11 replies to this topic

[fstab]

I own both, and I was wondering what everyone thought about them.

Quote

Zune HD
Pros:
-Beautiful OLED display
-Long battery life
-Relatively lightweight
-Media sharing between devices
-HD radio
-Artist pics, bio, related, etc.
-Very powerful graphics chip
Cons:
-Relatively few apps
-Marketplace is not open to developers
-Only two capacities (16 and 32 GB)
-No built-in speakers

iPod Touch
Pros:
-Larger display
-App store has tons of apps
-Many more accessories are made for iPods than Zunes
-iTunes is very easy to use
-Many storage capacities
Cons:
-Display has bad viewing angles
-Speaker has bad quality
-Startup/shutdown time is slower than Zune

What do you think?

[IdeaGuy]

Well the truth is zune is the most suckiest of the gadgets. Ipod rules and it cant be compared to the zune.

[Ash-Bash]

I would go with the iPod Touch, The App store is a fantastic thing in the world of MP4 players! Yes it is sort of over priced and the accessories too but its a wonderful piece of technology! The touch screen is awesome including the way you zoom in on a picture or photo. Agreed the Loud Speaker is very bad in quality and Loudness. The Start-up and down time I really could not give a crap about as I just use the standby the same on my iPhone... The standby does not use that much battery. The iPod is also a lot more popular because its so good and the zune is just rubbish, Apple are like a Million dollar trade mark, Zune is just something for the 99P store.

I first bought the iPod Touch 2G, 8GB when it first came out I loved it and still do (a bit) but it was sort of annoying I needed to take my Phone having 2 devices, One for music the other for calls. Then I saw the iPhone 3G S come out so I got that in the 32GB edition and its wonderful!

I recommend if you are going to get the iPod touch maybe think about saving up for the iPhone you will benefit it by miles!

Edited by Ash-Bash, 01 January 2010 - 03:51 PM.

[BuffaloHelp]

I was always fascinated with Star Trek The Next Generation. I remember trying not to miss a single episode to have the chance to see various gadgets they pretended to use. One of the desirable gadgets was the hand held reports in the form of tablet but it's only the size of 4X6 or 5X7. A web tablet is a good comparison to today's actual gadget.

That's what iPod Touch reminds me. iPod Touch's ability to surf the web, zoom in and zoom out, store and retrieve information in the size of hand sized device. It's one step closer to "the next generation" of data storage and consuming information. There are many personal media players out there. Some are exceptionally well thought out in constructing these devices. But iPod Touch does one more--web browsing. And soon I'm sure this will lead to even greater advance in technology. And talk about built-in accelerometer... so many application utilize that even now.

iPod Touch, hands down for now!

[gisellebebegirl]

I have an itouch, (Ive had it for over a year now, the second generation one) and i completely disagree with your cons!

Honestly I have NEVER turned off my ipod touch in the year i have had it for, you set it to sleep, press a button, it is automatically awake, the only time when you would really turn it off is to reboot, or backup your system, that is it

and there are many reasons why you do not turn your itouch off, for one it has push notifications, thus i find it a waste of software to turn it off!

The speaker quality is descent, but honestly you will never use it, LOL i think it is kinda cheap when people blast out the itouch's speakers, but that is just me

as for the display bad angles, i like mine, just the way it is hahaha

if you want a smart choice, go with the ipod touch

good luck x

[k_nitin_r]

Hi!

I haven't had a Zune HD or any other Zune yet. However, I do have an iPhone 2G and can tell that the iPod Touch would be just as amazing, but without the cellular network connectivity. If you can, go with an iPhone instead of the iPod Touch - you might even get a good deal on it with a carrier subsidy.

The iPhone or iPod Touch can be very engaging, especially with the plethora of applications you can find on the iTunes AppStore. You have applications for social networking, tons and tons of games, VNC and remote desktop client software, and the option to jailbreak the phone or player to install software that the AppStore hasn't approved yet.

The disadvantage of having an iPhone or an iPod Touch is that you have to use the Apple iTunes software to synchronize your data. There is, however, an option to treat the iPhone as a disk drive but switching between the two modes requires me to delete all of the music that I have on the player. Also, the synchronization of music and videos is one-way and would delete media that isn't on the local drive during synchronization, making it difficult to synchronize between multiple PCs or if you format your computer and re-install Windows often.

The VLC player for the iPhone isn't half as good as the VLC player for Windows. In other words, it doesn't work as 'advertised' but that's a problem with the player rather than the iPhone so it isn't something I can blame the iPhone for.

