The portable mp3 player wars, at least for this generation are over: Apple has won. Microsoft should give it a rest, at least until such time when bettery technology has improved. With Vista coming up they might spend their energy better I think.
My prediction for the MS device: it will be bulky, it will have poor battery life, and people (with a few obvious exceptions) will hate it.
Then again, I am not a good measuring rod: I still think the apple video ipods are a dumb idea and I see people liking them. I gots my 40Gb gen 3 or 4 (dunno) and that has served me well for two years while hopping all over Europe.
ajaxian
· 3 years ago
Forget apple Ipod - go all other brands, including microsoft - take on apple in the portable music player war.
Die ipod! may other players reign.
anyways that's what I think!
range
· 3 years ago
I like the memory capacity of the Ipod, but not the interface. I'm not saying that it's the best but its OK. The MS mp3 player has been rumoured for some months, I think I read about it on Engadget. I agree with Michiel, that war is done.
However, if you compare it to the console wars, XBOX 360 vs PS3, even if the PS2 is still on top, with the tactical errors that Sony made, maybe MS can do some damage to Apple, though I would think that it would surprise me.
MS is a behemoth, looking for new avenues and income streams to combat stagnation.
Chris
· 3 years ago
If the wifi capabilities of Microsoft's rumoured player extend beyond a basic browser for their take on Apple's iTunes Store, then I think it would be a worthy competitor to the iPod. I'd love to be able to wirelessly sync the device with libraries on other computers/devices on my network such as a Media Center PC or a NAS device.
Either way, competition is a good thing, right? ;)
Michael Gannotti
· 3 years ago
With the Robbie heading this up I for one will be very excited to see what Microsoft comes up with. I own a first generation Portable Media Center and while I do use it extensively for a couple of scenarios it has been too bulky a device with limited battery life to make it a practical carry around device. I am hopeful to that this will not be the case, and no I haven't seen any examples of it either. Would love to see them combine music/video/games (so I can watch my shows, listen to my music, and play portable Halo) all within a nice compact form factor but thats probably a long off, if ever, pipedream.
Christian Burns
· 3 years ago
Recording capability indeed. They would need to take a look at waht is available now in that area and at least try to improve. I would hope. It seems so obvious to those that like to record stuff. Who will give it to us first?
BenN
· 3 years ago
Hell, a couple of years ago the browser wars were done. Let's face it, unless there's only one company in the market, the war hasn't ended.
I like the iPod, but it's still too expensive for me to ever consider buying. For the same price I could get a Pocket PC, which admittedly would have less memory (2GB SD card) and an ever so slightly worse interface as an MP3 player, but it would allow me to surf the net, use GPS navigation and watch the occasional video on a screen slightly larger than the iPod's. And if all I wanted was an MP3 player, then there are plenty of much cheaper options.
Larry
· 3 years ago
If true, must mean that Apple has their MVNO network plans in place, they have had a patent on a wireless iPod for some time now.
Face it, MicroSoft is a follower, they'd only be leaking this if they wanted to freeze as many customers as possible to hold off buying current and coming soon iPods.
Also... Lets see... Wasn't freedom of choice a MicroSoft positioning statement at one time? Now they might be making the whole stack, and will make it Windows only etc etc.
What a load...
PodSlug (Erik Herz)
· 3 years ago
Microsoft should simply buy Archos which makes this nifty device: http://www.archos.com//products/tv_centric ... Maybe this will help them with the French against the iPod.
Oops, it runs Linux and plays MPEG-4 ... at some point MS will need to free itself from a Windows-centric business model and consumer strategy but at this point I don't think that they are ready to embrace and extend MPEG-4 or Linux.
PodSlug (Erik Herz)
· 3 years ago
This is a very funny video on the Microsoft iPod ... I wonder how much of this we will see when they launch their new device:
PS: I hope you can watch it ... use IE if you have to! It is really worth it.
miniplayer.info
· 3 years ago
Very interesting news! I hope this product doesn't follow in the path of Office 2007 and Vista with delay after delay. (Not that I really care because I'm using the beta's and to me it is like they have already arrived!)
The MS boys can count me in. Nice of them to give the iPod/iTunes users an upgrade path.
Brett Nordquist
· 3 years ago
Forget it. Unless it's easier to use than the iPod it will die a quick death. The only reason I'd care about wifi could be to sync up with a friends iPod. Microsoft is so clueless when it comes to portable players that they shipped the latest Windows Media without podcasting support. Only a few of my friends in tech listen to podcasts. Microsoft will never reach the masses unless they make it as easy or easier than Apple does. Imagine giving your mom an iRiver player (which are quite good) and telling her to fire up Juice to find some podcasts. Outside of iPod and iTunes, nobody seems to understand this.
Robert Scoble
· 3 years ago
Brett, I totally agree. My son sure won't consider anything but iPods too. Microsoft is swimming up a big river here. That said, Patrick said he'll check it out when it's released. Having wifi would make it a lot easier to use, especially in our house and especially if you have a music subscription service where you can get infinite music. That would be a huge selling point over the iPod if it were to come true.
Dips
· 3 years ago
With the news of wifi I hope they don't try and cram in too many features into the product. It might be a unique selling point but to the majority it won't be a deal breaker.
