Disclaimer: Image heavy post.
Call me a fanboy but here are some screenshots of both iTunes 9 & Zune 4. Have a look at the gorgeous UI the new Zune as compared to that utterly ugly iTunes UI. The Macboys should find Zune to their liking – borderless window. And this is not something entirely new. Zune desktop’s previous version was also way ahead in UI compared to iTunes. Screenshots:
Zune 4 Quickplay:
iTunes 9 Genius: (This is the only ‘good-looking’ screen in iTunes)
Zune 4 DJ Now-Playing: (These screens also go into Full Screen mode. Gorgeous!)
The flames below the track status bar is a visulization! Here’s another beautiful screen:
How can you not like such displays:
Zune 4.0 DJ Screen:
iTunes 9 DJ Screen:
Zune 4 Music Library:
iTunes 9 Music Library: (Coverflow a beautiful UI makes not.)
Zune 4 Marketplace:
iTunes 9 Marketplace:
Zune 4 Marketplace, artist page:
iTunes 9 Marketplace, Artist page:
Edit: @aryayush pointed out that the image I had posted here before was of the search results and not the artist page. Corrected.
Zune 4 UI Themes:
Zune 4 Podcasts:
iTunes 9 Podcast:
Both players intheir minimal view:
Here is the Zune 4’s First Launch video, which again looks slick:
And the Zune HD vs iPod Touch comparison chart:
| Zune HD | iPod Touch 3 | |
| Display | 3.3 inch touchscreen, OLED | 3.5 inch touchscreen (no OLED) |
| Resolution | 480 x 272 px | 480 x 320 px |
| Color | Black, Platinum, Blue, Lime Green & Red | Black |
| Browser | IE Mobile | Safari |
| Software | Zune Firmware 3.0 | iPhone OS 3.1 |
| Capacity | 16 GB/32GB | 8GB/32 GB/64 GB |
| Price | $219.99/$289.99 | $199/$299/$399 |
| WiFi | Yes | Yes |
| HD Radio | Yes | No |
| HD Video Out | Yes | No |
| Wireless Sync | Yes | No |
| Input | Touchscreen keyboard and accelerometor | Touchscreen keyboard and accelerometor |
| App Store | Not yet | Yes |
Comparison Courtesy: QuickPwn
September 16th, 2009 at 12:35 am
Damn you Microsoft.. this thing deserved to be launched in India..
September 16th, 2009 at 9:52 am
If only I had a zune, I would be using Zune software as my default media player in Windows. Or if Microsoft releases Zune sync for Nokia phones…
September 16th, 2009 at 3:03 pm
But the Zune media format support still sucks as neither the player nor the software supports popular formats like DivX/Xvid/MPEG-4 Advanced Simple Profile, MPEG-1/2 and containers like AVI/MPG/MKV/FLV. That makes the player useless because all of my content is in these formats and I don’t want to pay for crap quality shareware converters which are available by the dozen.
September 16th, 2009 at 3:27 pm
Yeah that’s kinda a downer but not like iTunes does all of that
WMP 12 plays a lot of the formats & along with VLC at hand, I’m all good 
And I guess we can’t do much about the formats supported on the devices too much of politicals involved in the decision making and format support.
September 17th, 2009 at 9:11 pm
Hey ,
Still being ugly , it is mostly sold MP3 player and mostly used downloading station . I would say Microsoft first needs to reach a little near to the sales and download count before you call Itunes Ugly
Ratish
September 17th, 2009 at 9:13 pm
What is ugly … is ugly. The fact that it is widely used doesn’t mean that it is not ugly.
September 17th, 2009 at 11:04 pm
I think that Opera software should develop Opera browser for Zune.. they can make it paid if they want.. it would be awesome to use that on it… btw.. does Zune HD has any email client?
September 17th, 2009 at 11:13 pm
Nope.
September 22nd, 2009 at 11:33 am
Considering India to be a huge market for microsoft, they should launch Zune HD here..!!
September 23rd, 2009 at 9:52 pm
Nobody listens to HD Radio in the US. OLED sucks in day light. The interface might be cool…but Apple is supposedly revamping iTunes on the next update. Ugly? not really. Pretty? no, but it doe the job well. WMP is a resource hog. and you are comparing WMP to iTunes…not exactly apples for apples is it? Zune subscription sucks.
Oh, and MS is WAAAY behind the power curve on this.
I’m a big fan of MS. But they’ve been dropping the ball left and right for years in this area.
September 24th, 2009 at 5:00 pm
thanks for the great post, nice one.
October 8th, 2009 at 6:11 am
Yeh, look at your fucking taskbar. Call me an XP fanboy, but that shit is ugly.
October 8th, 2009 at 10:49 am
Oh my god… I am glad.I don’t have all this know-how about these kinds of things, or my little old Nano would drive me insane!But think both of it i will choose I-pod touch.
October 12th, 2009 at 5:36 am
Person whose library screenshots are above seems to be using pirated music from “djluv.in”
November 3rd, 2009 at 12:29 pm
anonymous
Zune does support those formats now dumbass why don’t you jsut give up Microsoft has once again out done apple
March 9th, 2010 at 9:50 am
Dude you suck. iTunes and iPod beat the shit out of Zune. That’s just fact, and i’m sorry that your trying to deny it.
June 28th, 2010 at 11:08 am
The Zune software sure looks good, but it takes a lot more clicks to achieve what I can do in the iTunes with fewer clicks. I can’t click more for the sake of beauty, no matter how much I love Windows and find Macs ridiculously expensive..
July 18th, 2010 at 8:04 pm
Trying it out now