PureLegend's Zune review

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Grand Master

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zune014dq5.th.jpg

Picture shows the quick list feature, so you can create playlists on the go

My Zune arrived after 5 days by a 3 day delivery service from a UK eBay seller. Feeling ecstatic, I opened the pack.

zune016si5.th.jpg

The very first thing that struck me was the size of the box. Seriously, it was all compact and eveything, and felt quite heavy. A very nice feel to it, sliding off the top to get inside was a procedure that made you think that the box must be worth a bit on it's own. +1 for the Zune (Y)

I flipped up the "Welcome to the Social" flap, and saw the Zune. My very first thought was "Oh, that's not too bad", thinking back to the media calling the Zune a monstrosity. It's no iPod Nano, but then, it's no Archos either.

The feel of the Zune mimics the box in a way. Rough, quite expensive, and it makes you feel very confident in your purchase.

Doubleshot

MS's big news is the doubleshot of the Zune, where the different colours have a different "glow" to them, in my case, my black one has a calming shot of blue.

It's a very welcome addition, because without it, the player looks rather bland. It's a feature that kinda leaves you wondering how they did it.

However, it doesn't look anywhere near as nice as in the promo material. It doesn't glisten in the light. It doesn't illuminate. The only time you will get anywhere near the supposed "true" doubleshot is by holding it in front of a light or something along those lines.

A nice little feature is the USB cable has a clear doubleshot, making it look better than your average cable. :yes:

Syncing

I didn't plug it in first time, instead, I listened to the pre-loaded stuff, which has a mostly techno feel to it. Once I got bored, I plugged it in, and fired up Zune software.

It asks me to name my Zune. In the end, I call it Celebration. I doubt this act is reversible, as my Zune's name appears to spring up everywhere.

Next it says "Music will be synced automatically. What else do you want to sync?" What? :blink: But I don't want all my music synced!!! I choose pictures, as it's certain to have enough room for them all. I click next, and it starts syncing. I stop it, because it's also doing my music, and search for an option to tweak my syncing. Options seem to be quite scattered, it doesn't feel like options that link come up in one box. I find the option and re-sync, along with a few music files and films. Syncing is fast, around 1 second per song.

Battery

Currently, it has a slither yet. Wait! Now it has half battery. Now it's somewhere in the middle. But now it's half! And...back to the slither.

You get my point. Battery life is great, but the indicator barely counts as an indicator. Poor (N)

Movie playback

The software takes WMV, and will convert MPEG4 just for you. So I give it a WMV to sync, an entire DVD, to be precise. It's a no go. Why? The audio is stored in MP3...great, it doesn't even have total WMV support. What a joke :rolleyes:

Eventually, I did get it working, and put it on there. However, I couldn't find any options about writing a description to appear on the display and such. The options I did find mysteriously vanished :wacko:

But once you get it working...it's awesome. Sharp, crisp, nice. It doesn't seem to support a few colours, though, so you get a few oloured blocks around or on things sometimes. Nothing too bad, though.

Whilst watching, you can jump ahead a few minutes by a small click, or hold to fully fast forward or reverse. You can also bring up film info as a translucent overlay while playing. It will also remember the position you stopped at and did/watched something else for every video on there. Major plus (Y) (Y) :D

It has a 320x240 screen, making it 4:3, and it can also take 640x480 for playing via 360. Films will scale themselves. And, yes, the resolution is fine for looking at subtitles :woot:

Images

Surprisingly, they aren't downscaled, meaning you can zoom in, send to others for PC use, and other things. Very nice, you can order by folder or by date taken. It also does slideshow. There's not much really to say about images, it works as you expect. Oh, and you can set images as your background, a nice touch.

Music

zune009he6.th.jpg

Phone pictured is Sony Ericsson K700i

Belive what they say about album art. Even if you give it high-quality album art, it still wants to use Marketplace's grainy copy. Bleugh :x

A rich sound, it has an equalizer which uses presets only, and it has a nice thumping volume to it. Thanks to the "twist" style of Zune menus, you can find almost any song in seconds.

