Microsoft Zune HD Black (16 GB) MP3 Player

I normally avoid writing reviews this soon after buying a product, but given that the Zune HD was just released today, I am guessing that a lot of people are looking for information on it. This review is based on my experience with the player in just one day. I purchased it this morning and have been playing with it all day, trying to figure out all of its features.

In case it wasn't obvious from the title of the review, I have been largely disappointed by the Zune HD. It is likely that my expectations were inflated because of all the hype and anticipation, but objectively I feel that this gadget fails in most of its intended uses.

Not to bore you with long stories, but I have been trying for 5 years now to replace my old iPaq PDA without much luck. I finally decided to just go ahead and sell it because I was getting tired of its constant freezing and overall sluggishness. I was very unhappy with the 2d generation iPod touch, which had an incredibly poor WiFi reception.

I had big hopes for both the Zune HD and the 3d generation iPod touch and decided to wait until they were both available so I will have a better choice. Each one had certain features that I was specifically looking for, and unfortunately neither had all of them. At the end I decided to try the Zune HD first for two reasons: longer battery life and a little better video format support.

Other than that, I need a device that can be used to: browse the internet, receive email, possibly use skype, have a calendar, unit converter, and of course play music and videos. The longer the battery life, the better since I am routinely stuck on 9+ hour flights. An added bonus would be a GPS, but... So far the only gadget that was able to do all of those things was my iPaq, I really don't understand why the PDA market was replaced by clearly inferior PMPs.

Anyway, back to the Zune HD. As a devout windows user, I have never been a fan of Apple software, so I was looking forward to not having to use iTunes. Sadly, now I think that the Zune software is an even bigger turd, and the Zune can only be synced with it. In fact the player is completely useless without first syncing with the PC software (I think macs are not even supported.)

I feel like the better part of my day was spent trying to figure out the Zune software than the player itself. I don't want to review the software, but nothing really seemed to work as it was supposed to, I was getting constant errors, and transferring media from my computer to the device was a chore.

The player itself is quite attractive, I particularly like the back side, which is made of brush metal and does not attract fingerprints. The front is mostly glass and naturally smudges easliy. Actually, it looks and feels exactly as I expected based on the pictures. The box it came in was very attractive as well, but included very few accessories - the player, headphones with three different color covers, and the sync cable. There was no support stand, not even a cleansing cloth.

The first sync was very unsettling - the software asked me a bunch of questions, like selecting three favorite artists, sharing preferences, and sync method. I left the default sync method, which was supposed to automatically check between my PC and Zune HD libraries and make sure that both devices have the same files, however after the first sync not a single file was put on the Zune. I had to change the setting to manual sync and then drag and drop each file I wanted. Luckily it did allow me to ctrl select multiple files so I didn't have to do them on-by-one.

Once the sync was completed, I was hoping to be able to browse the player while it was still plugged in so it could continue charging. It didn't let me do that though, later I found out that while plugged in to the computer, the player can only be used if the Zune software is not running. This might be familiar to seasoned Zune users, but this is my first such device :-)

I tried several songs and two different video clips (actually the same video encoded in two different formats - H.264 and WMV) and I was badly disappointed by the sound quality - it was average at best, and with the included earbuds it was right down poor. The WMV clip had a significantly lower volume level than the H.264 one. Changing to some better quality headphones improved the quality a bit, but was far from good (so far the best audio quality I've heard on a portable player was from the Samsung P2.)

Video quality was acceptable, though clearly inferior to the iPod touch and even the Samsung P2. The iPod trumps it because of its higher resolution screen, and the P2 has a better quality AMOLED screen. The Zune HD's screen has a weird blue tint on its glass and when viewed at an angle, the picture becomes decidedly blue.

While playing with the music and video playing features I made another unpleasant discovery: although I had read in various reviews that the Zune HD has physical volume controls on the side, the reality is that it does not; there is a button on the side, but it is one button, not a volume rocker, and this button does not control the volume, instead, it brings up an on-screen control menu, part of which is the volume control. The exact same menu is brought by a simple tap on the screen. What is the purpose of this button on the side is a mistery to me.

