- Posted by sondreb on September 17, 2008
I have had one of the first versions of Zune for quite some time now and yet again amazed by the updates that Microsoft has thrown towards us users. All their software (and firmware) upgrades so far has been fully supported by the full range of Zune devices. This makes my Zune device a little bit newer every time Microsoft comes with a new update. And yesterday they released version 3.0 which includes some very nice updates, some which I will cover in this post. There are so much new stuff in 3.0 that I don't want to start comparing functionality to iTunes or iPod. In our home we have multiple music players, including iPod Touch, Zune 8GB, Zune 30GB, Creative PMC, JOS-300 and more. Initially I loved the iPod Touch, it was a very nice device for surfing the web, but it's months since I last used it and it's collecting dust.
Zune Desktop Software
This is the equivalent of iTunes from Apple - it's the desktop application that runs on your computer where you can discover, buy and download new music. This is a premiere demonstration of the Windows Presentation Foundation framework for rich applications that Microsoft introduced with .NET Framework 3.0. The UI is very slick and smooth, although the application (and the background encoder for music and videos) does takes up a good bunch of memory and CPU, it's not to bad.
Big new features in 3.0 is the mixview. When you select an album in one of the available views (artists, genres, albums), an action is activate where you can open up a view that displays the selected album in the middle and smoothly fades in related artists and albums. There are different ways something can be related, one is actually "related" and another is "influenced". So you can go from your favorite artists and easily find bands that your own was influenced by - and probably that way discover similar music you might enjoy. I don't use mixview much, because you've always had the option to view all related items through the "related" link on album details.
In the screenshot on the right you see the album view, which is very similar to the view you get if you navigate through the Zune Marketplace and finds an album you don't yet own. There isn't always an easy way to know if you're actually looking at content that is locally on your machine or actually online on the Zune Marketplace. The best indicated is the right side button on individual songs, it says "in collection" on the screenshot which means I have it locally. I'll come back to the significant value of this smooth integration later when I write about the Zune Pass (subscription).
At the bottom right of the application there is a "Now playing" link that will display the current playlist. In previous versions, this "Now playing" UI stayed static, but in 3.0 it actually fades over to displaying band photos and random selections of text that is related to them. I really love this feature and it's perfect for playback on PC or computer when you're having a social gathering, or just pushing back the chair and relaxing to your favorites.
Some of the text it displays in this "screen saver" mode is metadata from the social network behind Zune, which is our next topic.
The Social Zune
When you hit the social link in the Zune desktop software, you get a list of your friends. Being that I actually live in a country where Zune isn't released yet, my friends list is somewhat short still. Be not afraid though! Two of my co-workers recently bought themselves Zune players, they just haven't gotten into "The Social" yet :-)
What you actually see is the Zune Cards for the individuals, sort of like the Xbox Live Gamercards for those who know how those work. You can see the latest played songs (games on Xbox), favorite artists, albums, songs, total playback and something called Badges. Badges is something you receive when you're a faithful listener to your favorite bands. Opening up my friend malfunct's card reveals his recent played songs, which I can then download (if you have a Zune Pass) or purchase. malfunct is a "Bronze Album Power Listener" of Prince of Darkness by Ozzy Osbourne. It's quite obvious who his favorite artist is. From malfunct's profile, I can discover his friends and what music taste they have.
The same social metadata is available on the Zune website, where you can discover the most played albums, artists the last week or all through all time.I can tell you that Linkin Park has been played 560,274 times right now. It'll be interesting to see what that value actually is a week or month or year from now.
So the Zune is very much about the social aspects, using your friends and community to receive impulses to discover new music and bands. You have of course the option to choose what type of information you want to share or not, so don't worry. Let's move on to some more interesting topics...
Zune Pass
This is where things starts getting interesting. The Zune Pass is a subscription to the music on Zune that gives you permission to download (or stream) and play almost everything that exists in the Zune Marketplace. Unfortunately you don't get to download everything, different labels have different policies and practices put in place that might prohibit Microsoft from making everything available (that's what I think, I don't know the official word). Bands like Metallica doesn't allow you to access their content with a Zune Pass, but with Microsoft Points (Zune Points) you can purchase all of their songs.
All of the songs you download (without purchasing) is protected by DRM. If you don't connect your Zune player with the PC for a month, you won't be able to play what you've downloaded. You could consider the Zune Pass like a subscription to XM radio, broadband or television subscription. As long as you pay a monthly fee, you are allowed to do as you please.
