The Zune and Vista (a double post)
I don't have enough spending money to be frequenting Woot.com these days, but I visited a few days back when I was gift-hunting and I noticed they were selling 30GB Microsoft Zunes. Curious to see what people were actually saying, I dove into the comments and found gems like these:
I've had my Zune for 10 months now, and I love it. The bigger screen makes watching movies on it more comfortable than an iPod. — someguy184
anyways, say what you will about the zune, it's a really good first attempt. — entity447
wow, I have a Zune and love it. I love it so much more then my old 5.5G iPod that I returned to get it. Its slightly larger size is more then made up for by its larger screen size and overall better interface. This, is a great deal for one. — icanstillcu
Really happy with it; great sound, big screen, offers a subscription service that iTunes doesn't. Not nearly as many accessories out there compared to an iPod, but a nice A/V dock, remote, etc. — dschmoldt
I bought one in January and it was easily the best tech purchase I made this year. It's very easy to use, reliable, and fast. — bwgrady
Any geek can make it work — couple hiccups on the early version software but installs on XP and Vista easily. Not saying Zune's the best, but it's decent and meets my needs. Biggest plus in my book is $14.95 all you can eat music — I download gigs of music (some on the Zune, some on the PC, some I move around to my work machine, etc.) for a flat rate. I think that's much more appealing than pay per song. I will acknowledge that I'm on the hook for that $14.95 a month but to me that's the cost of a CD or two. — crietmann
No, the screen is still quite crisp anyway. Sure, the dot-pitch is worse, but the difference in quality is negligible. If anything, the display on the Zune is more vibrant, and there is less backlight bleed. Video on iPods always seemed like an afterthough with such a tiny screen. Zunes were meant for Video. — cuttlefish
I've got a 30 GB iPod and a 30 GB Zune, and I've gotta say that the Zune blows the iPod out of the water. The battery life is about the same; I haven't noticed a difference. The bigger screen is awesome and the actual software is amazing. I can switch from artists to playlists in one click, and sort through my music noticeably quicker. I also love being able to choose my background picture. The radio feature is great too. I though it was going to be a cheap add-on, but it picks up the stations almost as good as my car. I love it! The file transfer is pretty neat. I received a file containing 65 pictures in under 10 seconds and most songs in about 5. Trust me on this, I was a former iPod lover, but the Zune is in a league of its own. It's a shame Microsoft didn't market the Zune the way it deserved to be. It's an amazing product. Don't hesitate!!!!!!!! — dye187
The thinkg i like most about the Zune is the Zune PC software doesn't force you to log on as a User like ITunes. It allows guest logins and you will not lose your music/videos. For those that have IPODs know what I am talking about when bringing their IPOD to another machine. With the guest login you can hook up to another PC with Zune software and copy music/video to Zune as a guest without wiping your current media off. Big Plus!!!!! Also you can put DIVX AVI filles on it - the Zune software will convert but still - cant do that with Itunes without converting 1st with other software. There is a registry hack to allow for this. As far as screen - much better than the Video IPOD and autmatically goes into Landscape for Videos. So I am posting because my daughter wants a Zune and it is a great price. Lastly you can share wirelessly unprotected/unlicensed versions of MP3/WMA no problem - they will not ask for license. Plus the radio is a great little addition - not bad compared to IPOD. — powerx86
Now I know that's a lot of quotes and I've probably lost half the people reading this post by now, but I just wanted to make it clear that people in the Woot forum are making a lot of positive statements about the Zune… which I find very intriguing. Weren't all the tech journalists, online and off, railing against the Zune when it came out? Didn't they all say that it's a poor effort and a waste of money? It seems to me as though the noise that was coming from the journalists doesn't agree at all with what consumers are saying, and I am guessing there are two reasons for this:
- The people commenting at Woot are just a small minority group that actually likes the Zune, whereas everyone else hates it with a passion.
- Today's tech journalists are out of touch with consumers and have a serious bias toward Apple products.
Now, it's entirely your opinion which of those is right (or if you have a third reason, feel free to share it), but I am really convinced by now that the latter is the case. That's why I don't read any tech/gadget blogs, and the recent fury of iPhone coverage at Engadget reaffirmed my decision. The way I see it, when journalists/columnists/etc. label a new product as lousy and discourage people from buying it, and months later consumers turn around and say it's a great product, there's clearly something wrong with the journalists. I'd say they lost their credibility.
