iZunes
I spent some time last night looking around the ‘net for information about Microsoft’s new Zune product launch. Actually, it was hard to miss, and I complement Microsoft for creating a ton of buzz around their new media player. Every local television network kept flashing their promos for “the hottest new music player this Christmas.” Their timing was also well done, just over a week away from Black Friday, the busiest shopping day of the year, and the almost official start of the holiday shopping season.
After going through the available info, I noticed one important detail that hadn’t struck me before. The new Zune supports the AAC file format. This is quite important because this “audio associated codec” (not “Apple associated” as it mistakenly gets called) means that the new Zune will play content from the iTunes store. To the best of my knowledge, this makes the Zune the first player, not made by Apple that will work with the insanely popular iTunes (it also plays MP3 and WMA files). In fact, apparently there is a way to import your iTunes into the Zune.
While there have been some excellent non-Apple players from SanDisk and Creative, one of their problems has been that they won’t play music purchased from Apple. So, when an iPod owner has their shiny white player go to the electronics graveyard, if they want to continue to listen to those dollar a song tracks, they need to replace their iPod with another Apple branded product. From Apple’s standpoint it is marketing genius as everyone that has purchased more than a few tracks from iTunes will keep buying a player from them, again and again.
I’m not sure why other manufacturers of MP3 hardware haven’t created a player that will play the content from iTunes. I thought it was some type of licensing issue, but maybe not. Perhaps we’ll see support for the AAC format added at the upcoming CES in January from Creative, SanDisk and others. By the Zune adding this one feature, it now means that when an iPod owner needs a replacement, they finally have a real choice. It’s too early to tell if the iPod is the better player or the Zune, but anything that gives consumers a choice is a good thing.
--Jonas
After going through the available info, I noticed one important detail that hadn’t struck me before. The new Zune supports the AAC file format. This is quite important because this “audio associated codec” (not “Apple associated” as it mistakenly gets called) means that the new Zune will play content from the iTunes store. To the best of my knowledge, this makes the Zune the first player, not made by Apple that will work with the insanely popular iTunes (it also plays MP3 and WMA files). In fact, apparently there is a way to import your iTunes into the Zune.
While there have been some excellent non-Apple players from SanDisk and Creative, one of their problems has been that they won’t play music purchased from Apple. So, when an iPod owner has their shiny white player go to the electronics graveyard, if they want to continue to listen to those dollar a song tracks, they need to replace their iPod with another Apple branded product. From Apple’s standpoint it is marketing genius as everyone that has purchased more than a few tracks from iTunes will keep buying a player from them, again and again.
I’m not sure why other manufacturers of MP3 hardware haven’t created a player that will play the content from iTunes. I thought it was some type of licensing issue, but maybe not. Perhaps we’ll see support for the AAC format added at the upcoming CES in January from Creative, SanDisk and others. By the Zune adding this one feature, it now means that when an iPod owner needs a replacement, they finally have a real choice. It’s too early to tell if the iPod is the better player or the Zune, but anything that gives consumers a choice is a good thing.
--Jonas
posted by digitaldoc at 11:07 AM
2 Comments:
I could be wrong, but I'm pretty sure that you still can't play songs bought from iTunes on a non-Apple MP3 player. The problem is not with the AAC codec, but with the FairPlay DRM that Apple uses to encrypt songs sold over iTunes. Apple has not licensed it to anyone else, therefore they can't play songs from the iTunes store.
The Zune will import all of your music from iTunes that were not bought from iTunes. There are programs out there like QTFairUse that will remove the DRM and allow it to play on a Zune, but I doubt Microsoft would do that automatically for you.
I stand corrected:
"On install, the Zune automatically imports your existing iTunes database, for the most part without any hiccups. It even grabs the playlists and converts them to Zune's default playlist format. What it doesn't do is import the smart playlists, so you'll have to start all over with those. Except you can't, because there aren't any smart playlists in the Zune. In any case, the Zune should carry over the non-protected iTunes music, but if you purchased songs from the iTunes store (or any other online store) you're out of luck."
Link: http://www.gizmodo.com/gadgets/software/itunes-vs-zune-software-whats-right-for-your-music-215000.php
Thanks for pointing that out! This significantly diminishes the usefulness of the new Zune player. At least if there is hack to convert iTunes to a less restrictive format, this should enable the power users to choose a Zune over and iPod.
--Jonas
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