RL
· 3 years ago
I expect this to be a Media Center Micro. Same type of interface, similar to UMPC's. I have to agree with BenN, that the PPC with Media Player 10 serves the same function, and with Media Center, it's pretty easy to sync up recorded TV shows without having to pay for it. I own a good bit of MS hardware and have been pleased with it, including the now unavailable wireless router. I hope you told MS in your exit interview that you quit due to the lack of podcasting support in Media Player 11.
Bob Jones
· 3 years ago
I find it amusing that people suggest Microsoft should give up because they've lost to Apple in the portable audio market. If Apple had given up many years ago when they had 'lost' to Windows we wouldn't have OS X and we'd probably be waiting even longer for Windows Vista.
Granted, Apple's iPod is clearly the superior product, unlike Windows compared to OS X.
Phil
· 3 years ago
Digg.com is reporting that the player will offer users a free version of all songs they have purchased from iTunes. This is really cool!
@Brett Nordquist: Microsoft hasn't shipped WMP11 yet. When it is released (for XP), I expect it to have podcasting support.
Brett Nordquist
· 3 years ago
Dileepa: You may be right about MS adding podcast support to the final version of WMP 11. But what a feature to leave out of a beta that's going to be downloaded and written about by the early adopters. Very strange.
jsjs1313
· 3 years ago
In my opinion. There is still hope if the price is right. If this thing sells for $100 less than the ipod videos, I think it has a great chance. I can't tell you how many pc users own ipod's, but refuse to switch over completely. I do like the wi-fi feature as well:)
BenG
· 3 years ago
I can almost guarantee you that the wifi will enable downloading pay-for music, and podcasting will be either left out entirely or hacked on as an afterthought.
Microsoft are not agile nor intelligent enough in this space to release an unencumbered, useful device. Revenue sharing will rule the day.
Microsoft is jealous of iTunes because it basically creates free money for Apple (effectively zero incremental cost on each song purchased).
BenG
· 3 years ago
I can guarantee that the driver for adding wifi is to facilitate impulse purchasing of pay-for music. IF the device can retrieve podcasts, it will be a hacked-on afterthought.
There is no way Microsoft is intelligent or agile enough to release an unencumbered player, or add wifi for altruistic purposes ("the geeks will love wifi, so lets spend more on hardware and stick it in"). Makes me laugh.
When Microsoft looks at iTunes, they see dollar signs. iTunes is free money. It costs apple effectively nothing to sell one more song.
Kosso
· 3 years ago
It's obvious that Apple's 'wiPod' would ONLY record in a proprietary format for Quicktime.
Naturally MSoft would push WMA - unless they were smart and recorded to MP3.
The Archos AV400 would only reord audio to PCM wav. Then the PMA430 gave the choice of MP3 or WAV.
The thing is, is that the device also has av editing features on the device. You can't do this (so easily) with MP3 as WAV. I met with the the developers of the Archos and fed them a bunch of ideas about this along with a load of easy quick-win features they could add. This was while I was at BBC News developing apps and systems for mobile journalists to create and upload content from the road (or pocket)
Mobile wifi players will be interesting - the Archos PMA430 has wifi on board, a linux-basd os, and SDK and people did start to create podcatching apps for the device, with no need for a desktop at all. They were clunky though. But they *did* work.
Trouble is, with mobile wifi is the increased power consumption. Less power to actually play the media downloaded.
I cant wait to see the offerings from both Apple and Microsoft.
But I think Nokia are already WAY ahead of the game, with their N91 phone. With GPRS AND WIFI built in with a 4gb harddisk on board and 'normal' headphone jacks as standard. Loads of apps on Symbian to be made for this and also Flash player support too - I've alreadt built the RSS reader for it :)
I want one ;)
Until the next thing comes along...
Christopher Coulter
· 3 years ago
I will save them the overhype, and all the viral marketing, "enthusiast junkets", and blogger beach-ball astroturfing and annoying MVP fanboyisms, and Scoble flame-ups about "grassroots". It's DOA.
UMPC, Tablet PC, Pocket PC/WinCE devices and SPOT watch redux. Bulky, unwieldy, poor battery life...feature targeting the Early Adopter Geeky markets, plus not internally dogfooded, with massive firmware and chipware updates (always resulting in a new device purchase, Pocket PC style), and then handcuffed with some evil DRM that kills the Geek market, WGA for MP3. You expect anything less? That's been the script for 20 years.
Xbox had the design and slickness however, amazing what spending billions can do for you, yet for all that even the deathly old PS2 outsells it (not comparable as next generation) but darned scary from a macro view. And the open source XBMC still kicks it, trump card with Xbox Live tho.
Jason
· 3 years ago
I have to say that unless Microsoft's iPod killer appeals to the masses (and I don't mean the geeks like myself), it will utterly fail. Kinda live Urge. (Have we heard about Urge lately?)
What does the average person care about wireless connectivity? They have to dock the music / video player sometime to charge it, why not sync then?
Revolution, not evolution, will yield Microsoft its victory. But, I don't see that coming from Redmond..
Prove me wrong, Microsoft. Prove me wrong.
John Handelaar
· 3 years ago
Here's a prediction: I think the Apple design you linked to which they think is a phone is actually a TV remote. Or a video-capable iPod which can be used as a TV remote.
