Slashdot Mirror
Microsoft Zunes Committing Mass Suicide
jddeluxe writes "There are multiple reports springing up all over the internet of a mass suicide of Microsoft 30GB Zune players globally. Check Zune forums, Gizmodo, or other such sites; the reports are spreading rapidly, except apparently to the Microsoft official Zune site."
It's a Stand Alone Complex!
No good deed goes unpunished. - Avon, Blake's 7
Blue Zune Of Death!
I guess they just allocated a 3 bit year, in their systems (starting year 2000). Hey who would think there would still have Zunes around b 2009.
If something is so important that you feel the need to post it on the internet... It probably isn't that important.
Nice to see the editors are on the job.
"No one likes working in a hamster wheel, and your shop smells of cedar shavings from here." - TaleSpinner
30mb Zune? Micro$oft? Go back to /b/ CmdrTaco
...but it doesn't tell me what's happening, sounds sensationalist, and actually uses "Micro$oft" - who types that???
Anyone else think the comments just weren't rendering right before they turned off ABP and saw ads?
Let me know when one commits homicide. That will be news.
They've successfully dispelled the rumor that no own owns a Zune.
Do you even lift?
These aren't the 'roids you're looking for.
I also like how the Microsoft clearly talks about the problem, despite the summary claiming otherwise.
I turned on my Zune (bought for 90$ last year) today morning only to find it die a sad death with the hard disk humming in the highest pitch. I do not think the hard disk will survive 3 more hours of such grueling ordeal. I feel sorry for MSFT. Best of luck, guys.
$top the pre$$e$, thi$ ju$t in -- $la$hdot ridicule$ Micro$oft!
Al$o I think $omeone me$$ed around with my keyboard driver$...
You don't need no entertainment
You dont need no Zune control
No dark sarcasm on the nets
People leave them Zunes alone
Hey! people! Leave them Zunes alone!
All in all it's just another brick in the wall.
All in all you're just another brick in the wall.
Take the cheese to sickbay, the doctor should see it as soon as possible - B'Elanna Torres, "Learning Curve"
but something touched me deep inside...the day the 30 gigs died
I started singing "bye, bye MS 30 gig zune"
tried to download from the zune store but the zune store was dry
and the ms fanboys were drinking whiskey and rye
the day...the 30 gigs died
Designed Obsolescence.
You didn't really think they'd support this thing through 2009 did you? Oh, go back and read your EULA. It clearly states that at the start of 2009 you'll have to pay a subscription fee for you unit to continue working. You signed it in blood from the paper cut. Legally binding in hell.
So when my insides stop working correctly and I die that will be considered suicide?
--I'm not talking about dance lessons. I'm talking about putting a brick through the other guy's windshield.-
This year has 366 days in it instead of the normal 365.
So if you did (365-day) you could end up with -1 which might cause either a crash or freeze.
Just one (likely) possible cause. If that is the case it should fix its self tomorrow.
That is a common mistake that anyone who is older then 30 years can do. Dag Nabbit, Back in my day I would have pined for a 30 megabyte music player. We had to use instruments fashioned out on animal hides and termite infested wood. Then pay from memory the music. And it never sounded as good as you remembered it.
If something is so important that you feel the need to post it on the internet... It probably isn't that important.
According to Herman at gizmodo, this is the solution:
"Your zune will need a "hard reset."
To do this, use a small screwdriver to pop off the plastic shielding where the zune cable plugs into and remove the two screws on either side of the plug. Next pop the cover off and locate the battery plug at the top left corner of the zune, using your screw driver, pop the cable connection half way off, and do this to the other plug on the right side. Wait 3 seconds, then push down the right connector and then the left battery connecter. Your zune should start up immediately. Press the backing of the zune down (make sure headphone jack is aligned) and put the screws and cover back in place.
It's an easy process but if you're unsure don't attempt it if you think you'll screw it or something. :)"
Not pretty, but it might help those of you who have this problem.
According to others on the forum, it is caused by the new firmware, so you might not want to update it. Changing the clock might be a temporary fix if you want the new firmware.
Would you not want to commit Suicide ?
I have 2 of them. 1 for hacking the other for my daughter. Her zune locked up, I went downstairs and dug out of the box the old zune that has never been updated. Yes date and time are pretty close to accurate.
MSFT drones mucked up the clock ocde in the firmware over the past year.
Do not look at laser with remaining good eye.
Never blame on malice that which can more simply be attributed to programming error. Occam's Razor, and all that.
Zunes with older firmwares are unaffected, a hard reset will blow away the current firmware and get your Zune working again.
