yes, notebook. it doesn't effect disconnecting the external HDD whatsoever, even with itunes open. Now, if i had one of the movies/shows playing through itunes then yes i assume it would. But as long as the file isn't opened then i can connect/disconnect with zero issues.

and if i try to play the movie without the HDD connected it will say file missing click to locate it, or something similar.

9/16/2009 11:46:31 AM

oh awesome. I will definitely set this up then. Thanks again.

9/16/2009 11:55:10 AM

I used to do the same and it works fine.

9/16/2009 12:17:58 PM

any Zune sdk info or developer links?

9/16/2009 1:00:08 PM

There doesn't appear to be a public SDK currently. Which is probably the only lame thing I've heard so far.

Actually I spoke too soon.
http://forums.xna.com/forums/p/38975/226669.aspx



[Edited on September 16, 2009 at 1:15 PM. Reason : .]

9/16/2009 1:13:36 PM

Played with the Zune HD at Best Buy today.

I have an iPhone so I wouldn't really need one, but damn it's sexy as hell

9/16/2009 9:24:26 PM

^ I have an iPhone and I bought one. iPhone can't output quality video to a TV/monitor, can't listen to the radio, and can't play modern games. It'll be interesting to see if I keep it in my pocket though, or if it gets relegated to the backpack or car.

9/16/2009 10:57:38 PM

^ is your iPhone a 3G or a 3GS?

9/16/2009 11:05:14 PM

What type of inputs will this thing take? What I am getting at is something I can do a carpc type application with, but I want to utilize a 10.5" LCD I've had for years as the actual display.

I suppose I could just use the Zune itself for the control, but if I could map a touchscreen overlay back to the device itself (via bluetooth?) then that would be much slicker and probably a little more driver safe.

Does this thing have a GPS?

9/16/2009 11:12:32 PM

Quote :

"and can't play modern games"

umm what? does not compute.

Quote :

"iPhone can't output quality video to a TV/monitor"

it outputs standard definition to TV/monitors and the quality is no different then watching regular TV. HD is available through iTunes but you can't sync it to the mobile devices which generally makes sense because the phone only has a limited space of 16gb and much smaller screen...HD movies and TV shows are huge. That wouldn't leave much room for anything. Although it would be cool to be able to take your iPhone/Zune HD to a friends house and hook it up to their TV to watch HD content. But I don't see that as something I would do often. I do however output to my in-dash Nav LCD for road trips so everyone can watch TV/movies from the iPhone and in that scenario quantity of videos/music > video quality.

[Edited on September 17, 2009 at 12:19 AM. Reason : .]

9/17/2009 12:15:32 AM

Quote :

"iPhone can't output quality video to a TV/monitor, "

Actually, it can, when Apple decides to allow it. There's already been rumors of third party docks that supports 720p that are awaiting the approval of Apple.

Quote :

"can't listen to the radio"

I'd take internet radio (on the go, no less) over terrestrial any day of the week.

Quote :

"and can't play modern games."

Have you seen Real Racing? Or Modern Combat: Sandstorm? Hell, even Madden looks pretty good. And all those games run great on the 1st and 2nd gen iPhone. Just wait until there starts to be a couple of decent games made specifically for the 3GS and then say the games aren't modern (wtf does that even mean?). The only thing stopping the iPhone from being the ultimate portable gaming device is the lack of any non-touch based controls. A problem that Microsoft decided not to fix with the Zune.

The Zune HD looks decent, I'll give it that. But I just don't think it did anything at all to make it stand out above the iPhone or iPod touch. All it does is provide an alternative to the Apple monopoly. Maybe they'll get people that are looking for a new mp3 player that don't want an iPod for whatever reason, but I can't imagine too many people will be double dipping. At least not too many that aren't getting paid by Microsoft.

9/17/2009 12:25:42 AM

Quote :

"I'd take internet radio (on the go, no less) over terrestrial any day of the week."

seconded. Can't listen to pandora while on the road with the zune HD. But you can listen to a couple of schmucks laughing at the dumbest shit in between commercial breaks on the way to work in the morning with your zune HD. But you can also use your car radio for that.

