Official Pink Zune gets 100,000 unit production run
By Conrad Quilty-Harper 
posted Apr 7th 2007 11:10AM
posted Apr 7th 2007 11:10AM
Yes, that light pink rectangle you're looking at is an official shot of the Pink Zune, in all its magnenta-ish glory. We all knew it was coming -- and we've seen the rather more garish 100-unit hot pink Zune before -- so this isn't exactly the biggest news 'round these parts. No, if Microsoft really wanted to impress us, they'd take their minds off planning a targeted, 100,000 unit production run of pink cases and set their mind to really fixing the Zune. One of the fixes is sorta down already, but there's at least four more things that we think need to change in order for the social to get more members. Last time we checked, a Zune in a lighter shade of pink wasn't one of them, and neither was one in red. 
really a slow news day, eh, Engadget? :)
adding colour wouldn't save a player. Ditching the DRM and go with maybe even the PlayforSure DRM would.
oh, guess how many Zunes are sold in Canada? 0! Don't trade the Canadian people like this. those 11 people who actually want one is out in the cold.
Of course it's a slow news day. First, it's Saturday. Second, it's the day before a major Christian holiday.
UGLY!!!!
I dont mind a black zune, but pink is just terrible!
If the Zune had all the features of the new Sansa player from the start it would've destroyed the Ipod but noooooo, Microsoft was just counting on the 3 inch screen to sell these.
Yeah! Easter Egg Hunt colour for the Zune on Easter Weekend. Brilliant!
;)
BTW...where is my Pink K5 I was promised??? Samsung...MS just kicked your ass.
You can spray paint a turd any color you like, but nobody is going to want to put it in their pocket.
Microsoft, this has got to be one of those attention-grabber cry for help sorta things. Pink? No way, man. This will sell nothing. Ditch DRM. Or add PlaysForSure. And to think, I actually thought about getting one of these...what was I thinking?
I'm giving some serious thought to buying a pink zune.
I have a pink DS, and if I could I would've bought my Wii, and XBOX 360 in pink. Then put Hello Kitty stickers on everything.
Nobody is going to steal something that's pink and has a hello kitty sticker on it. They'll think they're stealing from an 11 year old girl.
I think this is cool. I'm not a Zune owner, but have been wanting a pink Sonos controller for my daughter.
For something that is soooo 'unsellable'. Out of 6 girls that have seen this, 6 have said they 'want one NOW'
moje, isn't there a rule banning people from surveying at elementary school? ;)
100,000 production run. wow, they actually plan to sell them all? :)
Zune should target a bit more tech-savvy people who know how to network and sharing songs, not pre-teens who loves anything pink.
Why?Theres a huge market for people who want pink things.
moje, isn't there a rule banning people from surveying at elementary school? ;)
100,000 production run. wow, they actually plan to sell them all? :)
Zune should target a bit more tech-savvy people who know how to network and sharing songs, not pre-teens who love anything pink.
Formula for a Zune post on Engadget.
Engadget reports Zune story. Fill it with the most negative slant possible.
5 out of the first six post are typical fanboys that will:
Wonder why anyone would buy one.
Say that only 4 people would ever get one.
Call it a failure. (The ironic thing is that more people will buy a Zune than an Apple TV, but I can assure you that they will never call the Apple TV a "failure")
Say it is ugly.
Use the word "turd".
In other words they prove how retarded Apple users have become.
God... People like you just never get tired of running off at the mouth, do you?
Did you even READ the Engadget reviews on Apple TV? If you did, you'd remember how they ended off saying that while it's a great product, it's not worth the money they're asking for it.
While the world was off celebrating Apple and EMI's decision to sell DRM-free music, Engadget decided to call it for what it is, with Ryan writing a great piece on how great a marketing strategy it is, and how it's not the saving grace that people were hailing it for.
Before you go flaming, get your facts straight. And if you can't do that, then shut the fuck up and stop reading Engadget. Nobody's forcing you. I'm tired of people bashing Engadget for doing their jobs.
"The ironic thing is that more people will buy a Zune than an Apple TV, but I can assure you that they will never call the Apple TV a "failure"."
