Zune HD to arrive in Europe
MICROSOFT HAS HINTED that its Zune HD will be appearing in Europe fairly soon.
Unlike the original Zune music player, which has been about as popular as Steve Ballmer in a Trappist monastery, reviews for the Zune HD have been rather good.
Microsoft has been setting up a video service, which means it will be possible to rent or buy HD video content for the new player.
Initially it looked like the hardware would not appear in Europe, probably because the Vole could not do a deal with that many telcos or music studios. But it looks like it has managed to do something because at the bottom of the press release it mentions that the service will be rolled out to 17 international markets by the end of Autumn.
The markets are Canada, Australia, Austria, Belgium, Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Ireland, Italy, Netherlands, New Zealand, Norway, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland and the United Kingdom.
Obviously the service would be useless if the Zune HD is not also shipped with it and so we should expect the machines to arrive on our shores and get inspected by Her Majesty's Customs and Excise before then.
The Zune HD is a natty machine. It uses an organic light-emitting diode (OLED) multitouch screen, an Nvidia Tegra HD processor, and has HD radio capabilities with software advancements such as the new Quickplay menu, a web browser and music and video playback features.
The Quickplay menu is supposed to allow punters to get to their content with only one click. It can store and play back 720p HD video files to an HDTV using the new Zune HD AV dock accessory.
Content can be put onto a large-screen HDTV when you get home. It has a radio which was a piece of cutting edge technology that Apple considered itself godlike for finally putting on Ipods recently, but which other players have had since Marconi ripped off the invention from Tessla.
In the US it is being flogged in a black 16GB version for $220 with a platinum 32GB version also available for $290.
The video service is also going to end up on the Xbox LIVE service which will probably also get a choice to download or instantly stream HD video in full 1080p with 5.1 surround sound. µ
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The Zune Video service mentioned along with the list of countries is for the Xbox 360, which is available in Europe - there is no confirmed release for the Zune HD as yet in the UK or anywhere outside the United States, until it gets its CE mark etc it is not going to be available here.
Number 3...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RrGeY9nhMK8
Rob
I'm braced for the latest $1=£1 price translation...
'HD Radio' in the Zune HD does not mean High Definition Radio, it means Hybrid Digital Radio, although Microsoft are obviously implying it means the first.
Hybrid Digital Radio is a digital radio format that is proprietary to USA, so to bring the Zune HD to Europe as The INQ suggests Microsoft will need to put a different DAB receiver in for each country's digital radio system. Annoyingly this means the radio won't work in 'foreign' countries when one goes abroad.
Digital radio is a PITA, they should've put an FM receiver instead.
I'm not 100% sure but I think the HD radio chip is also configurable for DAB and a few other digital radio transmission types.
May not be as bigger job as first thought.
However, I'd settle for them scrapping the HD/DAB radio bit and just dropping the price £50.
I'm not 100% sure but I think the HD radio chip is also configurable for DAB and a few other digital radio transmission types.
May not be as bigger job as first thought.
However, I'd settle for them scrapping the HD/DAB radio bit and just dropping the price £50.
Tesla, not Tessla
Put Netflix on it and people won't be able to stop themselves from buying it. I am a marketing genius. Donations accepted.
Unfortunately they've held off to long, I already bought a Creative Zen, and I'm not about to replace it since it works...