I've got SimCity, Sims 3, Real Racing, all the X-Plane games. They all seem to be 'modern' to me. SimCity is quite impressive and that came out a long ass time ago. But I guess you can't play PGR so its obviously not impressive enough.

Quote :

"Actually, it can, when Apple decides to allow it. There's already been rumors of third party docks that supports 720p that are awaiting the approval of Apple."

how is that going to work if you can't sync your HD content to the iPhone? or is that something apple will be allowing for these devices?

[Edited on September 17, 2009 at 12:33 AM. Reason : .]

9/17/2009 12:31:25 AM

Quote :

"seconded. Can't listen to pandora while on the road with the zune HD. But you can listen to a couple of schmucks laughing at the dumbest shit in between commercial breaks on the way to work in the morning with your zune HD. But you can also use your car radio for that."

I can't listen to ESPN Radio, NPR, or any other talk radio through my iPhone. I can't listen to college or pro sports either. And believe me I have tried for the entire time I've owned my iPhone. Podcasts fucking SUCK, because I can't get them on-demand. The HD radio is a HUGE plus for me because of that. Pandora/Last.fm don't do much for me on the PC or on the go. They both destroy my battery life and I am just as happy listening to my actual music collection.

Quote :

"'ve got SimCity, Sims 3, Real Racing, all the X-Plane games. They all seem to be 'modern' to me. SimCity is quite impressive and that came out a long ass time ago. But I guess you can't play PGR so its obviously not impressive enough."

I've got dozens of awesome games for my iPhone too. I love them actually. But once you see a modern console game on the Zune HD, it's like booting up a SNES emulator on your computer. The iPhone games look so horribly stodgy, slow, and basic it makes me cringe playing them now.

The key thing for the Zune is it's XNA based, which means that porting XBOX Live Arcade titles is VERY easy to do, and potentially porting 360/original xbox titles isn't difficult either (from a purely technical standpoint). There isn't going to be the mass availability of the iPhone, but the game quality for launch titles should be pretty damn high.

Quote :

"Actually, it can, when Apple decides to allow it. There's already been rumors of third party docks that supports 720p that are awaiting the approval of Apple."

So what you're saying is, you can't. There's all kinds of shit you COULD do on Apple hardware if they "decided to allow it". Good luck on that. And a dock supporting 720p on the iPod/iPhone is worthless because you can't put HD content on the device in the first place (without jailbreaking it).

Quote :

"it outputs standard definition to TV/monitors and the quality is no different then watching regular TV. HD is available through iTunes but you can't sync it to the mobile devices which generally makes sense because the phone only has a limited space of 16gb and much smaller screen...HD movies and TV shows are huge. That wouldn't leave much room for anything. Although it would be cool to be able to take your iPhone/Zune HD to a friends house and hook it up to their TV to watch HD content. But I don't see that as something I would do often. I do however output to my in-dash Nav LCD for road trips so everyone can watch TV/movies from the iPhone and in that scenario quantity of videos/music > video quality."

See, you miss the point a little bit. Zune's video store is the Live Marketplace. That means buy once, play anywhere. I can sync HD content to my Zune (which btw isn't huge, it's marginally more space than SD content on the iPlatforms), but I don't have to. I can login to any Xbox360 or PC and play my content live, without downloading or syncing, in HD. I'd only need it on the device for road/airplane/offline experiences.

On the Zune itself, I completely agree, HD is overkill. It's the ability to keep my video in the cloud and on-demand that seals the deal for me. iTunes requires me to keep everything local, and that suuucks.

9/17/2009 2:23:29 AM

...and Noen for the win.

9/17/2009 5:06:07 AM

Quote :

"I can't listen to ESPN Radio, NPR, or any other talk radio through my iPhone. I can't listen to college or pro sports either. And believe me I have tried for the entire time I've owned my iPhone. Podcasts fucking SUCK, because I can't get them on-demand. The HD radio is a HUGE plus for me because of that. Pandora/Last.fm don't do much for me on the PC or on the go. They both destroy my battery life and I am just as happy listening to my actual music collection."

NPR has an app
XM/Sirus has an app so you can listen to all the sports stations you want on the go. You can also listen to talk radio if thats your thing. Oh and its commercial free? wow!
AOL Radio
Pandora


You speak of destroying your battery life? What do you think using HD radio on the go is going to do? Also if you're in a car there is a power source to charge from.