Totally different markets. Compare the DAP market to the set top box market. The standards for success and failure are measured on a different scale.
Besides, It's all about WMA for Microsoft. In general they don't like to get into the hardware market. They would much rather create an industry standard and collect license fees. They didn't want to make players in the first place, but their 'plays for sure' system wasn't catching on and they had to act. This is their 2nd attempt to break into the digital audio market and it's slow going. Add to that the fact that a totally DRM-free marketplace could be on the horizon and it doesn't look good for WMA.
Engadget, of all places, should know that success in the MP3 player market isn't determined by quality of player but by the popularity among sheeple. Look at the iPod, for a long time it hasn't been even in the top 5 of MP3 players as far as quality or features are concerned yet it continues its market dominance due mostly to the fact that it is seen as the only MP3 player. The Zune could bring world peace to the market and it still wouldn't matter in the eyes of the people who buy MP3 players, but light pink sure goes a long way to match their pink Puma shoes, pink handbag, or frat boy pink shirt.
Engadget should know that, or Microsoft should know that? Because MS could have saved themselves a lot of trouble if you had been in those meetings. Besides, if what you say is correct, why isn't Sony dominating the video game market, or the portable audio market?
Your post sounds like sour grapes to me.
Popularity is certainly a factor, but it's not the only one, and I don't agree with the idea that the iPod continues to be successful SOLELY because of its existing popularity. You said the iPods are no longer in the top 5 in quality or features, but what do you base this on? What are the top 5 mp3 players (hell, even the top 5 in each category of hard-drive based mp3 players and flash-based mp3 players) in quality currently, and why are they better in quality than any iPod model?
Re: features; this has been a complaint about the iPod for a long time. People can't seem to figure out why "Brand [Fill in the blank] MP3 Player" isn't completely dominating the market, even though it has all sorts of features the iPod doesn't. The idea here seems to be that people buy an mp3 player in order to have the most features possible or that that is the primary criteria in a music player.
But realistically, that isn't the case for a lot of people. Sure, as tech geeks who read Engadget, we like the idea of gadgets that do all sorts of cool things, but this isn't necessarily something that applies in the music player market.
What is ultimately important with a music player is that it does a good job of its primary function; playing music. And that comes down to having a good interface for managing music on the player, and for navigating through it and playing it while you're using the player. One of the reasons a lot of people continue buying iPods is because they do like the iPod's interface itself, and the iPod/iTunes integration.
This is something I think that Microsoft did realize when they were doing the Zune, which is why they did change the emphasis to tying everything together into a single hardware/software environment.
I think the fact that there are people like yourself who still do not seem to understand why people keep buying iPods, and think that it is solely because of their popularity, etc. are probably contributing to the problem that other music player manufacturers still haven't been able to really put out a product that really does fundamentally beat it.
But some companies do understand it; Microsoft clearly does. And I think Samsung and Sansa both understand it as well, and have shown it in some of their product updates and focuses.
The big question I think is what Apple has in store for the future. Will the iPod as it currently as continue to evolve from its basic form factor and functionality (scrollwheel-based interface on the iPod and Nano), or will the next iPod borrow the same UI and hardware that we've seen in the iPhone? At this point I'm not sure. But it shows that Apple is continuing to think about these things, rather than just resting on their laurels despite the success of the product they have made, and the so far failure of any company to really put out a product that can really take people's attention away from the iPod.
Honestly that's my biggest problem with the Zune. It's just that so much of it seems to be about "matching" the iPod, rather than creating something that totally blows people away and is a clear revolution over the existing iPod concept. I mean, I was really expecting when Microsoft finally unveiled the Zune, that it would be like a real leap forward in music playing (like what was demonstrated with the music playing aspect of the iPhone a few months later), rather than just a device that fit into the current iPod-way of doing things (right down to Microsoft shutting out other stores and making it all tie into a specific store).
This idea of everyone being sheep, nobody knowing about other products, etc, comes up all the time by left-wing anti-corporate elitist wankers who think they are "free thinkers".
iPod dominates because it is better looking than all the other players, that is it.
We sell a good number of Pink silicone and crystal cases at www.zuneone.net so I expect they will have no trouble moving these Pink Zunes.
