Microsoft may have been playing catchup to the iPod ever since it launched the Zune, but the Zune HD, which today materialized from a rumor to a real product, looks to be a rather nice piece of hardware.
The new player has a 3.3-inch capacitive OLED touch screen at 480 x 272 resolution, which will give some kind of multi-touch functionality and let you watch movies in 16:9 widescreen format. It also has Wi-Fi, an HD radio (what?!) and “HD Video Out”, for which you will require an optional dock (and an optional HDTV). Also, see if any of this sounds familiar:
Enjoy your favorite websites with a full-featured web browser including tap to zoom technology, built-in accelerometer, and touchscreen QWERTY keyboard.
<Cough> Safari <cough>. Will this be a mobile version of Internet Explorer? We hope not. Of course, success will come down to the software, something that the Zune isn’t exactly famed for. There is, though, one real killer app — music streaming over Wi-Fi. The iPod Touch can do this with some third party apps, but it looks like the Zune HD will use the Zune Pass subscription service and let you stream any track you like, direct. It’s a shame there’s not a 3G radio in there, too. Wait… Could this mean there’s a Zune Phone coming?
Product page [Zune.net]
Press release [PR Newswire]
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