Funny... I know tons of people, and none of them own a zune, or probably don't even know what a zune is :P

Forget it Micro$oft :P

so uh wonder who the number one hard drive based player could be.

I own 2 zunes (me and my daughter) and they are really great players. Love 'em. Ipods are great, too.

Variety is a GOOD thing.

I thought this may have been to quick to call. Zune is a player that is going to grow but to become second i doubt it i feel apple will lead no doubt and then creative will come second and then zune will come after that.

Microsoft got in the game too late with the hard drive music players and will never even come close to the iPod's, ever. Although I have to admit it is a very nice player with lots of features that the iPod does not have and needs add-ons, meaning they want you to spend more money. If the future iPods come with built in fm-tuner, bluetooth connectivity, all in a smaller package with a bigger screen then it'll really blow other competitors off the market.

If Zune had a good FM transmitter built in instead of the silly crippled wifi I'm sure it would sell more.

People act like its bad to come in second. This isn't a car race where second is nothing. Were talking about millions of dollars for coming in second. Ask Pepsi if being second to Coke wasn't profitable or Reebook if being second to Nike was such a bad thing. There's millions of dollars to be made coming in second or third or forth. You let number one spend all the money on advertising, research and finding out what the consumer wants then you quietly slide in and make millions picking up what they miss. I'd take second in that kind of race quite happily.

Maybe they ought to start making big claims about the numbers of them they have 'shipped' instead, eh?

:P

Zune is better than ipod in terms of screen size. Ipod is easier to navigate than the zune. Both players have advantages, the ipod has been around longer and is more popular.

Both have horrible amps so who cares really? oh yeah i forgot no one cares about sound quality just having a massive ammount of music.

I'm sure it's like books. "sold" just means sold to retailers and middlemen. I seriously doubt from the (one) I've seen outside of a retailer's shelf that they've sold anywhere near a million units to end users.

I bought a Zune months ago and I like it better than my iPod. However I do like the iTunes store better than the Zune store. They both offer similar music selections but the iTunes store is organized better. I have no desire to by movies or videos, so I could care less that Zune doesn't offer those. If I'm giong to watch a video, TV show, or movie I'd just as soon do that on my PC monitor rather than on the iPod screen. I'm very happy with my Zune and would recommend it to anyone, assuming they don't want to watch TV shows on it.

I love the zune... my only qualm is the weight. hopefully, future models will be a little more trim. i love the software, though. it lets me get on xbox live thru my pc instead of buying that $100 wireless adapter for the 360.

I think ipods are more vulnerable than anyone suspects. They are the leaders because they were first and put out the best quality product. I do have a nano and I am happy with it but itunes is a real dissapointment. Apple is way too arrogant to maintain the market lead forever. I have started using Media Monkey instead of itunes. The comparison between the products is really disturbing. The makers of MM try to make the best product they can. MS and Apple just want something that works and the public should be grateful to them for that service. Both MS and Apple are in their own dreamworld where they are the idol of the public. That the public will 'buy' anything they have to sell. Neither company will be able to stand up to real competition from a great concept. MS is better when it comes to hardware than Apple. MS is far less innovative than Apple. I think the MP3 player of the future will come from 'left field', maybe from Asia. It will come from a company that tries to make the best MP3 player that can be made. Lets face it, the amps do suck on all MP3 players to make a better one is last century's technology. They reason that has not been addressed is none of the makers care if they sell high priced crap. The way you need to reset an ipod is more proof that they do not care if they sell junk. There are probably hundreds of ways you can significantly improve an ipod. With the price tag as high as it is some one will challange them. With in the next few years there will be a large demand for HiFi mp3 players. Something that you can plug into a HiFi amp and get high quality music. All the player are still following Apples lead. I do not see Apple going that route. Those devices would really upset the media maffia!

yea i dont know what kind of dumbasses buy songs, buy the player but dont buy songs, get em free

Originally posted by Mez:

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I think ipods are more vulnerable than anyone suspects. They are the leaders because they were first and put out the best quality product. I do have a nano and I am happy with it but itunes is a real dissapointment.... Lets face it, the amps do suck on all MP3 players to make a better one is last century's technology.

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iPod was not first by a long shot, but it was the first to become popular. The Diamond Rios and Creative Jukeboxes were for sure out before the iPod. What the iPod had that those lacked, though was a decent UI.

Remember the Creative Jukeboxes that were like 6gb and in a Discman form factor? Or the Diamond Rios that were larger than life and held like 256mb? I sure do!

The iPod Shuffle (I haven't heard the new, micro ones) had a better amp than the real iPods. Pathetic. My Zen MicroPhoto has a decent one, I wouldn't call it amazing, but is better than most, especially Apple's.

Creative seems happy to hold on to the number two position. Apple and Microsoft both advertise their products. The closest things to advertising I've seen Creative do is include their player in an Orville Redenbacher commercial.