Zune HD: You call that a browser?
After a few hours on Tuesday of playing with the Zune HD that Microsoft sent me, I found a lot of things I like about it--the slim size, the Quickplay user interface feature that gives you immediate access to recently added and favorite songs, the big on-screen volume controls, and the Zune Pass, for example. But the Web browser seems like an afterthought.
CNET's Donald Bell had better luck with the on-screen keyboard than I did.
(Credit: Donald Bell/CNET)I know that mobile Web browsing isn't the same as PC browsing, but I've used Safari on the iPhone for more than a year, and it's great--I actually read articles, for work and fun, on my bus commute to work. It's so good, I've been taking it for granted. Not anymore.
Microsoft says the Zune HD's browser is based on the mobile version of Internet Explorer, but it doesn't look like any version of IE I've ever seen. The address bar is hidden--you have to pull up on the gray bar at the bottom of the screen to get to it. The other alternative is to click on a small magnifying glass to conduct a search on the mobile version of Bing, which I found difficult to use. (No slam against the full browser-based version of Microsoft's search engine, which I like.) For instance, when I conduct a search on my employer's name, "Directions on Microsoft," Bing Mobile assumes I want news stories that cite the company, when in fact I just want our home page. There's a link on the Bing Mobile site that says "web," which I assume is supposed bring me general search results from around the Web, but when I clicked it repeatedly, nothing happened. There's also no auto-suggest or auto-complete for search queries--each time you want to search for "Chinese restaurants," you have to type the whole query in.
Regardless of how you're trying to navigate, the on-screen keyboard seems to require more finger accuracy than the fault-tolerant keyboard on the iPhone (probably because of the smaller screen). The back button is hard to hit--I kept selecting the favorites menu by mistake. Sites are also considerably slower to load, and the resolution doesn't seem to be nearly as good as the iPhone or iPod Touch, with a noticeable flicker on pages with white backgrounds.
Maybe it's just me--Donald Bell thought the browser was great--but I can't imagine using this browser for any length of time.
Matt Rosoff is an analyst with Directions on Microsoft, where he covers Microsoft's consumer products and corporate news. He's written about the technology industry since 1995, and reviewed the first Rio MP3 player for CNET.com in 1998. He is a member of the CNET Blog Network. Disclosure. You can follow Matt on Twitter @mattrosoff. 
A "browser" is just a gimmick feature. Lets just consider all of the brilliant new features MS added to the MEDIA features, which is the primary reason to buy a Zune. Smart DJ is amazing, pulling in songs that I don't even own. The interface of the Zune HD is stellar. Music quality is perfect. It is the best device for playing music or videos.
Who cares about that other crap, browsing the web and all. Maybe if people actually got lifes, and stopped sitting around, bored, then they woudn't "need" a browser. Lol :D
There are a lot of sophisticated multi-media web apps in the pipeline that I'm sure users will want to have access via the Zune browser:
e.g.
- HTML5 allows users to read their email offline, stream audio & video, etc., WITHOUT plugins.
- WebGL is intended to allow users to run 3D graphics accelerated web apps, etc. (e.g. games), WITHOUT plugins.
The iPhone/iTouch is capable of delivering some of this functionality TODAY. Why shouldn't users expect the same from Zune?
Here you go. Thats a CrunchGear video. SEE HOW GOOD THE KEYBOARD AND BROWSER ARE!
See Crunchgear's UI tour. SEE HOW GREAT THE KEYBOARD AND THE BROWSER ARE!
But maybe the author just needs to get used to it. Thats what you guys had to do when you originally got the iphone. Why not give the same credence to the Zune HD?
Plus, this is a wi-fi only device. How many people will be away from their laptop and looking to browse the web on a regular basis? Id always use my laptop over my cell, same way with the Zune HD. As long as the browser is decent, who cares. It doesnt have 3g, so let it be.
Just another "i love my ipod and nothing else compares" article.
@aMaclover(boy),
Get over yourself. You're not that good.
http://acid3.acidtests.org/
The Acid3 results, for desktop browsers, are:
Chrome 2.0 - 100/100
Safari 4.0 - 100/100
Opera 10 - 100/100
Firefox 3.5.3 - 93/100
IE 8 - 20/100
Judging by IE's poor performance on desktops, I suspect the browser results on the Zune will be dismal.
Kind of in a sticky situation. If I tell you what it scored on my iPhone you would say I was a incorrect biased Apple fanboy just making stuff up. If I tell you a low number you would just laugh and point and make rude comments about the iPhone.