An 'Apple Tivo' might come with a Video iPod, and it'll need the numeric keypad to function as a remote with live TV.
taotakashi
· 3 years ago
Well, for me (although I own one) the ipod is just too closed. You always have hassle when connection to another computer or when you want to get something back from it, set aside issues with mixed usage in different operating system (which killed my filesystem on there once).
But that said I don't think MS will do it any better in that respect..
And.. will it look cool?
David
· 3 years ago
Except for the Xbox, Microsoft has had very bad luck with all it's hardware attempts. But this sounds pretty cool. Of course, so did the umpc, until it came out and it pretty much sucks in the current version. Nobody should ever use the term "iPod killer". That's just foolish.
realestateceo
· 3 years ago
IPOD rocks
Diego Barros
· 3 years ago
If Microsoft want to compete they had better get great integration with Windows Media Player and their music store. I don't think Urge is anywhere near as close as iTunes is as far as being tightly bound to a player, or a good enough online music store either.
I heard a rumor that the name of the iPod Killer is to be the "Microsoft Portable Music Listening Device" To be available in seven different editions. Can anyone confirm? "iPod" just doesn't have the same affect. :-)
Jason
· 3 years ago
>>> Except for the Xbox, Microsoft has had very bad luck with all it’s hardware attempts
I think their keyboards and mice are excellent. Much better than the "mighty mouse". There's always room for improvement, but I love the wireless optical desktop. The look, feel, and function are everything I need, and I feel like I have complete control over everything. Not something I've gotten with other keyboards.
Jason
· 3 years ago
Big question:
Will Microsoft learn from that video that suggested what would happen if Microsoft created the box for the iPod? The one where the requirements were larger than the box? And words and icons were all over the freaking thing?
jbelkin
· 3 years ago
MS already has a non-PC TV attachment - WEBTV which they've owned since 1998.
MS has shut down the home networking division.
MS watches - anyone wearing one?
MS Tablet PC's - BIll G swear they would sweep the world 3 years ago? Dkd you stand in line for hours to buy one?
MS Mobile phones - after NINE years, the reviews are still no Palm/treo/Blackberry and while their OSes are fine, no one thinks it's great. The new MS Q phone requires 3 menus and submenus to select SPEAKERPHONE.
MS has been selling and stocking WMA stores for 7 years - Apple basically outsold EVERY ONE of them combined and cumulative in less than a year.
MS has spent $8 BILLION dollars to sell 25 million XBoxes ... aka $400 spent to sell each machine - how much do the machines go for?
MS also swore that Media Pc's would sweep the nation - if you minus the minimal non DVR
Henry Mencken
· 3 years ago
Robert, isn't kvetching about this un-attributed, unsigned rumors wallowing in the badness of anonymity? Or are there levels of greys when dealing with anonymous content?
anon
· 3 years ago
Great, more origami project-like hype from Microsoft.
Microsoft's MP3 player product will be just like the rest of the products it makes: without a coercive bundling advantage dependent on an existing monopoly distribution channel, mostly ignored, disliked and undesired by the mass market.
RL
· 3 years ago
In defense, I will give you points on that MS has bragged alot about their products. In response let me just give a little bit of customer testimonial. I did not buy most of these things for the MS brand, but researched what they did, and how they would benefit me. I am typing on a MS keyboard, the ergonomics are great and the quality of the plastic and response is awesome. I love the fact that there are built in keyboard shortcut keys that I can assign or let them remain at defaults. All of those quirky lil office shortcut keys are clearly marked. I bought it 4 years ago, prior to the rise of Logitech. I also use a MS mouse, it happens to have a fun lil shortcut button that allows you to have an onscreen magnifier. It has many of the same features mentioned above for the keyboard. I am one of the few consumers that bought the home networking equipment from MS. That was when it was the same price as linksys, and prior to the price wars between the two. The router is more stable than a linksys, allows to me to create a DMZ very easily and a GUI you can almost dance to. It also has a little web filter on it. I have never used it but you can filter content by name or keyword. On the wireless adapter, it actually works with Windows 98. Find me a Linksys adapter that can do that. You can find a Cisco one that can, but they were a lot pricier than the MS or Linksys version. As a side note I wish MS would go back into the home networking hardware market. MS watch I have never had so I can't comment on that, but then again why would I need a watch when I have a PPC. Who wears watches now? Tablet Pc, another one I can't comment on, yet. MS Mobile phones, I can comment plenty on. I own a MPX220 smartphone and a HP IPAQ pocket pc phone. I have NEVER had to buy a ringtone or wallpaper. I just drop a wav/midi/wma file in and there's my new ringtone. Wallpaper is easy too. Drag and drop from the PC. Email is simple, whether I use Exchange, or pop3. If I get bored, well that's what the BBC news and Internet Explorer is for when I am standing in a long line. If the Q is like any other Windows Mobile device, you can easily assign a shortcut key to the speaker phone. I will agree with the online music/video stores, and I have only used it twice. Mainly because the DRM is irritating, but so is everybody else's including apple's. When I get more comfortable with managing the MS DRM, they may get some more of money too. I own both the xbox, and the 360. Both are awesome, yeah they have lost money on that, but they have made money on the software. Can anyone say HALO 3? HALO 2? How about a HALO movie? Also, Live Arcade is a pretty little money maker too. Look at the sales there. I know they have gotten 50 bucks off of me. Media Center, if you don't own one, you may not get it. I replaced my cable company's dvr box with one and got a nice little surprise. I actually get a guide that is accurate compared to my cable companie's one. Oh and I can pause and rewind live radio too. The shows I record can be placed on DVD and archived, or I can sync them up to my PPC where I have an "ipod" video experience. My music is available to me from anywhere on my network as well as my videos and pics. And, I can use the 360 to watch tv, or listen to my music files, or play an audio sideshow. All these being said, the failure of MS is not in the product, but in the Marketing of the products and bragging too much before they sell.