Already have the fix posted at The Tech Empire
Whoot, go me.
Check out JoshJitsu.info for Brazilian Ji
If the Zune 3.1 firmware turns out to be the problem, then I assume the patched version will be Zune 3.11. Hey, this sounds familiar.
Boy, this site has really started to slip, quality wise. The Zunes have failed, stopped working, anything but committed suicide. Jeez.
Have to say though, I'd hate to be MS Zune support at this point - most of the staff will be off or in serious party mood, not what you need when something this big happens.
I want a list of atrocities done in your name - Recoil
So, how long before Microsoft has to beg to Congress for a bailout?
"No one will buy our products ever since the Zune Fiasco! Give us money! WA WA WA!"
In the land of the blind, the one-eyed man is usually crucified.
You ate a McDonald's Big Mac once. It's well known that their minimum wage employees occasionally jack off into the secret sauce. So it's perfectly fair to call you a cum guzzling jiz mop.
Do you even lift?
These aren't the 'roids you're looking for.
http://www.google.com/trends
At the time I loaded the page:
1. zune frozen
2. reset zune
3. zune locked up
4. zune troubleshooting
Then you must cut the one ring from Sauron's hand, carry it to the fire of Mt. Doom and cast it into the cauldron.
"Lack of speed can be overcome. In the worst case by patience." --Znork
Day 365 has passed and this is day 366. This has happened before. This will happen again. All will be well tomorrow.
Thank you,
Microsoft Zune PM
Played For Sure.
Never shake hands with a man you meet in a fertility clinic.
...people see Zunes commiting suicide by flying out from Ballmer's office.
@neonux
So now there are three things wrong with the summary: Microsoft is spelled with a dollar sign, the player holds 30 GB (not Mb), and the Zune support site link is mentioning the problem.
Two sentences, three errors. Can we get an update to the summary, please?
I have two 30GB Zunes that are affected by this. The best theory I've heard is that it is having issues with this being the 366th day of the year. Maybe all will be well again tomorrow - we'll see.
Actually that's "30Mb", 30 megabits, or 3.75 MB.
You just got troll'd!
The fact that it doesn't load UI and doesn't play music doesn't mean they aren't working perfectly fine. Apparently, they just gained sentience.
It's already kind of lame when someone spells it M$ or Micro$oft in a comment but... in the summary? Childish much?
My apologies for offending your employer. Speaking of childish antics, I wonder if Steve Ballmer got a new chair for Christmas?
The original reason for M$ was because Microsoft BASIC allowed for one or two letter variable names, and a dollar on the end made it a string variable, so it was a kind of geeky in-joke. Unfortunately, Micro$oft is of the childish "all they care about is money" variety, and I suspect most people using M$ use it as an abbreviation for Micro$oft, rather than "MS as a variable name. For my next trick, there are only 10 types of people in the world, those who get binary and those who..." {etc}
You are not alone. This is not normal. None of this is normal.
I'm not sure what's worse. The fact the the editors write that, or the fact that at this point my brain doesn't even notice it.
"linux is just DOS with a UNIX like syntax" -- Galactic Dominator (944134)
It's actually a long tradition that started with Compu$erve.
If you're primarily a Linux user and then try to get anything running on a Windows server, the $ will seem quite appropriate. It seems the only thing M$ doesn't do to hit you up for more cash is rent Windows by the hour. What's so wrong with expressing that opinion neatly in a single character change?
That too is common. Other names you might hear/read in a similar vein (which may or may not reflect my personal opinion) include Burger Thing, Qwost, Stop and Rob, Tragic Markup, Circuit Shitty, etc.
You had wood? Spoiled kid.
Are you kidding? When I was a kid I had wood constantly. Now that I'm [much] older I can only dream...
"terrorism" and "pedophilia" are the root passwords to the Constitution
Then pay from memory the music.
I believe you are mistaken. To my knowledge, it is still free to remember music, but the RIAA is working with the US government to close this so-called 'neural hole'. They're really just looking after the good of the artists. Really.
.there is enough of everything for everyone.
I sooo hope this is related to the DRM on the device. That would totally make my day/year, as well as that of every other anti-DRM person.
Colin Dean Go a year without DRM
It seems the only thing M$ doesn't do to hit you up for more cash is rent Windows by the hour.
They're working on that too. No joke. IIRC, it was posted on Slashdot before. I think it had something to do with a patent.
It's 2008/2009, right?
Please explain to me how Microsoft bungles such a simple thing. Do they really not test this crap or what?
