Otaku Gadgets

Had this been in the near past, I would’ve laughed at the title too. Since when has Zune been a threat to any personal media player, let alone it being a threat to the iPod? Now however, things have changed. It seems like the new Zune HD might have a fighting chance against Apple.

For example, this time round people at least know that something called the Zune HD is coming. Sure, many won’t ever know that the Zune line existed long before the new Zune HD and that Microsoft has actually killed off all the other Zunes. But now that the Zune HD is shaping up much better than all the other Zunes, Apple may have something to worry about. Jump to the other side for a full feature-by-feature comparison.

The new Zune HD has a lot of features that match those of the iPods and some that the iPods do nor have at all. The first noticeable thing that the Zune HD has is something that none of the iPods have – an OLED screen. As you might know, OLED is a technology that makes for much better displays. The screens are brighter and have better viewing angles. Not to mention richer picture quality.

The iPods may have color screens, but they cannot match the richness that will be brought to the table by OLED screens. With the help of an additional dock accessory, the Zune HD will also be able to play HD video, a feature that is conspicuously missing in all of the iPods.

However, both the OLED screen and the ability to play HD video have been done before. Cowon has already brought out PMPs that have these features. So Microsoft is not bringing anything new to the table. There’s only one exception to that – the HD radio tuner. This will allow the Zune to tune into more than just the songs. It will be able to catch the song meta-data that is being transmitted. You guessed it – this will compete directly with the new Nano’s radio features. The Zune HD matches even the iTunes-tagging feature with its own song-tagging feature that works with the Zune Marketplace for downloading tagged songs.

Microsoft will be upgrading the storefront substantially in order to facilitate downloading of the TV and movie content that is currently available only to the XBOX community. The company is also planning to significantly increase the amount of video content that is available at the Zune Marketplace. This one will go to Apple because it will take more than that beat the iTunes Store. Especially after the iTunes Extra and iTunes LP extended content features that provide customized and interactive content as a value-added service that is exclusive to the iTunes store.

Next comes the browser. Zune HD is the first Zune to get the Internet. No doubt this will be a welcome move to en-users but no one knows yet if it will stream Flash content. This is important because of the iPod Touch 3G that runs on the iPhone OS. Mobile Safari does not support Flash even though Adobe says that it has a version of Flash ready for the iPhone OS. Zune is already late in entering the game but if the browser supports Flash it will have something to one up Apple in the user experience section. Other than that, there isn’t much in the Zune HD that can match all the functionality provided by the iPhone OS and the app store with 75,000+ apps (figure according to Apple at the September 9 ’09 event).

One thing that the Zune does give you and the iPod doesn’t is a subscription-based model for the online store. Apple charges you per download while Microsoft charges you only a fixed monthly fee. Redmond has of course overemphasized this to ad nauseum in its ads. Although this can be pointed to as a real advantage, I am yet to see someone raving about how the Zune Marketplace is better than the iTunes store. And I do see a lot of tech everything everyday.

Now the point here is that the iTunes store actually offers a lot more content than the Zune Marketplace. Why else would Microsoft talk about adding much more videos and TV and Movie content from the XBOX platform? Those are basic things that such a store should have already.

The main rivalry of course is going to be between the iPod Touch and the Zune HD because they are both touchscreen based devices and they both have gaming capabilities. Now that Apple has focused on marketing and developing the iPod Touch as a gaming device, there is going to be a lot of changes in the market dynamics of the Touch and the new Zune HD. It has been confirmed by videos that the Zune HD will have gaming capabilities.

However, it must be kept in mind that the iPod Touch has just received a hardware boost in order to make it a better portable gaming device. It even has Open GL now. The Zune on the other hand is still very much media centric even though it has been revealed that it can run 3D games. Since the gaming feature is not a focus of the Zune HD, it can be safely assumed that the gaming will not be at par with the gaming on the newly upgraded iPod Touch.

The touchscreen on the iPod Touch is likely to be better than or the same as the Zune HD. The UI on the other hand is much more likely to be better on the Touch than on the Zune HD. The iPhone Touch is a full-blown portable computing device. The Zune HD is a PMP device.

Lastly, there is also the physical design. This usually depends on personal preference and you already know my choice.

So what does it look like? In a few hours Microsoft is will try to bring down an immensely successful line of Apple PMPs with just one comparable device.