In case you don’t remember, I’ve been on the hunt for a media player. My PSP wasn’t cutting it because of its size and interface so it just wouldn’t do. The Zune caught my eye because it had more features than the iPod and was the same price. Initial reviews from some major sites are rather lukewarm, scathing in some cases, but I think it’s because they’re all Apple hugging zealots who are too attached to their iPods. The Zune will probably never be able to top the iPod since it is so entrenched in culture, but that doesn’t make it a bad player. Hit the jump for the rest of the review.

Design

The Zune may not be as sleek as the iPod, but it is a pretty good looking device. The 3 inch display dominates the front of the device with the controls right below. At first glance it seems like it has a scroll wheel like the iPod, but it’s actually just a control pad shaped like circle with an “ok” button in the middle. A play/pause and back button flank either side of the control pad. The back is very minimal with a Zune logo and a circular indention mirroring the control pad. Near the bottom of the back is a little message: “Hello from Seattle”. The top has a headphone jack and a hold switch and the bottom presents a connector port to connect the Zune to a PC. The shell seems pretty sturdy. It’s made of plastic that lets you grip it really easily and isn’t prone to fingerprints.

Interface

The interface is pretty much idiot proof. I picked up the Zune and had the menu system figured out in a few short seconds. From the main menu, you’ll see a few general sections including music, videos, pictures, and radio. Each section is further divided into a series of sub-menus. When your listening to music, the album art is displayed along with other track information. When you hit the back button, it brings you one step higher up the menu hierarchy. Each successive press of the back button will bring you higher and higher until you return to the main menu. The neat thing is that the music keeps playing while you navigate the menus. Unfortunately, the Zune can’t multi-task, so you can’t listen to some tunes while looking at pictures. Even more cool is the ability to play music while looking at pictures.

Audio

The audio quality is excellent on the Zune. The sound comes through crystal clear using the headphones that come with the Zune. My one complaint is that it doesn’t have built in podcasting support. I have a feeling Microsoft shies away from anything with the word “pod” in it. Yet another reason why we should be calling them netcasts… The Zune also has built in FM radio though. It can even display the song that is playing if the radio station is using RDS. Each menu in the music menu organizes music in a different manner so finding that one specific song is a breeze.

Video

Watching video on the Zune is a joy. Unlike the minuscule screen the iPod has, the Zune’s screen is actually watchable. Getting video on to it is pretty straight forward. The Zune itself only supports WMV, but the software is able to transcode any video format playable on the iPod. Sadly, it can’t transcode anything other than what can be played on an iPod, so you’ll have to use some third-party software to transcode all your AVI and DivX files.

Pictures

Not much to say really. It’s pretty hard to mess up displaying pictures. You can divide up your pictures into folders and watch them in a slide show. An option in the settings menu allows you to change how long each picture is displayed. You can also use a picture as the background for your Zune which is kind of neat.

Social

Microsoft marketed the Zune as a “social” device. It has built in wireless capabilities that allow it to communicate with other Zunes. Unfortunately, I haven’t had the chance to test out the wireless functions yet since I don’t know anybody else with a Zune. However, based on what I’ve heard, it’s not that great. The Zune allows you to send a fellow Zune user a music file, the catch is that it is wrapped in DRM restricting how many times it can be played. That sounds fair but it does this even for un-DRMed files that weren’t bought off the Zune Market Place. Based on that, I can tell its a flop, hopefully Microsoft will make it less restrictive with future firmware updates.

Software

The Zune also comes with some software. It’s Windows only at the moment so Mac users are out of luck. You need the software in order to transfer media onto the Zune since it isn’t mass storage compatible (see hack). The interface has some neat features like displaying how many songs you have in an album by the depth of the “stack” of music. Through the Zune software, you can do the usual tasks like burning and ripping music. You can manage all your music, videos, and pictures through it and synchronize your media library with your Zune. Setting up the software and Zune was a pretty straightforward process, but it was long and drawn out.

Final Verdict

Overall the Zune is a solid media device, despite its few flaws. If your an iPod owner who has bought tons of music from the iTunes Music Store, I wouldn’t recommend switching. Contrary to popular belief, the Zune can not import music bought from iTunes. However, if you are in the market for a new media player, I would seriously consider the Zune. It’s a nice player and you get more bang for your buck than you would for most other players. It might not be as cool as the iPod, but it has a lot more functionality built in.