Zune Reviews Less Than Stellar.

Reviews of the Zune have been coming in in anticipation of its release next week and the trades have not been kind.

Walt Mossberg of the Wall Street Journal writes:

[The Zune has] too many compromises and missing features to be as good a choice as the iPod for most users.

I found it’s interface lacking and that it left a filmy residue on my fingers. It’s also an odd choice by Microsoft to make the Zune radioactive.

Its penchant for restarting at inopportune times should probably not be considered unusual for a device coming from Redmond, but the sudden sounding of a boat horn when it does might make using the device problematic.

The New York Times’ David Pogue was likewise unimpressed.

Competition is good and all. But what, exactly, is the point of the Zune?

I mean, really. After fifteen hours of fiddling with the damn thing, all I got was a severe electric shock. I haven’t seen this written anywhere else, but the Zune doesn’t actually do anything from what I can see.

I’m serious. It doesn’t play music. It doesn’t play videos. It just gives you an electric shock.

What the fuck?

In an attempt to bolster Microsoft’s fledgling device, Rob Enderle, Paul Thurrott and John Dvorak held a brainstorming session this afternoon to come up with positive things to say about the Zune.

“Um…” Enderle said, looking at the brown Zune in his hands.

“Er…” attempted Dvorak, poking at another Zune with a pencil.

“It, uh…” started Thurrott. “I has an odor.”

“Yes,” Dvorak agreed. “But not a good one. Kind of like old sweat socks.”

“Let’s just try free-associating,” Enderle suggested. “It… it has a round button thing and two other buttons and… uh…

“Ow! Mother fu… the damn thing just shocked me!”

Microsoft, when reached for comment, insisted that it was Apple that made the Zune. When pressed, the company suddenly adopted a fake Mexican accent and said it couldn’t “Speeka de English.”

39 thoughts on “Zune Reviews Less Than Stellar.”

  1. I told a girl once that if she had a Zune, I would squirt her something before she got a shocker.

    Later that day, I was in a county holding cell being raped by a fellow inmate.

    What a world; what a world.

  2. Ocho. For those that only speeka da English – eight.

    I heard that Zunes also eats baby seals and leaves the toilet seat up late at night

  3. Using Strontium-90 as an ingredient is a terrible idea! If you try to eat it (with wine or not) you will get Leukemia or bone cancer!

  4. It’s too bad that the product hasn’t even been released and people seem to have moved on to newer things. Maybe Microsoft should wait until the product has been out for a few weeks before announcing it.

    This is last we will speak of Zune. It is dead to us now.

  5. oh man… that sweatsocks thing is gonna stay with me. White socks, brown stains.

    This is why things need to be shiny.

    Zune is not shiny.

  6. Arrakis, Zune, dessert planet. (Hhmmmm lakes of chocolate custard.) The only known source of the spice girls. (A red Zune Spice Girls…that’ll sell!)

  7. He Cars guys, don’t make these entries so damned funny that i keep rolling over the floor laughing alle the time. I wear en expensive designer suit , and you should see the state of it now!

  8. The Vegetarians resent the comment about eating baby seals. If you would have said baby panda bears, that would be a different story. Damn Pandas.

  9. So the big feature of the Zune is it can shock you wirelessly?

    If it could do it to someone else, I’d pay for it.

    *ZZZOT* Y”EOW quit doing that you jerk”! heh

  10. How many shocks do I get before I have to recharge the damn thing?

    Can I wirelessly share my shocks with someone else? Like, can I zap that a-hole who tries to run me over in the crosswalk?

  11. Update: a Zune shuffle is in the works; it is not a smaller version of the standard Zune, in fact, it isn’t a device at all, but rather a dance step that the Zune marketing hotshots insist will add to the socializing craze that will soon sweep the country. The Zune shuffle invites groups of people to participate in a syncronized dance characterized by steady, exagerated arm gestures performed to a Latin beat. Every eight bars everyone shouts “Ehhhh, Zunarena!” and continues ad infinitum. Sounds cool, I can feel the magic…

  12. It won’t work with a Mac so who cares? Besides, Windows users are used to pain, so they probably don’t even notice the electro-shock, or that it comes in brown. That piece of crap looks more like beige if you ask me.

    Just don’t let it scare the horses, I mean ponies.

  13. Instead of buying a Zune you could just buy a spork and in the event of… yeah I got nothing.

  14. If you can deal with the shock, it functions as a fairly convincing hammer for a few hours.

    I predict big sales in the construction industry. The bad news for Microsoft is that there is a down turn in new housing starts.

    And illegal immigrants don’t like shocks.

    And they bring their own tools from their homes in Canada.

    And they sing while they work so they’re not interested in MP3 players.

    Oddly enough, they also hum when they eat.

    Yea, Zune’s gonna tank.

  15. Wireless shocking? That was exactly what Nikoli Tesla was trying to achieve! Wireless transmission of electricity!

  16. How reliable are the electric shocks, though. Sprolly just like freaking Windows. Soon as you’re ready to zap the neighbor’s cat the damned thing will display the blue screen of death.

  17. I have found that Zune is actually also a Swahili word. It stands for “crap that can shock you, not play music well, and squrts little parts of songs all over cute chicks who then go for guys with iPods.”

    Hmmm…Swahili is quite the efficient language.

    Bozos (Swahili for Bozos)

    S.

  18. I got the zune….cost me 100 bucks less than that iripoff er um, ipod.the It has all of the features of the ipod too plus a few that the ipod doesnt. The screen is 20324978234987 times better than Ipods. The zune will also play songs that my ipod was too stupid to. It doesnt get completly scratched and look like a piece of shit 5 minutes after i take it out of the box. I walk around with it in my pocket all the time and it doesnt have a single sctatch and looks like the day i got it (dont even have a case for it), try doing that with an ipod. Yeit looks like microsoft has done it again, taken a good idea and perfected it. Its just sad that everyone is so stuck in the stupid ipod fad caused by all of those pop culture friendly hip commercials, and everyone wanting to fit in cause its what their friends have. You sheep need to use your own brains. Zune rules I give it a 20 on a scale of 1-10. Oh and if you bash this and have never used a zune then you are proving that you are a sheep. good day.

  19. Wow, the screen is really 20324978234987 times better than the iPod’s screen? If more people knew this amazing fact, the Zune might be doing better! Oh wait, never mind, that’s not even true.

  20. My Zune doesn’t allow me to look too far left, else the ear bud shocks my ear. It also has a habit of finding the most melo song on my playlist, then it follows up with the heaviest song. I think it doesn’t like me.

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