PodSlug (Erik Herz)
· 3 years ago
I just installed Windows Media Payer 11 and looked around for any sort of RSS support. I did not see any. I am surprised that they don't just turn the WMP into an iTunes killer and bundle it with every OS shipped.
Has anyone else see any RSS support in WMP?
Molly C
· 3 years ago
@Bob Jones "Granted, Apple’s iPod is clearly the superior product, unlike Windows compared to OS X." --------------
Huh? How about letting Microsoft actually release their player before automatically declaring the iPod to be "clearly superior". Good Lord.
Brett Nordquist
· 3 years ago
I can hear it now. The MS fanboys will say that to get the most out of the new MS player you'll need Vista, WMP 11, Media Center PC and a music subscription.
Molly: How long do we have to wait? How long as the iPod been around and MS still doesn't have a competing product? They must be busy getting Vista and Office 2007 out on time. :-)
dmad
· 3 years ago
#38. Maybe because history says they likely won't come close to threatening the iPod. MS seems to build products for their own employees (geeks) and rarely appeals to the common consumer. The only exceptions are the keyboard, mice and Xbox. What do all those have in common? Apparently none of them run Windows. ;-) If this thing has any hint of a Windows OS as its core then you can pretty much bet it will be confusing, bloated, non-intuitive and a pain in the ass to use. Like someone said earlier, prove us wrong. But we've seen this movie before and we know how it ends.
Edward
· 3 years ago
There is an NT OS at the core of the XBox, albeit a stripped down and heavily modified version.
Christopher Coulter
· 3 years ago
Oldie but goodie...
Up to 33 SKUs, whooo. ;) Ok, I better stop now.
iPod Microsoft Style (Ver 1.2)
iPod Home - only 100 songs allowed. Same as regular iPod just with control lock (which will be hacked).
iPod Home Premium - Now with 150 songs, and 2 extra solitaire games.
iPod Professional Edition - Vague add-ons and unlimited songs. But looks corporate, brooding stock-photography Office-looking pictures on the packaging.
iPod Readers Edition - Same as regular iPod, just with a CD sampling of Audio Books, and a few included Audio Books and some Shakespearean-looking packaging.
iPod Sports Edition - Added program to monitor heartbeat and calculate miles jogged. Also has cutesy sports-themes. Lacks skinning support however.
iPod Plus! Edition - Same as regular iPod just with more eye-candy and theme makers and totally k-rad PC quality 3D screen savers (which will render your iPod comatose). Only Edition that offers themes and skinning support.
iPod Mobile Edition - An Activesync-like program to sync with Windows Mobile 2005 and Smartphones and the odd ‘Plays for Sure’ devices. Mobile as defined as not connectivity, phone or Blackberry-like functionality, rather merely sync'ing to other Mobile devices.
iPod Gamer Edition - Full solitaire Suite with Pac Man and MS Arcade Pinball.
iPod Photo Edition - Picture support. With a nice but generic photo album and sync software. Since requires firmware upgrade only the Ultimate Edition has same functionality. Firmware will be bootlegged and spread on fan sites, following with lots of calls to warranty support. No Video support.
iPod SPOT Edition - Just a bigger and more ugly version of the SPOT watch, but can play around 40 mp3’s too. No Photo or Video Editions.
iPod Ultimate Edition - Regular iPod just bigger HD, with all Plus!, Reader, Sports and Mobile and Gamer Edition add-on’s. Costs nearly twice as much, and eventually comes in differing colors. The only model with real good support levels. And the only Edition without a Software Assurance subscription that is avail. for firmware upgrades. Lacks Enterprise and Office Edition functionality. 'Ultimate' is not meant to be defined literally.
iPod Ultimate Media Center Edition - Just like regular Ultimate Edition, except has the customized Media Center interface. Also firmware upgradeable.
iPod Video Edition - Video, but not the iPod Photo Edition, includes not the Photo or Photo Album functionality. Ten new SKU's: iPod Video Home Edition, iPod Video Home Premium Edition, iPod Video Professional Edition, iPod Video Readers Edition, iPod Video Sports Edition, iPod Video Plus! Edition, iPod Video Mobile Edition, iPod Video Gamer Edition, iPod Video and Photo Edition, iPod Video Ultimate Edition. SPOT Video not avail. as not enough CPU power. Office and Enterprise not offered in Video format.
iPod Media Center Edition - The SKU with Video and Photos, comes with a customized interface. Pen support not avail. with Media Center Edition.