I mean, it would be one thing if it was some unknown, unforseeable bug -- but this is a fucking leap year problem. Hell, we studied that problem back when I learned Cobol. In 1991.
So again, how does this happen this day and age? Even for Microsoft, this is so far below "acceptable" that I can't believe it happened.
The Wii is the dominant console in the US.
The Xbox 360 is dead in Japan and mainland Europe. Still somewhat alive in the UK but easily being outsold by the PS3. And the only with the huge price cut has the 360 been managing to outsell the PS3 in the US.
The Wii and PS3 have been absolutely destroying the 360 in worldwide sales since 2007.
(waits for the inevitable response quoting that infamous Xbox fanboy console sales 'tracking' site...)
but... Zune 3.11 for Workgroups
@neonux
I own 2 of the 3.
Xbox 360 - mine did the RRoD after almost 3 years of fairly heavy use. Guess what? Microsoft replaced it no questions asked. I'm no Microsoft fan, but that was great customer service. When I bought my 360 originally, I was actually pretty anti-Microsoft (Linux, Mac, yadda yadda). But at the time, I considered it the best console for the money. It was good enough that even if Microsoft hadn't replaced it (and after 3 years, I didn't expect them to), I'd have bought another one anyway.
HD-DVD - just bought my HD-DVD add-on for my 360 about 2 weeks ago. Why? Player is dirt cheap, and there's still a ton of HD movies/TV shows out there. Since it's a "dead" format, most stores are clearing them out DIRT cheap. I picked up 10-15 HD movies the other day for an average of $8 each (brand new, not the used ones Blockbuster is selling). That's way more attractive to me than the $30 average price for the BlueRay stuff (which I also buy for my PS3).
Yeah, I know you're trolling, but take it from someone who owns all three major consoles (360, PS3, Wii) - the 360 is a great console (though I'm not thrilled with the new Dashboard look) and holds its own against the PS3 in every place it matters - performance, graphics, game selection, etc. Sure you can beat it up on tech specs these days, but I still probably play it 2:1 over the PS3.
-- "Other than that, how was the play Mrs. Lincoln?"
due to lousy programming MS cant even git the Y2K bug in the right year
Every time I hear the name "Zune", for some reason I look around for sandworms.
Serious? Seriousness is well above my pay grade.
I sense a disturbance in the Force... It's as if tens of voices cried out in terror and were silenced.
Yes, but ONLY the RROD is covered under that warranty. The 360 has been plagued with other issues, including a high optical drive failure rate, disc scratching, and various other lockups and error conditions not related to RROD. And you're out of luck if you get one of those conditions, which is why many people clog the exhaust vents with a towel when they get one of these other issues, hoping to induce a RROD and get a free replacement.
I hear Bill got him a few throw pillows for the sofa.
It must have been something you assimilated. . . .
Food for thought.
If he had bought, say, an 80 GB iPod before September of last year, he would have paid $350 for it. If instead he buys a Zune that lasts a few months for $50 and then buys an 80 GB iPod after September of last year, he would have paid $250 for it, thus a net GAIN of $50.
Point is, depending on how long the Zune lasted and what he gets to replace it, it's entirely possible that he broke even or even came out ahead. Shoot, maybe he'll buy one of those 80 GB iPods used and make a lot more than $50 for waiting on it. Or maybe he'll take advantage of the fact that by just getting by on a $50 Zune for a while, he can buy a much more interesting device now, such as a 32 GB iPod Touch, whereas if he had bought one of the shiny new 80 GB iPod videos a year ago, he likely wouldn't do.
At any rate, I just plain disagree that by buying something cheap now and holding off on getting the bleeding-edge gadgets, you're "losing" money, as should anyone who has, for example, invest $50 or $100 into upgrading a slow component of their desktop instead of going out dropping $2000 on a high-end system every year.
Worst Console Ever.
Dead Movie Format
and a dead 'iPod killer' with a stupid brand name
It's hilarious in a pathetic sort of way to know there are huge numbers of diehard Microsoft fanboys out there who are actually dumb enough to own all three of those Microsoft turds.
If you're looking for a company with a history of failed product launches, look instead to Sony. With their sudden success with Blu-ray, I'm starting to think there's a chance the Cubs might win the World Series.
Oh, say does that Star-Spangled Banner entwine / The myrtle of Venus with Bacchus's vine?
...like tears in rain.
Contrary to the popular belief, there indeed is no God.
I call BS. It had nothing to do with "In-joke". I've known about the "Micro$oft" for years and years and coded in BASIC well before that. It's always been about the money, always has been, probably always will.