The headphones themselves have a slight crackle, but not too bad. The magnetic strips are a great little touch, and a nice way to show off your new toy :p

The radio has an "alright" sound, not stunning, enough to get you by. RDS is cool, but manually scanning can be a pain.

Wi-Fi

Other people can see what you're listening to, if you allow it. WiFi, currently, isn't as useless as was said, but it's only good if you know another Zune.

Wi-Fi is a pain to turn on and off though, having to go through the options and everything. I guess MS want you to be "totally connected" or whatever buzzword they are using this week...

Other features

What other features? No calendar. No alarm. No contacts. Heck, not even a clock. It really does scream at you "Firmware upadate here please!" :no:

Conclusion

I am personally happy with the Zune, however, I can see it being a Marmite situation. You might be one who can't stand the lack of extras. You might love the big screen and style.

I'm sold on it :D

Overall 8/10 (Y)(Y)(Y)(Y)(Y)(Y)(Y)(Y)(N)(N)

UPDATED

I took it into school today. Thought I might share with you the responses I got...

80GB iPod-owning ICT teacher

I only know one person in real life who had ever heard of the Zune, but didn't know it was called Zune. So it came of me as a shock to have him come up to me and say "Ah, Is that the Zune?"

I said yes, and he said he'd heard of it, and about the "video on the side" feature, which I then demonstrated. He asked a few questions, I answered them, he then pulled out his iPod and said "If I had the choice, I would go Zune"

1G iPod Nano-owning indie-loving girl

She had been impressed by the posed picture, and was quite eager to see it. Very impressed by the style. UI was like second nature to her, and she commented on how easy it was to get to grips with. Impressed with video clarity, and battery life (which she seemed very interested in) and her jaw dropped when she realised how much 30GB actually was...

MySpace fanatic

Me: It does FM Radio

Her: Really? Does it do Southern FM?

Me: Yes :unsure:

Her: Radio 1?

Me: Yeah...

Her: Juice FM?

Me: Yep...

Her: Awesome! :woot:

Creative Zen Video owner

"Holy **** that screen is huge! :woot: But it's so hard to get it back in it's case..."

2G iPod Nano owner lover

"Wow. That's huge. I could build a house made out of those. What's it called again? Zune? :rofl: "

The shy girl

"Heh, it looks like one of those things you use to test for electric current"

LG Chocolate-owning "gangster"

"**** me, that's incredible. Is that Creative?"

"No, it's Microsoft"

Girl I sit next to

"I can't belive you actually carry the Ghostbusters theme on there :| "

Guy with everything (C2D laptop, AMDx2 with modded case etc...)

"I'd get one, but I've already got a PSP. It does all I need it to do"

I even managed to get one of my best friends to order the white one...then I'll be able to try out the Wi-Fi (Y)

UPDATED #2

I spoke to one of my friends who's got the whole iPod+iMac+iLife thing going on. He had used one, and was not impressed at all, citing that the syncing was dire, it was slow to move through the menus, and it crashed on him twice. Oh, and the fact that it didn't work with his iMac was laughable, in his opinion.

I also showed it to my dad, who favours the iPod because of it's ease of use and it's high support. Naturally, he was skeptical about something which couldn't work with most cars or MP3 Hi-fi sets. I showed him the screen, and he was amazed at the size of it, and that he could definetly see himself watching an entire film on it, unlike the iPod. He laughed when he realised the Zune didn't even have a clock on it.

Edited by PureLegend
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Grand Master

QuarterSwede

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Pretty good review although you may want to explain some things that people who don't have a Zune wouldn't know (ex. magnetic strips?).

When I messed with one at the store I remember thinking it wasn't as bad as I had heard. The menu system works pretty well although it isn't really intuitive.

Grand Master

PL_ Veteran

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The menu system works pretty well although it isn't really intuitive.

Most people I showed it to tried running their finger around it, like an iPod, so it could have been made clearer, maybe with arrows...

I tried it with my 360 today. Video quality is mediocre, but it does what it says. Really slow to load up file lists though :|

Oh yeah, and I tried clearing up some space on it, and next time I synced it deleted everything on it :| Syncing is still a bit of a mystery...why are you syncing that? What's that? Why are you deleting that? :wacko:

Grand Master

Scirwode

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Really nice review (Y). It looks massive next to the K700i though :o.

