⌦ Why announce now, when you’re not releasing the Zune HD until the fall? –”Honestly, the disclosure timeline was shook up a little bit,” says Brian Seitz, Marketing Manager of Zune. “We’ve been weathering a round of rumors over the last couple of months. In my job particularly it’s painful to not be able to talk to our customer.”
Seitz says Microsoft is building the final firmware, so features are not yet set in stone. But with a full reveal of many of the Zune HD’s video marketplace features and their integration with Xbox Live at E3 next week, it seemed like the time was right.
⌦ Why would someone care about HD Radio? – Besides higher quality audio, it’s all about subchannels. “A country station could have a subchannel of bluegrass or new country,” says Seitz. One of Seitz’s local NPR affiliates switches to BBC broadcasting at 8PM—but runs the full BBC Radio stream on a subchannel 24×7.
⌦ Can you record HD Radio to the Zune HD to listen to later? – Nope, but you can “tag” songs for later purchase, similar to how it works with the current Zune’s FM radio, although more consistent artist and song data from HD Radio stations make it more accurate than before.
⌦ How about that HD video output? – You can do it, but it’ll take a “dock” that Microsoft is manufacturing. (Nothing that Seitz said implied there couldn’t just be a simple cable, too, unless there is some sort of heavy-duty scaler in the dock itself.)
⌦ Will there be Flash support in the web browser? – Despite rumors to the contrary, Flash support is “still being worked out.” The Zune HD’s web browser may not ship with Flash support at all.
⌦ How much storage does the Zune HD have? And will there be more capacious hard drive variants? – The Zune HD will be flash memory-based, but Microsoft hasn’t announced capacities yet. (I’d be shocked if it’s under 32GB.) There aren’t any plans for hard drive-based Zune HDs, nor should we expect any other touchscreen Zune devices before the end of the year. “This will definitely be our hero device for the next cycle.”
⌦ Will there be games? – “We know that people like games on the go,” and it sounds likely that a few casual, one-off games might be available on the Zune HD as are already available on older Zune. But there could be something more in the future: “There’s definitely discussions happening. We would not be very smart if we weren’t exploring those opportunities.”
⌦ So what’s this about Zune on the Xbox, then? – It’s not games—it’s video. “We’re taking over the existing Xbox Live Video Marketplace. That will turn into Zune. And we’re not just taking it over, but we’re adding new features.” What those features will be will have to wait until Microsoft’s E3 keynote. Portable Netflix, perhaps?
‘nother zune. Er, yay?
huh. just when i thought i couldn’t possibly give less of a shit about this thing microsoft does what they do best and underwhelms me yet again.
no offense, microsoft.
So you can listen to HD radio on a device that should be entirely capable of recording it, but you’re disallowed from doing it.
Because everyone’s recording individual songs off the top 40 stations and laboriously, manually tagging, a pervasive practice that must be stopped.
And no one would ever want to record the remainder of an NPR show to listen to later.
Why get this device? I’ll just record FM radio, stream subscription music, watch Media Center recordings, synch music over Wifi (with no computer), and listen to Flash-based web music with my iPod.
“There’s definitely discussions happening. We would not be very smart if we weren’t exploring those opportunities.”
Wait, they’re launching an iPod touch killer, and there aren’t any games?
They’re still “exploring those opportunities?”
How can these guys be more clueless? It’s astonishing. Some of the brightest people work at MS but they can’t seem to get their shit together and get a decent product to market.
@5 I think it’s code for “we can’t tell you what games are coming yet.”
I gave my wife a Zune 8GB for her birthday last year, and she loves it. It’s a very nice device. I actually think it’s better than the comparable iPod.
With that said, Microsoft really needs to get it together when it comes to marketing this device. They’ve done very little to explain why Zune is a good alternative to the iPod, and they’ve made some really boneheaded decisions about pricing and distribution. I get the feeling sometimes that they looked at the iPod, said, “We can do that!”, and decided to try to copy Apple’s business model instead of trying to figure out how they could compete on the basis of unique qualities.
The marketing manager sounds here like he’s holding something back. But it’d better be something pretty darn revolutionary or the Zune is going to see yet another flop.
there should be an 80GB Zune HD
I’m no Microsoft tool, but Zunes are good machines. HD? Meh…
Will it have apps?
How can these guys be more clueless? It’s astonishing. Some of the brightest people work at MS but they can’t seem to get their shit together and get a decent product to market.
Lets see, no built it microphone, no camera, no games, no flash support, and can’t record streamed music. Why would anyone want to waste their hard earned money on this useless paper weight? HD radio who cares?, hey stupid!!! that is why I bought a mp3 player, because I want to listen to my own song selections. Do you really thing I want to hear advertising and/or random songs on my player. Is no wonder apple is dominating. MS needs to get fresh, young blood amongst its ranks.