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A Hands-On Zune Review
jayintune writes "2old2play.com got the chance to sit down with Microsoft's new media player, the Zune, to give some comments and insight into the players User Interface, Video Playback, Music Sharing, as well as software and setup." From the article: "I had expected the player to be fairly heavy, but after holding the Zune in my hand it was clear that I was wrong. It is not as light as the latest video iPod, but compared to my fourth-generation iPod, the Zune was lighter. The top of the Zune had a clear glass layer while the exterior had a tactile feel to it, nothing like the hard metal and plastic of the iPod devices. The 'skin' of the Zune was a 'rubberized' material that had a smooth seductive feel to it. I found myself unable to stop stroking the device, so much that the demo assistant asked me to put it down."
I think he did answer that in the review: "Upon a successful transfer, the music is wrapped with a digital rights management (DRM) layer which will give the user a three day or three-listen license." I would imagine that this is as simple as Microsoft somehow tagging the file within the Zune's filesystem (nobody ever said its file management would follow a standard) to prohibit redistribution of the music to other devices, playing more than three times, or playing after three days. Microsoft has complete control over the platform, after all, so I would assume they went about this the "easy way" by doing something like this. It's similar to what Sony did with Minidisc recorders back in the day. Music recorded through an optical or digital source was not encoded differently on a Minidisc, but was "tagged" in the file system to prevent playback of that track through a digital output connection (to prevent redistribution of nearly-perfect digital copies from player to player to player...)
Like I said, I'm not a Microsoft schill or anything, and don't care either way about the Zune or whether or not people will use it / like it / stroke it. I'm just interested in the technology and getting the biggest bang for my buck when I eventually purchase a music player. Competition with Apple's iPod from the Microsoft camp can only mean good things for the consumer, regardless which player they choose to purchase.
Not to mention the fact that 4th gen iPod weighed 5.6 oz. and Zune weighs 5.6 oz. Miraculously, Zune is lighter.
Here is a blurb from the frontpage of their website:
Yep, and they seem to be pretty good at it too
There are already YouTube downloader-converters and standalone .flv converters for the iPod.
Windows users can already paste a url into iTube, and it will download YouTube's .flv files, convert them to .mp4 format, and add them to iTunes, which will then sync those movies to your iPod.
Mac users can already paste a url into PodTube, and it will download YouTube's .flv files, convert them to .mp4 format, and add them to iTunes, which will then sync those movies to your iPod.
SUPER is another Windows program that converts .flv files to .mp4 for iPod.
iSquint is another Mac program that converts .flv files to .mp4 for iPod.
Every one of the programs I mentioned are freeware.
Albuquerque PC
>PlaysForSure still exists, and those that bought PFS music can still buy many PFS players. They
>won't buy Zunes, but how does that mean that they were "FUCKED by Microsoft"? They can buy still
>buy PFS players, just as they could before Zune.
Yes you can still buy PFS player... BUT FOR HOW LONG?? Analysts are predicting that Zune won't take iPod market share but it will take the share of non-iPod players. So MS is aiming to sink the PFS community with a new entrant.
Looks like MS have thought of that whole can of worms... They don't apply DRM
We don't actually "wrap all songs up in DRM:" Zune to Zune Sharing doesn't change the DRM on a song, and it doesn't impose DRM restrictions on any files that are unprotected. If you have a song - say that you got "free and clear" - Zune to Zune Sharing won't apply any DRM to that song. The 3-day/3-play limitation is built into the device, and it only applies on the Zune device: when you receive a song in your Inbox, the file remains unchanged. After 3 plays or 3 days, you can no longer play the song; however, you can still see a listing of the songs with the associated metadata.
So they don't DRM stuff, but there is a 'hard limit' built into the device itself. Apparently.
The best is the enemy of the good