Microsoft Challenges the iPod (Again)
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Here are some of the iPod features that the Zune lacks: Games, alarm clock, stopwatch, world clock, password-protected volume limiter, graphic equalizer, notepad, auto-synched copy of your computer’s calendar and address book, and Disk Mode, which lets an iPod serve as an external drive for carrying around computer files.
If you use the Zune’s wireless features, you’ll also get much worse battery life: 19 hours of music playback on the 80-gig Zune versus 30 on the equivalent iPod. The 80-gig Zune is still thicker and chunkier than its iPod rival, too.
Above all, you may miss that thriving virtual bazaar of iPod accessories: more than 3,000 stereo docks, cases, car adapters, and so on, compared with only a handful for the Zune.
Here are some of the iTunes software features missing in the Zune’s software: Smart Playlists, which assemble groups of songs based on criteria that you specify (“80’s up-tempo songs I haven’t heard in three months”), choice of visualizers (screen-saver effects that dance to the music), closed captioning for videos and TV, Cover Flow view, and a graphic equalizer.
The Zune store is missing a lot of iPod features, too: TV shows, movies, audio books, monthly allowances and comprehensible pricing.
At the iTunes store, you pay $1 a song. But on the Zune store, you pay using Microsoft Points, which are sold in blocks of 400 ($5). Songs cost 79 to 129 points, which means 99 cents to $1.61. Suddenly, you’re a currency trader.
This absurd system serves nobody except Microsoft. First, it’s a ham-handed effort to make you lose track of how many dollars you’re actually spending. Second, you can’t just buy one song; the least you can spend is $5. And finally, you’ll inevitably waste money, since it’s unlikely that Microsoft’s various song prices will divide evenly into 400.
The bottom line: the iPod is still a more versatile, compact and beautiful machine. But the Zune has come a long way in very little time. Already, its potential audience is no longer limited to a sect of irrational Apple haters. It’s now a candidate for anyone who values its unique powers — excellent built-in FM radio, scratchproof case and wireless auto-synching — more than they value the richness and choice of the iPod universe.
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