For my next trick, there are only 10 types of people in the world, those who get binary and those who..."
... get laid?
Stop Computers/Cars Analogies on S
M$ is an excellent way of disambiguating the abbreviation, which could otherwise cause confusion between Mississippi, Multiple Sclerosis, Manuscript, and so on. It has the added advantage of clearly announcing the author's POV, and for anyone who was paying attention at the time, recalls the bad old days of undocumented DOS, public and private Windows APIs, "embrace and extend", and so on.
Micro$oft has put a lot of effort into refining the behaviors that have earned it the dollar sign in its name. It isn't easy to get all the people in an organization as large as Micro$oft to shed the fetters of their early training in morality, ethics, and playing nicely with the other children. M$'s freedom from the limitations of ethical encumbrances deserves to be recognized.
Public usage of "M$", and "Micro$oft", is perfectly cromulent. This is a company that has gone to great lengths to earn this kind of recognition, and it would be almost criminal not to award it to them.
It's too bad you couldn't simultaneously make that joke and put yourself on the right side of the comparison....
the terms serve their purpose well as long as they piss off people like you.
Can't say they "piss me off" in the slightest. "Shake my head bemusedly" would probably be a more accurate description.
One purpose they do serve, however, is as a barometer of a poster's credibility. As do posts like yours.
Clearly the fact that it found an extra second added when it contacted its time servers indicated that this was actually stage one of a cunning DRM hack and so it went into lock down mode.
You'd have a huge post on Apple support forums, with no official postings by any employee. Attempting to speak to Geniuses or tech support will only yield a, "huh, I've never heard of *that* happening before" as they replace your player for you.
A few weeks later, a firmware update containing many bug-fixes magically happens to fix this one too, and it's never spoken of again.
Microsoft has a lot of problems, but I am *so* glad they actually admit when there's an issue and not just sit on it like Apple in the hopes that it will go away.
It's already kind of lame when someone spells it M$ or Micro$oft in a comment but...
Yeah. I'm one of the ones that had to learn to not be childish with that use on /.
Do you go back as far to CP/M? The history of CP/M, CP/M-86, QDOS and the *original* PC-DOS? If you had - and I suspect you don't - you might cut some people some slack for that usage.
There exists a pre-PC-DOS link to a statement that Bill Gates put out regarding piracy of BASIC and denigrating everyone for how much money he was losing, how much he and his guys had invested in time and dollars and so forth. It was a little whiney, but he was pretty much spot on regarding the whole piracy thing. http://www.digibarn.com/collections/newsletters/homebrew/V2_01/gatesletter.html
And in those days - just like today - we all paid close attention to Intel. The 8086 was out there, we were all waiting for CP/M-86 stability to get a better computing environment. And CP/M-86 was taking time because it was work and because it was going to be (and eventually was) a quality product.
Seattle Computer Products, a hardware mfgr, created the Quick and Dirty Operating System (QDOS) and despite revisionist history, to ostensibly debug their hardware in anticipation of CP/M-86.
The follow-on history is very nicely summarized right here: http://74.125.45.132/search?q=cache:tIEkLM0yDDkJ:maben.homeip.net/static/S100/software/microsoft/DOS/The%2520origins%2520of%2520MS-DOS.ppt+qdos+S-100+quick+and+dirty+operating+system&hl=en&ct=clnk&cd=5&gl=us - that's the html/cached version, if you want the PPT file, it's here: http://maben.homeip.net/static/S100/software/microsoft/DOS/The%20origins%20of%20MS-DOS.ppt
Part of the backstory on his money loss was that the Osborne had come out, but then the KayPro did too, was doing better, and was getting a lot of attention for the superior (to MS) S-BASIC. So, sales of MS BASIC were not what the company expected. In fact, here's the backstory on Microsoft's creation and the importance of MS-BASIC. I putting the cached link and the orig - I couldn't get the orig server to respond as I write this: http://74.125.45.132/search?q=cache:kKA51ycXpCAJ:www.thocp.net/companies/microsoft/microsoft_company.htm+history+of+altair+basic&hl=en&ct=clnk&cd=1&gl=us and http://www.thocp.net/companies/microsoft/microsoft_company.htm
But add up the history: BASIC w/ license disputes, QDOS w/ license disputes, OS/2 w/ license disputes, Windows w/ license disputes.
Microsoft was once a darling company to many of us. They freed us from the clutches of IBM mini-computers and mainframes at work. It was a pain in the ass, but we could do desktop programming in BASIC rather than getting time to do our FORTRAN calculations on an IBM.
