Zune price announced

[nolanfan34]

Microsoft has announced the price of the new Zune media device. It also confirmed the launch date in stores of Nov 14.

What are people's thoughts about this thing? If you have an iPod already, are you considering checking out a Zune? Are the features like wi-fi capability and the bigger screen going to be enough to attract a market?

The wi-fi thing will be interesting, the ability to share songs between devices could be fun (I was thinking of Evan's subway iPod story a while back).

I have no connection to this product, just interested to see what people are thinking or if people even know about it in the first place.

[4 High]

I like what ive read, but it would take alot to make me change over from Ipods which i love alot.

[b00000000000m]

The Wi-fi sharing is very restricted. Any file that you download via Wi-fi can only be played three times before it's deleted.

Also, what's up with the color choices? Brown?

[TiK]

Haven't really looked into these at all, as I've already an iPod that I've had for about 2 years now that I'm satisfied with, and being that I'm so used to the iPod interface, etc., I will most likely just buy another iPod when this one dies. Also, being that I have no real intention of watching any sort of video on any of these things, the bigger screen for me, is irrelevant.

[rjoefish]

My iPod is getting kind of old, I'll have to look into snatching one of these up. I'll probably wait until after the holiday season for a month or two and see what the reviews are and how people are liking them, or not liking them.

[NT!]

don't really want a full-size mp3 player, would much rather get a nano. hell i have a shuffle right now and that's enough.

[turnipmonster]

I think it would be great for someone to come out with something that is real competition to the ipod in terms of quality/design/functionality, but nobody has (imho) done that yet.

getting people to accept another DRM standard is going to be quite the tall order, apple's DRM is fairly entrenched and no other DRM has really stuck for better or wors. this is unsurprising given the ipod's market share. from what I've read the wifi thing sounds like a really poor implementation of a great idea, hopefully it will exceed expectations.

[Jack of Arcades]

There's zero chance of me switching from my iPod to a Microsoft product, although there's a small chance I'd switch from an iPod to something like an iRiver.

[IlPug]

i dont think there will be many switchers to begin with, but with the power of microsoft and the lean towards home entertainment (both by apple - ie the itv, and MS with xbox etc.) over the next few years i think the competition could really heat up..specially since MS is willing to lose money to get comsumers buying their product (ie it being a long term strategy)

-pug

[Aloysius]

"The real magic would have been if they had a way of importing protected AAC files, and people could make the transition," JupiterResearch's Gartenberg's said. "It won't work with purchased music from Urge or Rhapsody or Napster, for example. It's interesting, but it's not really a game changer, one way or the other, and not something that I think will drive iPod users over to the platform."

The Zune's price will put it in direct competition with Apple Computer's latest 30GB iPod, which also costs $249.

LOL @ buying this. Also, don't think screen size and Wifi capability will matter much to the marketplace. It will take a seachange in the way consumers get their digital media for this thing to take off - it will be interesting to see how MSFT's digital media strategy unfolds.

[ QUOTE ]
Also, what's up with the color choices? Brown?

[/ QUOTE ]

I like the brown, kind of cool looking IMO.

-Al