Zune HD

I’ve just managed to get my hands on a Zune HD. It is a personal music player from Microsoft. The Zune brand has been around for a while. The first players appeared a few years ago and have been developing ever since. They are rather like ipods; but they have one or two nice extra features, including built in WIFI and radio but they have always something of also-rans when compared with the all-conquering Apple product.

However the HD version might change that. It has a superb OLED display and an all new multi-touch user interface. As the name implies, you can put high definition video onto the machine and get video output into an HDMI display.  The whole package is lovely and the hardware is beautifully made and very stylish.

It also runs XNA, so you can take C# games that you have written for the framework and they just run on the device. Your games can even take advantage of the multi-touch interface and the accelerometer inside the Zune. I managed to convert a game to use them in just a few minutes. I’m going to write some posts nest week about porting games over onto the platform, but there won’t be much to say as it is all so easy to use.

The only problem with the Zune is that you can’t get it in the UK yet.

Comments

[200906665]

Looks nice! anyway i'm looking forward to writing complete and tech C# programs, the I'll be able to make my own analysis

[Alfred Thompson]

Can we expect some Very Silly Zune games soon then?

[James Taylor]

First off always good to see a fellow Zune User!
Second off.. mine happens to be a lot older :(
thirdly! thank you for the brilliant presentation yesterday i wanted to ask you some questions in person but unfortunately you quickly vanished!

Thanks for the Information and the websites.

James.

[Joel]

@200906665 If thats your new student id, i'd advise not posting it anywhere, as its meant to remain near secret for marking purposes, and can seriously incriminate you as a whole. I'm not victimising you though, i'm just saying *sigh*.

On topic, i've been looking forward to the zune for a while, when it is released in the UK, i'll snap it up in no time, as i'd love to deploy an app on there ;)

[Enthused Zunadilliadad]

oooooooooh, it arrived!

[Rob]

Sorry about leaving at speed. I had a few things at home I had to sort out. If you have any questions feel free to get in touch directly via the email on this site.

Alfred, I'm definitely going to have a go with the Zune HD and see how silly I can make it. I'm itching to have a play with the new hardware, there seems to be great scope for silliness here. What I'd really like is to get a hundred or so and make a "Zune Jenga" game using the accellerometer....