29 replies to this topic

[Paladin58]

Well, yeah, I finally got ahold of my Zune today, after a month of it sitting on layaway, tormenting me. Since it was a sale day, I picked it up for $200. Anyone else have one, and if so, what do you rate it in terms of ease of use, screen quality, and playback quality from other players that you know of?

Edited by Nology5890, 05 June 2007 - 02:47 AM.

[Ash]

The heck is a Zune?

You have to explain what one is.

[Ash]

B E A utiful. Sounds like you're onto a winner there Nology.

[adummy]

in terms of the way Microsoft is offering songs, its a piece of shit.

but just the Zune itself, it is very good imo. The screen is in HD (a very small version of HD) and videos look great on it. Download a few HD trailers of games and it looked incredible on that small of a screen.

about the magnets: they are very tiny ones on the outside of the earplugs so they hook together and they plugs dont get tangled.

[Ash]

Mate, there is an easier way to supposedly stop headphones getting tangled and that's to have a little slidey thing on the wire that brings the phones together.




And believe me when I say that it doesn't fuckin work. Wires ALWAYS get tangled, no matter WHAT.

[Jeeves]

That "watermelon red" is the most wrong thing I've seen since hot pink hotpants on a beardy

[Ash]

ROFLMAO.


While I genuinely do NOT recommend the software Sony uses WHATSOEVER (I could code better MYSELF), Sony Walkman HD mp3 players are the pinnacle of easy to use. They also look cooler than any iPod. Oh, so they don't have video capacity. Neither will any media player after about, oh, three weeks. Apart from the fact nobody'll use the vid capability, nobody'll have the battery life to make it viable to continue to do so after those three weeks.

Decent battery life and 20 gig capacity make my Sony almost 100% ideal for me. I just wish the software you *had* to use to make it work were as fun and easy as the player itself. It's like iPods. You're stuck with some fucked up useless piece of bloatware to make it work. At least iTunes has a use, and that's batch conversion of music to a sensible file format. CONNECT player has fuck all as far as redeeming features go.

Edited by Paradox, 07 June 2007 - 01:25 AM.

[Paladin58]

Well, then it seems that my new opinion mirrors a lot of you guys': the player itself is great, but the software for it is... not so much. I mean, about the only thing I could ask for is a delete option in the player, so you don't have to connect the player to a PC every time to get rid of bad songs. Edit: And, a half-decent player software that doesn't freeze constantly.

Edited by Nology5890, 12 June 2007 - 07:08 PM.

[narboza22]

While I am an iPod fanboi and do not see any point in the Zune, isn't there some 3rd party firmware or something for the Zune yet? Before I got my iPods, I had some old POS mp3 player that originally did not work with iTunes, but I downloaded something that made it all work. I don't remember what it was because it was a really long time ago.

[MCV]

I wouldn't care what pile of shit ypu placed on my desk. As long as it plays any file I tranfer to it, I'll use it. This means that as long as I can transfer HellMarch.mp3 from the MyMusic folder to the player, I can use it. None of that silly "illegal" stuff since all the stuff today sucks (well, not all. Say 90%)

I like stuff that prevents illegal activity. It creates this boundary between people who steal for convenience and people who steal because they are hackers.

[Ash]

While I do agree with the boundary between, I do wonder how it is you figure that anti-theft devices make that boundary more defined...

[Paladin58]

While on the subject of Zunes still, anyone know of any 3rd-party programs that work with it and blow away MS's initial offerings? I'd look, but I'm off in my search capabilities as of late.

[MCV]

While I do agree with the boundary between, I do wonder how it is you figure that anti-theft devices make that boundary more defined...

Because the people who cannot circumvent the anti-theft devices but want the stuff for free (normal, mundane brainwashed people) cannot get the stuff for free, while the people who know how to circumvent them (intelligent hackers) get their stuff free, making that the boundary between them. This will eventuallt stop the brainwashed people from downloading, so that the only lawbreaker are the hackers, how nature intended it to be.

(I think my mind my be running cynic "be mean and non politically correct" mode now)

[Carnivean]

While I do agree with the boundary between, I do wonder how it is you figure that anti-theft devices make that boundary more defined...

Because the people who cannot circumvent the anti-theft devices but want the stuff for free (normal, mundane brainwashed people) cannot get the stuff for free, while the people who know how to circumvent them (intelligent hackers) get their stuff free, making that the boundary between them. This will eventuallt stop the brainwashed people from downloading, so that the only lawbreaker are the hackers, how nature intended it to be.

(I think my mind my be running cynic "be mean and non politically correct" mode now)

Let me point out some things which exist that will stop your 'anti-theft' working. Also, wanting something for free is brainwashing? I'd say that since over time entertainment has went from being free and simply for everyones enjoyment to a high income money fueled industry that paying for it would be the real brainwashing... oh well.

Torrents
Usenet
Limewire
Rapidshare
Megaupload
Gigashare
etc.

Hackers only indeed.