A good number being all 12 of your inventory...?
sorry, couldnt resist....
Ignore me man, love your zune! it is yours, and you must have seen something in it. Afterall, I am yet to see a mom that thinks her son/daughter is ugly or bad! Love covers all imperfections baby! The pink zune will sell over a millions units... yeah!!!!
Great! Now MS has one in the pink and one in the stink!
Re...4 out of 5 of the first posters....
Yeah! I must be the 1 out of 5.
>Yeah! I must be the 1 out of 5.
I wonder, how many people here who actually HAVE a Zune... hand up!!!
yeah, exactly Bryant.
it's what happened when you deliver a product with DRM that nobody want, in a package that nobody cares for.
Get 'em while they last!
The price has dropped too - Target had them for $228 last week, and amazon is $219. If you work for a retailer you can get one on expertzone for ~210 with tax and shipping.
The ironic thing is that more people will buy a Zune than an Apple TV, but I can assure you that they will never call the Apple TV a "failure
--
Yeah right. More people bought the AppleTV in the first week of release than the Zune. Right now there are about 500,000 geeks trying to figure out how to play doom with the Apple Remote.
Thanks. But I would rather not take the word of an Apple user when it comes to most things. You guys have too much of a tendency to exaggerate and frankly sometimes you guys jut lie.
So no, there aren't 500,000 people that bought an Apple TV. If it was it would have been splashed on the front page of this site, and another site that shall remain nameless, multiple times with many exclamation points.
Well, at least M$ didn't copy the iPod nano's pinkish shade, eh? But it doesn't fit with the other players.
That zune looks icky
Zunes are for Dorks®!
What I don't think anyone realizes is that Microsoft wasn't trying to come out with "THE iPod killer". Microsoft put out the Zune to create a player for people either getting into the portable audio market, or someone looking for an alternative to their old mp3 players. I know that there are those few people that say "HAHHAHA!11 Lawl I no taht teh zoone wil nvr beet teh Ipod!!!1" But what both Microsoft and Apple know is that the iPod is what is keeping Apple alive. The Zune is just a way for Microsoft to experiment in the Portable Media market. Look at Zuneinsider.com, the actual team that works on the Zune reads all of the comments left, and will respond to them. As far as I know, Apple doesn't do the same.
If microsoft had wanted to completely destroy the iPod, the Zune wouldn't be out yet. Microsoft would have worked on it until they were sure it was EXACTLY what they wanted to sell. The Zune team uses ZuneInsider to get feedback on what is working, and what isn't working with their product.
I have my own set of complaints, and things I'd like to see for the future of the Zune, and I know that the Zune team hears them. I have quite a few complaints about the iPod too, but I don't nearly have as many about the Zune.
What I'd like to see happen is people actually use the Zune. Go to Target, find the Kiosk and just use it. As soon as you get past the fact of "Eww it's brown!" and "Oh Em Gee! It's huge!" actually try to use it. After you use it then you can actually post legitimate arguments, rather than "You can spray paint a turd any color you like, but nobody is going to want to put it in their pocket." Then, maybe, I'd actually understand what people don't like about it.
I'm just sick of comments that are not justified, such as "It's a turd". Brown Zune: IT'S A COLOR. Guess what, there are other choices, Get a black or White Zune (or Pink :)) if you don't like it. They are just trying to cater to different tastes.
"Zuneinsider.com, the actual team that works on the Zune reads all of the comments left, and will respond to them."
That is easy to do when you have less than 10 percent market share. Just kidding. Seriously though, I do not own an ipod, my default dap is my treo 700wx (microsoft) but I will say this, microsoft missed the mark here... big time. You do not go after a behemoth like the ipod with a product that YOU have to sell its strengths. Its virtues should be apparent from the eyeball test. The zune would have been a great addition to an evenly split or fragmented market. But the way the market was and is Microsoft needed a difference maker. Imagine, the iphone, smaller with a microsoft logo, touchscreen and kick ass interface. Game over! Sadly, we have a fatter ipod wannabe that needs foot soidiers to go to blog sites and scream how nice it is. Face it, the zune is a bad product. Telling us its functions and superhuman strength is old, we have been hearing that from creative and iriver owners for years now, it didnt improve their sales numbers. Microsoft come with it or dont come at all. Heck, I am more likely to buy this Asian knockoff
http://cmt21.manufacturer.globalsources.com/si/6008802695760/pdtl/Flash-MP3/1002896812/11.6mm-Slim-MP3-Player.htm
It has all most of the functions of the zune but not as bulky or ugly.
