Zune Thoughts - Daily News, Views, Rants and Raves

Depending on where you are in the world, it's already 2009, but I've still got a few hours left in 2008 so here I am writing up a quick post. I wanted to wish everyone in the Thoughts Media community a very happy New Year! 2008 ended a bit rocky for most of us, but I hope 2009 will be a great year of prosperity and hapiness for everyone. I want to thank each and every one of you who regularly visit our sites and have made them your technological home on the Web. Your support is deeply appreciated. I also want to thank the great teams of volunteers that make each of these sites tick: your dedication and desire to strive for excellence helps make these sites great. Here's to a great 2009!

We'll all be taking January 1st off to relax and come January 2nd we'll be back to the news as normal.

"Early this morning we were alerted by our customers that there was a widespread issue affecting our 2006 model Zune 30GB devices (a large number of which are still actively being used). The technical team jumped on the problem immediately and isolated the issue: a bug in the internal clock driver related to the way the device handles a leap year. The issue should be resolved over the next 24 hours as the time change moves to January 1, 2009. We expect the internal clock on the Zune 30GB devices will automatically reset tomorrow (noon, GMT). By tomorrow you should allow the battery to fully run out of power before the unit can restart successfully then simply ensure that your device is recharged, then turn it back on. If you're a Zune Pass subscriber, you may need to sync your device with your PC to refresh the rights to the subscription content you have downloaded to your device."

There you have it, straight from the official support thread on this problem. So for those of you who were about to take screwdrivers to your Zune and open them up, just wait until tomorrow and it should start working again. This confirms that it was in fact caused by this year being a leap year, and thus having 366 days. I'm shocked and disappointed that Microsoft allowed this bug to go un-checked - they have some of the longest and most grueling test cycles in the industry for their software, so I'm stunned that the Zune team allowed this to happen. The Zune is struggling enough as it is, this is a black eye it really didn't need. We'll discuss that issue in a couple of days...I have some thoughts about it.

We all know about the crazy Zune 30 failures going on now, and I've been watching as the headlines come zipping into my inbox via Google News Alert. Yes, this is a "Zunetastrophy" (I had to get it on the fun), but I think it's important to remember it's just a media player - let's keep everything in context. My favourite image so far is the one below, courtesy of this VentureBeat article. I'll point out that while I admire MG Siegler's wit, reading an article like this one confirms that he's about as balanced and fair-minded as a car with two wheels. But let's get on with the fun...

Here are the most entertaining headlines I've seen so far today:

1. The Zune Screen Of Death
2. Zune 30s all freezing up at once. Ack! Aliens!
3. 30GB Zunes hibernating for 2009?
4. Zune gloom: hundreds of players failing simultaneously
5. Y2K returns 9 years later to disable Zunes?
6. 30GB Zunes Killing Themselves In Droves
7. 30GB Zune apocalypse arrives as devices enter digital coma
8. The Day Zune Music Died
9. Microsoft's Zune in Worldwide Meltdown
10. 'Zune 30 Midnight Meltdown' Angers Music Lovers
11. The day the ZUNE stood still
12. Zune 30GB players get an early hangover
13. Microsoft facing 'Red Ring of Zune'?
14. Zune Extinction Event: Microsoft Music Players All Freeze Up at Once
15. Microsoft Scrambling To Thaw Zune Freeze
16. The Zune’s New Year’s eve of destruction
17. Zune became self-aware at 2:00 AM December 31, 2008

Did I miss any great headlines?

"Right, so this is a weird one: we're getting tons of reports - tons - about failing Zune 30s. Apparently, the players began freezing at about midnight last night, becoming totally unresponsive and practically useless.The crisis has been dubbed by Zune users 'Y2K9', due to the apparently synchronized faceplantings across the country. According to tipster Michael, the Zune users experienced something like this:"

Gizmodo is reporting that a lot of Zune 30GB owners are reporting their devices are freezing up today. The official Zune.net hardware forum already has several threads by 30GB owners. Could it have anything to do with the new year? I doubt it as Jan 1, 2009 has only just arrived in Adelaide, Australia as I post this. If you have a 30GB device, has it gone belly up? This seems to be too widespread to be a hoax.

Update: I've confirmed with a lot of people that this is indeed happening. A few interesting threads: 1) Facebook as a group for people with 30GB bricked devices and 2) A hard reset might be the fix. There will be no Happy New Year for the Zune team at Microsoft as I am sure many will be called in today to resolve this.

