Zune HD (P)review
While listening to the gdgt podcast on my way to work this morning, Peter and Ryan mentioned some of the companies that would have a presence at their launch party on Tuesday. I found it interesting that so many industry heavies were showing up, but not really surprising. What did surprise me is that they said there would be a demo of the Zune HD available.
When it was announced a few months ago, the gadget world got rather frothy at the mouth with some of the details that were officially/unofficially announced. Some of the specs might be:
- 16:9 display
- OLED screen
- HDMI output at 720p
- Integration with Xbox 360
- Some Windows Mobile 7 features
- Interoperability with Windows 7 OS
- 4, 8, 16, and 32 gigabyte versions
- Full touch screen
- WiFi
Some of that stuff sounds a lot like the iPod Touch to me. Then again, many PMP devices have similar specs. There are a few features that I do find interesting, though.
HDMI output – A non proprietary solution to getting video off your device and onto your television. I can get an HDMI cable for about $5, whereas the TVOUT cable options from Apple cost a lot more than that, and you need a 4-hour course to figure out which one works with which device at which resolution. I can’t imagine every future Zune HD owner, or even a majority of them, are interested in watching ripped/downloaded content from their PMP to their TV, but it could come in handy for a number of us. The 720p is also nice, but I’m sure everyone will be offering that by the end of the year. (*Note – gdgt launch party was last night and there is a Zune HD dock that appears to use HDMI as the output, so you won’t be able to connect directly to the device via HDMI, you’ll have to buy their propietary solution. Why am I not surprised?)
Integration with Xbox 360 – I’m still giddy with my 360 that I bought a few weeks ago. If I were able to use a Zune HD as a backup for my profile for use on other 360s, that would be nice. Settings, game save points, and maybe even the DLC that I get on there through Live Marketplace, if able to be transferred to the Zune HD, would also be excellent. Then I wouldn’t have to have someone at my house in order to show them the trailer for Madden 10 I downloaded the night before.
WiFi – Why am I interested in this? Because I’m still waiting for proper synchronisation between my PMP (iPhone) and my PC. My biggest hangup with this is that I subscribe to 8 or 9 podcasts, half of which update daily. I hate having to plug in my iPhone every morning to make sure I’ve got the most recent ones. If the Zune HD can offer full sync features via WiFi and Zune Marketplace, that would be sweet.
Windows Mobile 7 Features – We all know that Microsoft desperately wants iPhone type marketshare and reputation. Windows Phone, as it’s now called, looks like it will continue to be offered on a glut of phones rather than having just a small number of well thought out devices (or maybe even just one). However, if the Zune HD interface/OS eventually morphs itself into a media and messaging central, Microsoft might be able to dig into that marketshare a little bit. They’ve been talking about WinMo 7 for over two years now, and it’s still just a glimmer on the horizon, but maybe this Zune stuff has been the holdup. If the groups are all talking and working together, maybe Ballmer can rally the troops to putting together a desirable product and take the hype away from Android and snatch a few customers back. AT&T certainly isn’t helping Apple’s cause. Even I am considering jumping ship when my contract is up.
With the failures of the Zune program over it’s first few years, I’m not totally sold on it being Microsoft’s next killer app. However, the fact that they’ve been able to keep this device so well clouded for so long leads me to believe they’re either making sure they get it (mostly) right, or tossing paper airplanes around the office and playing Solitaire while watching gadget guys like me write articles about something we’ve never even seen. I guess we’ll have to see what the next gdgt podcast has to say about it and keep on waiting.
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