iPod Pen Edition - Touch-screen functionality, separate isolated SKU. Ultimate and Ultimate Media Center Edition does not include Pen Support. Pen not avail. with Photo or Video Editions. Has iNote program, for taking and inking notes. Eventually Pen and Media center will fold into the next version of iPod, but only if you have the Ultimate bundle will you be able to upgrade your firmware.
iPod N Edition - Comes without a Music Player at all, just stores your mp3's. Sort of a Flash card, with playback buttons that don't do anything at all.
iPod Office Edition - SmartPhone-like Outlook contact/calendar functionality, worse than a toothache in terms of usability. Has many versions, each requiring and upgrade to Ultimate Edition. Hold-outs, presented in Dinosaur adverts.
iPod Enterprise Edition - Wifi, but only hooks into Exchange servers. A lame attempt at push-email that won’t really work. Costs triple regular iPod and a Software Assurance subscription is required. Also only version that gets premium iPod OneCare support.
iPod LIVE Edition - Monthly fee-portable Web-based iPod, allows you to sync your regular iPod songs to an online site, for times when not carrying an iPod, yet have web access and want to listen to your playlists. Requires iPod to work, cannot sync songs direct without the iPod. Limit of 4 syncs or 40 songs per month (whichever comes first). No collaboration or sharing features.
iPod SmartPhone Edition and iPod SmartPhone Video Edition - TBA. But has a secret viral-marketing countdown website pointed at by key Microsoft bloggers.
solomonrex
· 3 years ago
I'm not feeling it. Apple has a huge lead, this will only tick off MS's partners and that is becoming a trend for MS.
Worse, MS has no reasonable expectation of doing well with hardware. It took a lot of outside help to create the X360, and it's hardly considered perfect hardware. The controller was %1,000 better than the original xbox, but there's no reason it should have taken them 3 revs. Face it, if J Allard and co. are MS hope, they're doomed. I'm buying an X360, but there's no way I'm giving up my ipod. And I sincerely hope to get X360 2.0 when the overheating, huge power supply and overpriced network adapter are fixed (not holding my breath). Yes, MS's online console doesn't have builtin wifi, but they're mp3 player will?!?
What MS needed to do was move Sony to WMP11, since they have had great products with sucky software and they're the only mp3 maker that has a sliver of cred next to Apple (no longer the case). Good software, good hardware both with name brand recognition would work. But since MS made the Xbox, that's not going to happen and now MS is stuck ticking more partners off by siphoning their customers away.
Since Sony can't produce competent music software and Yahoo is buddying up with MS, I predict Amazon will start competing, compounding MS's problems.
Lance Robinson
· 3 years ago
There has been a Microsoft music player for years. It just has other capabilities too. :P
The idea that the iPod needs Wi Fi is bogus. Take any of the Wi Fi phone users. I bet they are downloading stuff in their computer and then moving it to the phone. I know I am (Nokia N80, use the audio player mostly for podcasts). Is faster and better. Besides, the Microsoft iPod will probably not be Mac or Linux compatible, so people will see it as another Microsoft Attempt to lock them into Windows. Since people do not want that anymore, it will flop.
Christopher Coulter
· 3 years ago
Since Sony can’t produce competent music software
Umm yah forget about Soundforge, Acid 6 and the new Cinescore? Sony makes some of the best music software out there. Now music player codecs and stuff like that, well ok. But Sony is a big company with many parts...
Goebbels
· 3 years ago
I love this nonsense so much I wish it were true: add WiFi support that will not always be available when 802.11g is hopefully months away from finalization. Add MVNO support that requires additional add ons and subscriptions... add a claim that iTune files will be transfered when MS does not have all the content the iPod has... plus, I can place any purchased iTunes on any iPod; does that mean I can transfer any and all iTMS tracks from anybody's collection to WMA rather easily? Plus, hasn't this "top secret plan" been around for six months? They are going to successfully deliver every rumored feature that iPod fans have been predicting for 3 years into a product at launch after failing with PlaysForSure, MSNMusic, and now Urge? Right!!! And this one product alone will have several loss leaders built into it: iTune transfer, a nonprofitable store, and an MVNO? I can't wait...
And Scoble keeps acting like it comes down to recording which has been available for years but 99% of the people don't care about! Lovely...
Christopher Coulter
· 3 years ago
...after failing with PlaysForSure, MSNMusic, and now Urge?
Hope (or rather failure) springs eternal at Redmond. Plus they never view failure as failure, seeing it in the Clay Christensenish lucid-dreaming way of 'failure as a success', and that the path to success is paved with many failures -- and in fact depends on it. Failure instead of a stigma, is now considered an evental path to success.
It's that type of insane thinking that will mortally wound Microsoft eventually.
Mary Gilmartin
· 3 years ago
I bought an ipod shuffle saturday and returned it sunday due to all the problems I had trying to set it up. And I am not the only one burned off the ipod due to poor customer care, help documention and product. Check out the ipod shuffle help forums on apple to get an idea of the problems.
I was really looking forward to an mp3 player. At least I still have the psp. Easy to use, easy to transfer files, easy to find help.
All Comments
The portable mp3 player wars, at least for this generation are over: Apple has won. Microsoft should give it a rest, at least until such time when bettery technology has improved. With Vista coming up they might spend their energy better I think.
My prediction for the MS device: it will be bulky, it will have poor battery life, and people (with a few obvious exceptions) will hate it.
