It's pretty funny listening to all the fanbois here dissing the ZuneHD. I love my iPhone but the ZuneHD looks amazing. OLED screen, high resolution... Yea. I like. Wish it ran iPhone OS. 
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iPhone 3GS Capable of High-Definition Video Playback?
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In theory, yes. In reality: are you really going to haul your Zune HD, your dock, and your cables to your buddy's house, crawl around the back of his H/T receiver to connect it, just to watch a movie?
99% of consumers probably will not.
This continues to be a problem with Microsoft: hyping their products based on features consumers ultimately just don't care about (HD radio, squirting songs, etc.).
And OLED screens? How many consumers know anything about those? Sure, it's a great improvement, but is it a key feature worth shouting from the rooftops? No. Put an iPod touch with a camera and a bajillion available apps next to a Zune HD with an OLED screen and HD radio (and HD video output via a must-be-purchased-separately dock) next to each other, offer them for the same price, and the consumer is going to pick the iPod touch almost every single time (if brand bias is not a factor).
Erm, BluRay is around 40Mbps, most movies average 30Mbps.
iTunes is what? 8Mbps max? 5Mbps?
What are you saying?
It looks amazing to technogeeks who look at specs, particularly to technogeeks with a strong Apple aversion ("TEGRA FTW! APPLE SUXORS! ZUUUUUNE!!!"), but to the consumer? Highly doubtful.
I've been hearing about how "amazing" the Zune is compared to the iPod since, well, that brown and green one was first released. That amazement failed to turn into actual sales, unfortunately.
Speaking of, didn't MS say the new wave of consumer electronics was brown? How did that turn out?
You do realise that is how the iPhone SoC has worked, even since the first version? The current version has the A8, the Neon, the graphics, and the video acceleration as separate IP cores inside, then there is all the other stuff.
It's just that the NVIDIA controlled portions on the Tegra (the graphics) are likely to be more powerful. But that will come at a cost - power consumption.
Don't get me wrong, Tegra is going to be a very decent system chip, and maybe having two ARM11s will make up for not being an A8. But it isn't massively more advanced than the Samsung SoC in the iPhone 3GS. It probably costs a lot more though.
So What so the fraking unit can run even hotter than it does now.
I would prefer a cooler running phone than hd on a screen this size!
I would prefer a cooler running phone than hd on a screen this size!
It's pretty funny listening to all the fanbois here dissing the ZuneHD. I love my iPhone but the ZuneHD looks amazing. OLED screen, high resolution... Yea. I like. Wish it ran iPhone OS.
High Resolution? It's a 480x272 display. It's only that they announced the HD Dock (at extra cost) for HDMI output, and I believe some HD Radio features, that it's HD.
However it should keep Apple on its toes, because it's a major step forward for Microsoft. And yes, the OLED display will look brilliant.
maybe they will output 720p-1080p through firmware update, like they did with bluetooth on ipod touch.
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The poster conducted a series of tests of increasing resolution and bitrate to the iPhone 3GS...
That explains this:
The screen is 480x320. Why waste the storage space and battery life to play more pixels than the LCD is capable of displaying?
HD, at 720p, which is not quite 1080p. Not such a 'killer' feature after all.
A likely upgrade, in less than 10 months from now!
Not until the Zune HD(720p) is actually released, which isn't until October. Until then, the prospect of 1080p rules.
True, a radio tuner is hyped as a significant feature, as was 'The Social,' squirting, etc. OLED screens are great indoors, but outdoors, they become completely washed out without a backlight and reflective pixels, and colors degrade quickly. Perhaps they'll tack on a laser pointer, and a shoe horn, before it's released.
Steve Ballmer ain't laughing right now, that's for sure!
Zune Shots
Media Out Interface. Seeing as Apple TV SKU's are likely getting a refresh, it's posssible that we'll see the iPhone being able to do video playback via a TV/Screen. Would be useful in gaming too...
From back in May:
https://forums.macrumors.com/posts/7620756/
![apple-media-out-interface.jpg]()
From back in May:
https://forums.macrumors.com/posts/7620756/
It does indeed, but I don't think HD output is it; I think the OLED screen is the biggest feature.
People underestimate the power of the iPhone. It's certainly possible that the 3GS can output 720p (consider as well that the OS doesn't support multitasking, so the hardware isn't doing much else other than video decoding). The new iPod touch will probably have higher clocked hardware than the 3GS, so I'm almost positive it could output 720p.
