Critical Review of the Zune

ceallaigh writes "Andy Ihnatko of the Chicago Sun-Times has a critical review of the Zune. "Avoid," is my general message. The Zune is a square wheel, a product that's so absurd and so obviously immune to success that it evokes something akin to a sense of pity."

Comments

Did you see CmdrTaco's review of the Zune?

[Anonymous Coward]

"Wireless. More space than a nomad. Awesome."

Re:Did you see CmdrTaco's review of the Zune?

[Ford Prefect]

What does wmv have over mp3?

Erm... Video?

Re:Did you see CmdrTaco's review of the Zune?

[Paradise Pete]

Not meant as a troll or a flamebait, but you're one stupid sonofabitch.

Now there's a quote that seems destined to become somebody's sig.

Very funny review

[ctid]

I was reading this review with a little smile on my face until I came to this part, which caused me to LOVFL:

"These devices are just repositories for stolen music, and they all know it," said Doug Morris, CEO of Universal Music Group. "So it's time to get paid for it."
Well, Morris is just a big, clueless idiot, of course. Do you honestly want morons like him to have power over your music player?

If that's not enough, the reviewer then weighs in with:

Take the Zune's one unique and potentially ginchy feature: Wi-Fi. You see this printed on the box and you immediately think "Cool. So I can sync files from my desktop library without having to plug in a USB cable, right? Maybe even download new content directly to the device from the Internet?"

Typical, selfish user: How does your convenience help make money for Universal? No wonder Doug despises you.

This suggests that for your typical tech-journalist, the issue of the power of music companies and the damage it does to consumers' interests is perfectly clear. However, I don't know anything about the Chicago Sun Times - is it a big newspaper? Does this review suggest that the mainstream media in the US is ready to turn a critical eye on the music companies?

Yeah, and about this "squirting" thing...

[Elbowgeek]

That's not just bad marketing, it's a marketing showstopper. Remember Ball-buster-man's comment "You might want to squirt me pictures of your kids"? Sorry, anyone who puts squirt and kids in the same sentence should be locked up, IMHO.

Seriously, it sounds like Ball-head-man was desperately trying to come up with a catchy name for that wifi thing the device does so badly. He's the most executron-looking dweeb I've ever seen; he typifies the image of the whole company to the yoot who buy such gadgets.

So please Mr. Ballmer, don't squirt on me, K? Thanks...

Re:Marketing not going so well for them either

[soft_guy]

One of the stores had more space for Sandisk players than the Zune.

In their defense, Sandisk is the #2 player and they probably can actually sell some Sandisk players.

Zune is a catastrophe

[SethJohnson]

The Zune is literally a marketing catastrophe. Andy I. is alerting his readers of the trainwreck it represents. He's identifying the showstoppers that make this a poor purchase. When we're talking about a $250 buy-in, it's important to warn consumers that the glitches are not minor. Even if MS got everything else right with this player, it would be something for parents to avoid purchasing if they're going to have to manually create and install .dll files on X-mas morning.

There's no sense for Andy to discuss the finer details of weight, size, etc. The problems cancel out how superior the form factor might be over the iPod. It's like you're asking for a reporter to discuss the positive aspects of Osama Bin Laden-- "Well, he exhales carbon dioxide, which plants need for photosynthesis." Yes, I'm in agreement with Andy on this, the Zune is the Alqueda of mp3 players.

Seth

Re:Zune AD: wtf?

[TheRaven64]

I think the ad is saying that Microsoft are buying batteries from Sony...

zune == anus

[arekusu]

After playing with the unit for a few minutes and being disgusted with the UI, this is what I noticed leaving the store:

The "zune" logo on the translucent marketing material, when viewed from the back, looks a lot like "anus".

That about sums it up.