[Xalor]

I would go for the ipod touch 3g over the zune hd, only if you take the 32 gig one. The new one has a faster processor, and it does have much better capabilities than the original. If you plan to only use the browser + twitter + music/video I would take the zune Hd though. I'm more into the apps just as much as the music, since I do love the simple to play games, and even the more advanced games on the touch. Its much more reliable I think so far anyway, few reports of troubles even with jailbroken ones, and the zune although amazing with the specs, graphics alone cause of Tegra (nvidia's system on a chip design) has been reported to be very buggy. If you do plan on getting on the zune cause of the screen and system quality I would wait up a bit until a new firmware is released. It should fix some of the problems and the SDK or whatever it is should be released to 3rd party developers as well. However Microsoft is working on an individual contact only, since you see that the twitter app was developed by twitter itself, same with the Ferrari GTI and Audiosoft. Some of the games seem much nicer on the Zune than they are on the touch. The screen gives it a better quality, but the iPod touch is much better in light than the zune HD. OLED washes out in light and the iPod touch doesn't. The smaller screen on the Zune HD makes playing games a bit more difficult, I assume from what Engadget says. I've only used the device in person on a couple of occasions, since I only own an iPod Touch. I still strongly reccomend the iPod Touch. Just using it for 3 months makes it more useful than my laptop at times. I can quickly check for movies, or find a song, that I've been searching for. Even the games that I wouldn't pay to play on a PC, I actually paid to play on an iPod Touch. If you own a PSP, I wouldn't reccomend it as much, but I can't attest to that either. I have a PSP with a dozen or so games, but I still enjoy the same games so much better on the iPod Touch since its a bit smaller and I can play a quick run on endless or add a bit in the storyline, while on the PSP its basically only a gaming console, media wise its okay, but can only handle a couple of formats. Zune HD is better on the screen quality as well since it matches pixel to pixel on a smaller screen to the iPod Touch, although quality on a small screen is rather pointless anyway. Overall I reccomend the iPod touch because even though you mention the screen as a disadvantage, the Zune HD and the iPod Touch cancel each other out on that end. The iPod Touch does bring in a full browser, that lets you display even complex webpages, unlike the Zune HD which only lets you use mobile sites, so sites like Engadget don't load fully. However if you are an audiophile, or someone who plans on using it only for music and video I would go for the Zune HD. Radio plus a suberb quality screen for videos and a great tagging system plus a rather well designed integrated music experience system (Zune pass) makes it a solid device. ONLY FOR MUSIC LOVERS. Its only for those who only want music on their device. The iPod touch gives you a better app ecosystem, more apps, sometimes better quality apps, a decent processor for the 8gig device and a blazing processor for the 32gig or the 64 gig, the latter two I reccomend getting no matter what. The iPod touch does give you more bang for your buck with the apps, and the integrated youtube player. And you still get a great music player, albeit not as slick and intuitive as the Zune HD, but is still making leaps and bounds with the expansion of the Genius system, and regular updates still make it just as good at times.

[rayzoredge]

I can't say much about either device, but I know that CNet actually gave high marks to the Zune HD and that the iPod Touch 3G isn't much different than the 2G, depending on what size you get.

There is NO difference or improvement with the 3G 8GB. However, the 32GB and 64GB variants feature faster performance due to better hardware (800MHz from 533MHz ARM processors, 256MB of RAM from 128MB). The larger variants also feature 802.1n connectivity (although this isn't announced as a feature), voice control, and "VoiceOver" (where the iPod will read text for you).

According to CNet's review, the only notable addition to the Zune HD over the iPod touch would have to be HD Radio. What's interesting to note is that if you do decide to purchase the Zune Pass to allow additional downloadable content, the Zune costs more than the iPod as far as the cost of ownership goes.

[Xalor]

rayzoredge, on Jan 2 2010, 01:45 PM, said:

I can't say much about either device, but I know that CNet actually gave high marks to the Zune HD and that the iPod Touch 3G isn't much different than the 2G, depending on what size you get.

There is NO difference or improvement with the 3G 8GB. However, the 32GB and 64GB variants feature faster performance due to better hardware (800MHz from 533MHz ARM processors, 256MB of RAM from 128MB). The larger variants also feature 802.1n connectivity (although this isn't announced as a feature), voice control, and "VoiceOver" (where the iPod will read text for you).

According to CNet's review, the only notable addition to the Zune HD over the iPod touch would have to be HD Radio. What's interesting to note is that if you do decide to purchase the Zune Pass to allow additional downloadable content, the Zune costs more than the iPod as far as the cost of ownership goes.