Ok, lowest rank me you over-sensitive zune owners.... hahaha
My brother has a Zune, and I have an iPod. I have to be a lot more careful with my iPod than he does with a Zune. Personally, I'd much rather have a Zune, they're a lot better. A lot of people will eventually come to realize this, and a lot of girls will go for a Pink Zune. I know I would.
Apple only made 100,000 Apple TVs in the first run (from what I've read)...so .5 million sold...not so much.
My god, that's horrendous.
>Why?Theres a huge market for people who want pink things.
True, but Pink itself going to make people buy a sub-par product?? even if I'm religiously into one colour (thank god I'm not), I wouldn't go for Zune, gigabeat and even the Archos 404 are MUCH better alternatives to this. (funny, Zune is base on gigabeat design).
drop the DRM, Microsoft, and open up your marketplace. maybe then you will salvage some of the loss and humiliation (fairly or unfairly) suffered with Zune.
I've used both. Not only is the Zune a sturdier player (try dropping both on a oncrete floor if you don't believe me), but the sound quality out of the Zune is better too.
Sturdy and good sound.
That's really all I look for in a DAP.
And by "oncrete", of course I mean "concrete".
@Bryan
So according to you, everyone who does not like the Zune is an Apple Fanboy...okay.
Zune is a four-month old product, and will evolve as much as the iPod has since its release. (Why else market so heavily to young adults who haven't yet "grown into" a specific music player? Zune hopes to grow with that generation.)
And don't doubt that Microsoft will dump enough money into the product to bring it up to a competitive level. Any NPR fan can appreciate the FM radio, for example, and Sansa's Connect is brilliant enough that I wouldn't put it past MS to release something remarkably similar for its flash-based Zune. As for the pink Zune, its attractive and reaches out to a different crowd. Why people take this stuff so personally is beyond me -- if the DRM-free days are truly coming, then maybe this conversation can die a quiet death, or at least get downgraded enough to return to levels of normalcy.
I picked up a Zune in December and love the thing. But that isn't to say MS shouldn't add a video catalog and improve the overall software experience. And Apple should consider regaining FM users who think beyond Top 40 radio.
"Call it a failure. (The ironic thing is that more people will buy a Zune than an Apple TV, but I can assure you that they will never call the Apple TV a "failure")"
Huh? I said I liked the zune. I just dont like the color pink. I hate apple, I hate ipods, and I think the appletv is overhiped. I WANT the zune to succeed. I did NOT call it a failure.
"So no, there aren't 500,000 people that bought an Apple TV. If it was it would have been splashed on the front page of this site, and another site that shall remain nameless, multiple times with many exclamation points."
Umm, who? Which sites?
Apple only releases numbers when they want to, we won't know until they want to. And based on (actually) understanding Apple, past annoucnements and their own understanding that half a million is not significant, they wouldn't release a number unless it was a million.
The AppleTV was the first product to outsell the iPod at Apple for 3 years, and it does so for 4 weeks. It remains a decent seller.
I will predict that it reaches 1 million units before the Zune. It is only a prediction but I do so quite comfortably.
Why? Zune is hoping these 2 colors (presumably both at 100,000) will get them over the hump of their own prediction of 1 million by June. That's, say,
"What I don't think anyone realizes is that Microsoft wasn't trying to come out with "THE iPod killer"."
Yeah, I've been hearing this PR spin since the day Zune came out. Since when does Microsoft do ANYTHING where the goal isn't to completely decimate the competition? You're either naive, or so beholden to Microsoft that you can't see the forest for the trees.
"If microsoft had wanted to completely destroy the iPod, the Zune wouldn't be out yet."