Quote :

"I've got dozens of awesome games for my iPhone too. I love them actually. But once you see a modern console game on the Zune HD, it's like booting up a SNES emulator on your computer. The iPhone games look so horribly stodgy, slow, and basic it makes me cringe playing them now. The key thing for the Zune is it's XNA based, which means that porting XBOX Live Arcade titles is VERY easy to do, and potentially porting 360/original xbox titles isn't difficult either (from a purely technical standpoint). There isn't going to be the mass availability of the iPhone, but the game quality for launch titles should be pretty damn high."

Ok, now you're just starting to sound like a mindless Microsoft goon who's been drinking too much of the kool-aid. None of these games are 'slodgy', slow or basic. They're all very quick to load and very responsive. Graphics are fantastic. (and this isn't even on the 3GS).

You want to talk about game quality? PGR is not something to bring to the table.

Quote :

"See, you miss the point a little bit. Zune's video store is the Live Marketplace. That means buy once, play anywhere. I can sync HD content to my Zune (which btw isn't huge, it's marginally more space than SD content on the iPlatforms), but I don't have to. I can login to any Xbox360 or PC and play my content live, without downloading or syncing, in HD. I'd only need it on the device for road/airplane/offline experiences. On the Zune itself, I completely agree, HD is overkill. It's the ability to keep my video in the cloud and on-demand that seals the deal for me. iTunes requires me to keep everything local, and that suuucks."

I'd much rather keep everything local because it literally will play when I demand it. I've had my experience with Microsoft's marketplace. As much as I love the xbox360 the whole reason I bought apple TV is because anytime I rented a movie via the Xbox360 I'd have to do so a day in advance from the time I wanted to watch it. The instant streaming aught to fix that (hopefully) but it hasn't. Also the content of iTunes > Zune Marketplace as far as movies and TV shows (for now).

And HD content is significantly larger. A SD movies is about 1.25gb. The same movie in HD is almost 4gb! How is this not a significant increase?

9/17/2009 8:05:07 AM

Quote :

"Podcasts fucking SUCK, because I can't get them on-demand."

I am actually curious about this.

I can start any length podcast over 3g and it just streams in. However I only listen to podcasts, I don't download video podcasts. Is there a difference? Is that not what you mean by on-demand?

9/17/2009 9:18:01 AM

Quote :

"I can't listen to ESPN Radio, NPR, or any other talk radio through my iPhone. "

The Public Radio app is one of my most used apps and it works perfectly. Even has almost all of NPR's daily programs available on demand so you can listen to them whenever. Not to mention you can stream in public radio stations from all over the country.

9/17/2009 9:25:49 AM

Gonna wait until the zunephone comes out before i get in on this.

9/17/2009 9:26:17 AM

Mild trolling to follow:

It seems like torture to play anything other than a basic game on a phone.

Simcity 3? On a phone? You have to be shitting me.

9/17/2009 9:46:17 AM

Quote :

"I am actually curious about this. I can start any length podcast over 3g and it just streams in. However I only listen to podcasts, I don't download video podcasts. Is there a difference? Is that not what you mean by on-demand?"

I never got into podcasts but you can stream them to the phone the one time i tried it just for the hell of it.

Quote :

"It'll be interesting to see if I keep it in my pocket though, or if it gets relegated to the backpack or car."

The Zune HD is more closely comparable to the iPod Touch. Because no matter how much better you say the Zune HD is to the iPhone...you still can't make any calls from it, send/receive txts, emails, etc from anywhere. So you still have to lug around two devices in your pocket unless everyone is like you and would much rather leave their cell phone in the car and only take their music.

[Edited on September 17, 2009 at 9:55 AM. Reason : .]

9/17/2009 9:51:48 AM

If you go to a game and want to listen to the live broadcast while you're there, it won't work over internet radio. You have to listen on FM.

9/17/2009 9:57:29 AM

so wait...you're AT the game but you still want to listen to the radio? Is this some nascar shit we're talking about here?

9/17/2009 9:58:33 AM

it would be nice at a game for injury report.

