Posted on 08/18/2009 4:31:11 PM PDT by Star Traveler
Letters from Microsoft: An Employee Tosses His Zune
August 18th, 2009
by Daniel Eran Dilger
Windows Enthusiasts like to paint me as biased against the Zune because I didn’t get a free gift basket from Microsoft and then turn around with a CNET-style gushing review of the me-too player that manages to consistently slink a year or two behind Apple. But what does one of Microsoft’s own developers think of the device? Here’s an independent report from a person deep inside the Zune maker.
The developer, whom I’ll call “Mike Rosoft,” volunteered the following experience with the Zune in an email: “[some months after being hired] … I did the dutiful thing and bought a Zune 120 gig, thinking it would be better than the 80g iPod I had before. I saw some plusses and minuses to the software interface and the potential of the social and Zune pass aspects (good ideas, typically flawed execution) but I didn’t give much thought to the actual audio quality.
”I figured I’m using a lossless codec, it’ll be true CD quality, I have some nice Creative Aurvana earbuds, it should sound pretty good. But I have pretty sensitive hearing, and over a long time I noticed that I wasn’t enjoying the music as much when I played it on the Zune. It didn’t sound as good as I expected it to, and I was starting to think it was a function of stress and depression, but that wasn’t it.
“Because after I got the iPhone I spent a day transcoding all the music from my collection that I expected to want to listen to from the original Apple lossless files to 256 Kbps AAC (standard iTunes Plus preset). It was only slightly involved. I’d right-click a bunch of songs, convert to AAC, and then with smart playlists and sorting on various columns, I’d drag the converted ones to my iMac with file sharing, import them to iTunes (copying them to the right directories and stripping the ” 1“ added to the name to avoid a collision with the original lossless version with the same extension) and finally deleting the transcoded version from the original PC. I lost my play counts and star ratings, but I’m fine with that.
Cutting Corners on Quality.
”After syncing the first batch and plugging in the same Aurvana earbuds, I almost instantly realized that i’d been robbed, by the Zune, because the AAC version sounded amazingly good, obviously better than the uncompressed version on the Zune. So now my whole music collection takes up like 25 gigs of flash and sounds better than I had ever expected.
“I believe they either f*cked up the DAC or the analog circuit pathways on the Zune and lost like 10dB or more of signal to noise. I think the stereo channels might be leaking into each other also. It just sounded muddy and I’d been using it all this time, not just with the earbuds but in my commute to work every day in the car.
”BTW, I think I could perhaps tell the difference between AAC and lossless after very carefully listening to each version, but the differences would be so subtle as to be meaningless in terms of enjoyability. Whatever they screwed up in the Zune to make the lossless version sound so flat and dead was much worse.
“Music is a very important part of my life and Microsoft robbed me of a portion of that enjoyment through typical corner cutting and short-sightedness. I’ve decided I’m going to find a nice grassy space this weekend and get my roommate to film me smashing up the Zune with a giant pipe wrench, a la the scene from Office Space where they smash up the printer. Should be a YouTube hit, especially with the story of why I’m doing it.
The Great Exodus of Microsoft’s Talent.
”Did I mention to you that after the layoffs, people have been resigning right and left? Always the same story, going to do something else, not sure what, but something else. Two weeks notice, see ya. I’ll be doing the same tomorrow morning along with a friend who’s quitting for the same reasons. In fact, he’s been frustrated longer than me, probably because I was blaming myself and not the real problem of the toxic work environment.
“We can’t figure out: how can you make a great product with shifty tools, and how can you make great, or even acceptable, tools on top of a shifty platform? You can’t ratchet up the quality, certainly not when you haven’t been allotted sufficient time to do so. You can only try to prevent the quality of everything from dropping further into mediocrity.”
Rosoft hasn’t yet posted his video or his story, but when he does I’ll link to it.
Up next: if you think Microsoft’s cutting corners on the Zune in the manner of the Xbox 360 is the worst example of the company’s failing to learn from its previous mistakes, get ready for a big surprise. Because Microsoft is preparing to replicate one of the biggest, most uncontroversial blunders of the recent decade in its misguided efforts to imitate Apple.
