Although this older model isn’t as small or pocketable as the newer generations (or competing iPods) it’s still an ideal solution if you mostly plot on using it in the car, on an airplane, etc where pocketability is not as huge a concern. The screen is large and fantastic for watching movies for on long flights, etc. And the overall user interface (the visuals, navigating menus via the ‘twist’ navigation, etc) is far more polished and robust than even the tried-and-right iPod classic interface.

At this point, it makes as much sense to get the newer generation of this product. But this has certainly been a pleasant surprise as I had a lot of trepidation when first purchasing this product. It wasn’t seen as cool or as hip as an iPod. But day-to-day functionality is what mattered most to me and in that regard this thing excels.

So what have we so far? Unimpressive unit. No bonus goodies worth mentioning. Software that is both unsightly looking and hard to setup… What the heck could there possibly be about the Zune to warrant four stars? Well, after a while, the Zune was something that was quickly forgotten about. Not forgotten as in “stuffed in a drawer never to be seen in the light again” but something better. Something that has become such a part of my everyday life that I don’t even reckon about it any more. It’s something that you keep with you like your wallet, keys or cellphone. You don’t RECKON about your wallet, it’s just there, doing what wallets do. Keeping your credit cards, receipts and loose cash in one handy pouch. And that is exactly what the Zune has become in my everyday life: a music wallet. It is in my hand with my Cellphone. It goes with me in the car. It’s at the gym on the tread mill. It’s in my garage jacked into my small bookshelf stereo. It’s on my chest when I am laying out in my hammock. It’s plugged into my home stereo… It’s an everyday part of my life. And if you are only playing music (videos are another tale), it keeps playing and playing and playing. I have had the Zune out in the garage in 100+ degree heat playing non-stop for 12-13 hours. It plays continuously for the 10 hour drive to my parents house in Florida. It is the energizer bunny of music players. The buttons are dirty and worn but they still work. And for those reasons I give the Zune four stars.

To be honest, two firmware and software updates (and a set of proper headphones) have corrected a lot of the issues of the initial release package giving the unit a nice breath of fresh air and a small more longevity.

So for those of you looking for a respectable alternative to “iPod madness”, I can honestly recommend the Microsoft Zune without reservation.

Pros-

1. Downloads are soooooo simple!!!! Simpler than the Creative products (which I still reckon are excellent).

2. Movie quality is superb and the software (have to buy it) was not outrageously expensive.

3. Movie downloads don’t take nearly as long as the Zen Vision M.

4. It is simple to navigate through the menus, which is excellent since the product manuals are not very helpful.

5. Battery time is substantial.

6. The software I bought to download the movies has a built-in decrypter to take off the anti-piracy protection codes so that I can download the movies that I have bought and own. Creative may have that now, but hasn’t in the past, so I couldn’t download my favorite movies that I personally own!

Cons-

1. has to be charged through your computer, THERE IS NO A/C CHARGER INCLUDED

2. It is a small heavy and thick, which may bother some but doesn’t bother me at all

3. Found it at Target on clearance for $132.99 (not online) and I paid $159.99 plus s/h – could’ve saved over $30.00 buying it at my local store

All around, I have had this thing for about a month and I am so very glad I bought it. It was a wise buy. Now I can listen to my tunes in the car or anywhere as well as watch movies and listen to teachings.

Upon reading reviews for it, people seemed to have varying experiences with the device but the pretty much agreed that the software is terrible.

I’m here to say, I LIKE my zune but the software is astoundingly terrible. My OS is Windows Media with the most recent service pack and it will not install. NO version of Zune software will install on it and that’s with 4 hours on the phone with customer service and pretty much anyone else I could call. Luckily the absolutely oldest version will install on my parents’ computer (Windows XP) and updates will download and work with it. The software annoyed me at first because it synced every piece of music on the entire computer onto the zune. It took a small while for me to figure out how to get the music I wanted organized into different folders and to tell the software where to look for it.

As for the device itself. I’ve never owned an ipod, the only other mp3 players I’ve had was a small sansa that my dog ate (RIP mp3 player) and another one that the brand doesn’t matter, it sucked. I was interested in how cheaply I could get 30 gig of space with the zune.

When there comes a day that my zune dies, I will probably look around some and if improvements in software have been made I will likely go with a newer zune. If not, then this will be the last zune I own.