Zune owners: You answered my questions!

Jayhawker wrote:

Yep, I used Winamp all the the time. iTunes was a breath of fresh air for me.

I'm still a winamp fan. The clip editor and option to midi output, it just works well for me when I have to mix with Acid.

I ordered a refurb iPod touch a couple days ago. Only 8GB, but I haven't even topped that on my soon defunct 30 GB iPod, so it works for me. $200, which seemed good.

I really like the ideas of the iPod touch, but still have nothing but hate for the way apple handles iTunes. I also have over 25gb of just music on my Zune, so the Touch is out right off the bat.

Thin_J wrote:

I really like the ideas of the iPod touch, but still have nothing but hate for the way apple handles iTunes. I also have over 25gb of just music on my Zune, so the Touch is out right off the bat.

I have an overall hate for Apple and how they do business. I bought the Creative Zen Vision W a few years back and it is great for storing videos and such, but I recently got a Zune 8Gb and love it. I never used portable media players actively before but I use my zune every day (the Zune is what got me to start listening to GWJ).

nsmike wrote:

Must be a Zune 30 if he's saying "first gen." My Zune 80 only exhibits one of the behaviors listed above, and that's moving on to the next podcast in the list.

Same here. I think I would prefer iPod behavior here, but with most podcasts, I'm picking up the device and fast-forwarding through the final blah-blah-blahs to get to the next 'cast anyway.

Certis wrote:

I ordered a refurb iPod touch a couple days ago. Only 8GB, but I haven't even topped that on my soon defunct 30 GB iPod, so it works for me. $200, which seemed good.

I was looking at those deals last week very carefully... unfortunately, I don't think I can give up my 60GB 5th gen for anything less than the 32GB touch... and it's STILL too expensive (even as a refurb). I also get "screwed" by ordering from Apple online since I am forced to pay "tax" (thanks to that one location in the state). Sigh.

I agree that the touch seems like the future for me, but since this is a Zune thread I won't go into it any more.

SommerMatt wrote:
Certis wrote:

I ordered a refurb iPod touch a couple days ago. Only 8GB, but I haven't even topped that on my soon defunct 30 GB iPod, so it works for me. $200, which seemed good.

I was looking at those deals last week very carefully... unfortunately, I don't think I can give up my 60GB 5th gen for anything less than the 32GB touch... and it's STILL too expensive (even as a refurb). I also get "screwed" by ordering from Apple online since I am forced to pay "tax" (thanks to that one location in the state). Sigh.

I agree that the touch seems like the future for me, but since this is a Zune thread I won't go into it any more.

I would love to get my hands on a touch, but as has been noted, they're too expensive. Plus, I'd only really take it if I could liberate it from iTunes. I wish there was some viable alternative out there, but Songbird is the only one that looks like it's got the chops for it, and it's much more difficult to use.

Wish there was a winamp hard drive based player....

This isn't the time/place, and I've said it before, but I just don't get the hatred people have towards iTunes. Don't bother to explain... we've been down that road before.

SommerMatt wrote:

This isn't the time/place, and I've said it before, but I just don't get the hatred people have towards iTunes. Don't bother to explain... we've been down that road before.

And we don't get how anyone can actually like it. But yes, we've had the conversation over and over.

*sniff*

I'm so proud!

lancejt wrote:
*Legion* wrote:

Another question: Does the Zune gracefully move from PC to PC, or is it fussy when synched with more than one PC?

Very graceful... it simply connects as a guest device, allowing you access to that library but not requiring it to be tied to that PC...

Also, you can register 3 zunes on an account and that account (if subscribing with zune pass) can be activated on 3 computers as well.

Wait! So I can get my wife a zune and she can use my monthly subscription as well?
She has been constantly jealous of my subscription based music vs her itunes.

WiredAsylum wrote:
lancejt wrote:
*Legion* wrote:

Another question: Does the Zune gracefully move from PC to PC, or is it fussy when synched with more than one PC?

Very graceful... it simply connects as a guest device, allowing you access to that library but not requiring it to be tied to that PC...

Also, you can register 3 zunes on an account and that account (if subscribing with zune pass) can be activated on 3 computers as well.

Wait! So I can get my wife a zune and she can use my monthly subscription as well?
She has been constantly jealous of my subscription based music vs her itunes.

that is correct...

One benefit of the Zune that I was not expecting is a considerable upgrade in audio quality over the 5G iPod.

The new Zunes have removed EQ software, opting instead to optimize the audio signal all the way down at the hardware level. Some audiophile geeks have taken measurements of this-and-that and found the Zune to be superior in a number of aspects. I'm not up on the various technical aspects of that stuff, but I can say that there's definitely a clarity to the Zune's audio that my old iPod was missing. Much better instrument "separation" rather than sounding muddy.

