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Microsoft Launches Zune HD

Macminiintel said:
I told my cousin to go see one, as she lives in the US, I think she went to Best Buy. She's a Mac user, but by know means a Apple ultimate fanboy, lol I am though. I asked her to report back to me, she said the display was like some cheaper plasma TV screens, with a shaky backlight, which got annoying after a few mins of switching on the device. The in store lighting at best buy also was glaring on the display quite badly, also she said it had a very cheap lightness feel to it, something you don't get with Apple products. She also said some of the parts which looked look metal, are infact plastic, whats suppose to imitate metal.

i'll still with my iPhone thanks :D
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oh well, if your cousin says so, i am good with that :D
 
cenetti said:
I have all three of them... and it's clear as day and night..... Anyone who denies that FACT is a damn fanboy fool.... in denial..
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Wow, calm down.

I don't deny that is how your iPod Touch and iPhone look. I have no idea why they look like that. I have mine sitting right next to me and it looks nothing like that, not even close. The black is very dark and I even have my brightness cranked all the way up. I've seen others and they look like mine as well. What you show in those photos is not typical.
 
Macminiintel said:
hmm well I've never had any issues from software updates, so people either broke there iphones themselves just so they get new ones, or they like to just whine. As for that the xbox 360 its one of the most failed electronic gadgets of this decade. Also I use my iPhone a lot longer than an hour a day, is that all the Zune HD's battery lasts LOL. I've never heard about that $199 replacement fee, nor the 3.1 update bricking iPhones. I Did here though that the 3.1 update stopped support for exchange 2007 on iPod touch & iPhone 3G. I'm a daily Mac rumours reader as well as 9to5 Mac. this is a Mac forums hence "Mac rumours", meant for Mac fans, not windows fans
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http://www.tuaw.com/2009/09/15/iphone-3-1-problems-flood-our-tip-box/ Has links to discussions at Apple support forums too.

Oh yeah? The Xbox360 is "one of the most failed electronic gadgets of this decade"? Are you referring to the bogus 50% numbers or the numbers published by an actual company that carries out the warranty repairs and put it at under 10%, which is quite normal for ALL electronics?

I use my iPhone a lot too, but combined total in an entire day is not even a full hour with the screen on. I don't watch video on it, Safari is too slow compared to Firefox on my Mac using my home internet connection, and I don't play cheesy games on it. Zune HD's real world battery life is similar to the iPod touch :rolleyes:
 
Nice to know that AMOLED screens are that bad, well atleast according to so well quoted AppleInsider:
Myth 1: OLED is a great display technology for mobile devices

First off, Microsoft gave the Zune HD a new OLED display. OLED is an interesting new technology that uses a layer of electroluminescent organic compounds, rather than the inorganic materials used in traditional LCDs, to produce an image. OLED panels don't require a backlight, so they can render true blacks and provide a higher contrast ratio.

However, today's OLED panels are much dimmer than standard issue LCDs: a typical maximum output of 200cd/m^2 compared to around 4-500 for mid-range LCDs. OLED also performs considerably worse in bright light because OLED is 100% emissive rather than being partially transflective.

A good quality LCD actually uses ambient light to make its image brighter and more vibrant; OLED does not. This means when you take it outside, the OLED's screen is completely washed out by sunlight. Unless you only plan to use your mobile device in your dark basement, you don't want one of today's OLED screens, particularly on a mobile media player that you might expect to use on the go in various environments.
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Well if that's true then oled screen on mobiles do really suck too! I guess then that phone in the middle is much dimmer compared to two awesome TFT screened phones and all the people who use it have never left their basements... Really, after reading the first "myth" I just couldn't continue reading, because it was just full of misinformed mumbo-jumbo with some half-truths and cool numbers to make it see legit.
samsung-i8910-07.jpg
 
peperoni said:
Well if that's true then oled screen on mobiles do really suck too! I guess then that phone in the middle is much dimmer compared to two awesome TFT screened phones and all the people who use it have never left their basements... Really, after reading the first "myth" I just couldn't continue reading, because it was just full of misinformed mumbo-jumbo with some half-truths and cool numbers to make it see legit.
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A quick Google search turned these non-Apple-fan sites up.