Now, moving on… I want to quote something from the latest post at Joel on Software:
I've been using Vista on my home laptop since it shipped, and can say with some conviction that nobody should be using it as their primary operating system — it simply has no redeeming merits to overcome the compatibility headaches it causes. Whenever anyone asks, my advice is to stay with Windows XP (and to purchase new systems with XP preinstalled). — Even the Office 2007 box has a learning curve
I take it Joel hasn't seen this screen?
And where was Joel when OSX came out? What did he have to say about all the OS9 applications that were completely incompatible with OSX? I can't be bothered to dig down and find out, but I really hope he insisted that people not buy it…
Anyway, I just want to mention that Microsoft gave developers years to test and program on the early versions and betas of Windows Vista… all the software companies had a long time to ensure that their programs would be compatible, and a lot of them just put their hands in their asses and did nothing. Even with all that, Microsoft still provided a way for users to ensure their programs would be compatible with previous versions of Windows, going all the way back to Windows 95. Sure, these compatibility options don't always work, but I doubt that anyone is having as much trouble with program compatibility as Joel is. When I upgraded, almost all my programs continued to work just fine. Plus, just about every program that has been reported as incompatible (a really good list is at IeXbeta) is either an old version or deprecated.
So I wonder, exactly what doesn't work on Windows Vista? What is Joel having so much trouble running? (p.s. redeeming merits can be found at a previous post: A Happy Vista Customer)
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I completely agree, at least about Vista. I think it's absolutely better than XP, and while maybe it might not be worth it for businesses to upgrade, there's no reason to willfully choose XP over Vista. The wifi support alone makes it worth it.
Like goatse style?
Not really… more like they sat down when they did it.
With respect, telling applications to run in compatibility mode doesn't automatically invalidate all the problems with Vista.
Driver support for graphics cards is still a major problem - and anyone doing more than just reading email or cutting code will know how bad general driver support is, still.
Will it get better? Sure. XP took some time to get it right, too. But the product worked, out of the box, from day one. Vista has had some shocking QC issues that should never had made gold.
As for the OS 9 to OS X change over, there is a massive difference. It was an entire platform change, not just a newer kernel, driver model and gui - Vista isn't an entire platform change, no matter what Redmond or others might suggest.
Ran Vista for about a month before I dropped back to XP.
Compatibility mode simply didn't work for certain applications and games. It had trouble recognizing an external hard drive. Warcraft III wouldn't even install.
XP is going smoothly again. I'd missed it.
Brendan, I don't think you realize the inherent contradiction in your statement; Vista was not an entire platform change, OSX was, therefore, Vista did not leave consumer in a harsh transition state where they had to go out and buy all new software, drivers, etc., OSX did.
Phil: Yes, Microsoft attempts to support a range of graphics cards while Apple just makes very specific hardware deals. It's a matter of entirely different business models. I'm not saying that compatibility problems don't exist, and I have probably been lucky since all my essential programs have worked. I guess what I forgot to mention is that telling consumers not to upgrade is a lot like telling programmers not to update their software to be Vista-compatible. Without a Vista userbase, who's going to put pressure on all the software companies to update their programs?
The arguments about Vista only really matter to a tiny minority of people like us - the vast majority of Vista users will be people who have bought a PC or laptop and have it installed on there. They will use it quite happily oblivious to all of this kind of thing. Let's face it, in 5 years time, 90+ % of computers will be running Vista or it's successor like they are running XP today and most of those people won't care or really know about alternatives.
Personally, I've been using the 64-bit Home Premium version since it launched in January. I chose the 64-bit version because it is more secure and tolerates poor applications less - if a driver isn't signed, it's not coming in. The 32-bit version allows you more flexibility. But, it has continued to work perfectly since the day it was installed. The only driver that I couldn't acquire at the time of installing was for my Canon Scanner - but I blame Canon for that because Epson already had Vista drivers out for their scanners at the time.
As for the Zune, a lot of the reviews just stuck the boot in, concentrating on the wireless sharing function. I don't use that function and I don't know anyone who does. For listening to music and especially watching movies, it's a joy to use and much better than the iPod I had before it - even now when I'm using it I feel like I'm enjoying using it rather than it just being a tool to do a job. The battery doesn't seem to be deteriorating in the same way as my iPod battery did either - not yet at least. I only buy MP3's - I don't use any shops that sell DRM'd music so that wasn't a consideration either.