When Microsoft decided to enter the portable mp3 player race, I thought they were insane… now that I have one, I know they were!  Here’s the story (Scroll to the bottom to see a video- I’m even wearing my BurningMan goggles):

During SXSW Interactive, I left the press lounge (all you can eat Zone bars, all you can drink coffee… electricity, silence) to go shoot my next panel, and there’s KBJ (@KateBuckJr).  She’s talking to some people, and she (tosses me under a truck) says “Oh! You guys need to interview….”(grabs my by shoulder, yanks me in front of some dude, and some girl who’s running camera) “Ori… he’s a designer!”

“Uhhhhh….?”

“So.. what do you know about  Microsoft Website Spark?”

“Uhhhh….”  Kate was nowhere to be seen. I felt so used.  I also felt anxious… I had another panel to be at.  I didn’t know if these were friends of Kate’s or not, so…. sure, let’s play nice. “Do you have a 1-sheet?”

The guy gives me a 1 sheet which is pretty damn boring.  Damn engineers not knowing marketing or copywriting….. work with a team, people… work with a team.

“Can you give me a summary? This isn’t cutting it”

“Sure… and by the way, since you’re actually taking the time to help us out, you might win a Microsoft Zune!  No promises… we’ll see how you do.”

“Ummm… I can turn your lame 1 sheet into 140 page book.”

Thankfully, another guy came by who actually works for Microsoft, and he actually gave me a summary of the Website Spark series….  You get access to MS Expression, Visual Studi0 2008, SQL Server 2008, Silverlight, MS Server 2008 for 3 years, plus video training, plus submitted into a directory… so you can actually be found by clients.  All for $100… well, they say it’s free, but at the end of 3 yeas, you pay $100.  Sounds good!  Good web development software can be expensive, and hard to learn… so $100 + tutorials sounds good.  I’m a fan of Dreamweaver– been using it for years, since MS Front Page (what Expression replaced) made the sloppiest code I’ve ever had to work with.. it was awful.  Anyways….. I repeated what I learned from this guy.  I didn’t say that I’ve used it.  I just said what he told me was included, and that I think it does sound like a good deal for someone who’s getting into it.

Since I kicked ass, they said they’ll give me a Zune.  I overheard the guy say “Should I give him a 16 or a 32 gig?”  “Ummm.. 32 would be preferred!” (interjected by me) “Yeah.. give him a 32 gig, he kicked ass!”

I now had a 32GB MS Zune HD.  Yay.

Benefit #1- I can display photos and video from my adventures, without having a real smartphone (i.e. blackberry, iphone, android).

Benefit #2- My Ipod Nano from 2007 doesn’t do a good job playing video… I have so many seminars on video… but I only watch them at my computer.  With a Zune, I could carry 32GB of them, and view them at my leisure.

Benefit #3- My Nano is a 4GB.  At 32 GB, I wouldn’t have to keep swapping out my library.  I’d just have it on there, and choose at will.

Benefit #4- Apparently, there’s Facebook apps, etc… for it, so I would be able to keep my FB usage to the Zune, and be more productive on the PC (Mac).

Speaking of PC/Mac… Zune does not work in Mac OS.  It only works in Windows. Apple made ipod work in windows….. but no, MS had to be a prissy bitch, and make their Media Player only work in their OS.  Bad move.  Way to alienate people who don’t have Windows.  Well, that’s ok.. I have Bootcamp with Windows Vista, and I can boot that with VMWare Fusion…. thus, I do have Windows.

Reminder:  I prefer Windows to Mac OS… I have so many videos and interviews where I talk shit about Mac OS… but that’s starting to change finally.

Step 1: Open the box.  Check.  Earphones seem kind of crappy, but that’s ok, and expected.

Step 2: Sync up Zune with PC (can’t really do anything until you do).  Step 2a is actually to install the setup app, from http://Zune.net/setup – I kept getting a 404 (Page not found).  I even googled for it, and tried clicking instead of typing the URL.  No luck.  That’s pretty damn annoying! Getting a fancy new toy, and not having all the parts…. that’s like being given a car without an engine.

The next day, the Microsoft Zune Setup software page worked fine.  I got the software, and installed it.  Yay.  I was gushing with anticipation as I plugged my new Zune HD in.  Which video would I watch first?  What percentage would I use for music vs audio books vs videos?

Those were all great questions which were irrelevant, as the software would not detect my Zune.

Since then, I’ve tried not just in VMWare, but also by straight up booting into Windows (Bootcamp), as well as on my older PC Laptop… which said that I need to update something about Windows, but then IE 8 installed itself, so now nothing works as it should (read as: So now Windows won’t update itself, so I can’t get the damn fix that I need in order to be able to run the Zune software).  I got it as far as booting in Bootcamp, plugging in the Zune HD, Windows detects it as a USB device, Zune software Auto-runs as it sees the Zune, a message comes up about updating the firmware from 4.0-> 4.2 (or 4.3, can’t remember), would you like to (yes)– step 1 of 4… 0%.  That’s it!  It will sit there for hours at a time, not updating.

If I hit cancel, and go into the Zune software, it shows that no Zune is plugged in (i.e. I can’t do jack shit with this thing, and I’ve now wasted a few hours on it).

Last night for good measure, I tried it on a friend’s PC (Gateway), and still no luck.  It’s not just ’cause I”m on a Mac.  It’s not my imagination.  For the record, I’m the one that many many people come to for tech support.  This is pissing me off.  This “Free” Zune has cost me a lot of money in time…. if I was working all those hours on a paid project, instead of trying to fix something for my self, I’d have enough money to buy a 32GB iPod Touch, and be up and running in no time.

So far my review of the Zune HD is….. Even at free, it sucks.

If you have run across this issue, and know how to fix it, I”d love to know.  If you work for Microsoft, and want to send me a Zune that works… thus showing that you care, want your product to get a better review than “Even at free, it sucks.”, and want to make better the situation of giving me a broken product… I’d love to talk to you.