I listen to a few TWIT network podcasts, and they push Audible.com subscriptions a lot on there. There's an offer for one free audio book and a 14-day free trial they get.

Unfortunately, I discovered that Audible.com does not support the Zune. Extremely disappointing, considering both the Zune 30 and Zune 80 are among the larger capacity offerings out there, and audio books are not for slimmer MP3 players. I was pretty miffed when I found this out, and I think it's downright idiotic for them to be so far behind on this support.

So beware, if Audible is something you're looking for. There are rumors that support will come before year's end, but nothing official, so if you want it now, buy another player.

Audible used to come as mp3s.

Continuing my Zune loverade indulgences... I just noticed something in the Zune software that makes the Zune a million bajillion times better of a podcast device than all of my old iPods (and, as far as I can tell, the current ones):

Per-show podcast settings

With iTunes, settings like how many episodes to keep were universal. If I wanted to keep all episodes of one podcast, I had to keep all episodes for ALL of them.

With the Zune, the universal settings exist as a default, but can be overridden on a per-series basis. So I can download an entire video podcast series to copy over to my Zune, without having to do the same for multi-year audio podcasts of which I just want the latest episodes.

...Or you could just opt to manually manage your music on iTunes and do the same thing.

I'm just saying

SommerMatt wrote:

...Or you could just opt to manually manage your music on iTunes and do the same thing.

I'm just saying :)

The whole point of "podcasts" is an automated sync process. Having to manage them manually would require me cutting my subscriptions down to about a fourth, or spend all of my free time managing podcasts (no thanks). I prefer just using a player that does it right.

I know you like iTunes, but it's not necessary to come running at any little complaint about iTunes. I don't hate iTunes, I used it for a long time. But I'm quite glad that the Zune software & player has implemented podcasting better than iTunes has. iTunes was never the best or most capable podcast handler, but it was a very convenient one.

I dunno, it seems like a pretty obvious feature to me: "keep a month of This American Life, but only 2 days of NPR news". Any decent podcast tool should be able to do that, you know. You can be as dismissive as you like of his need, but he wants the feature, the Zune software offers it, and iTunes does not.

Computers are supposed to automate things. It's what they do.

Actually, now that I think about it, the poor iTunes podcast management bites me, too. I totally can't trust it to do what I want it to do. I use a podcast utility in Linux instead, and manually load tracks into iTunes when I want them on my phone. Fortunately, I don't listen to many podcasts on my phone, so that doesn't take a ton of time for me -- but iTunes is, nonetheless, a very weak tool in this area, to the point that I preferred a command-line utility in Linux.

*Legion* wrote:
SommerMatt wrote:

...Or you could just opt to manually manage your music on iTunes and do the same thing.

I'm just saying :)

The whole point of "podcasts" is an automated sync process. Having to manage them manually would require me cutting my subscriptions down to about a fourth, or spend all of my free time managing podcasts (no thanks). I prefer just using a player that does it right.

I know you like iTunes, but it's not necessary to come running at any little complaint about iTunes. I don't hate iTunes, I used it for a long time. But I'm quite glad that the Zune software & player has implemented podcasting better than iTunes has. iTunes was never the best or most capable podcast handler, but it was a very convenient one.

I'm not running at "any little complaint" of iTunes. iTunes is a tool, and it works for what I want it to do the 30 minutes a week I decide to use it. When I plug my player in, it automatically loads any new episodes and leaves them there until I decide to delete them. Wheee. I know, I know... it DOES take up ALL my free time keeping all of that straight, but it's worth the trade-off.

Apparently, I don't have the same needs/requirements that you do for podcasts, as I've never had the same issues. I'm glad it's working out for you.

I'd been looking for a portable player since I started using the motorcycle for commuting but I hadn't gotten an iPod because it lacked an FM tuner and I like my NPR during drive time. This is tempting. Very tempting.

iTunes repeatedly made an absolute mess of my podcasts and podcast management, and since that's what I use my player for the most, I had no hesitation about trying something else. It was far beyond simply keeping the shows I wanted to keep and getting rid of outdated stuff, though. I don't know what possessed it (the most appropriate term here, because I think the software was consciously trying to spite me) but it would delete brand new podcasts if I didn't sync IMMEDIATELY after downloading the new episode. If I had iTunes open the night before and it had updated the podcasts, the next morning when I turned my machine on, all of the new episodes it had downloaded would just be gone. Despite my efforts, I couldn't fix it or find any setting that was wrong. I have no doubt that Apple uses it's position in the iPod market with the vast majority of iPod owners being Windows users to deliberately gimp the Windows version of iTunes, then blame it on Windows and try to convince users to switch to Mac.

