Apparently, the Zune folks have now released an updated version of their software that is compatible with Windows Vista. I learn this from Dwight, who leads off his item with “From the It’s-About-Time Dept.“
Well, all righty, then. About time?
Just to put this in perspective: This upgrade would be six weeks before Vista is released for the retail customers who are presumably the Zune’s target market. And about 30 days after it was released.
Tough crowd. Apparently in the 21st Century you have 29 days to get a product perfect or it’s written off as a miserable failure. Unless you’re in politics, that is.
But what do I care? I refuse to even think about buying one of these things until Om Malik finishes his review.
(Oh, and congrats on the book deal, Dwight. Remind me to tell you how many times I tried to resign from my first book writing gig.)
… In the comments, Dwight says the new Zune software doesn’t work. I’m still waiting for Om to weigh in.
… Another update. I wrote this in the comments but figure it’s worth repeating here:
The last thing I want to do is defend the Zune. I haven’t seen one or used one. My point is twofold:
1. Microsoft is not a monolith. It’s really a collection of companies. So, should they have delayed releasing the Zune until they had Vista software?
Or delayed releasing Vista until the Zune software was ready? That’s a marketing decision which one can critique. It truly sounds like the Zune was released too early, but the absence of software for Vista isn’t the problem.
2. The comparison to iTunes isn’t accurate at all. iTunes is included with the operating system, just as Windows Media Player is. Zune is really being treated as if it were a third-party product from a completely different company. I honestly don’t get that strategy, but that’s what it is.
Ed Bott 
It’s more a matter of perception than anything else… If you’re making a massive, hype-filled entry into a market with what you’re selling as a state-of-the-art device, wouldn’t you want it to work with your state-of-the-art flagship operating system?
Yeah, there may be, oh, six people who’d actually be able to use the Zune/Vista combo. But given who those six people likely are — early adopters, reviewers, bleeding-edge influencers — wouldn’t you want to make sure it worked in this showcase?
The argument has been made that the Zune was released way too early, and I think that’s a valid one. The fact that it took this long to make it work with Vista is more evidence of that.
“The fact that it took this long to make it work with Vista…”
Six weeks before Vista is released to the consumer public it works with Vista? That’s “this long”?
The only people who can get Vista today are corporate customers and reviewers and bleeding-edge techies. I don’t make marketing decisions. I guess Microsoft decided they would rather have it for sale in the Christmas season for the 99% of their market that still uses XP than wait till January when the Vista software is out and no one is buying anything.
Bad decision? Maybe. I won’t be getting one anyway.
Well, actually, it kind of doesn’t work with Vista.
I got the software to do an initial sync, but now it’s either locking up or refusing to do anything further. I’m seeing a lot of the “Not Responding” message in the title bar.
Maybe it does need that extra six weeks . . .
I’ve seen a similar dynamic with Vista as a whole, where its critics obsessively single out the fact that Microsoft broke its promises about what was supposed to go into the OS, as opposed to talking about the end result. Now if MS had charged us back in 2003 for Vista, they’d have good reason to gripe — but isn’t it kind of silly to not withhold expectations about something that big until it’s done?
See, I’m more with Dwight on this – If I am the kind of person to go and buy a Zune on release day, I’m the kind of person who’s going to be using my Zune on a pre-release version of Vista. While I don’t hate MS for delaying it, I do find it a little odd that they didn’t focus on their product readiness for Vista – and lets face it, what Microsoft have done is lose a little face because people read headlines, not details.
The headline is that they dropped the ball with Vista’s Zune support, and that is always going to cause people to lambast ‘you’ with accusations of being unable to make your own device work with your own operating system.
K
Keith gets it.
It’s not about utility, it’s about the perception of Microsoft as a company that has its act together. Don’t you know that, on the day Leopard is RTMed, there will already be a version of iTunes that works with it waiting in the wings as well? (Buggy, probably, but it’ll be ready!) This is why Apple has the rep it does.
Not having a Vista version of the Zune software when Vista’s RTMed looks like Microsoft didn’t plan ahead, or worse, couldn’t execute.
Microsoft had the same issue with drivers for other hardware products. Mouse, keyboard and fingerprint reader drivers were not available at release (they are now, and they’re a little buggy, too). Again, early adopters and influencers were irritated. Those are the very people you don’t want to piss off, because they tell their friends, who tell their friends, etc etc.
The last thing I want to do is defend the Zune. I haven’t seen one or used one. My point is twofold:
Microsoft is not a monolith. It’s really a collection of companies. So, should they have delayed releasing the Zune until they had Vista software?
Or delayed releasing Vista until the Zune software was ready? That’s a marketing decision which one can critique. It truly sounds like the Zune was released too early, but the absence of software for Vista isn’t the problem.