Let me preference my results by saying that the iPhone is running Safari and based on the same acid test that Safari desktop is running my results were the same for Safari on the iPhone; 100/100.
Clearly, a test is less important, to a company that can't pass it.
What the results do demonstrate is the extent of grief web developers must go through, just to support Microsoft's web browsers.
Perhaps there should be a "Be kind to a web developer day", where for 24 hours, no one uses IE.
Hands up who amongst businesses gives a crap about a test made up to promote an arbitrary standard that tech heads seems to care about?
What? No-one?
Hands up who cares about making sure their websites run on IE?
Oh. Everyone.
No-one cares about ACID. It's irrelevant.
It's not exactly voluntary, to support IE. You kinda have to, regardless of its faults, because of its market share.
If people/companies would just stop using IE, web developers would be able to implement their websites according to web standards, like they should.
Acid3 is VERY important, because it gages how well a browser conforms to open web standards. Microsoft doesn't like it, because it shows how poorly they conform.
When I run on Opera, it matches the reference exactly.
Is the 100/100 an accurate measure of compatibility?
If your device has Wi-Fi, it needs a full blown browser with Java and Flash support.
For the sake of their users, Microsoft should cease the deployment of IE & their other hodge-podge collection of browsers & begin to promote other modern web browsers (Firefox, Chrome, Safari, Opera). That would buy them time, to:
a. catch up to the other browser vendors OR
b. acquire a fast moving browser company (wouldn't it be ironic, if they acquired Opera?).
Poor Poor MS Shareholders on the hook for another billion down the tube
this lacks any sort of true analysis.. how about HD video output? wireless sync?
"he resolution doesn't seem to be nearly as good as the iPhone or iPod Touch", what does that even mean? what is the resolution of the Zune HD? What is iPhone/iPod Touch's? Some sort of technical comparison _might_ be worth while, instead of awful statements like this? Wow.
Why not concentrate on the direction the Zune HD is bringing Microsoft as a whole? Its clearly a pet project of Microsoft to one day take over their Windows Mobile line, if you want to continue your style of non-technical writing (yet pretend to be technical in doing so?).
Worst cnet article I've read to date.
http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/technologybrierdudleysblog/2009867170_microsoft_launches_zune_clarif.html
On the one hand Microsoft are pitching it as a pure music player and don't want to get distracted by such frivolities as app stores and cameras etc. If this is true then great, we have some competition for the ipod classic, but I don't believe this for one minute. I mean why include HD, which refers to playback of movies over your tv, _not_ the clarity of the zune screen?
This and other features smacks of Microsoft being wrong footed by the unexpected rise in popularity of the ipod touch and they are trying make a last minute alteration to the course of their mighty juggernaught to compensate.
Don't get me wrong I'm not trying to pour hate in Microsoft's direction, it's just I don't think the reborn Zune in its current schizophrenic incarnation does them any favors whatsoever.
perhaps they didn't give to $90 dock needed for HD output.
http://www.appleinsider.com/articles/09/09/14/from_oled_to_tegra_five_myths_of_the_zune_hd.html
I've seen it posted too, but why [the name-calling]? Jeez, somebody report this offensive and ironically ignorant comment.
That aside, I agree the tone of the article is on the schadenfreude side, but at the same time I would love to hear the other side of the argument - especially whether the OLED screen is as bad as they make out in daylight.
802.11n shipped in products for years, before the standard was finally ratified (last week, in fact).
The way things look, HTML5 is going to be no different. Firefox, Chrome, Safari & Opera are already building HTML5 functionality, into their browsers. WebGL was just recently integrated into WebKit.
This stuff is happening NOW...not sometime in the future.
Yeah, expecting M$ to adhere to any standards is like expecting your local child rapist to protect your children.
Historically and consistently, Microsoft have infected the Internet with proprietary code, or toss their own code into the open standards. J++ was one example where MS created their own Java calls. Thankfully Sun sued their ass off and stopped it. Then there was Front Page, their non-standard web design program, thankfully now dead and gone. No one but IE users could render the resulting pages properly. Another example is JScript, which pollutes Netscape's JavaScript (aka LiveScript) standard. This is one big reason why visiting scripted web pages can be extremely dangerous. As per usual, Microsoft think of sales first and customer security last.
