I must admit after seeing the latest line up from iPod it really took the wind out of my Zune sails. As if the iPod Touch was not enough, the WiFi features contained there in are exactly what was missing from Social aspect of the Zune. You can walk into a participating Starbucks and download new music, you can also surf the web ... did I not mention this in a wish list several moons ago.
The Zune had WiFi features when it was released, and never capitalized on it. The down side of the touch is that I only see them in 8Gb and 16Gb version. The amount of music and videos that I want to watch makes this a real issue.
The iPod classic, I believe, remains the true flag ship and with the next versions at 80Gb and 160Gb it is clear that the bar has been raised significantly. They have also adopted the Cover Flow (display album covers) mechanism that made the iPhone look so cool on the TV commercials. Even more impressive is the proposed 40 hours of playback ... I am going to have to see that.
The iPod 80GB and 160GB classic versions retail at $249.99 and $349.99 respectively. I am sure the new Zune retail price of $200 is in direct response to iPod's highly competitive pricing. If the rumor mill is true then the next Zune update will allow music downloads wirelessly, the rumor came out of engadget.com and they are far from reliable. There is also supposed to be a new line of Zune toys but again rumors along with photo editing is cheap, especially on the Internet.
Still, I remain hopeful!
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