jamesb
Community Manager posts : 123

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# Posted: 1 Aug 2007 02:06:16
the zune, as it is, has spread itself too thin, sure it has a lot of features that appear nifty, but it doesnt do any one of them particularly well.
the ipod on the other hand, has stuck to the KISS (Keep It Simple Stupid) principle, it plays music, and depending on what version you have, it plays movies, and it does both very well and very gracefully.
the key difference is, apple stuck to its main functions, and then relied on third party hardware developers to add functionality to the device, so the user could decide what they wanted.
the zune on the other hand, haphazardly crammed a bunch of features into an obese device and expected it to be an ipod killer when it wasnt good at any of them.
1. zune interface is garbage, a scrolling clickwheel with built in acceleration gets you through a list a whole lot more precisely and quicker than holding a button down. 2. the quality of sound coming from a zune isnt all that great, and again, when playing music or making a "quick list" the interface really sucks, i mean to add a song to the "on the go" playlist on the ipod, you hold down the center button for a few seconds and BAM! done, to do the same on a zune, you have to click on the song, select and click on add to quick list, and then there is the infamous " are you sure screen" that is more of a statement that you have to ok 3. video play on the widescreen is nice, and the interface mostly works for this, but its not great 4. the radio reception sucks, worse than your car or your 20 year old walkman 5. the wifi is a joke, first, there is a noticeable drain in battery life, second, no one else uses it as it is so crippled its basically pointless. 6. the number of manufacturers for Zune accessories is nothing compared to that of the ipod, so when you want a zune accessorie, you have to pay for it, and pay dearly and your selection is very limited, i mean i bought the car kit (car charger + fm transmitter) for $80, and neither is of a high enough quality to be worth it.
so in finishing, if apple were to simply make some slight changes, for the better, to the UI, and then drop it into the current gen ipods and call it 6th gen, i would still trade my zune for one any day
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