proclivity for adding "features", I have no doubt the Zune will grow in weight and size (ie wireless components, etc.).
Link: http://mobilemag.com/content/100/335/C9281/
Uhm... probably gonna get slammed for this but is there any chance it's not the final case OR that it's in a different/special case for FCC testing? I loathe MS, truly I do but I honestly can't believe they wouldn't realize that the case isn't gonna be a big hit. So I'm thinking maybe it's some other reason that it looks so hideous.
Anyone know what kinds of tests are being run on it and if that requires a special (ugly) case?
You know what killed the Apple Newton? Bad integration with the host computer.
You know what will kill the Zune? Windows Media Player. (and having too many buttons to fuss with)
Well, Microsoft has confirmed that Toshiba will be producing it so it is effectively an updated Gigabeat S. Wow.
Can someone please tell me exactly how much market penetration the Gigabeat S has made! This thing is going to bomb big time.
kyle allen: "atleast its not apple". Yeah, just like the New York subway is not a Ferrari.
@noobs: "i sacrifice sound quality and codecs all becuase apple is too gay to make their players drag and drop"
Too gay? If by "too gay" you mean better looking, slimmer, on average more intelligent, and doing a better and higher paid job then I guess you're right.
"You know what will kill the Zune? Windows Media Player."
You are an idiot. WMP11 is freaking awesome. So much better than iTunes. iTunes is a memory hog and the buggiest piece of crap on Windows.
Where is the 80gb version? After all Toshiba came out with the first 1.8 inch 80 gigger!! What a waste of time if it isn't available in a high cap version.
Obviously developed by the Vista team.
Microsoft's new product launches are more funny than most comedians these days!
whether or not ipod's success is marketing, design, software or features, I'd never buy an apple product simply because I think stevie boy is a c0ckbite. He killed newton, thus he deserves nothing.
rant aside, I doubt I'd buy the ms 'pod' either. iriver has a decent product, works as needed and is simple to use and load with my music. I have no need for a music service of any kind, as all my digital music is ripped from my cd's. I can go to best buy or amazon.com for my music needs. I can also, if needed, just record individual songs from a billion music streaming websites if I like a song I don't own already.
http://www.zuneinsider.com/2006/07/nyub_not_your_u.html
Redmond will release Zune in time for Christmas and sell nearly 50, not counting the ones Microsoft will send to Steve Jobs as a lousy joke. MS CEO Steve Ballmer will be arrested for biting a mother on her face in a department store while her son and daughter inspect the offerings at the iPod display. Ballmer will claim the report of the attack was a "gross exaggeration, spread by Microsoft's infinite enemies; I just brushed by her, looking for the Zune display" before settling out of court. Defects will plague the players (all 42 that will finally be sold) and Microsoft will end up in a law suit with all its media vendors who will charge that Microsoft was refusing to pay royalties after placing a 1/800th of a second of silence at the end of the songs they were selling through Zune and claiming they were all "new, original and innovative works copyrighted Microsoft. Duh." After 8 months of litigation, the suit will be settled out of court after CEO Ballmer bites through one of the tires on the Sony attorney's Lexus in the court parking lot and is shot with a tranquilizer round by the Washington State Department of Animal Control. Zune will be pulled off the shelves in June 2007 after MS issues a press release describing "its brilliant *pilot* of a massive, galaxy-stretching, mind-expanding portable media program yet to come" as a "total and unquestioned success." Analysts will point out, however, that after the law suits, media companies were so shocked to find nastier lawyers working for MS than they ever employed, MS was unable to contract any content for the Zune service at all. MS will be forced to start its own recording label and will only be able to sign William Shatner scatting and singing obscene lyrics to television theme songs and, in a desperate play, offer downloadable monster movies of CEO Ballmer stalking and eating his neighbors' pets. Analysts, newspaper columnists, national security consultants and religious leaders will accurately predict the devastating Vistapocalypse that will attend the release of Vista on Thanksgiving Day, 2007. Microsoft, sure of its success, will make an unprecedented media move buying all of the available commercial air time on the SuperBowl broadcast to demonstrate Vista's "advanced features" during commercial breaks starring William Shatner and CEO Ballmer as 'Spock' aboard the new "Starship Vista." Breaking with tradition, the spots will air live and will have to be improvised largely by Shatner when Ballmer's bright red Federation officer's jersey becomes hopelessly tangled around his head. "The new Aero screen saver is guaranteed to neutralize erectile dysfunction, hair loss and flatuence, right Science Officer Ballmer?" Shatner will announce, beaming from his familiar captain's chair, while muffled shrieks emanate from the crimson-shrouded head of the shirtless Ballmer, thrashing senselessly, struggling to pull the jersey down over his head. By the third quarter, newscasters will announce during breaks in the action that Vista had been cracked by Eastern European and Central Asian terrorist groups, had already taken over all the Vista desktops in the western world and were using them to drain corporate bank accounts and send wire transfers to Al Qaeda. Ballmer, interviewed by sportcasters on the scene, will be by then hopelessly entangled in the red jersey with his hands caught in the sleeves and his arms suspended over his shoulders. Unable to answer their questions with anything more than a strangled scream, Ballmer runs from the TV cameras and head-butts the Astrodome until he is unconscious. The next day, President Bush will declare, "Now I know what the 'blue screens of death' thing-things were all about. These people are fellow travelleres to Al Qaeda and their collaborators in the Democratic Party," and orders the Justice Department to bring racketeering and terrorism charges against the company. MS attemtps to deflect the charges by changing its address to a vacant lot in Spokane and ordering its employees to hide their eyes behind their hands while at work on the Redmond campus. CEO Ballmer flees justice and is caught in a dragnet some months later by British Columbia animal control officers, answering a call about an insane pet-eating bear running amock Fort Nelson in northern British Columbia. There, CEO Ballmer will be shot dead after fatally chewing through the neck of one officer and nearly severing his head from his shoulders. MS finally will collapse as thousands of employees leave, disgusted by the ethics of company convicted of abusive business practices and accused of shoddy engineering, racketeering, terrorism and finally, in the last straw, cannibalism. The company loses most of its board and finally a court appoints a board of receivers to maintain the company until the Windows operating system can be sold to investors. Microsoft XBOX survives as Shatner buys the division, keeping the tradename 'Microsoft' as the receivers could find no one else to buy the name of a company associated with crime, terrorism, insanity and cannibalism. Shatner will market a successful range of pornographic outer-space adventure games under the brand for the XBOX.
I just editorialized on this very subject this morning.
http://businessopinions.blogspot.com/2006/08/microsoft-and-toshiba-partner-on-new.html
Will this have PDA functionality?
Microsoft has filed an application for US trademark on the Zune. See more details here
http://www.zunemax.com/the-zune/zune-us-trademark-application-filed
what a pice of shit. it looks terrible!!! WLAN - for what?? i love my iPod and i'll buy the next generation, too!!!
Does anybody know if Zune uses PortalPlayer chip?
First! I wish they could have shown a side view. Well the tension is building ...
http://www.laptopbatteryclub.com/
My friend purchased one. It is pretty thick. It is also pretty heavy. It is still pretty cool, however, with the features such as Wifi and built in radio. The software on it is quite usable, but it comes with no games at all. It will probably be even cooler when Linux is ported to it.