Wednesday, November 15, 2006

Microsoft Zune software review with screencast

I just loaded the new Zune software on my system. I want share with everyone my first impressions of the software and the new Zune Marketplace.



The installation of the Zune software was easy. I did not like that it asked you to attach the Zune player before continuing to install. It did allow me to Skip after a few seconds, but I juat wanted to try the software and compare it to iTunes. If anyone at Microsoft would like to send me a Zune to test (e-mail me at michael(@)bazzoni.net), I will do another post on the sync aspects of the software as well as the player.

Here is a link to my screencast: zune_software.avi

After you install the Zune software, all your MP3 files will have a cool new icon.
The player piece of the software works as expected. In the beginning of the video you will see that I used the rating system to display songs that I like. I did this so you could see this view and also see the items that Zune found album art for. Zune did not find all the album art, but neither did iTunes, so no problem.

For the Zune Marketplace I had some issues. As you will see in the video I get errors trying to preview tracks in the marketplace. Not sure what is causing these, I will have to do some more investigation.

I will be purchasing some music and testing it out on my system and report back later. I am interested to see what the Beatles catalog looks like on Zune Marektplace...more later.