DRM? Wait a minute ... you might think, "I don't want no stinking DRM on my computer!". I'm with you on this, and I think DRM as a means to protect consumers against actually utilizing goods you have bought is very evil. Luckily there is a solution to this, you can purchase DRM-free MP3 versions of a lot of albums. But if you're like me, you don't think 192 kbps is a good enough quality. Which is why I mostly use my Zune Pass to download and explore the music universe - and when I find something I enjoy, I go shopping for the CD that is DRM free and I can rip in WMA-Lossless format (or OGG, e.g.). I think this is very important, that when you purchase a CD it has to be open, free and compatible (playable) everywhere. When I some day have kids and they grow up, they can inherit my huge DVD and CD collections and enjoy them as much as I did. If everything I owned was DRMed, they would probably not be able to enjoy any of it.
With 3.0 you get a free 14-days Zune Pass, so make sure you take good use of this and explore what it's all about. I can promise that you will get hooked and whip out your credit card for a subscription when things stops playing. Good luck!
Zune Marketplace
I'm not gonna write to much about the Marketplace, but one of the new features is the Picks which actually is a personalized page that displays recommendations that fits your listening profile. There are two types of recommendations you can subscribe to on the Marketplace and that's the "Channel for You" and the "Songs for You". Channel is a new thing in 3.0 that is a dynamic updated channel that either populates using your profile, or you can pick from some of the existing available channels. Like Pop, Trance, etc.
You have music, videos and podcasts available. I think they will add games soon, since 3.0 actually ships with two games: Hexic and Texas Hold'em. Developing games for the Zune device is done using the XNA Game Studio, which is a .NET based programming environment that you can use to develop games (and applications) for Zune, Xbox 360 and Windows. If you want to develop your own games or install third party games right now, you can sign up to the XNA Creators Club and get access to the tools and means to deploy custom software on both Zune and Xbox 360.
The video section contains a collection of TV series, music videos and other video shows. The podcast collections are nice and I subscribe to a bunch of them, both audio and video podcasts are available. If you don't find your favorite podcast in the Marketplace, there is a button where you can add custom podcasts. If you go to collection/podcasts you will see a button named "add a podcast". This allows you to enter a custom URL to any podcast you want to automatically download.
Zune Devices
I've written all this text and still I have not mentioned anything about the actual device you use to listen to music and videos on the go! Me and my wife has one Zune each, I have the old model and she has one of the flash based ones.
With 3.0, Microsoft launched some new models, one which is a beautiful blue flash memory player and a 120GB black hard drive model. If you're interesting in buying, check out http://www.zune.net/en-US/products/default.htm.
One of the first reactions I've received from people when they see the Zune is the bright and big screen. This was true back before iPhone/iTouch arrived, but I still think it's a great screen compared to the normal iPods. It is decent to watch videos on, but most of the time I listen to music so the screen doesn't really matter that much. What matters is the user interface and how intuitive and smooth is is. I find the iPods to be rather hard to control, it's hard to quickly navigate through the menus and I often use the scroll wheel to go to far. I like the Zune buttons better, it's up, down, left, right or pressed :-)
Don't know if there is much point writing a lengthy post on music, video, pictures and radio experience, but I want to note that the Zune devices all comes with wireless (Wi-Fi) networking. This means you can synchronize your device over the air. Sitting in the living room and get the latest podcasts while the PC is in a different room. You can share music with other people you meet, this happens wirelessly without an wireless access point (sharing between two Zunes').
New in 3.0 is the ability to go online on the Zune Marketplace using the wireless network. You can stream, download and purchase music in the same way as you can on the desktop. You can pick music and put them in a cart, which becomes available within the Zune desktop software. You can download the songs either on your desktop or on the device. Last night I downloaded a new album by Ice Cube, when I then connected the Zune to my PC, the same album became available here. What impressed me most with the Marketplace feature directly on the device, was the ability to listen to and stream whole albums over the wireless network. If I have friends over or I visit my friends, we can search and play music directly on the device. That's love right there!
As I mentioned earlier, 3.0 adds support for games and includes Hexic and Texas Hold'em. I'm looking forward to new titles in the coming months!
Hope you enjoyed my thoughts on the new Zune 3.0, please leave some comments with your own experience or questions! Add me to your friends list, my Zune profile is CareBear1981. Enjoy!