Meanwhile, IE remains not only the single least secure web browser available, it has been consistently poor at resolving standardized web pages. IE 6, which is what has been infected into the Zune HD, is well known to be intolerant of even old web standards. Using IE 6 to deal with current web standards is, in a word, insane. Even IE 8, despite mega promises, remains horrible at web standards. The result of course is poor rendering of modern web pages. Why Microsoft would inflict Zune HD users with an archaic IE 6 based web browser is beyond comprehension. You figure it out.
Then log-in to Opera Link and sync all your Opera desktop bookmarks, Speed Dial settings, search engines, Notes, and typed history. Now, wasn't that simple?
I should have saved all those screen shots lol.
I can't imagine using any browser on a PMP for any length of time. I've had the iTouch with Safari and Oceanus and after while it's a bit tedious typing on them that's why you have apps!
I've played with the ZuneHD and its nice but unless it supports a wide array of apps I don't see why we would compare it to the Touch. It's probably the best media device I've used outside of browsing the web. However the Sony Walkman has a much richer sound than both the Zunes and Ipods.
The browser is fast and easy to use to me. I don't have problems hitting any of the keys and I don't have small fingers.... In comparison to the limited time that I've spent on an iPod browser I can say that the Zune was faster but that could be to any number of conditions that may have changed over the past months. I don't really see a large need for the browser anyway unless I'm stuck somewhere with no phone, laptop, or computer nearby and I'm close enough to an access point to get out to the web for whatever drastically important reason, it's just a nice to have feature. Being able to get to the marketplace and sync over WiFi are much more satisfying features using the capability.
as far as people concerned over apps, I do recall when I bought my original iPhone, there was NO apps to get other than what was on it. you have to give it time to develop. A true way to judge things is to give the Palm Pre and the Zune HD until this time 2010 and 2011 to see how far they came along in the same amount of time apple has with the iphone/itouch.
to just expect it to come out the box and immediately be where apple took a year or two to get to isn't a fair debate. on that note, why hasn't my apple iphone gotten MMS yet and its been out for 2+ years and my palm pre came out a few months ago with it. why has the zune always had FM radio and apple just recently squeezed it into one of its players.
the thing is that these are mp3 players and you all are talking about web browsers. its like buying a ps3 or xbox and then complaining that they don't have adequate web browsing capabilities (but then who actually buys them to get on the web). as someone said.....its just a nice feature to have but are you really gonna use it for an extended period of time = NO Plus as another person noted, you need to be in wi-fi range to utilize the feature and for most people, they have a laptop in such environment.
. @ zyxxy
You claim "no one buys a mp3 player for the browser so this is a false debate going on". If you think the Zune HD is competing strictly as an mp3 player, you are a bit naive. If it were just audio, Microsoft would not have needed to move to a completely touch screen interface. Portable devices like the Zune HD and iPod Touch have much higher expectations from them as opposed to simple MP3 players. Web browsing is absolutely becoming a core function. While the Zune HD may be a competitive MP3 player, it is lacking in other areas such as web browsing. IE is dragging the platform down and it's not just for the Zune HD, that applies to other Windows Mobile devices. Unfortunately, for the Zune, Microsoft doesn't appear interested to even opening the doors for competition. If they did, I'm sure someone would port a good WebKit based browser for them. MS is dropping the ball here. Just acknowledge it and move on.
it works pretty well actually... maybe pick up and use one first? you fail...
A masterful pwning. I salute you.
I bought my iPod touch due to it's portable browser. . .
If you want to compromise, and get a crappy browser from a product, then that is your choice. When I bought my iPod touch, I was extremely impressed by the fact that such a small product could run music, movies, Applications, browser, etc. To say that "Noone cares about the browser" is false.
But I admit that these are you perceptions and we all have differences of perception.
TechCrunch just mention that Zune HD have a browser and nothing much else.
can Zune open gmail, yahoo mail and hotmail without any trouble and fast ? (not just the lite/mobile version).
Now don't get me wrong, everything else is fantastic, even better than I expected. BUT!!!
The browser is garbage, absolute garbage.
Nothing Works, No Flash, Can only pull up the mobile versions of websites. The keyboard is not bad, but getting around the net is the worst, and I like bing, but forcing me to use it is just awful.
GET THIS: You can't even access drop down menus on the browser. Really this is most basic.
Hopefully, A firmware update, or maybe a web-browsing app, is on its way.
Does anybody know how I can contact Microsoft about this?