9/17/2009 10:02:18 AM

maybe I don't go to games enough or when I do i have decent seats (or at least good enough that i can see the game with my own two eyes) /shrug

9/17/2009 10:04:25 AM

listening to the broadcast is great, especially during halftime and stuff like that. I do it at panther games. But it still wouldn't ever sway me towards the zune. I bought an AM/FM "walkman" radio last year for like 15 bucks and it works perfectly. I just keep it in the pouch of my seat cushion and pull it out on gamedays.

9/17/2009 10:17:38 AM

I guess I never thought of doing that except at the one Nascar race I'd been to. But that was mainly because it was so loud so the headset helped a little.

9/17/2009 10:23:52 AM

yeah, its nice to hear things other than "draw play to deangelo williams up the middle for 3 yards that will bring up 3rd and long" or "with that rushing first down scotts tru-green chemlawn will donate 50 dollars to brad hoover's arthritis foundation" 30 times a game.

9/17/2009 10:47:14 AM

I'm just accustomed to muting the commentators when I'm watching soccer on TV because they're morons.

9/17/2009 10:48:33 AM

Quote :

"NPR has an app XM/Sirus has an app so you can listen to all the sports stations you want on the go. You can also listen to talk radio if thats your thing. Oh and its commercial free? wow! AOL Radio Pandora You speak of destroying your battery life? What do you think using HD radio on the go is going to do? Also if you're in a car there is a power source to charge from."

Thanks for the NPR app! This will make my life much more enjoyable

XM/Sirus requires a subscription. If I have a tuner, I get all the talk and sports radio I want for free. AOL Radio is a complete piece of shit.

And with Pandora/AOL Radio, I get 5 hours of total battery life. From 100% to dead is 5 hours while streaming music over 3g. Yes, I think HD Radio will last a little longer than 5 hours.

Quote :

"Ok, now you're just starting to sound like a mindless Microsoft goon who's been drinking too much of the kool-aid. None of these games are 'slodgy', slow or basic. They're all very quick to load and very responsive. Graphics are fantastic. (and this isn't even on the 3GS). You want to talk about game quality? PGR is not something to bring to the table."

Performance on my iPhone 3G for ANY 3d game I have never goes over 10-15fps. Never. The iPhone uses a general CPU. The Zune uses an nVidia tegra. Guess which one can do hardware textures and lighting? Guess which one can handle 20x the polygon count? Again, you haven't seen them side by side.

You put PGR against any racing app on the iPhone, and guess which one wins?

Quote :

"I'd much rather keep everything local because it literally will play when I demand it. I've had my experience with Microsoft's marketplace. As much as I love the xbox360 the whole reason I bought apple TV is because anytime I rented a movie via the Xbox360 I'd have to do so a day in advance from the time I wanted to watch it. The instant streaming aught to fix that (hopefully) but it hasn't. Also the content of iTunes > Zune Marketplace as far as movies and TV shows (for now)."

Weren't you just asking about how to keep your library synced in two places, because you can't keep it all on your iPhone? And yes, you are talking about the original video marketplace. Instant streaming does fix it (how has it not? You can watch video ON DEMAND). Totally agree about the content, both for video and apps/games.

9/17/2009 11:23:30 AM

Quote :

"I can start any length podcast over 3g and it just streams in. However I only listen to podcasts, I don't download video podcasts. Is there a difference? Is that not what you mean by on-demand?"

If it's over 10mb, it won't download on the phone (at least it hasn't ever worked for me, I always get the "you must download this via WiFi or sync from a PC" popup). And every podcast (NPR) I want to listen to is over that limit.

9/17/2009 11:25:33 AM

I believe with podcasts through the iphone you can simply click once to play (stream) the podcast instead of downloading and then playing. I have done this several times for This American Life, but i was on a wifi network at home. I haven't tried on 3G, but i imagine it would be the same way since you are only streaming, not downloading the entire copy.

9/17/2009 11:31:53 AM

Quote :

"If it's over 10mb, it won't download on the phone (at least it hasn't ever worked for me, I always get the "you must download this via WiFi or sync from a PC" popup). And every podcast (NPR) I want to listen to is over that limit."

Thats what I thought you were referring to.

I listen to many casts that are beyond 10 megs. I click play and it streams. i don't download it to the device.