The two other physical buttons function a lot like the ones on the iPod touch, except worse. The power button on the top is very easy to press by an accident, which is not a problem if the player is running, but does turn it on if the player is off. The home button has a significant delay in its reaction... actually nor really a delay, but strange way of going back to the home screen - the screen goes completely black for about 2 seconds first, and then it goes back to the home screen. It took me a while before I got used to that - at first I kept thinking that the player was going into stand by instead of to the home screen.

The features I was most interested in were the Zune's internet capabilities. I had read plenty of reviews and preview, but none of them ever talked about the browser or any other internet capabilities. So I would like to talk a lot about this and frankly, none of it is good. The single mention I had heard about the browser before was that it was supposedly as good as the one on the iPod touch. I call total BS on that one and here is why:

The Zune HD's web browser is, and is recognized as a mobile browser. While the Safari browser on the iPod touch takes you to the actual regular web site, the Zune HD's browser always displays the WAP version of every site that supports it - that's pretty much most major sites like Yahoo, Google, AOL, Microsoft, etc. So the claim that the Zune HD brings you the "real" web is a total lie.

Secondly, with its lower resolution screen, the Zune simply does not render web sites as nicely as the iPod touch, nor does it do it as fast - it is times slower, and I experienced plenty of sites which never finished loading.

Right after the sync I realized another disappointing fact - there is no mail client. The only way to check email is through the web browser - my AOL account was very difficult to use, because the WAP version is not designed for touch devices.

Another thing missing is a youtube player. Which reminded me of another thing - the Zune HD does not have a built-in speaker. As useless as that might seem, I love a little speaker for youtube videos and watching TV episodes without headphones.

The keyboard is decidedly weird and I made a lot more mistakes with it than I ever did with the iPod touch, though on the plus side it does have the .com button (genius idea!) There two other very annoying quirks on the text entry - the address bar did not clear automatically and had to be deleted by pressing and holding a tiny back button. There is also no TAB key for moving forward when filling out log-in information and forms on web sites. There is no copy and paste and text cannot even be highlighted. Another thing the browser does not allow is tab browsing and pop-ups, pages that require them do not work properly either.

After playing with the browser extensively, I'd have to say that I find it pretty much useless and I don't care to ever use it again. Frankly I don't care to use the player itself ever again, but before I finish there are a few more things I'd like to cover.

The radio is probably the one feature I didn't have much problem with. The reception was strong and clear and I did like the HD radio. I wish though that there was an easier way to change stations and some presets (there is a way to store favorite or recently used stations on the home screen though.) Then again I hate radio so much I don't even listen to it in my car.

After so many disappointments I had one last hope for the player's redemption - the marcetplace and its apps store. I was hoping that there might be an email client somewhere there, maybe a calendar, or at least some fun games... in a word - no.

The app store is a total joke. I am sure it will improve over time, but right now it has a calculator, a weather gadget (by MSN of course), and three games. I tried downloading all of those over and over throughout the day and each and every time I got an error message without any explanation. Only after the first time, I received a message that I must be logged on with Zune account at the next sync. Luckily the Zune software allowed me to used my hotmail account and I did not have to sign up for a new account or give any personal information. I synced the player again, this time while logged in with my account, only to get an error again. I was never able to download any applications directly from the player.

I was able to download all of them from the desktop software and after syncing them manually to the Zune HD they all worked. The games were awful, the calculator I am sure new math better than me, and the weather widget was nice, but that's about it - nothing interesting or particularly useful there.

I don't know why, but I am feeling really blue after this right down awful experience with the Zune HD. I really wanted it to be as great as the hype about it was. Tomorrow I am exchanging it for a 3d generation iPod touch and I really hope that they have fixed the WiFi radio in them