Hasta La Gadget!

With Windows Phone 7 offering full Zune functionality and then some, the new mobile OS has clearly created a surplus of lower-capacity Zune HD devices, causing Microsoft to respond with a rather significant price drop. Typically, a discount would indicate an imminent refresh, but we doubt that’s the case here. The 16GB Zune HD has shaved off $30, to $169.99, and you can now grab the 32GB version for $199.99 — the same price you would have paid for the 16 gig before the drop, and nearly $100 less than the $299 you’ll spend on a 32GB iPod touch. The 64GB model is holding fast at $349.99, but with a $70 plunge on the mid-capacity model, you might have just enough cash left over for that tattoo you’ve always dreamed of.

[Thanks, Daniel]

16GB Zune HD drops to $169, edging closer to EOL? originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 04 May 2011 09:59:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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A conclusion for Captain Obvious to draw, this is not. As with most mega-corp job postings, the wording in Microsoft’s latest is just obfuscated enough to keep us guessing, but a few key phrases have us (as well as ZDNet‘s Mary-Jo Foley) on edge waiting for the next big thing in cloud storage. Judging by the rousing reception seen by Amazon’s Cloud Drive, we’re guessing that the folks in Redmond haven’t forgotten completely about Kin’s one positive feature: Kin Studio. Based on a new job request, there’s a Windows Phone Mobile Studio brewing, and the leading thought is that this is really Kin Studio… but for WP7 devices. Granted, this may be nothing at all like it sounds — we could be looking at a future home for apps, or simply another aspect of Zune that’ll make music management a wee bit easier. That said, we’d love to see Microsoft bust out a world-class streaming / storage service for its mobile platform, and you can bet we’ll be prying for details at MIX next month.

Microsoft job posting teases Windows Phone Mobile Studio, requires thinking cap to grok originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 30 Mar 2011 09:39:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Released in 2009, Microsoft's Zune HD packs an OLED screen, HD radio and HD video-out. Photo: Jon Snyder/Wired.com

By Peter Bright, Ars Technica

Bloomberg is reporting that Microsoft will cease development of its family of Zune-branded music players due to weak demand and a desire to focus on its smartphone platform.

Zune will live on as a software-and-services platform, according to Bloomberg’s source. Windows Phone 7 embeds the Zune player for media playback on the phone, uses the Zune Marketplace for online music sales, and the Zune PC software for media syncing and firmware updates. These uses will be unhindered by the cancellation of the standalone Zune hardware.

Since their introduction in 2006, the Zune players always played second fiddle — with that — to Apple’s iPod line. The 2009 Zune HD model was a well-received, well-designed, and supremely elegant device, but was a case of too little, too late. It was competing against Apple’s iPod touch, with its enormous App Store advantage.

Microsoft also did little to promote the Zune brand beyond US borders. The original models were also available in Canada, but until recently, the Zune HD was U.S.-only. As a result, Microsoft failed to threaten Apple’s dominance, leaving Cupertino to take 77 percent of the digital music player market last year.

Over the past couple of months rumors have been swirling around that Zune would either be killed off or rebranded, and Microsoft has yet to officially confirm the hardware’s demise. The apparent decision to cancel the standalone hardware may be the fact behind the rumors, or this could be the first step in a complete overhaul and rebranding of the platform, possibly codenamed “Ventura.” The decision to end Zune hardware production also means that it’s unlikely that Microsoft will ever mimic Apple and produce an iPod touch equivalent for Windows Phone 7 — the phone platform without the phone part.

See Also:

• Zune HD Gives iPod a Real Run For Its Money
• Video: Zune HD vs. iPod Nano Smackdown
• Microsoft Sets Up Zune HD for Failure — Again
• Hands-On With the Zune HD

Zune hasn’t gotten much love from Microsoft as of late, but that might change over time — ZDNet’s Mary Jo Foley noticed that the company is staffing up for a cloud-based multimedia project (by a group known as “Ventura Media Services”) directed at PCs, TVs and mobile devices. “The team is a tight group of music and video lovers that create services and experiences revolving around music/video discovery and consumption,” read a series of job postings that date back at least as far as July of 2010, calling for software developers in Beijing and Redmond who are familiar with the Microsoft Azure cloud platform. (Two of them have “Zune” in the job title.) While it’s hard to say if this project is a major focus for Microsoft no matter how often the job posting says “large scale” (we count four times) it’d definitely be nice to have some competition for Google and Apple when they start drawing the multimedia-streaming battle lines.

[Thanks, zblack]

Microsoft’s Ventura could be a cloud music / video platform, have something to do with Zune originally appeared on Engadget on Tue, 08 Mar 2011 19:38:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Don’t get too excited when you see this update notification pop up — as far as we can tell, it’s got nothing users will notice — but we’ve just been told by Microsoft that the company is getting ready to send out the first software upgrade to Windows Phone 7 devices in the field early this week. It’s being billed as a “minor update to help prepare” for the copy and paste stuff (which we’re assuming is still targeted for early- to mid-March, per Ballmer’s MWC keynote), though the exact timing of this first one will vary a bit depending on carrier. Oh, and a note before you hook up to try to grab it: it also required a recently-pushed update to the Zune software (or the Connector for Mac OS), so you’ll need to get that first before restarting the app and looking for the phone firmware.

Microsoft pushing small update to Windows Phones to prepare for copy and paste update later on originally appeared on Engadget on Mon, 21 Feb 2011 12:32:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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