| Sunday, December 3, 2006 |
21:42 - Everybody wins... sometiiiiimes
http://www.extremetech.com/article2/0,1697,2061973,00.asp
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Jason Cross of ExtremeTech has what must be the longest, most in-depth Zune review yet. It's also one of the most positive ones, which seems to suggest that in order to get a better impression of the Zune, you just need to give it a chance.
Ultimately, I'm pleased to see that; it means, as I've said before, that Apple—who didn't feel the need to rush any new iPod-related products to market for the 2006 Christmas season—gets to take all the time it needs in responding to all the things the Zune does well. Some of the things that Cross discovered (such as more sophisticated Smart/Auto Playlists and better device-to-computer syncing, which is new in iTunes 7 in the first place) Apple might well take the opportunity to absorb into its own stuff, and I doubt anybody would blame them—indeed, I know several iPod/iTunes users who seem to get hung up on the geekiest of shortcomings, such as the ability to do really specific, oddball database queries in their Smart Playlists. Apple might even look into the sidelong navigation system that the Zune has and everybody seems to like, where you can go left-and-right from album to genre and so on no matter where you are in the hierarchy, and might even try to spiff up the screen transitions to respond to the well-executed in/out zooms that telegraph clearly how you're moving "in" or "out" of the device's depths: the iPod's left/right wipes are purely functional, but they don't grab one's avaricious eye anymore.
But it's anybody's guess whether Steve and crew will consider these things worth disturbing the purity of execution that the iPod exemplifies, and that iTunes exemplified up till version 7 with all its kooky glitz came along. Either way, though, we know this for sure: the 6G iPod and iTunes 8 will probably be the most significant updates—as far as basic usability goes—since the first generation, because this will be the first one that's driven by competitive pressure that inspires real, high-profile praise going somewhere other than straight in Apple's direction. I, for one, can't wait to see what they've got cooking.
Via JMH.
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Brian Tiemann
