Thursday, November 15, 2007

New Zune

Microsoft released the new models of the Zune media players yesterday, and the reviews seem generally positive. One thing that has kep me from buying a Zune (apart from the bulky hardware and crappy PC software, ahem) was the lack of a subscription service.

I've been very happy with Napster's subscription service and my old Creative Zen Micro. For around $15 a month I can download and listen to pretty much any album, and then purchase ones I really like if I want them on CD. The Napster software works well, and the Zen Micro is a decent music player.

I'm happy to see that the new Zune software now includes a subscription service, called Zune Pass. For some lame reason, Microsoft decided to "hide" the monthly price for Zune Pass. You won't find it here or in the FAQ. Instead, you need to go to this Microsoft Support article. Weird... Perhaps we show you the price once you've created a Zune account, but personally I'd like to know the cost before going through the rigmarole of setting up an account (and handing over my personal info).

Now, if there's a way to get TV shows off of my Comcast DVR and onto the Zune, that would be nice. Anyone got that working yet? :)

1 comment:

SabraGirl said...

I got home on Tuesday night to find that J had bought me a new little pink zune, and I have to say I love it. The killer feature is the radio, but the "squircle" is realy nice and the interface in general rocks.
I don't know about the comcast DVR, but a friend of mine was telling me that he has his last generation zune set up so his media center records a show in high-def (through some gadget he bought from the UK that fakes out the cable signal) then runs some software that removes all the commercials, and then wirelessly syncs with his zune so it automatically has all copies of his favorite shows. I'm kind of jealous :-)