Edited by Suiseiseki, 12 June 2007 - 08:22 PM.

[MCV]

Well, of cource, at the time, you can get nearly anything for free as long as it is either audio.

But! Normal people were never intended to steal. That would mean that (almost) everybody are criminals, and that would cause the M.A.D. of the Modern Society in the end. Societies are supposed to have a small group of people who commit crimes and are frowned upon. If we have to frown upon all members of society, you will be expelled from society, rather than the people who were frowned upon, since the criminals now are the majority.

End line: We need another Stalin or another Ronald Regan or something. Someone who says "Here is the line. Crossing it it not accepted!" and willing to take action against the criminals.

(Uh, I must have been doing too much homework. I started to write this like an essay draft after I while. I just enter The Zone when writing sometimes.)

[Ash]

Sounds an awful lot like a police/nanny state to me...

Normal people are as likely to steal as anyone else on the planet. Define 'normal'.

While the law makes it break a rule we can choose to break it if we want to. All this gestapo crap removes that choice.


There is a simpler way to stop piracy. And that's to do the complete and total opposite of what companies etc are doing now.

[Carnivean]

Well, of cource, at the time, you can get nearly anything for free as long as it is either audio.

But! Normal people were never intended to steal. That would mean that (almost) everybody are criminals, and that would cause the M.A.D. of the Modern Society in the end. Societies are supposed to have a small group of people who commit crimes and are frowned upon. If we have to frown upon all members of society, you will be expelled from society, rather than the people who were frowned upon, since the criminals now are the majority.

End line: We need another Stalin or another Ronald Regan or something. Someone who says "Here is the line. Crossing it it not accepted!" and willing to take action against the criminals.

(Uh, I must have been doing too much homework. I started to write this like an essay draft after I while. I just enter The Zone when writing sometimes.)

Normal people, eh? Piracy has become main stream as people have started to feel ripped off by prices. All entertainment industries have a constantly increasing profit margin yet their prices decrease very little. Rape, Killing, Property damage and (property) Theft are all still frowned upon and those who do those crimes make up your said Minority. Violation of copyright however, has become a very common thing as the technology to make sharing anything that can be converted to a digitial form has become available.
Your minority is still there, real criminals are still the smallest grouping of people. Pirates aren't grouped with them as the actions they take are no where near as severe. Really in regards to breaching copyright it is much more likely as time goes on that piracy will either stop being seen as a real crime (if companies keep up their DRM using, fan suing bullshit) or it will be reduced when companies start doing something sensible. Like removing proper DRM and lowering prices (£10 a CD? Please, you're making them for 10p a CD.).

Edited by Suiseiseki, 13 June 2007 - 03:58 PM.

[Ash]

Plus I'd be more inclined to buy CDs if I felt that any significant proportion of the profits were going to the actual songwriters.

It doesn't. Of that £10 the artists themselves see £1.

Does that seem right to you?

A fiver, where the artists see maybe 70%, is fair. It would effectively destroy the majority of piracy. Also think about those albums and songs that you can't find in shops. Without the likes of pirates and sharers etc, how would you get hold of unreleaseds, B-sides, old EPs that can't be bought anymore?

Then you get games and consoles. Forty quid for a PC game? SIXTY for one of the new consoles? Americans get it for half that. Does that seem right to you? And what of games you CAN'T buy or find anymore? Should they be lost to time itself once the game company stops making it and the shops stop selling it? You might pick up a copy on eBay but the developers see no money from that. Assuming they saw anything from the extortion the game shop marks up on it. These games would cease to exist.

And what about try-before-you-buy? Demos are often screwed-up versions with more bugs than an exterminator's kill-count.

Copy protection also prevents people backing up. I was FORCED to back up my YR after the inner hole of my YR CD actually corroded and broke away. Thank GOD for the ability to break copy protection or else I'd have to fork out ANOTHER twenty quid, which is unacceptable...

Edited by Paradox, 13 June 2007 - 04:12 PM.

[OmegaBolt]

Plus YR is becoming pretty rare. It's not in any shops I know and can be £40 new on Amazon.

On the subject of iPods; they are just glorified MP3 players with no extra points attached.

[ihateharriers]

i was also the proud owner of a microsoft zune, until it was stolen that is

i was amzed by it - the video was fantastic, and it was perhaps the best way for me to impress the ladies with my artwork

the screen was fantastic, and i never had any problems putting movies or songs on there at all. the Zune media player is nice too (beats the hell outta iTunes) and keeping everything organized is nice and easy. i still wish i had mine, it's just too bad there's so many scumbags out there.

now let's get something straight - i hate microsoft, windows, and bill gates. i have no problem with the zune because i never had any problems with it, unlike most other microsoft products. i will still take a zune before an ipod any day, and i think that if your looking for something truly extraordinary and unlike anything else that anyone has, get a zune. i was one of three people in a school of 1500 with one, and prolly 95% of that 1500 had ipods, so when you show people what that zune could do they were usually amazed at the display quality of the screen as well as how cool it was in general.