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blog Internet Microsoft Zune

Internet slowdown caused by the Zune 4.0 software

Well because the 4.0 version of the Zune software insists on downloading the same files over & over again even though I had told it not to in version 3.1 by marking it as played it insists on downloading stuff it can’t play. This is a major annoyance as it makes it so I can’t watch youtube & the rest of my Internet is slowed down as well. I wasn’t until after I closed the Zune software that I was able to regain access to a decent Internet connection. I guess from now on I will only have the software running for an hour at most when I don’t care that I will have no Internet to speak of with it open. Sure I can do basic browsing but at speeds that you used to see with dial-up Internet not the 5 mbps download speed I’m supposed to get with my DSL connection.

Microsoft you are messing with my bandwidth like Apple iTunes does with the resources on my local computer. I have since removed & refuse to reinstall iTunes because of the issues that I’ve had it cause in the past on my computers. Microsoft you need to fix this or you are going in the same direction as iTunes. Please get you testers to test with podcasts that have pdf files in them as that should help you tell when you have this issue come back in any possible future versions.

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blog Microsoft Zune Zune hardware

New firmware for the Zune 120

Well I installed the new firmware on my Zune 120 today & it installed without any issues. I will say this in Microsoft’s defense they didn’t change my setting for the wireless like they did with all previous firmware updates. Previous versions enabled the wireless without even asking for permission, they just told you that was how they were going to do it, so I was surprised that they allowed my setting to stay.

Ok that’s all I have to say good about it. They didn’t make certain changes that I wanted like adding Unicode support & the music, pictures, & videos are always present even if you don’t have any of or all of those categories on your Zune. I mean they were able to figure out how to do that with podcasts, audio books, & games why can’t they do it with the others. I would also like to be able to remove the marketplace option from the Zune if I so choose to.

If Microsoft would make a Zune HD with a decent amount of space & have no limits on the number of files along with fixing any other issues I’ve mentioned I might buy one but as it is I can’t see a use for it other than a really expensive door stop, wait it wouldn’t weigh enough to do that job I guess a paper weight is all I can think of.

I guess Microsoft didn’t really put a lot of thought into the idea that HD means it will need more storage space. So I really don’t get why they want to drop the storage size allowed to something so small with only 16 GB & 32 GB options. I guess some people like having that little data but I like having tons of options which means I need more space.

Which reminds me I haven’t tested yet if the firmware will allow me to increase the total number of files on my Zune. I hope that they finally fixed that issue as you should not have a file limit in this day & age. Or was it the software that was the cause of the issue I really don’t know. Oh well if they fixed that I’ll be happier.

I’m just glad that the Zune 4.0 software still doesn’t eat up tons of CPU time unlike a certain piece of software that was written by a competitor. Yes I mean iTunes & you apple fan boys &  fan girls can keep on claiming how wonderful everything Apple is & does, but you are going to have a very hard time of converting me to “The Church of Steve” (AKA a worshiper of Steve Jobs & all that he is & does).

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blog Microsoft Zune

Another issue with the marketplace

Well yesterday Zune said “We have great freebies this week! TV: 30 Rock and Psych. MP3s: Simian Mobile Disco and Mayer Hawthorne. Grab them at Zune Marketplace now!” yesterday on twitter but for the life of me I can’t tell what is free with the new & “improved” marketplace. If anyone figures out how to tell what is the free content I’d be glad to find out how to know what exactly is free.

I have found that for the music at least I’m able to find it, but for Psych I haven’t been able to find anything. On thing I did notice is they changed it from “Free” to “No Charge” if that helps anyone else out.

Well after further investigation it turns out that it was the first episode on the first season of both 30 Rock & Psych that is free. I didn’t check there because they normally only do an episode on the most current season of a show when they release one for free.

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blog Microsoft Zune

Another issue with the Zune software

Well I just remembered another issue that I’ve been having with the Zune software & apparently the 4.0 version didn’t fix it either. I have episodes from my podcasts showing up in my music & video collections. Obviously the audio podcasts are showing up as music & the video podcasts are showing up with the videos.

Above you see an example of the issue that I’m talking about. This is one of the reasons I want to be able to have the podcasts outside the audio folder. Also it makes more sense to have the pictures from the Zune sent to a folder other than audio. Last time I checked a picture was not an audio file. Also most of the stuff in the audio folder other than podcasts is music & most of my podcasts as not music.

I was really hoping that they would see reason. I was also hoping with this release that would release a firmware for the 120 GB Zune & older models that gave us Unicode support so that the music I have from Japan can actually use & display it in the native language. I say that because trying to guess who “□□□□” is really hard to tell if it is “新居昭乃”, “岩本正樹”, or some other artist that happens to have four Japanese characters for their name. I don’t see why I should have to update my entire collection to match the complete & total lack of Unicode support on the Zune. I know that the Zune HD is supposed to have Unicode support but that doesn’t help me as I have a Zune 120 & the Zune HD does not have anywhere near enough storage space for my needs to even think of buying one. If Microsoft would release one that is 120+ GB in size I might consider buying one, but otherwise I will not purchase one as it won’t meet my needs.

That reminds me of another issue I have with the software Podcasts like “The Bungie Studios Podcast” is listed under the “t’s” in the software but on the device in the “b’s”. Its inconsistencies like that I don’t understand that they miss. I also noticed in the music section they ignore the word “the” if it is the first word for sorting titles in the software & on the device. For example you will find “The Beatles” under the “b’s” in both the software & on the Zune itself. So to fix that one the easiest way would be to just fix this issue.

Edit September 17th 2009 or 2009-09-17 I updated the blog to support UTF-8 which I had forgotten that I didn’t add this post made me realize that issue so I corrected it, but I had to put the “□’s” & Japanese characters back as they all became “?’s”.

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blog Microsoft Zune Zune software

More on the Zune 4.0

As I expected the Zune marketplace is having major issues today. You learn to expect this when they release software for both the website & the clients on the same day. Also when they said they had free content on twitter on the same day that they release a major overhaul for both the website & the client software.

Anyways on to the new issue I found in the migration to the 4.0 software that they call an upgrade. I had several podcasts that were set to “Sync only the first unplayed episode” they somehow all were changed to “Sync all unplayed and partially played episodes”. which obviously increased the number of files & the size of the space used by the podcasts on my Zune & that happened without my consent.

Another issue I had marked several videos in my collection to “Never sync with Joecr-120” before the “upgrade”. After installing the 4.0 software they no longer had that tag. So now I have to go through my collection & set that again so that only stuff I want is synced to my Zune.

Please Microsoft learn from your mistakes & don’t try to do so much all at the same time. You are running faster than you are able to maintain when you do stuff like this. I really think you would have had a better launch if you had spaced everything out more & also I would have liked it if the marketplace didn’t keep crashing on me.

As I said earlier you brought back an old bug. I guess those who fail to learn from history are doomed to repeat it & I guess that means the Zune team has not learned from history.