Ah, the old "the product sucks because they WANTED it to suck" line. I'm sure a mediocre product with an almost non-existent response from the marketplace was part of Microsoft's ultimate strategy. If so, they hit the bulls eye!
Wow, the MS apologists are really getting desperate these days.
As for a pink Zune, it's obviously targeted to the female demographic. And female buyers are typically more attracted to style (what's "en vogue") and ease-of-use than tech specs. In other words, they'll continue to buy iPods. Coloring a Zune pink is just wailing in the wilderness.
And don't doubt that Microsoft will dump enough money into the product to bring it up to a competitive level
--
The two have nothing to do with each other. MS is evil. And they never come out with original ideas.
I'm guessing this thing will follow the Xbox model and be profitable...never.
"MS is evil. And they never come out with original ideas."
And Apple users keep proving how completely clueless and bizarre they are.
A philosophy of hate isn't going to sell people to your products.
"Apple only releases numbers when they want to, we won't know until they want to. And based on (actually) understanding Apple, past annoucnements and their own understanding that half a million is not significant, they wouldn't release a number unless it was a million."
After you post this, you actually have the gall to post this...
"The AppleTV was the first product to outsell the iPod at Apple for 3 years, and it does so for 4 weeks. It remains a decent seller."
You just posted that you have no idea what Apple has sold, but you then say that it is selling faster than the iPod?
Like I said, you Apple users have too much of a tendency to either exaggerate or just flat out lie.
"You just posted that you have no idea what Apple has sold, but you then say that it is selling faster than the iPod?"
Posting a sales benchmark of units sold is a whole lot different than looking at a Top Sellers list on their store, is it not?
I can see what sells best at Amazon, that does not tell me how many units sold.
"Like I said, you Apple users have too much of a tendency to either exaggerate or just flat out lie. "
I neither exaggerated or lied. You have too much of a tendency to be ignorant and illogical.
ok, sfw for the colour,, is it anygood? from the feedback here,, no! so what should i buy? from all i can find,, microsoft;crap, sony;crap(mine died, lost 3000tracks :'( & i'm travelling) apple;crap, itunes store,,-my lord,, what a con!,,, so,, whats worth buying,, why isnt someone putting together a mp3 that the world will be happy with?
i do like the idea of pink,, who is gunna steal one,, but look at it this way,, in a years time, when its obsolete, still pink, & still on the self,, it should be a cheap buy.
ask any average person on the street what the hell a gigabeat is and they wont have a clue. they know what ipods are, and they are more likely to know what a zune is that the other brands. this is who MS wants to sell to- the average person, not the people that read a million reviews online and know all the little niche and quirky products.
the great majority of buyers are not techie and will not really care too much beyond 1) who makes it 2)what does it look like (color/size/display/etc) 3)does it play my music easily and well. they know its MS and they know it will play music well, so really they will be buying on looks and appeal. MS cant change the whole form factor but they can give more colors to appeal to more. people will buy more ipods because in their minds the apple fits the criteria better, but the zune will eventually catch on once they see a few of them in person.
no not all people will get one, i didnt-i personally think its too big..and i already have 2 ipods, but to say its going to completely fail just because you think brown is an ugly color and you hate MS shows why you arent in microsofts marketing and development team (and no, its not because you dont WANT to be in it, its because you cant)
I love how whenever there is a post about the Zune, every post that could conceivably be construed as negative towards either the Zune or Microsoft immediately gets tagged as low ranked. And anything positive is highly ranked.
Apparently, we now know how Microsoft is spending some of it's marketing dollars. Paying people to track blogs... what do they call it? Astroturfing?
Good call. I was going to say exactly the same thing.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zune#Criticism
Zune sales HAVE been slow. And pink is supposed to correct that? I guess we'll see.
Earlier today on Amazon the black Zune was ranked 55th in sales, well below a variety of iPods and a couple of Sandisks.
The brown Zune was ranked 321st while the white stood at 414th. The pink is $40 bucks more and, well... pink with a big black circle at the bottom.
Source:
http://www.jangle.net/Electronics/MP3-Players/Most-Popular/Page-1/=Search/Save.aspx
http://www.jangle.net/0/All/Most-Popular/Page-1/Zune=Search/Save.aspx
Of the 12 girls that come by my desk everyday They all said they would not buy it, and that it looks really ugly and what is that big black dot in the middle...why isn't it white?
