HP Music Player and Music Store

[Lanbrown]

Re: Re: Does anyone of these companies do their homework?

Originally posted by iMeowbot
HP are in far better shape than that. They showed a profit of USD1.4 billiion for the FY just ended. Remember that they run an insanely successful printer and peripherals business, and are the top seller in the rather profitable Unix server market. This is certainly no Dell; there's actual engineering going on there (and word has it that they're pretty good; it was an HP engineer who designed the Apple I and II).

Are you sure about that? Sun still holds the number one spot.
"The figures, made available to selected server vendors Monday, also cover Linux servers, servers with x86 chips and the overall performance of the server industry."

"Sun maintained its top ranking with 35.6 percent of the market."

"HP held a 31.5 percent share of the Unix market."

"Meanwhile, in focusing on the x86-based server market, HP remained the leader with its 31.6 percent share. That was down, however, from year-ago figures, when HP accounted for 34.5 percent of the market."

So if you meant x-86 that also runs windows then yes, they are number one. If you are talking purely UNIX or a type of derivative, then no, they are not number one.

http://news.com.com/2100-1010-5077446.html

 

[Lanbrown]

Re: competition is a good thing

Originally posted by bellychris
alot of people i know still have windows 98... even though it may be a step backwards maybe they should consider writing for this os

License availability:

Windows 98 June 30, 1998 June 30, 2002 November 30, 2003*

Windows 98 SE June 30, 1999 June 30, 2002 March 31, 2004*

Windows Millennium Edition December 31, 2000 December 31, 2003 December 31, 2004

End of Life

Windows 95 December 31st 2000 December 31, 2001 December 31, 2002
Windows 98 / 98 SE June 30, 2002 January 16, 20046 January 16, 2005
Windows Millennium Edition December 31, 20038 December 31, 2004 December 31, 2005

So there is one year left of support from MS before they stop writing for Window 98. People that still use 98 will need to upgrade if they want to run newer software.

 

[rjstanford]

Originally posted by Highland
Does anyone know if it'll be easy to move files between the different WMA based players/stores??? (ie. If I download on Dell Music Store, and then want to transfer to my HP player).

Also, does anyone know if the quality of WMAs are as good as AACs? AACs seem to be a big step up from MP3...

As to the first - that's the claim. And so far I haven't seen anyone complaining about not being able to do it - and I don't see any reason why they wouldn't be able to, either. This is potentially a Big Deal to a lot of people.

The quality - quite frankly, I think that WMA wins out at 64k and AAC wins out at 128k... although with 40gb+ HD players and firewire/usb2, why worry about it? I'm reripping everything (slowly) from 192k to 320k MP3s right now... Actually, I should stop that, go back, get a nice external drive, rip everything to FLAC, and then convert to format-du-jour at will in the future. D'oh! Ah, well, next time I guess. But I'm hardly representative

Oh, and as for the previous question of why MS doesn't support AAC playing in WMP - don't forget that Apple hasn't liscensed FairPlay (needed to play iTMS songs) to Anyone else. Nobody but iTunes and the iPod can play iTMS music (legally), and this will remain this way until Apple changes their mind.

-Richard

 

[rjstanford]

Originally posted by the_mole1314
I recently had a discussion with another new iPod user today:

Him: "I love how the iPod works for windows, but my windows audio files won't work on it."
Me: "Yeah, I know."
Him: "Why?"
Me: "I don't know."
Him: "What should I do?"
Me: "Re-rip into aac or mp3 using iTunes for Windows."

Lets all mediate on that....

Hmm. That's not a good sign. First of all, what if he bought the music? iTMS has, what, an 80% share of legit. downloaded music sales right now? And falling (inevitably, due to increased competition)? That's a lot of WMA files out there that people paid good money for. Don't you think they'd like to keep them? And what if your friend had 100 CDs he'd already ripped? Or more? At that point, it becomes easier to return the iPod and buy a slightly less cool competitor than to spend a few days reripping his collection.

Portability is the main reason that I don't do any WMA/AAC files - I'll take the openness of MP3, thank you - but there are lots of people out there who don't worry about things like that. As this conversation goes, if more people start hearing about their friends buying iPods and not being able to use their existing music on them, don't you think that this is going to hurt potential iPod sales?

-Richard

 

[rjstanford]

Originally posted by eazyway
Yes I did follow your link and it showed the Zen at $314.99 and sold out not $249 as you suggest. So don't shout get yours links straight.

Hmm - very weird. If I go back there, it says that I still have one of them in my cart (has an "in cart" button rather than the price). Checking the cart (see picture) shows it at the original price. So I'm sorry that they raised the price on you. I guess that the demand was high enough, even after they got completely sold out of stock on hand. Which certainly makes it look like some people like this product more than the twice-the-price iPod (which was the original discussion poinit after all). On the other hand, if anyone out there has Windows-type relatives who want an MP3/WMA player, I guess I still have the option to get these at $249...