http://www.oled-info.com/oleds-direct-sunlight

http://www.intomobile.com/2009/09/02/oleds-in-sunlight-basically-they-are-not-very-good.html
 
DMann said:
This is no exaggeration, regarding the current state of OLED.
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That just demonstrates what I said to a poster earlier. There is no better when it comes to LCD and OLED. Both technologies have different strengths and weaknesses. Arguing about it is pointless. It all boils down to which you think will work better in this class of products, which weaknesses and strengths are better suited to a mobile device. Since mobile devices are used in a variety of environments, I would think the daylight issue with OLED pretty much nullifies whatever perceived advantages it has.

Say what you will about the iPhone's blacks or color saturation, but I've never once had a problem viewing it clearly even in direct sunlight which is remarkable. For me, that's far more important a trait in a mobile device than deeper black, but whatever. To each his own.
 
inkswamp said:
That just demonstrates what I said to a poster earlier. There is no better when it comes to LCD and OLED. Both technologies have different strengths and weaknesses. Arguing about it is pointless. It all boils down to which you think will work better in this class of products, which weaknesses and strengths are better suited to a mobile device. Since mobile devices are used in a variety of environments, I would think the daylight issue with OLED pretty much nullifies whatever perceived advantages it has.

Say what you will about the iPhone's blacks or color saturation, but I've never once had a problem viewing it clearly even in direct sunlight which is remarkable. For me, that's far more important a trait in a mobile device than deeper black, but whatever. To each his own.
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Very much agreed - the iPhone's transflective pixels do a great job at maintaining images in direct sunlight, which seems more beneficial for those who actually leave the house, than having deeper black contrasts in low-light environments.
 
I take the point about OLED screens but would point out that the examples given refer to first generation low nit screens (the N85 series 1 is a 170 nit screen - the series 2 replaced it with a superior 300 nit model).

Dilger's argument is spurious until we know the specifications of the Samsung AMS326FA05 display the Zune HD uses. I'm guessing it's a second geenration screen but let's wait and see.

However, let's not kid ourselves - OLED screens are the way forward and I find it ironic that Dilger - who is a critic of the OLED in the Zune - was waxing lyrical about the possibility of an OLED in the rumoured iPad.

That's the problem with Dilger - he's inconsistent and doesn't do enough research. That and he's quite mad obviously.
 
Good thread! usual arguements for and against.

Two questions (1) how is the battery life of zune (my iphone is finished after a hard days work) (2) why do people want both a zune and iphone, - sounds very expensive to me
 
Lynxpro said:
Or considering how crummy and unreliable Word is to this day versus Word Perfect 5.1 from circa 1989. Gawd, I wish someone would open source Word Perfect so at the very least it could replace the OpenOffice word processor.

QDOS/MS-DOS/PC-DOS ripped off CP/M. Known fact. Microsoft BASIC allegedly appropriated the officially licensed DEC BASIC. Windows was inferior to GEM. And on and on and on.

Just image the computer world had the Atari ST and [Commodore] Amiga still persisted to this day. Now that would be healthy competition for the Mac platform, most unlike the Windows monopoly. We would have three similar platforms with easy application portability and with each duking it out for the most intuitive GUI and features. And all three would "just work".
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The question on everybody's mind... Who is Corel owned by Now!?

OpenOffice needs an overhaul. I wish IBM persisted with Lotus Symphony.
 
BongoBanger said:
I take the point about OLED screens but would point out that the examples given refer to first generation low nit screens (the N85 series 1 is a 170 nit screen - the series 2 replaced it with a superior 300 nit model).

Dilger's argument is spurious until we know the specifications of the Samsung AMS326FA05 display the Zune HD uses. I'm guessing it's a second geenration screen but let's wait and see.

However, let's not kid ourselves - OLED screens are the way forward and I find it ironic that Dilger - who is a critic of the OLED in the Zune - was waxing lyrical about the possibility of an OLED in the rumoured iPad.

That's the problem with Dilger - he's inconsistent and doesn't do enough research. That and he's quite mad obviously.
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I have to admit, Microsoft is doing something right. Im tempted to move BACK. All they need to do 7ify Office and Visual Studio. I will wait until 10.7 is released before I upgrade. Apple has that long to blow our freaken minds again.

