To control how my library synced in iTunes, I had to do some sort of funky hold the shift key when starting it up and create 2 separate libraries of my media. Otherwise it would sync random selections out of my full library to the smaller devices.

When you plug in a second zune you’ve got two choices to make: the name on your zune, and sync everything or sync a subset of the library.

And while I certainly use all these devices for various things (iTouch for jogging, Zune 80 at work, iPod 60 in home stereo, Zune 16 for wife’s workouts, etc.) and can appreciate each in differnt use-cases there is a hugely pro-apple/anti-microsoft slant in the article.

My personal favorites were that left & right on a zune dump you into a different screen when you’re trying to navigate into something, while the behavior of left and right on an iPod in a similar circumstance isn’t mentioned.

Oh yeah, and you’re right, repeatedly flipping your thumb up and down on the touchpad to scroll through a long library is a dumb idea (I disable all of my touch capabilities), and the iPod rotation pattern is smoother, but I do like the even smoother “just hold down to scroll down” pattern the Zune uses

Yes, the article ended up being a bit biased against Microsoft and the Zune. True, there should’ve been equal levels of comparison between both products (there was quite obviously lots of clarification and examples for Zune problems, very few clarification and examples of why the iPod is better).

However, a lot of the Zune/Microsoft users/fanboys posting here aren’t really doing much better. What I see is baseless complaints about a bias, and examples of Zune superiority in isolated situations. To these people… where are *your* detailed points to show why what you’re saying is important to the majority of users?

The main point of this article is this:

The Zune has many problems that Microsoft seems to have ignored. It lacks many features that the iPod currently has. It has very few advantages over the iPod, instead either being worse or equal in just about every way that matters. What good are advantages that most people either won’t care about in the first place, or find to be useless?

The main question that needs to be answered is… What about the Zune makes it a *better* choice than the iPod for a person who wants the best on-the-go experience? Is there anybody out there who can answer this question with real, solid advantages over the iPod?

I dislike just about all software and hardware that Apple has ever released. I don’t like the interfaces or the hardware limitations that Apple provides, nor the limited support for apps and games that Apple devices are plagued by. I also dislike iTunes for how it handles certain things and its limitations.

But I have seen and used the Zune in both generations, and I have been a faithful iPod Nano user for about 2 years now. I don’t use it for anything but playing music, and it does so with more advantages to me than any other device I’ve seen (the Sansa, with the radio tuner and MicroSD slot would be close but has a very poorly designed user interface). After finding out through friends and personal experience what you get for owning a Zune, I will keep my iPod and never look back.