Then again, I am not a good measuring rod: I still think the apple video ipods are a dumb idea and I see people liking them. I gots my 40Gb gen 3 or 4 (dunno) and that has served me well for two years while hopping all over Europe.
Die ipod! may other players reign.
anyways that's what I think!
However, if you compare it to the console wars, XBOX 360 vs PS3, even if the PS2 is still on top, with the tactical errors that Sony made, maybe MS can do some damage to Apple, though I would think that it would surprise me.
MS is a behemoth, looking for new avenues and income streams to combat stagnation.
Either way, competition is a good thing, right? ;)
I like the iPod, but it's still too expensive for me to ever consider buying. For the same price I could get a Pocket PC, which admittedly would have less memory (2GB SD card) and an ever so slightly worse interface as an MP3 player, but it would allow me to surf the net, use GPS navigation and watch the occasional video on a screen slightly larger than the iPod's. And if all I wanted was an MP3 player, then there are plenty of much cheaper options.
Face it, MicroSoft is a follower, they'd only be leaking this if they wanted to freeze as many customers as possible to hold off buying current and coming soon iPods.
Also... Lets see... Wasn't freedom of choice a MicroSoft positioning statement at one time? Now they might be making the whole stack, and will make it Windows only etc etc.
What a load...
Oops, it runs Linux and plays MPEG-4 ... at some point MS will need to free itself from a Windows-centric business model and consumer strategy but at this point I don't think that they are ready to embrace and extend MPEG-4 or Linux.
http://youtube.com/watch?v=mPukd_hiflE&sear...
PS: I hope you can watch it ... use IE if you have to! It is really worth it.
The MS boys can count me in. Nice of them to give the iPod/iTunes users an upgrade path.
Granted, Apple's iPod is clearly the superior product, unlike Windows compared to OS X.
http://digg.com/gadgets/Microsoft_s_iPod_killer...
Microsoft are not agile nor intelligent enough in this space to release an unencumbered, useful device. Revenue sharing will rule the day.
Microsoft is jealous of iTunes because it basically creates free money for Apple (effectively zero incremental cost on each song purchased).
There is no way Microsoft is intelligent or agile enough to release an unencumbered player, or add wifi for altruistic purposes ("the geeks will love wifi, so lets spend more on hardware and stick it in"). Makes me laugh.
When Microsoft looks at iTunes, they see dollar signs. iTunes is free money. It costs apple effectively nothing to sell one more song.
Naturally MSoft would push WMA - unless they were smart and recorded to MP3.
The Archos AV400 would only reord audio to PCM wav. Then the PMA430 gave the choice of MP3 or WAV.
The thing is, is that the device also has av editing features on the device. You can't do this (so easily) with MP3 as WAV.
I met with the the developers of the Archos and fed them a bunch of ideas about this along with a load of easy quick-win features they could add.
This was while I was at BBC News developing apps and systems for mobile journalists to create and upload content from the road (or pocket)
Mobile wifi players will be interesting - the Archos PMA430 has wifi on board, a linux-basd os, and SDK and people did start to create podcatching apps for the device, with no need for a desktop at all. They were clunky though. But they *did* work.
Trouble is, with mobile wifi is the increased power consumption. Less power to actually play the media downloaded.
I cant wait to see the offerings from both Apple and Microsoft.
But I think Nokia are already WAY ahead of the game, with their N91 phone. With GPRS AND WIFI built in with a 4gb harddisk on board and 'normal' headphone jacks as standard. Loads of apps on Symbian to be made for this and also Flash player support too - I've alreadt built the RSS reader for it :)
I want one ;)
Until the next thing comes along...
UMPC, Tablet PC, Pocket PC/WinCE devices and SPOT watch redux. Bulky, unwieldy, poor battery life...feature targeting the Early Adopter Geeky markets, plus not internally dogfooded, with massive firmware and chipware updates (always resulting in a new device purchase, Pocket PC style), and then handcuffed with some evil DRM that kills the Geek market, WGA for MP3. You expect anything less? That's been the script for 20 years.
Xbox had the design and slickness however, amazing what spending billions can do for you, yet for all that even the deathly old PS2 outsells it (not comparable as next generation) but darned scary from a macro view. And the open source XBMC still kicks it, trump card with Xbox Live tho.
What does the average person care about wireless connectivity? They have to dock the music / video player sometime to charge it, why not sync then?
Revolution, not evolution, will yield Microsoft its victory. But, I don't see that coming from Redmond..
Prove me wrong, Microsoft. Prove me wrong.
An 'Apple Tivo' might come with a Video iPod, and it'll need the numeric keypad to function as a remote with live TV.
But that said I don't think MS will do it any better in that respect..
And.. will it look cool?
I heard a rumor that the name of the iPod Killer is to be the "Microsoft Portable Music Listening Device" To be available in seven different editions. Can anyone confirm? "iPod" just doesn't have the same affect. :-)
I think their keyboards and mice are excellent. Much better than the "mighty mouse". There's always room for improvement, but I love the wireless optical desktop. The look, feel, and function are everything I need, and I feel like I have complete control over everything. Not something I've gotten with other keyboards.
Will Microsoft learn from that video that suggested what would happen if Microsoft created the box for the iPod? The one where the requirements were larger than the box? And words and icons were all over the freaking thing?