9/17/2009 11:35:28 AM

Quote :

"Weren't you just asking about how to keep your library synced in two places, because you can't keep it all on your iPhone? And yes, you are talking about the original video marketplace. Instant streaming does fix it (how has it not? You can watch video ON DEMAND). Totally agree about the content, both for video and apps/games."

no, not on my iPhone. to my laptop because I have over 600gb of iTunes purchased content and i only have a 300gb hard drive on my laptop. So last night I synced all the video content onto my time capsule and I can now access it any time any where with an internet connection. Since i have U-Verse with an upload of 1.5mbps I don't get too shitty streaming performance remotely.

I haven't tried the instant streaming on the xbox yet because I no longer rent movies from xbox since the netflix addition came out. Although netflix's instant streaming content does suck as well. But if the instant on 1080p is available that i would check out.

Quote :

"Performance on my iPhone 3G for ANY 3d game I have never goes over 10-15fps. Never. The iPhone uses a general CPU. The Zune uses an nVidia tegra. Guess which one can do hardware textures and lighting? Guess which one can handle 20x the polygon count? Again, you haven't seen them side by side."

Please welcome the 3GS. Now if they'll just get some content that takes advantage of the hardware. But to date all games I've played on the 3G have been smooth and have good graphics. This of course isn't in comparison to what i'm used to on a Xbox360 on an HD tv.

Quote :

"Thanks for the NPR app! This will make my life much more enjoyable XM/Sirus requires a subscription. If I have a tuner, I get all the talk and sports radio I want for free. AOL Radio is a complete piece of shit. And with Pandora/AOL Radio, I get 5 hours of total battery life. From 100% to dead is 5 hours while streaming music over 3g. Yes, I think HD Radio will last a little longer than 5 hours."

I have an XM/Sirus subscription but it sucks anyway so i don't use the app. Although it is there for those that like listening to the radio. I guess I just don't like listening to the radio because I hate having to put up with annoying DJ's that talk all the time, commercials, morning shows etc. Which is why I love Pandora. I've heard great things about AOL radio but I haven't tried it myself.


[Edited on September 17, 2009 at 11:43 AM. Reason : .]

9/17/2009 11:38:45 AM

Quote :

"600gb of iTunes purchased content "

jesus christ

9/17/2009 11:50:28 AM

Quote :

"I have an XM/Sirus subscription but it sucks anyway so i don't use the app. Although it is there for those that like listening to the radio. I guess I just don't like listening to the radio because I hate having to put up with annoying DJ's that talk all the time, commercials, morning shows etc. Which is why I love Pandora. I've heard great things about AOL radio but I haven't tried it myself."

Myself and 90 million other Americans would rather put up with commercials than pay for XM/Sirius. I had XM for about 3 months. The service was spotty as hell for me. And I also like morning shows

Pandora is great, no doubt about it. AOL Radio is a steaming pile of shit on the other hand.

9/17/2009 11:57:27 AM

I have XM in my car, love it. No spotty service at all, in fact, it beats the heck out of searching for radio stations every 30-45 minutes in the car when driving in the mountains. I too hate commercials and DJ's and morning shows.

Pandora +1
Lala +1 (for streaming my own music)

9/17/2009 11:59:52 AM

Quote :

""600gb of iTunes purchased content ""

just some quick math, you've probably spent somewhere near $10,000 on iTunes. that's ridiculous.
(at minimum $5k, if all were movies, $100k if all were music)

[Edited on September 17, 2009 at 12:10 PM. Reason : .]

9/17/2009 12:09:38 PM

Nvm...its roughly 500gb.

Thats 55 different TV series (478 individual TV shows). Most of them full series.

50 movies (half are purchased movies the other half are iPhone SDK tutorials)

~1500 songs


I've been purchasing content from iTunes since the day the iTunes store launched. The TV Shows i purchased because I didn't have cable TV since I just purchased commercial free content from iTunes.

Quote :

"Myself and 90 million other Americans would rather put up with commercials than pay for XM/Sirius. I had XM for about 3 months. The service was spotty as hell for me. And I also like morning shows"

I don't know how you can put up with commercials. I can understand 90million Americans not being able to responsibly afford XM subscriptions. But you on the other hand could if you wanted to. Just flipping through the stations on the radio you almost never turn to a station that isn't on a commercial break. Its way worse than TV.