IBM was under attack by the US Justice Dept. in the early 80s - we couldn't have been happier. Then, Microsoft - as a company - was becoming the new IBM, with all of its evil.
I - and many others - were quite accustomed to calling them Micro$oft and M$ by the mid-to-late 80s for their stunts.
I lived through that history. I watched a company that I supported putting the screws to people in the industry.
I was pissed the first time a pretty good post of mine was labeled troll and attacked with
Pathological kinda promises Path + Logical - but instead, you get stuck with pathetic.
Zune forums is getting killed -- I can't connect, and I don't think this is a simple Slashdot effect... And the official MS Zune site says that "Zune Social" may be a bit slow. Sounds like a lot of people are wondering what the hell happened...
*** *** You're just jealous 'cause the voices talk to me... ***
Betamax, DAT, MMCD, MiniDisc, ATRAC, ATRAC-3, SDDS, NetMD, Hi-MD, Memory Stick (Duo/Micro), UMD, HDV, SACD, HiFD, MicroMV, BBeB, ECP, ARccOS....
Sony's problem is that it wants standards to be proprietary to them. Some of the above still exist solely because of Sony's bullheadedness, typically only usable with Sony hardware, especially when it is to the exclusion of support for the open standards. Some were/may be superior technology, but keeping a stranglehold on the technology is the undoing of their efforts time and time again. My god, the cabling requirements for SACD players to stereo receivers were unreasonable, even with players that had HDMI ports (though granted DVD-Audio also failed to catch on).
Sony's formats and media succeed when partnerships with other companies (like Philips) force them to be more open. Sony's success is often in spite of their best efforts.
At least with Blu-ray and gaming the competition in the market was/is straightforward and not like their ATRAC-3 players refusing to play the established MP3 format.
(I own several Sony products, including a PS3 and a 400-disc DVD changer that also plays SACDs. I only own two SACD titles. I'm still buying HD DVD titles on the cheap. I may yet find myself buying a Sony HD video camera as Sony seems to be successfully dominating that market.)
Oh, say does that Star-Spangled Banner entwine / The myrtle of Venus with Bacchus's vine?
HD-DVD isn't "dead", it's dead.
It's as dead as VHS. There are no new releases on either.
Just because you find discs around you can buy doesn't mean it isn't dead. Also, my understanding is Blockbuster's HD-DVDs aren't used. The ones I see at Fry's sure aren't. If I wanted leftover older movies at $8, I'd be gassed with HD-DVD I guess. But I don't really. The good movies (like Hot Fuzz) sold out quickly when HD-DVD was killed, and the rest are dregs. BTW, dregs aren't $30 on BluRay (except for from Fox), they are $14-$18.
I've had my 360 die 4 times. The last time, MS wouldn't replace it (optical drive went bad, long story but they screwed me, IMHO). Good customer service is no replacement for making a product that actually works.
http://lkml.org/lkml/2005/8/20/95
First of all, I'm not an alarmist or a conspiracy theorist. I don't generally believe that anyone is out to get me. I run Vista on my laptop (and Linux on less important hardware).
This, however, is making me think seriously about the need for open source hardware.
What's happening to the Zunes (even though I'm sure they'll fix it shortly) might be the tip of the iceberg for what might happen to the rest of our hardware, either through design or negligence.
I've never seen the firmware running my computer's BIOS, my cell phone or my car. Normally, I wouldn't bother to look. But the fact is that 99% of the hardware we rely on is capable of doing the same thing, with much worse consequences. None of us know what kind of backdoors or bugs exist.
This is not good.
The bad thing is, I don't see many alternatives out there. Android is a good start. The Arduino board seems like a nice toy. What else can we do? Is there a viable way of setting up incentives so that the big manufacturers start releasing open sourced firmware?
RMS, where are you???
The big question is, why the hell does an MP3 player care about the days of the year? For some, it's as simple as having date/time info on the player, but let's not forget, the Zune is also packed with new DRM to ensure people do not abuse the Zune Pass (flat monthly fee introduced in November for unlimited tunes and some TV shows). DRM, again, is epic fail.
Huh. Microsoft has some cool new thing they want ready by the holidays. They rush it, there's a tiny bug, and it costs the company zillions in $ and PR headaches. Familiar, much?
I used to think that, but then I came back.
Link
Bonus: No leap-second problem to deal with today.
You are being MICROattacked, from various angles, in a SOFT manner.
Microsoft has announced their official fix:
Really. That's their fix.
If you have a Zune, but haven't used it today, don't turn it on before 0000 UT 01 JAN 2009.