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October 4, 2007

rivals

Zune 2 released to a resounding… ZZZzzz….

Posted Oct. 4, ’07, 6:25 AM PT by Derik DeLong
Category | Apple » Rivals

Zune 2 It’s becoming very clear to me that Microsoft, despite its initial zeal and excitement about its iPod killer, the Zune, has, like consumers, become bored with it. And yet, some people are still eating it up. There are three new models, the Zune 80 which contains an 80 GB hard drive, the Zune 8 with 8 GB of flash, and finally, the Zune 4 with 4 GB (priced $250, $200, and $150 respectively). That’s right, they have the same prices and storage types and sizes as the iPod nano and classic.

Microsoft is going after Apple’s monstrous marketshare and popularity by simply matching the price. Aggressive. There are a couple new features that make it almost interesting. It has wireless sync (they’re finally putting that wireless to good use). It finally supports MPEG4 and H.264. And podcast support.

I guess there are two big wins if you’re a Zune fan. First, your original Zune can be upgraded to match the latest Zune’s feature set (I envy that a bit). Second, the Zune store is going all DRM free (ok, right about now, I’m beginning to believe those that theorized the record companies wanted to sabotage iTunes’ marketplace superiority).

Some things are constant. There’s no Mac support (shocker). Microsoft seems to be getting a lot of mileage out of some rather minor updates to a mediocre product.


4 Comments

axel said:

No!!!!
The ditched the brown version.

I serious, it was the only one of them who look good

October 4, 2007 7:23 AM
andrew said:

Well if people make a big deal about it, and apple adds wireless sync, even if just to the iphone/touch, it would all be worth it.

October 4, 2007 7:57 AM
Gatesbasher Author Profile Page said:

From what I read, though, to use the wireless sync, you have to be plugged into the AC adapter, so it's only wireless if you're wired!

October 4, 2007 9:08 PM
Stu said:

Apple's customer support is so bad these days, and their ipods are so poorly made, Microsoft has an opportunity to take away some market share.

November 13, 2007 6:03 PM

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