It does, doesn't it :p ?

Scirwode

Grand Master

PL_ Veteran

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Really nice review (Y). It looks massive next to the K700i though :o.

It looks much more massive, but it's not too much bigger :p If you own or have seen a K700i, it will give you a great idea of the Zune's thickness. They're pretty much the same.

Oh by the way, thanks for all the comments guys! :blush:

Mentor

redeemed

Posted
Posted

Congrats on the Zune & the nice review. It doesn't look too bad after all.

What other features? No calendar. No alarm. No contacts. Heck, not even a clock. It really does scream at you "Firmware upadate here please!"

Check this out: Zune Firmware 1.2 is out! No new features as such, but some things are fixed.

Grand Master

PL_ Veteran

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No new features as such, but some things are fixed.

This is excellent news. If this is a sign of things to come, then Zune FTW! :D

I took it into school today. Thought I might share with you the responses I got...

80GB iPod-owning ICT teacher

I only know one person in real life who had ever heard of the Zune, but didn't know it was called Zune. So it came of me as a shock to have him come up to me and say "Ah, Is that the Zune?"

I said yes, and he said he'd heard of it, and about the "video on the side" feature, which I then demonstrated. He asked a few questions, I answered them, he then pulled out his iPod and said "If I had the choice, I would go Zune"

1G iPod Nano-owning indie-loving girl

She had been impressed by the posed picture, and was quite eager to see it. Very impressed by the style. UI was like second nature to her, and she commented on how easy it was to get to grips with. Impressed with video clarity, and battery life (which she seemed very interested in) and her jaw dropped when she realised how much 30GB actually was...

MySpace fanatic

Me: It does FM Radio

Her: Really? Does it do Southern FM?

Me: Yes :unsure:

Her: Radio 1?

Me: Yeah...

Her: Juice FM?

Me: Yep...

Her: Awesome! :woot:

Creative Zen Video owner

"Holy **** that screen is huge! :woot: But it's so hard to get it back in it's case..."

2G iPod Nano owner lover

"Wow. That's huge. I could build a house made out of those. What's it called again? Zune? :rofl: "

The shy girl

"Heh, it looks like one of those things you use to test for electric current"

LG Chocolate-owning "gangster"

"**** me, that's incredible. Is that Creative?"

"No, it's Microsoft"

Girl I sit next to

"I can't belive you actually carry the Ghostbusters theme on there :| "

Guy with everything (C2D laptop, AMDx2 with modded case etc...)

"I'd get one, but I've already got a PSP. It does all I need it to do"

I even managed to get one of my best friends to order the white one...then I'll be able to try out the Wi-Fi (Y)

I have yet to show it to one of my friends who seems to live his life in the iPod+iMac+iLife ecosystem... :shiftyninja: Anyways, hope those comments above helped a bit. I'll add them to the first post.

Grand Master

PL_ Veteran

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I smell lies... although I have to tell you that was beautifully written.

No lies...just PureTrut:D:D

I guess you have to bear in mind that most people (or at least the ones from my school) take gadgets at surface edge...they won't buy something with an SD slot over a MS slot just so they don't have to buy into a Sony forma:p:p

Veteran

LingeringSoul

Posted
Posted

Good review, dude. I like how you got other opinions on it as well.

Truth be told, it really doesn't look that bad, and I'm a pretty big Apple fan. I wouldn't buy one personally, but I would feel quite comfortable getting one for somebody as a gift.

Grand Master

PL_ Veteran

Posted
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I spoke to one of my friends who's got the whole iPod+iMac+iLife thing going on. He had used one, and was not impressed at all, citing that the syncing was dire, it was slow to move through the menus, and it crashed on him twice. Oh, and the fact that it didn't work with his iMac was laughable, in his opinion.

I also showed it to my dad, who favours the iPod because of it's ease of use and it's high support. Naturally, he was skeptical about something which couldn't work with most cars or MP3 Hi-fi sets. I showed him the screen, and he was amazed at the size of it, and that he could definetly see himself watching an entire film on it, unlike the iPod. He laughed when he realised the Zune didn't even have a clock on it.

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