Grumpicus wrote:

I'd been looking for a portable player since I started using the motorcycle for commuting but I hadn't gotten an iPod because it lacked an FM tuner and I like my NPR during drive time. This is tempting. Very tempting.

Do NOT buy a Zune "just because" it has a FM Tuner. Go play with one, play with the software, etc. The tuner is a little extra that, IMO, every MP3 player should have, but it certainly shouldn't be the deciding factor in what you buy.

That said, the few times I wanted to check on weather/traffic when not near another way to get that info, it worked, but as always, there's not much of an antenna on these things, YMMV.

duckilama wrote:
Grumpicus wrote:

I'd been looking for a portable player since I started using the motorcycle for commuting but I hadn't gotten an iPod because it lacked an FM tuner and I like my NPR during drive time. This is tempting. Very tempting.

Do NOT buy a Zune "just because" it has a FM Tuner. Go play with one, play with the software, etc. The tuner is a little extra that, IMO, every MP3 player should have, but it certainly shouldn't be the deciding factor in what you buy.

That said, the few times I wanted to check on weather/traffic when not near another way to get that info, it worked, but as always, there's not much of an antenna on these things, YMMV.

Yeah, the headphones are supposed to act as an antenna, but if you don't get perfect reception on a radio with a decent antenna already, you're not going to get the station. I don't use the FM tuner very much in either my Zune or my Sansa.

SommerMatt wrote:

I'm not running at "any little complaint" of iTunes.

The rest of your post did little to support this position.

This may shock you, but not everyone's usage pattern matches yours.

Malor wrote:

I dunno, it seems like a pretty obvious feature to me: "keep a month of This American Life, but only 2 days of NPR news". Any decent podcast tool should be able to do that, you know.

Indeed. It's not like the Zune deserves a gold star for this, but it's quite a revelation after the deficient podcast handling of iTunes.

I subscribe to a crap-ton of podcasts. Many episodes go on and off the player without being listened to, but the shows are subscribed to so that, on those days when I have to travel, the latest content is there waiting for me. (It's like the radio. You might not listen to a particular show every episode, but when you go traveling and want to hear it, you don't want to turn on the radio and have the show from 3 months ago playing). Some shows I listen to once in a blue moon, but I'm always glad to have them there when I go reaching for them.

Manually managing the deletion of those podcast episodes would require a non-trivial amount of time. With the iPod and iTunes, I had to make the choice of just limiting all podcasts to the latest 3 episodes, and living with the one-size-fits-all approach. There were video podcast shows that I stopped following as a result, because I couldn't have iTunes keep all of their episodes without forcing every other podcast into the same setup.

It's just refreshing, having things like podcast support that can do individual shows the way I want them.... or, y'know, having the music manager automatically find new music in the folder I've told it to watch, and have those albums automatically imported (no more File -> Add to Library, yay). But that's a different topic.

duckilama wrote:
Grumpicus wrote:

I'd been looking for a portable player since I started using the motorcycle for commuting but I hadn't gotten an iPod because it lacked an FM tuner and I like my NPR during drive time. This is tempting. Very tempting.

Do NOT buy a Zune "just because" it has a FM Tuner. Go play with one, play with the software, etc. The tuner is a little extra that, IMO, every MP3 player should have, but it certainly shouldn't be the deciding factor in what you buy.

That said, the few times I wanted to check on weather/traffic when not near another way to get that info, it worked, but as always, there's not much of an antenna on these things, YMMV.

Yeah, thanks. Perhaps I should restate to say that I wanted an iPod (Touch) but haven't gotten one because it didn't have an FM Tuner. If the new Zune is being extolled as a on par with the iPod, plus it has the tuner...

Legion, that's almost exactly why I stopped using iTunes for podcasts. If you were to show me that post in a year or two with my name attached, you could probably convince me that I wrote it myself.

Malor wrote:

If you were to show me that post in a year or two with my name attached, you could probably convince me that I wrote it myself. :)

Hmm, I'm not sure how I feel about that.

Another really neat thing about managing your podcasts individually is you can do chronological order PER PODCAST.
So if you start listening to, say, Morning Edition, you probably don't want to listen to them OLDEST to NEWEST. You set that one to maintain, say, the 3 most recent ones.
But let's say you also start listening to one of the MANY college courses available online by many universities. You don't want to start Biology 101 at the most recent, you want to start at the CRONOLOGICAL first episode. And it's probably easier to just sync the whole semester and have them sorted by date Oldest to Newest.

These things are (used to be) super easy with the Zune. Apparently the wife and I are the only people in the world having this problem. If you're not having this problem, PER PODCAST settings really, really rock, especially if you listen to different TYPES of programs. News/Current Events vs. Online Courses/AudioBooks(in podcast form).