The comparison to iTunes isn’t accurate at all. iTunes is included with the operating system, just as Windows Media Player is. Zune is really being treated as if it were a third-party product from a completely different company. I honestly don’t get that strategy, but that’s what it is.
I agree 100% that the Zune was released too soon, to get it out the door for Xmas. That’s part of the problem. If they’d waited, they’d have had a better product that might have had better sales. Microsoft was a lot smarter about Vista than it was about the Zune — the Vista delay, while painful in terms of Xmas sales, was The Right Thing to Do.
And I agree with you about the Zune being treated like a third party product. MS should have created a version of WMP11 — or perhaps offered a plug-in — to handle the Zune component, rather than doing it with a completely new media player. That was baffling, and just a little bit stoopit, I think.
Agreed about the odd divorce of the Zune from the rest of MS. I wonder if this was a pre-emptive strategy to keep the antitrust people from huffing. Either way I know I’d appreciate some kind of WMP11 integration into the thing just as a matter of course.
One theory that’s been running around in my mind since I first heard about this thing was that MS is experimenting with attempting to leave the WMP system behind, but in my mind that would be a massive mistake.
Agree that the lack of Vista support – while unnecessary technically at this time – did adversely impact perceptions of MSFT’s overall competence (not that there’s been a shortage of those data points). Also agree that the product was apparently rushed out before it was ready. Frankly, I don’t think noting that is Monday morning quarterbacking. Given the importance of this market, the dominance of Apple and the obvious scrutiny that any product from MSFT would be subjected to, MSFT’s top management should have recognized that there was no room for a poor or average first impression. As such, if they knew it wasn’t ready for prime-time, then they should have waited a few more months even if it meant missing the Xmas season. And yes Ed, I think you’re right. It is a tough crowd out there in the consumer market and not unlike a blockbuster movie – fail to do record box office in the first weeks and you fail period. MSFT keeps ignoring this because in the corporate world you get lots of second chances to eventually get it right.
I am an early adopter. I bought a Zune on launch day. I have Vista installed on my laptop and I’m actually using Visual Studio 2005 on it as well, warts and all.
I am this early adopter you like to debate over and I DID NOT CARE that it didn’t work with Vista out the gate. I didn’t expect it to, just as I really don’t expect my drivers and applications to really work 100% on Vista until at least 6 weeks AFTER Vista is really released.
Bob, “…if they know it wasn’t ready for prime-time…” You did just say prime-time correct? As in the average consumer joe? As in the person that probably won’t even have Vista until ’08 or they buy a new computer? Do you mean that prime-time? If that’s the prime-time you are talking about then the Zune was definitly ready.
Dwight, sorry, but you are a 100% completely wrong about the Zune being released too early. None of the real people I’ve talked to care about Vista-support and the only issues they really have are the small growing pains any 1.0 software has. I’ve even documented a few of my annoyances with the Zune software on my blog but I still don’t think it was released too early.
As an actual person that a) bought a Zune at launch and b) is running Vista I don’t care that it took a whole 30 days to get support. Unless you’re doing the same your opinion matters just a wee bit less.
“Do you mean that prime-time?”
No Shawn, I meant wrt ZUNE’s functionality generally not the specific Vista issue. IMO, they should have passed on Xmas and used the 2-3 additional months to get better wireless support (like WIFI synch to the Zune music store, etc) and generally ensure that the software was solid. Instead, they rushed it out, dissapointed many and will now have to spend twice as much money doing damage control and rebuilding the brand. Stupid.
Bob: We must be dealing with different market segments. Of all my friends that are more consumer-minded none of them are all that upset over something like WiFi sync. Most people that I’ve talked to on the street so to speak like it for what it is NOW. The bigger screen, the ability to have an a la carte or subscription service, the menu system and the general fact that it’s NOT an iPod are making people quite happy.
The iPod thing isn’t a bash against Apple by the way, it’s more that now that every soccer mom out there has an iPod it’s lost a bit of hip. Those fickle kids 🙂
Honestly, the people that I see with the biggest problems with the Zune are a) people that don’t actually own one and b) reviewers. Oddly enough this reminds me a lot of “The Matrix” movie, when it first came out it got horrible reviews yet the actual people that see movies loved it and it made quite a good bit of dosh.
Just to pick on WiFi sync, a lot of the people in my market segment (the 30GB+ HD DAP segment, including iPod owners) wouldn’t find WiFi syncing all that wonderful. Most of us, Zunesters and iPodlings, turn off sync as soon as possible. Most of our libraries are greater than 30GB (or 60 or even 80) so for us sync is worthless. We are of an age, mid 20’s to mid 30’s, to have bought on average 200 – 500 CD’s and all that music has been ripped and carefully organized and put onto our music devices.
Everyone I know that owns a Zune, and that is quite a few, bought it for what it can do today, not what it “should” have been able to do.