Fact is, things like web browsing on a PMP are kinda pointless. Most of us take our notebooks with us to work, and with those you don't have a miniature oversensitive keyboard (typing on a touchscreen sucks, iPod or Zune), tiny viewing screen or limited browsing. My Zune HD plays my music (with stunning class), videos, radio, podcasts, and gives me an unparallelled ability to discover music on-the-go.
If you know exactly what you're buying when you get it, the Zune HD is bar-none the greatest music playing device ever made.
My concern is that the over-all quality is lessened by the addition of a browser incapable of most internet requests.
no youtube, no flash, only mobile sites, ok ok ok.
But not being able to use a drop/pull down list menu? How could they forget that.
For an instance of the browser's failure:
Go to www.HDRadio.com on your Zune browser
The zune HD startup page tells you to go here to discover HD stations in your area.
So, you go there and it has menu for you to select your state and city.
Well, you can't... Because the browser is garbage.
Com' on Microsoft don't send me to a site that your browser cannot utilize. Just Dumb.
Cowon- any of them are superior
And I agree that Cowon makes excellent players, michial1!
- by Synthmeister September 16, 2009 8:47 AM PDT
- The Zune definitely has some bizarre things happening.
- Like this Reply to this comment
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- by Ray180 September 17, 2009 7:13 AM PDT
- The only bizarre thing about the Zune is how people try to distort the truth. Let me offer a different point of view...
- Like this
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Showing 1 of 3 pages (97 Comments)1. Why isn't MS trying to join the WinMo and Zune development platforms into a single, unified development/distribution/ platform? Apple's success with the iPhone and iPod touch is now snowballing because they have a unified base of 50 million users between the two.
2. Why is MS even hesitating to commit to an open development platform for the Zune? Or at least act like they are headed that direction.
3. Funny how Microsoft is pushing hardware specs instead of software variety and freedom for the Zune. I thot Apple was the hardware company and MS was the software company.
4. MS was trying to pay iPhone developers to port Twitter apps, etc. to the Zune/WinMobile platform. Can't some of their software engineers do that kind of stuff on their lunch break?
5. iPod touch has MS Exchange support and Zune doesn't. Just weird.
6. HD radio doesn't work anywhere else in the world but USA. What?!?!
7. The ZuneHD has less resolution than the non-HD iPod?
8. The iPod touch BTW, is fully capable of outputting 720p video. Apple could flip that software switch any time it wants to.
9. iPod touch also has an 802.11n chip. Just hasn't been activated yet.
10. Thot for sure that the Zune would have a camera, GPS (Microsoft maps!) or built in VOIP. Now any of those things would really distinguish it from an iPod touch.
I would love to see a real world comparison between Zune and the touch. I.e. real world battery life while watching videos, surfing the web, using wifi/bluetooth, screen viewability in bright sunlight, speed in loading websites, similar apps and videos. FPS in demanding games, etc.
1. One step at a time... let's get this thing launched first, ok? Of course iPods have a larger user base... it's been around a lot longer and, until recently, had very little real competition. Thanks for stating the obvious.
2. Zune would like to maintain control of the content in the early rounds to keep out the crapware that plagues the iPod ecosystem.
3. Hardware specs are being pushed because they trump the Touch in pretty much every category (OLED screen, faster processor, longer battery life, HD radio, HD video out, etc, etc.). Why wouldn't they point this out? Also, the Zune Marketplace is vastly superior to iTunes in terms of features and the UI. If you don't think so, you haven't checked it out.
4. This just sounds made up... source please?
5. Doesn't sound like something I need my PMP to do, but again, all in due time.
6. Since you didn't get the memo, the Zune HD is ONLY available in the US at this time so why does this matter.
7. The Zune has less resolution because the screen is smaller (by a scant .2" diagonal). This also means the Zune has a smaller form factor and is more pocketable. BTW, ALL iPods are non-HD (or non-High Definition). I think you meant to say non-HDD (as in non-Hard Disk Drive, which would include the Touch).
8. So why don't they flip that switch? They probably never will as long as AppleTV is around. They don't like to compete with their own products.
9. Again, just means you're paying for something you can't use... makes a lot of sense.
10. Not sure why you thought the Zune would have a camera. However, I think we all thought the Touch would have a camera -- BTW, it doesn't.
I think your last statement is the only thing that makes sense. EVERYONE shoud go to a store and try both devices side-by-side and only then decide which is best for them. Peace.