My Zune Experience Thus Far...

[Omnivus]

Ok, first let me start out by letting you know that so far I have not had a good experience with my Zune. Well, I should say my THIRD Zune. I had a 30GB first and couldn't get it to sync up half the time. Then I finally got it working on only one of my three computers. I decided I'd rather return it and get the 80GB one because 30GB won't last long.

So I returned the first one, and my second one was a Black 80GB Zune. Out of the box it was a little strange to me because I was used to the 30GB one, and the controls seemed different on this one. After some fiddling around I managed to get my music on it. Then all of the sudden the screen went black, and it froze. I could not get the damn thing to come to, so I had to do a reset by holding Back+Up buttons.

After the reset I had to reload the firmware 2.3 again. It seemed to run a little groggy, but I ignored it and put my songs back on. Then today I am using it, and it's working great until I decided I want to up the volume. The song is playing but the screen will not light back up. I am pressing buttons and nothing is happening. And it was NOT locked. It's almost like it froze again, then all the sudden it shuts off. After a minute it boots back up telling me I need to connect to my PC and reload the firmware.

So I attempt to do this by plugging it in but the computer says the USB device failed to load the driver. Then the Zune reboots again, and comes back saying I need to plug it in to my computer. Everytime I do this the USB driver fails to load and the Zune reboots. It was stuck in an infinite loop. I wrote it off as being a lemon, and took it back to the store to exchange it. So here I am on my third Zune in less than a week, about to sync my music up for about the 4th or 5th time.

It's really been a frustrating experience. And the software really sucks ass, because it acts very buggy. The syncing started deleting my songs for some reason, and I have yet to figure out why. It seems to sync a different number of songs everytime, and never gets all my songs on there. Maybe something is wrong with my songs, who knows. All I know is the marketing claims big things with these Zune devices, but has yet to deliver. Being an MCSE for years now, I have always been a Microsoft supporter even though this tends to be how most new Microsoft products work. I have never met a piece of technology I was unable to master quickly, except for this Zune. I know how to use it, the problem is it just won't act stable.

I am not sure if I should try the harddrive hack again or not, because when I used it on my computers at home they all would no longer sync up. I am stuck only able to use my work laptop to sync my songs up to. Why can't this just work like a normal harddrive and show up in Windows Explorer so I can just drag and drop my songs into it? Why do we need this buggy lame Zune software? I'd much rather use Windows Explorer or Media Player. Heres to hoping that third time is the charm, and this new Zune will work correctly and stay working long enough for me to enjoy it! :-/

- Omnivus -

[MadameMasenko]

Yes Omnivus, good luck with that.
It truly sucks when there are people out there who can't enjoy the best out of the zune experience.
The zune is such a great hardware device in itself.

[Gregory]

Before we troubleshoot, can you let me know how much RAM your computer has, and the processor speed.

Have you tried uninstalling with UnZoone, and reinstalling?

[Omnivus]

Thanks for the quick responses. The laptop I am using right now to sync up is a Pentium M 1.6GHz with 2GB of RAM. It's not super fast, but it's pretty quick. My computers at home are both dual Pentium IV 3.0GHz machines with 2GB of PC4300 RAM. I've never had any problems with any USB devices before on any of these machines.

A quick update, I was up very late last night trying to complete the ever joyful task of tagging my thousand or so songs. It seems each tagger software I used wanted to tag them differently. And then for some reason when the tagger doesn't know who the song belongs to it puts the information for "The Best of PM Dawn" and a picture of some rapper or something who looks like he is from the 70's or 80's with a giant afro. LOL! It's kind of funny actually, but annoying in the sense that it's displaying my song information incorrectly.

So as of right now, it's syncing up a bunch of new songs I put on there and it appears to be working correctly. It's been syncing for about 15 minutes or so now, which seems a little long. But hey, if it's working it's working, I won't complain. I will try that UnZoone software on my computers at home to see if it can assist me in uninstalling and reinstalling the software with the hopes of using it at home instead of at work.

I do really like this Zune though. My experience may have been a bit bumpy, but the idea behind this technology is really great. I have used other MP3 players before which have been easier, but don't even come close to the number of features and sheer capabilities of the Zune. I am going to stick with it, and the only way I will return it is if this one dies within the first 30 days. I am really hoping it doesn't though, because now that I have history with the Zune I don't want to abandon it for an iPod. Besides, those wheels on the iPods drive me nuts. I tried using one in Best Buy and it took me 5 minutes to even maneuver through the menu to the info I wanted.

I will keep you all updated on my progress! Thanks again!

- Omnivus -

[Jon]

Try the zAlternator hack?

[Omnivus]

LOL. Now this next issue was totally my fault. I forgot that the Zune 80GB comes with a bunch of music on it, and I hated it all. Really terrible music, in my opinion. So I synced up my music but forgot to delete the music that came on it. LOL! So now I have to go through it all and delete the junk. Oh man, I can't believe I did it. Messing with your Zune while at work is not too smart. I wasn't focusing 100%. Oh joy! ;-) At least it's working though.