Rated 
Good device but less than expected
Small, good display, good value, wireless sync, main formats supported
Main button too sensitive, screen way too small for video, sync issues
Posted 1 year ago - I wanted to buy a player other than iPod mainly because all my music I ripped with Windows Media Player in WMA format and this format is not iPod compatible. So my next choice was Microsoft Zune. Device looks nice and displayed image is great (especially on video) however, its size will not let you see too much. The main button is too sensitive but probably it takes practice. It supports all main file formats. Unfortunately these are all the strengths. Now come the weaknesses. First I expected from a Microsoft product to be able somehow to work with Windows Media Player - big mistake because it does not work at all. It comes instead with its own program Zune which is way more difficult to use than Media Player. The Market Place is useless because you may not buy Points with a credit card if you are outside USA but only with prepaid cards which honestly in Canada I did not see. The Social I am not interested in because I am not a teenager. The worst thing is that Zune software is collecting when first run all music from all folders you mentioned. If you forget one or you add new music other than through Zune software you will have to add it manually. The big surprise is that music ripped with Media Player (probably due to copyright protection) you will not be able to use it (it reports "Invalid Media") so you will have to re-rip all your music through Zune software and that is exactly why I didn't want to buy an iPod. The software is really bad. For instance you may not place a song directly into a playing list, you have first to add it to the collection and then add it to a playing list. When in collection, especially if you have lots of songs in your library is a real chalange to find something. In a word everything becomes very complex and it takes you a lot of time. If you want to change frequently your Zune's content then you must be prepared to waste a lot of time. My advice, buy a product without copyright protection because this is really annoying. Is not enough you spend a lot of money to buy music but afterwards you have to spend a lot of time too in order to move your music from one device to another. Really dissappointed. However, I couldn't assume that you will not have the same issues with other products too (this includes iPod).
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