Update 2: Microsoft has updated the "Zune Service Status" at the Zune support site and has created a sticky thread where you can monitor the situation. If you have a 30GB device and are impacted (seems to be the latest firmware) then you should subscribe to that thread.

Update 3: It seems it will fix itself. See the post by Skipdeez in the Zune.net forums.

"You don't usually equate CES with big time Energizer introductions, but this year is going to be different. While our fingers are still crossed that a 50-foot drum-toting bunny is seen storming around in the Vegas heat, we do know that said outfit will be bringing along its minty fresh Zinc Air Prismatic batteries, not to mention the newly unveiled Rechargeable Solar Charger. The above pictured device will boast a USB port to power an assortment of devices, and it can also be charged from an AC outlet if you just can't seem to locate the sun. Better still, its weatherproof nature should make it suitable for argonauts, and it'll only run $49.99 with a pair of rechargeable cells when it lands next summer."

I've tried some solar chargers over the years and never been totally impressed. They've either been poorly designed or performed poorly. With built in USB charging as well as the ability to charge batteries (assuming AA's and hopefully AAA's) it should cover a pretty wide variety of devices. From a design perspective, this seems to be pretty well thought out, so I'll probably be grabbing one when they come out to see how it performs.

I hope everyone that celebrates it had a Merry Christmas yesterday. For the first time, the annual "What did you get" post is across all of the Thoughts Media sites, so we should see an interesting mix of items.

If you celebrate Christmas, I want to wish you a very merry Christmas on behalf of all the staff here at Thoughts Media. If you celebrate Hanukka, Kwanzaa, or any other special event related to this time of year, may it be a special time for you and your family. I wish you all a time of peace and happiness over the next couple of days (and beyond that too of course!). We won't be posting news on the 25th, but will resume things on the 26th. Merry Christmas!

Ok, I had no idea that this existed. I don’t know how many of you knew that it existed either so here it is! The Zune Store. I’m not sure when it even opened up (And I’m going to be a lazy writer and not look it up. How ‘bout them apples!) but it looks like a great place to buy a Zune or, even more importantly, the hard to find accessories. This is a nice move by Microsoft to consolidate everything into an easy to find and navigate location.

The store has several sections. Buying a Zune has three separate links. One is for a standard player. The other two links take you to Zune Originals and a page with all of the currently available limited edition Zunes. There’s also an area for accessories and one to buy gift cards for either points or Zune Pass credits. Happy shopping!

“A 120 GB iPod Classic goes for $249, though its screen is roughly two-thirds the size of the Zune's. As far as music goes, when you're strolling through town listening to your tunes with your device in your pocket, will you really care which of the two you're using? The sad fact is, many would. The level of brand loyalty Apple enjoys today was prompted by increasingly aged innovations. As I see it, the main reason people turn their noses up at the Zune is that Microsoft is seen as uncool.”

If that isn’t the truth, I don’t know what is. Asher Hawkins did a side by side comparison of the Zune and iPod Touch. This is a comparison that at first glance seems a bit unfair given the very different nature of the two devices. When Asher admits to having been an Apple customer since age 5, then I didn’t exactly expect an unbiased look. I give Forbes credit for their professionalism though! Asher was very positive about the Zune in comparison to the iPod, even questioning why someone would choose a classic over the Zune 120.

Other than the fact that Asher was pretty positive on the whole thing, the most interesting comments came in regards to what you use day to day to listen to your music. And I agree completely. There is a difference of course between today’s MP3 players and yesterday’s CD player market. If you had a CD it would (usually) work in any player available.

Because of DRM and varying file formats, that’s of course not as easy anymore. I would guess, however, that most people who have their own music collections have them available in MP3 so that they can listen to them on any device they choose.

Our Web hosting provider, The Planet, is generally pretty good - but they have significant struggles when it comes to DNS (Domain Name Servers). At least a couple of times a year, they'll have a complete failure with their DNS machines, and they always just shrug and say "We provide DNS as a courtesy for our customers, nothing more" - as if that's an excuse for not being able to offer a service that's reliable. That's what happened today - they had a complete DNS failure, so all of our sites (and thousands of others) were taken completely offline. We're going to take steps to help prevent this in the future.