Zune Pass is basically the equivalent of an itunes account since you can't unlock some of the more advanced features of zune hd without using the zune pass. One example is the Smart DJ playlist, which is the genius feature of the zune hd, and tagging on the hd radio stations is not possible without a zune pass. A Zune Pass costs 15 dollars a month, and you still need to pay monthly to keep your songs, since they expire once the zune pass expires. There are ways to crack the DRM, but its not automated anymore, since you can't move the DRM songs to another device, although I heard there's a way to transfer it to a windows mobile device like the omnia 2. That was the device they used as the example I believe, although I doubt it follows Microsoft's rules on that matter. The HD Radio is a usefull addon if you don't have wifi all the time, but since you have most of the repeated songs on the radio you pretty much cancel it out on that point. Zune Pass costs about 180 dollars a year, you get 10 free songs a month DRM free for you to keep, so basically you pay 1.50 for each song, (assuming you aren't using the free unlimited downloads (DRM-based however)). If you do use the zune pass you need to basically think about the amount of music you listen, to and check if the Zune media player has those songs/bands/genre, especially if you plan on listening to more of the Indie labels, since the zune store doesn't let just anyone start selling their songs.

[rayzoredge]

I think that once Microsoft catches up on their little app library, the Zune HD will be a pretty good alternative to the iPod Touch. (Heck... as it is as a product, it is better if not just on par with the iPod Touch.) Right now, since I jailbroke my iPod Touch, it's not exactly the fairest comparison when I can do just about everything the Zune can and more... minus the HD radio, of course.

[Tremayne]

Ok, zune is like throwing a lamborghini made overnight in mexico against a volkswagen made using years of engineering in germany. Sure the lamborghini looks cool but are you gonna be able to find accessories and stuff for it? and if you can are they going to be as cheap as the ipod? do you care about microsofts terrible reputation vs apple's good one?

So yes, Zune looks like a good device but it's still in the shadow of a crappy predecessor and company.

[rayzoredge]

@Tremayne: Apparently someone's been drinking the Kool-Aid.

Both Microsoft and Apple are to blame for a lot of crap with their products. And your car analogy is rather poor, since the Zune has been out for a while and Microsoft finally got a clue and played along with aesthetics as well as bolster features to make an actual competitive product against the iPod Touch. How many people have an iPod? Tons, since it was one of the few better media players for the longest time to date, compared to less-spoken brands like Creative (moreso known for Soundblaster, but try uttering the name of that sound card to Joe Blow). Has anyone heard of an Archos? Not really, since they're not as ubiquitous. The Creative Zen Vision M was a pretty damn good media player too, but again, not as ubiquitous. We all know what Apple is. We all compare portable media devices with an iPod. But just because Apple got most people drinking the Kool-Aid with a good handful that are able to actually see WHY the iPod is a good gadget to have doesn't mean that everything else sucks.

Ever heard of any horror stories with an iPod? Not likely... because Apple HIDES the bad press. Exploding laptop batteries, iPods spontaneously combusting, yada yada... but no one pays attention to that because they're too busy making out with their cardboard cutout of Steve Jobs and are under that impression that Microsoft is the only evil entity. Apple does have some pretty terrible annoyances that a simple Google search can show you. Same with Microsoft. They both suck... just in different ways.

I'll challenge anyone else to show me how the Zune HD really sucks in comparison with the iPod Touch 3G and vice-versa like Xalor did and I'll give you an e-cookie. We already pointed out that the Zune Pass will cost you more in the long run, but what about people that don't care to be nickel-and-dime'd by the Apple App Store until that credit card bill arrives? As it stands right now, I think that Microsoft finally has something competitive here for the iPod-saturated PMP crowd, although the online content has quite a bit of catching up to do.

But maybe I'm just a Microsoft fanboy that owns an Apple iPod Touch 2G. Or just a guy who tries to see what's available before making the most-educated guess at what to buy and why. Who knows?

@Ash-Bash and k_nitin_r: As useful as the iPod Touch shows itself to be, I wouldn't advise getting an iPhone. The cost of ownership is just too great for less-than-great cellular performance with AT&T, unless Apple finally breaks it off and makes it available to other carriers. Carriers have to upgrade their networks to support 3G coverage and future-proof themselves for an easy upgrade to 4G, so it's not worth getting an iPhone for at least a while now. YMMV, obviously, but there are just too many people unhappy with their iPhones right now thanks to dropped calls and poor cellular coverage as well as feature limitations that shouldn't have been. You might as well get an iPod Touch and use Skype on it.