The hardware isn't the problem; the problem is that it simply isn't a killer feature. Screen output has always been a useful additional feature, but it's never been a killer feature. Simply bumping a mediocre feature up to HD doesn't make it worthy of being the fulcrum of the product.
30 Mbps is quite usable and better than DVD mpeg2. My Panasonic HD cam (flash storage) maxes out at 17mbps AVCHD 1080 30P (the High profile is 21 mbps) into an SDHC flash card. AVCHD is one of two standards for BD HD encoding (VC-1) is the other. I think the current BD 1080P standard tops out at 50 mbps or so.
What these test demonstrate is that it is possible to decode 1080p with the current 3GS hardware, but it may have practical limitations at this time.
Anyone buying apple gear must be aware that historically they have always crippled there hardware, thats how they get you to buy the newer model each year. If they give you everything up front now you woudn't need to.
Having just purchased a 3GS I can testify to this. The phone itself is excelent but is woefully let down by the 3 mpx camera which is appaling in dark conditions
If the processors inside the 3GS is capable of handling/displaying 720p & 1080p there is no excuse that this couldnt be done to a HD TV via a dock connector, it would be the perfect replacement for the apple TV.
The only reason why they won't do it, is that it will cripple the sales of the apple TV and what ever else they have coming along.
Having just purchased a 3GS I can testify to this. The phone itself is excelent but is woefully let down by the 3 mpx camera which is appaling in dark conditions
If the processors inside the 3GS is capable of handling/displaying 720p & 1080p there is no excuse that this couldnt be done to a HD TV via a dock connector, it would be the perfect replacement for the apple TV.
The only reason why they won't do it, is that it will cripple the sales of the apple TV and what ever else they have coming along.
Yah, i don't understand how the HD buzz word on a handheld device with 1/8th the resolution as standard HD makes any sense. All it would do is take more disk usage, more cpu, more battery, more heat, etc. to watch something rather than watch it in a format build for the device.
Try it yourself
Not sure this is really news to many people. I've got plenty of HD h.264 files on my iDisk for client approval. As soon as the iDisk app came out, I tried playing a load of them - all played fine, much to my suprise.
Download the iDisk app, upload some files to it and give it a go - it's hardly the work of some leet haxzors in China to prove this does/doesn't work. And, this is with Apple's hardware AND software.
It's also a neat way of storing videos off the phone for playback - it doesn't need a wifi connection to work AFAIK....
Not sure this is really news to many people. I've got plenty of HD h.264 files on my iDisk for client approval. As soon as the iDisk app came out, I tried playing a load of them - all played fine, much to my suprise.
Download the iDisk app, upload some files to it and give it a go - it's hardly the work of some leet haxzors in China to prove this does/doesn't work. And, this is with Apple's hardware AND software.
It's also a neat way of storing videos off the phone for playback - it doesn't need a wifi connection to work AFAIK....
Why would you need 720p/1080p? Portable Apple TV!
Obviously, playing 720p/1080p on the iPhone/Touch is silly. You wouldn't be able to really see any difference on the small screen and it would kill your battery life. Plus, 1080p content would be huge!
But does the iPhone/Touch have enough power to act as an Apple TV if it is plugged into a dock that is connected to your TV? They are both OS X based so the software side shouldn't be any problem. Apple could easily sell a new dock that has an HDMI connector and an infrared port so the Apple Remote can control it. Battery life wouldn't be a problem if it was docked. Also, the iPhone/Touch even has WiFi so you can sync content with your computer in another room. With one simple accessory, Apple could turn the 10's of millions of iPhone/Touches already sold into Apple TV's!
Obviously, playing 720p/1080p on the iPhone/Touch is silly. You wouldn't be able to really see any difference on the small screen and it would kill your battery life. Plus, 1080p content would be huge!
But does the iPhone/Touch have enough power to act as an Apple TV if it is plugged into a dock that is connected to your TV? They are both OS X based so the software side shouldn't be any problem. Apple could easily sell a new dock that has an HDMI connector and an infrared port so the Apple Remote can control it. Battery life wouldn't be a problem if it was docked. Also, the iPhone/Touch even has WiFi so you can sync content with your computer in another room. With one simple accessory, Apple could turn the 10's of millions of iPhone/Touches already sold into Apple TV's!
You have no idea what you're talking about. 30 Mbp/s rips at 1080p equates to some pretty good image quality.
Have you considered the problems with OLED technology such as a colour shift if the display is exposed to direct sunlight whether it is on or not and the shorter lifespan compared to LCD displays?
http://science.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=04/03/09/0112234
The display in the Zune HD is OLED but it is also lower resolution than the iPhone display.