Quote :

"just some quick math, you've probably spent somewhere near $10,000 on iTunes. that's ridiculous. (at minimum $5k, if all were movies, $100k if all were music)"

I honestly can't say how much I've spent on iTunes over the years but your math is way off because you can't base it off of storage size alone. Keep in mind that any HD content you buy it also comes with the SD version. So one HD movie can take up to 5-6gb between both versions.

[Edited on September 17, 2009 at 12:23 PM. Reason : .]

9/17/2009 12:17:48 PM

wow what an absolute piece of SHIT

watch some of the videos in this review, appalling:

http://www.engadget.com/2009/09/17/zune-hd-review/#continued

9/17/2009 12:58:34 PM

Quote :

"Microsoft is sticking interstitial ads on the player when you load applications. It's a bit jarring and a bit off-putting to see an advertisement on your device when you're trying to get into an app, and we think the company may want to investigate some other options here -- it just feels sleazy."

wait wait what? The ZHD has ads?

9/17/2009 1:20:00 PM

games only iirc (since they're free), not apps

^sorry, forgot about HD

"That could take as long as 30 seconds for Chess, Ars Technica reports, and 17 seconds for Goo Splat. The other available games are Hexic, Sudoku, Space Battle 3, Shell Game . . . Of the Future, and Texas Hold 'Em. Two utility apps, Calculator and Weather, are also available, but they don't show ads during start-up."

on my Zune30, i have all those games already (got them as soon as xna came out a year and a half ago) and there are no ads.

[Edited on September 17, 2009 at 1:28 PM. Reason : .]

9/17/2009 1:25:11 PM

I guess what I'm not understanding is...is it the zune OS that serves ads before launching an app or is it the app developer that can serve ads?

9/17/2009 1:42:29 PM

well it's developed in-house so the ads are coming from MS either way.

thought this person had a good point:
"As for the Zune HD ads, I'm torn. Thanks to the iPhone, I've generally come to accept that when a full mobile game (not a "Lite" version that teases a paid download) is free, there are going to be ads somewhere. The question becomes, would you rather watch an ad as the game loads, or see them while you play?"

9/17/2009 1:55:58 PM

^are there no plans for 3rd party apps? or you just mean the at launch apps?

9/17/2009 2:05:57 PM

Considering there are XNA extensions specifically for the ZuneHD.....I doubt Microsoft released these so they can write their own apps.

9/17/2009 2:14:36 PM

I didn't think so but figured id ask just in case. because I thought someone had already posted it.

9/17/2009 2:15:59 PM

Quote :

"wow what an absolute piece of SHIT watch some of the videos in this review, appalling:"

Are you smoking crack? The only thing that's a big disappointment from the review is the Web Browser.

9/17/2009 2:16:09 PM

^i thought he was being sarcastic or trolling. because after reading the review i was wondering if I read the write one. Although I didn't watch the videos.

9/17/2009 2:22:17 PM

Quote :

"Are you smoking crack? The only thing that's a big disappointment from the review is the Web Browser."

uh no...read it some more (as well as any other objective review on the internet) and you'll see the apps are laggy as hell, there are mandatory ads, fucking SOFTWARE volume controls, no divx support, etc.

but don't let that stop you from buying a shiny new toy

and watch the goddamn videos, the real-world UI lag is a deal breaker.

[Edited on September 17, 2009 at 2:30 PM. Reason : ]

9/17/2009 2:29:05 PM

^ App launching is slow, yes. The apps on it are basically demo apps. The ad bit is gay, but that doesn't make it a piece of shit.

^There is NO UI LAG AT ALL. I don't know what the fuck you are looking at? Even in the review, dozens of times, the guy mentions how there is NO UI LAG.

BTW, the software volume control was misleading. You can easily change the volume in your pocket with it while the zune is "locked". The reviewer just didn't know about the feature (which is hopefully outlined in the instruction manual).

No DivX support? FYI, the iPlatform doesn't support divx either. And I'd bet my right leg that more format support will be coming, similar to the rollouts for the 360.

9/17/2009 2:38:53 PM