MS has shut down the home networking division.
MS watches - anyone wearing one?
MS Tablet PC's - BIll G swear they would sweep the world 3 years ago? Dkd you stand in line for hours to buy one?
MS Mobile phones - after NINE years, the reviews are still no Palm/treo/Blackberry and while their OSes are fine, no one thinks it's great. The new MS Q phone requires 3 menus and submenus to select SPEAKERPHONE.
MS has been selling and stocking WMA stores for 7 years - Apple basically outsold EVERY ONE of them combined and cumulative in less than a year.
MS has spent $8 BILLION dollars to sell 25 million XBoxes ... aka $400 spent to sell each machine - how much do the machines go for?
MS also swore that Media Pc's would sweep the nation - if you minus the minimal non DVR
Microsoft's MP3 player product will be just like the rest of the products it makes: without a coercive bundling advantage dependent on an existing monopoly distribution channel, mostly ignored, disliked and undesired by the mass market.
I did not buy most of these things for the MS brand, but researched what they did, and how they would benefit me.
I am typing on a MS keyboard, the ergonomics are great and the quality of the plastic and response is awesome. I love the fact that there are built in keyboard shortcut keys that I can assign or let them remain at defaults. All of those quirky lil office shortcut keys are clearly marked. I bought it 4 years ago, prior to the rise of Logitech.
I also use a MS mouse, it happens to have a fun lil shortcut button that allows you to have an onscreen magnifier. It has many of the same features mentioned above for the keyboard.
I am one of the few consumers that bought the home networking equipment from MS. That was when it was the same price as linksys, and prior to the price wars between the two. The router is more stable than a linksys, allows to me to create a DMZ very easily and a GUI you can almost dance to. It also has a little web filter on it. I have never used it but you can filter content by name or keyword. On the wireless adapter, it actually works with Windows 98. Find me a Linksys adapter that can do that. You can find a Cisco one that can, but they were a lot pricier than the MS or Linksys version. As a side note I wish MS would go back into the home networking hardware market.
MS watch I have never had so I can't comment on that, but then again why would I need a watch when I have a PPC. Who wears watches now?
Tablet Pc, another one I can't comment on, yet.
MS Mobile phones, I can comment plenty on. I own a MPX220 smartphone and a HP IPAQ pocket pc phone. I have NEVER had to buy a ringtone or wallpaper. I just drop a wav/midi/wma file in and there's my new ringtone. Wallpaper is easy too. Drag and drop from the PC. Email is simple, whether I use Exchange, or pop3. If I get bored, well that's what the BBC news and Internet Explorer is for when I am standing in a long line. If the Q is like any other Windows Mobile device, you can easily assign a shortcut key to the speaker phone.
I will agree with the online music/video stores, and I have only used it twice. Mainly because the DRM is irritating, but so is everybody else's including apple's. When I get more comfortable with managing the MS DRM, they may get some more of money too.
I own both the xbox, and the 360. Both are awesome, yeah they have lost money on that, but they have made money on the software. Can anyone say HALO 3? HALO 2? How about a HALO movie? Also, Live Arcade is a pretty little money maker too. Look at the sales there. I know they have gotten 50 bucks off of me.
Media Center, if you don't own one, you may not get it. I replaced my cable company's dvr box with one and got a nice little surprise. I actually get a guide that is accurate compared to my cable companie's one. Oh and I can pause and rewind live radio too. The shows I record can be placed on DVD and archived, or I can sync them up to my PPC where I have an "ipod" video experience. My music is available to me from anywhere on my network as well as my videos and pics. And, I can use the 360 to watch tv, or listen to my music files, or play an audio sideshow.
All these being said, the failure of MS is not in the product, but in the Marketing of the products and bragging too much before they sell.
Has anyone else see any RSS support in WMP?
"Granted, Apple’s iPod is clearly the superior product, unlike Windows compared to OS X."
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Huh? How about letting Microsoft actually release their player before automatically declaring the iPod to be "clearly superior". Good Lord.
Molly: How long do we have to wait? How long as the iPod been around and MS still doesn't have a competing product? They must be busy getting Vista and Office 2007 out on time. :-)
Up to 33 SKUs, whooo. ;) Ok, I better stop now.
iPod Microsoft Style (Ver 1.2)
iPod Home - only 100 songs allowed. Same as regular iPod just with control lock (which will be hacked).
iPod Home Premium - Now with 150 songs, and 2 extra solitaire games.
iPod Professional Edition - Vague add-ons and unlimited songs. But looks corporate, brooding stock-photography Office-looking pictures on the packaging.
iPod Readers Edition - Same as regular iPod, just with a CD sampling of Audio Books, and a few included Audio Books and some Shakespearean-looking packaging.
iPod Sports Edition - Added program to monitor heartbeat and calculate miles jogged. Also has cutesy sports-themes. Lacks skinning support however.
iPod Plus! Edition - Same as regular iPod just with more eye-candy and theme makers and totally k-rad PC quality 3D screen savers (which will render your iPod comatose). Only Edition that offers themes and skinning support.
iPod Mobile Edition - An Activesync-like program to sync with Windows Mobile 2005 and Smartphones and the odd ‘Plays for Sure’ devices. Mobile as defined as not connectivity, phone or Blackberry-like functionality, rather merely sync'ing to other Mobile devices.