I hate how everyone that's anti-Zune always uses DRM against it. Like it's DRM is more evil than Apple's DRM. And everyone thinks that MS is dropping support of PlaysForSure. People have tested it out and Zune supports PlayForSure playback but you have to sync it through WMP. MS just doesn't advertise it because they'd rather you buy from Zune Marketplace.
By the way, Apple iTunes isn't the only market that has made a deal with EMI to provide DRM-free music. And I'm sure Zune Marketplace will serve DRM-free WMA. WMA isn't ALL about DRM, I rip all my CDs to WMA because it just sounds better than MP3. The Zune software or hardware do not automatically add DRM to DRM-free songs. Zune also supports AAC, so the DRM-free songs from iTunes will work on it, too.
People are so ignorant. DRM isn't even a factor or a short coming of the Zune, so everyone should shut up about that. If you want to compare it to other DAPs, go ahead and compare it's support of formats, it's ease of use, it's design, and then you can pick the best for you. DRM is a stupid argument. So sick of all of you who are so cliche about that.
"3plays-or-3days" digital rights restrictions are an issue. The wi-fi feature is basically useless because of it.
Not being able to use your device in disk mode is a very basic issue, too. No-name Chinese knock-offs can even do that.
RIAA-approved devices are generally not what people want.
"3-plays or 3-days" doesn't add DRM to files. It doesn't make the wi-fi useless. What makes it useless is the lack of people to swap stuff with. Free trading is only going to help piracy and they're trying not to. This does not seem like a short coming to me.
The rest of the stuff you mention I will agree with are features that it is lacking.
I have found the zune to be one of the easiest players to use, and like its interface easier to navigate than the iPod or Creative Zen's interface (which are pretty much the same).
Some one else mentioned earlier that so many people stick to the iPod because it's interface is so easy to use. The reason people stick with the iPod is because EVERYONE has one, and it's like the only thing people know about.
"Everyone know iPod mini is for girls!"
My sister (like most girls I hang out with) has smaller hands.
The Zune is larger than an 80GB iPod, blockier, and isn't deemed as easy to use and "hip" as Apple's product.
30gigs doesn't matter when most girls (who would be prone to pink accessorizing) keep only the more current songs on their player. And when it's too big to fit your smaller purses. And men, please know that most women often use a purse that is too small to fit a Zune when said purse is occupied by cell phone, compact, keys, wallet, etc. Maybe not in their daily life, but definitely if their gonna go out on the town. Where they most likely would share their new music with friend.
So please tell me, which one is a girl more likely to buy. A pink Zune, or a cheaper, smaller, cooler, pink nano?
I don't wanna sound like I dislike the Zune, but just because you drop a pink product doesn't mean girls will buy it. There are other factors besides "ooooh, that'll match my Pumas!"
"but definitely if their gonna go out on the town" I meant "they're". Rookie mistake.
"Where they most likely would share their new music with friend." friends*
Really Bob? To be honest, most of the people I know who feel that way are the polar opposite of the psychographic market than what you stated.
I'm not saying you're wrong. It just seems that it's more multidimensional than either of us previously thought.
kingofwale, Most of the target audience for ALL MP3 players are teens. Infact I don't think that any MP3 player company even cares about the tech savy people. We're only about... 10% of the market? most consumers are mentally retarded when it comes to technology, they just want what they believe is new. Take the DS, as an example. To the consumers it's something completely new. But to people like me, it's just a really dumbed down PDA with the screen cut in half, and a far slower processor, no Blutooth, a/b/g wifi etc.
The point is, that the pink zune will sell, and quite well, if not better than any other zune, and most people who will be owning it, will be teens.
one word... YUCK! This thing sux whatever colour it is!
>kingofwale, Most of the target audience for ALL MP3 players are teens
fact check, I AM a teen myself. What drives Teen's purchasing power isn't pink or any other colour, it's peer-pressure.
that is exactly why Apple is doing so well and will continue to do so well, they've captured that market. unless they do something horribly wrong, they won't lose it until some other company does something WAY cooler.. (maybe wireless link to facebook/myspace)
Zune has what? 2% of market share and yet to sell over 1 million units. when you're being outsold by even PS3, you KNOW you're in big trouble.