I miss Apple Computer Inc. Every event was MIND BLOWINGLY AWESOME.
 
MorphingDragon said:
I have to admit, Microsoft is doing something right. Im tempted to move BACK. All they need to do 7ify Office and Visual Studio.
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Hmm... some parts of MS's operations have turned around. Others - the WinMo division which doesn't seem to know what the hell it's doing for example - remain simply awful.

I still think that Apple have the best PMP ecosystem by an absolute mile though. I mean I like the Zune HD better but until they get the same scale of ecosystem that Apple have (and I'm not talking about apps which are largely irrelevant) it's hard to see how it'll compete.
 
BongoBanger said:
Hmm... some parts of MS's operations have turned around. Others - the WinMo division which doesn't seem to know what the hell it's doing for example - remain simply awful.

I still think that Apple have the best PMP ecosystem by an absolute mile though. I mean I like the Zune HD better but until they get the same scale of ecosystem that Apple have (and I'm not talking about apps which are largely irrelevant) it's hard to see how it'll compete.
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I have no intention of having a microsoft smart phone. HTC Magic FTW.

Ecosystem, uhh... Its an MP4 player. What MORE do I want???

.Net and Visual Studio are terrible. Thats why I like Cocoa and xCode so much.
 
It looks pretty neat, but as posters above have mentioned you're boned when you take it outside & the sun pops up.
 
I have a Samsung Omnia HD. I think it's called an 8910 in some regions. It has either a AMOLED or OLED screen and doesn't look as vibrant as my iPhone. It looks like an iPhone set at about 70% brightness. I kept searching for a setting to fix it. I was pretty dissappointed after hearing so much about OLEDs but sorta happy that it didn't make the iPhone screen look like **** because I was pretty certain it wasn't going to be my main day to day device.

I've never actually taken it outdoors so I can't comment on direct sunlight.
 
AndyK said:
It looks pretty neat, but as posters above have mentioned you're boned when you take it outside & the sun pops up.
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I'm not actually seeing this - the pictures provided show that it seems to be fine in daylight.
 
bobertoq said:
Things like video are scaled down, and widescreen content is 16:9 so it would fit just fine. For things like browsing menus, well I don't see why that matters.
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Videos are scaled down to the same width and height on both devices. You don't get better quality because the screen is 16:9, the only thing you don't have is black bars, but the video is 480 pixels wide and 272 pixels high, same on both devices.

And if you don't understand why having 48 more height pixels in a menu is a good thing, you're just a MS Fanboy, worse than the Apple fanboys here.
 
KnightWRX said:
And if you don't understand why having 48 more height pixels in a menu is a good thing, you're just a MS Fanboy, worse than the Apple fanboys here.
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Why do so many people here think it's okay to use personal attacks in place of intelligent and/or experienced arguments?

Wouldn't it be easier and nicer just to tell us all why "having 48 more height pixels in a menu" is a good thing?
 
kdarling said:
Why do so many people here think it's okay to use personal attacks in place of intelligent and/or experienced arguments?

Wouldn't it be easier and nicer just to tell us all why "having 48 more height pixels in a menu" is a good thing?
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Because it's not evident ? 48 more pixels means you get 2 more options without having to scroll.

Are people really not realising how more resolution is better ?
 
cicadius said:
This will be new for MS: A Blue Screen in HD.

Too little too late, no extra's in favor of Iphone.

I bet Steve will order all personnel to buy one of these instead of the Ipod.
He you guys at MS, at home you can use the Iphone.

MS stop copying and start inventing
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I seriously doubt the zune is going to blue screen. Heck, I've seen a reduction of blue screens occurring on PC's with the releases of Windows Vista and 7.
 
raggedjimmi said:
That is why Apple needs an OLED display in the iPod Touch. As it stands thats the only thing (for my needs anyways) that the Zune has over the iPod.

Why are Apple so dead against OLED?
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Because the technology still has some very bad issues, including the fact that the screen degrades faster than a LCD. The blue dye in a OLED fades even faster. That is why you don't see many of these screens in personal devices, including Apple.
 
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