iPod Gamer Edition - Full solitaire Suite with Pac Man and MS Arcade Pinball.
iPod Photo Edition - Picture support. With a nice but generic photo album and sync software. Since requires firmware upgrade only the Ultimate Edition has same functionality. Firmware will be bootlegged and spread on fan sites, following with lots of calls to warranty support. No Video support.
iPod SPOT Edition - Just a bigger and more ugly version of the SPOT watch, but can play around 40 mp3’s too. No Photo or Video Editions.
iPod Ultimate Edition - Regular iPod just bigger HD, with all Plus!, Reader, Sports and Mobile and Gamer Edition add-on’s. Costs nearly twice as much, and eventually comes in differing colors. The only model with real good support levels. And the only Edition without a Software Assurance subscription that is avail. for firmware upgrades. Lacks Enterprise and Office Edition functionality. 'Ultimate' is not meant to be defined literally.
iPod Ultimate Media Center Edition - Just like regular Ultimate Edition, except has the customized Media Center interface. Also firmware upgradeable.
iPod Video Edition - Video, but not the iPod Photo Edition, includes not the Photo or Photo Album functionality. Ten new SKU's: iPod Video Home Edition, iPod Video Home Premium Edition, iPod Video Professional Edition, iPod Video Readers Edition, iPod Video Sports Edition, iPod Video Plus! Edition, iPod Video Mobile Edition, iPod Video Gamer Edition, iPod Video and Photo Edition, iPod Video Ultimate Edition. SPOT Video not avail. as not enough CPU power. Office and Enterprise not offered in Video format.
iPod Media Center Edition - The SKU with Video and Photos, comes with a customized interface. Pen support not avail. with Media Center Edition.
iPod Pen Edition - Touch-screen functionality, separate isolated SKU. Ultimate and Ultimate Media Center Edition does not include Pen Support. Pen not avail. with Photo or Video Editions. Has iNote program, for taking and inking notes. Eventually Pen and Media center will fold into the next version of iPod, but only if you have the Ultimate bundle will you be able to upgrade your firmware.
iPod Starter Edition - Flash-sticks, cartoonish-color themes. Marketed at ‘Developing’ Markets, aka, teens.
iPod N Edition - Comes without a Music Player at all, just stores your mp3's. Sort of a Flash card, with playback buttons that don't do anything at all.
iPod Office Edition - SmartPhone-like Outlook contact/calendar functionality, worse than a toothache in terms of usability. Has many versions, each requiring and upgrade to Ultimate Edition. Hold-outs, presented in Dinosaur adverts.
iPod Enterprise Edition - Wifi, but only hooks into Exchange servers. A lame attempt at push-email that won’t really work. Costs triple regular iPod and a Software Assurance subscription is required. Also only version that gets premium iPod OneCare support.
iPod LIVE Edition - Monthly fee-portable Web-based iPod, allows you to sync your regular iPod songs to an online site, for times when not carrying an iPod, yet have web access and want to listen to your playlists. Requires iPod to work, cannot sync songs direct without the iPod. Limit of 4 syncs or 40 songs per month (whichever comes first). No collaboration or sharing features.
iPod SmartPhone Edition and iPod SmartPhone Video Edition - TBA. But has a secret viral-marketing countdown website pointed at by key Microsoft bloggers.
Worse, MS has no reasonable expectation of doing well with hardware. It took a lot of outside help to create the X360, and it's hardly considered perfect hardware. The controller was %1,000 better than the original xbox, but there's no reason it should have taken them 3 revs. Face it, if J Allard and co. are MS hope, they're doomed. I'm buying an X360, but there's no way I'm giving up my ipod. And I sincerely hope to get X360 2.0 when the overheating, huge power supply and overpriced network adapter are fixed (not holding my breath). Yes, MS's online console doesn't have builtin wifi, but they're mp3 player will?!?
What MS needed to do was move Sony to WMP11, since they have had great products with sucky software and they're the only mp3 maker that has a sliver of cred next to Apple (no longer the case). Good software, good hardware both with name brand recognition would work. But since MS made the Xbox, that's not going to happen and now MS is stuck ticking more partners off by siphoning their customers away.
Since Sony can't produce competent music software and Yahoo is buddying up with MS, I predict Amazon will start competing, compounding MS's problems.
http://geekswithblogs.net/lance/archive/2006/01...
Umm yah forget about Soundforge, Acid 6 and the new Cinescore? Sony makes some of the best music software out there. Now music player codecs and stuff like that, well ok. But Sony is a big company with many parts...
And Scoble keeps acting like it comes down to recording which has been available for years but 99% of the people don't care about! Lovely...
Hope (or rather failure) springs eternal at Redmond. Plus they never view failure as failure, seeing it in the Clay Christensenish lucid-dreaming way of 'failure as a success', and that the path to success is paved with many failures -- and in fact depends on it. Failure instead of a stigma, is now considered an evental path to success.
It's that type of insane thinking that will mortally wound Microsoft eventually.
Check out the ipod shuffle help forums on apple to get an idea of the problems.
I was really looking forward to an mp3 player. At least I still have the psp. Easy to use, easy to transfer files, easy to find help.