I wasn't really planning on getting a Zune, but this locks it:
"Not being able to use your device in disk mode is a very basic issue, too."
Why would they not let you use the Zune as a USB hard drive? That is one of the best features of the iPod... I use my iPod as a disk drive to move files between work & home almost daily. I also have portable copies of Firefox, Putty SSH, Filezilla (FTP program), and Thunderbird (email) on it... I can launch those from any Windows machine that has a USB port and have my most-used programs with all my settings already in there. Really handy, and now I don't have to lug a laptop on a trip just so on the off chance work needs me to SSH in and fix something....
Great feature, this should be standard on all DAPs.
@Bryan Flocks
That is so true. Good job.
@Leonard Nimrod
I guess that that utterly witty post proved you really ARE a nimrod. Can you honestly not think of anything better to argue about the zune than the brown color? I'm guessing you're one of those racist Apple users.
@kingofwale
Your first post was almost spot on. M$ SHOULD market to people that actually know what they're doing when they sit down at a computer (and by know what they're doing, I mean they can console into a Cisco router and configure networks, not log in to AIM) instead of marketing toward n00bs and girls who just buy pink stuff because they think it's cool. But your second post reeked of disinformation. I have a Zune. It is a great piece of hardware compared to the 2G 2ndGen iPod Nano that I had before. The only thing wrong with the Zune is the software. And what does DRM have to do with anything? If it bothers you that bad that your music has DRM on it, then use the analog hole to get rid of it.
@Zadilo
"What is ultimately important with a music player is that it does a good job of its primary function; playing music. And that comes down to having a good interface for managing music on the player, and for navigating through it and playing it while you're using the player. One of the reasons a lot of people continue buying iPods is because they do like the iPod's interface itself, and the iPod/iTunes integration."
1. You contradicted yourself by saying that people base how good an mp3 player is by it's management of music, then saying that people like the iPod because it integrates with iTunes. That didn't make any sense.
especially because:
2. The Zune's interface for music management is basically the same as the iPod. It has different menus, but the concept is nearly exactly the same. Take a look at the structure
Zune:
Music>Artist>Album>Song
Video>Video Titles
Pictures>Folder>Picture
iPod:
Music>Artist>Album>Song
Video>Video Titles
Pictures>Folder>Picture
They are exactly the same, so if you complain about one, you're complaining about the other.
"Honestly that's my biggest problem with the Zune. It's just that so much of it seems to be about "matching" the iPod..."
Not sure how it matches the iPod when it took Apple 5 revisions to get video to play on the iPod, and Microsoft got it right on the first try, if you ask me, Microsoft made more progress by simply RELEASING the Zune than Apple has all this time that it's been UPGRADING the iPod. If M$ can do that in ONE REVISION, I can almost guarantee that there will be far more than the iPod when the next revision of the two products comes out. And here's another way that the Zune isn't matching the iPod. The Zune has WiFi. iPod doesn't. The Zune has radio BUILT IN. The iPod needs an extra accessory for that function. The output resolution of the Zune is higher than the output of the iPod when using the TV Out feature. It doesn't have that annoying scroll wheel (I thought it was cool for a while, but it's really annoying after using a device that you can navigate using simple button presses.) Of course the Zune's screen is FAR bigger than the iPod's. And the Zune has a much more attractive appearance than the iPod's, which has stayed almost EXACTLY the same since the iPod came out. At least the Zune's appearance stands out a lot more than the iPod so that if Microsoft decides to do the same and keep it for four more revisions, it won't look like a cheap rushed effort like the iPod. The iPod (HDD versions) has a thin aluminum casing for the back of the device (much like the MacBook product line) that is easily scratched and dented, sometimes causing VERY costly damage to the unit if it is dropped.
I'm tired of typing so I'm just gonna end it there, but basically, the Zune is far better than the iPod, but the software needs to be better. Other than that, you can't attack the Zune without attacking the iPod.