-Richard

edit: reduced image size

 

[tychay]

Re: Re: Re: Does anyone of these companies do their homework?

Originally posted by Lanbrown
Are you sure about that? Sun still holds the number one spot.

Yeah, I think he's a bit off. Even including their Linux business, HP doesn't beat Sun. Though I think HP's Linux and Unix business is more diversified than Suns.

But the original poster is correct in saying that HP was very profitable last quarter.

Then again, it seemed the entire sector is doing well. Also, he claims this profit in this division (the largest total profit and largest revenue) and printers (best margins) shows "real innovation going on."

I don't believe so.

We all know that the Sun is setting.

Much of the old HP was spun off in Agilent. Most of what we know as HP computers are just HP branding done on the same computers. This announcement coupled with their move into flat panels shows that they are following the same ODM design chain and OEM supply chain paths as Dell. Printers cannot remain a high margin business forever.

Profit is nice. I seem to remember in the early 90's a certain personal computer manufacture had incredible profits and high margins and was in the printing business also. But then they became rudderless, inefficient, with too many product offerings. It was in danger of going out of business and the number of buyout rumors became a cacophony.

A certain person once gave this quote about finding a new CEO for that company and it'll very likely apply to HP in a decade: "Right now the job is so difficult, it would require a bisexual, blond Japanese who is 25 years old and has 15 years experience!"

(That company found such a CEO, HP will not be so lucky.)

 

[eazyway]

Originally posted by rjstanford
Hmm - very weird. If I go back there, it says that I still have one of them in my cart (has an "in cart" button rather than the price). Checking the cart (see picture) shows it at the original price. So I'm sorry that they raised the price on you. I guess that the demand was high enough, even after they got completely sold out of stock on hand. Which certainly makes it look like some people like this product more than the twice-the-price iPod (which was the original discussion poinit after all). On the other hand, if anyone out there has Windows-type relatives who want an MP3/WMA player, I guess I still have the option to get these at $249...

-Richard



edit: reduced image size

maybe you still can get the price if you checkout. I notice that that price had a 28% discount. Not the 10% on the site . Just bought 3 20 GB iPods for the kids for Christmas... I have 3 very high tech oriented kids and they just drool over the iPod ... 2 of them like to jog and my eldest daughter tested the iPod while running and found it excellent during the run. She hated to give it back to the store. They loved the scroll wheel and the remote !

I am very wary of running with music plugged in. So I insist they run along the lake and not the road.

Took advantage of the Thanksgiving discount and free engraving. Still a pricey deal. ($359 ea)

cheers

 

[Highland]

The quality - quite frankly, I think that WMA wins out at 64k and AAC wins out at 128k...

Well... 64k is no good at all for a music download service (there's NO WAY I'd pay for a 64k song!).

 

[acarboni]

This just in:

Big Lots, the nation's favorite closeout store, is going to be opening its own online digital music store by the end of the year.

"Our brick and mortar stores already have an excellent selection of Milli Vanilli, Color Me Badd, and Green Jello albums. We're excited to be offering this selection of music to our customers 24 hours a day on the internet, whatever that is," said spokesman and washed-up sitcom actor Jerry Van Dyke. "We actually have no idea what a 'download' is, but everyone's opening one of these interweb stores, so we figured we'd jump on the bandwagon."

When asked if a music player or jukebox program would be bundled with the service, Van Dyke said "Do you have any food? I'm so hungry. I could really use something to eat. Or some penecillan. My insurance from 'Coach' ran out in 1997, and I've been really itchy ever since."

 

[Dahl]

He he

 

[ryaxnb]

Originally posted by SiliconAddict
Thanks. I knew there was another retailer in there but Walmart didn't ring a bell.

Speaking of bells can we expect Taco Bell to open up a Latin music story soon?

This really is starting to get ridiculous.

MTV too.

 

[iPost]

Originally posted by eazyway
from kidA

Zen box is $314 on sale and 40% heavier. My kids jog and size and weight are very important to them. But it is all about what you can afford and more important what you really want. We are a PC (4) and Apple (2) household and all the kids(all in University..two taking computer science) all want the iPod not the Dell or any other device.

Seriously, if your kids run or jog, they do not want an iPod. I have two iPods (10 GB and 20 GB) and they've both locked up when I've taken them running. I tried clipping them to my waist and also attaching them to arm bands, and they still lock up (requiring you to do the two-finger salute to reboot them).

I really wish Apple would come out with a flash memory-based player. When I go running, I still take my old 128MB Rio player. It's really funny how in those iPod ads, they have people dancing around and shaking their iPod, which would also also lock it up -- just try it. Hard-disk players like the iPod aren't designed for rough handling like that.

I'm still waiting for the day when we will be able to buy an 8GB flash memory player. Solid state is the future if you ask me (and I guess the present too... I read some marketing blurb from Rio that flash memory players still make up about 80% of the portable player market).

 

[Sabenth]

I'd hate to see how much damage the drive really gets if people are dancing like the adds....