Guess what iceberg Balmer’s delirious company is going to aim towards for its next Titanic disaster! (Hint: it’s a far larger mistake than the whole ‘two years late iPod touch clone + Zune HD software problem’ I discussed in the last article.)
Kinda works on both side of the fence... eh? :-)
You said — Or it could be a load of crap
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Well, how music sounds and the “quality” is somewhat subjective, but there are audiophiles who swear that they can “hear differences” in different quality equipment. I probably can’t like some of those people can, but that doesn’t mean the differences in quality don’t exist.
In fact, in reading about the history of QuickTime and its operation on Windows systems, I have read that Apple was able to show Microsoft how to get better quality results (from their audio and video components running on Windows) than the Microsoft and Intel people even thought was possible in the first place. I understand it surprised them.
So, I wouldn’t doubt that some people can actually “hear” the better quality. I wouldn’t claim to be one of those who can hear it though — but as I said — it doesn’t mean that others are not hearing it.
The browser makes no differents as that is simply the user interface for downloading. The quality of digital music depends largely on its sampling rate. How many times each second the sound wave value is presented.
What matters is the original file compression, or sampling rate. The more frequent the samples of the sound wave the closer it is to the real analog sound.
There are thousands of codecs. The better ones are more expensive and require more resources to run. most of them sound the same to the average ear.
You said — Windows XP works just fine for me.
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I understand, and I’m sure it’s that way for a lot of people..., too...
Heck! I know some people who could just as easily live in a barn as anywhere... But, others like a nice home and nice furniture and stuff... so it’s all in one’s taste, I guess.
I don’t know how good or bad the zune is, but breaking it seems stupid. Clear it out, and give it to some little kid who can’t afford an Mp3 player. That’s what I would do. Some kid would probably love the thing.
true audiophiles prefer analog because it is far superior to any digital music.
there is a difference. The average person has an untrained ear and cannot tell the difference.
ipods are fine and so are zunes
You said — The browser makes no differents as that is simply the user interface for downloading.
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I think what many may be “missing” here — is that Apple also installed QuickTime components along with doing the Safari Browser installation. At least, at one time they did that.
Now, what can happen (and maybe this is what is being alluded to here) — is — that after a Safari Browser installation was done, things sounded different and better (can’t say for sure, but this sort of sounds like what is being said...). And that could be possible, because the QuickTime components would have been installed at the same time (at least there were at one time in the past, when Safari was being installed).
And what you said about there being a lot of different codecs is correct, but no matter what codec you have, if for some reason the current system you have does a *lousy job* of playing it back — no matter how good the codec which produced the sound, it’s still going to sound *terrible*.
NOW..., if some QuickTime software was installed at the same time (as Safari) and it “took over” the sound operation of the machine (at least for some tasks, as is the case with QuickTime) — then — it *can sound better* under those circumstances, because QuickTime was able to do things to sound and video that Microsoft and Intel didn’t even know could be done in the first place.
That’s how I would see this situation...
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As an additional note here, it could also mean that when something is playing “in the browser” (a plug-in for the browser), QuickTime can also be specified as the one who will take over and do the playing of the audio in the browser. In that case, that would be another instance of possibly sounding better than before.
“ithout having $5 million cash in the bank. Of course, many of these guys probably do”
Maybe not that much but a lot. Knew a few ofthose folks years ago. If any of those guys got in early, they could well be worth north of 250 mil. But relatively new guys much less - but likely after a five years there they could have 1-2m in the bank/stock options, plus an expensive home on Mercer Island.
I think if I had that much and quit, I’d be just fine - especially if I were in my 20s, 30s and had MS on the resume.
You said — I don’t know how good or bad the zune is, but breaking it seems stupid.
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I guess that’s life in the “fast lane” over at Microsoft... LOL...
Hoping to make the hearing aid people rich, are we?
You said — true audiophiles prefer analog because it is far superior to any digital music. there is a difference. The average person has an untrained ear and cannot tell the difference.
—
That’s what I “hear” from others who claim to be “audiophiles” — but I wouldn’t know if they really do or not. I suppose they can tell...
BUT, even so... they’re not going to be able to carry it around with them in analog... LOL...
I suppose they can do the “analog trip” at home and in some special listening room... but otherwise (elsewhere...), they’re going to get digital... :-) At any rate, you’re probably talking about 1% of the market for all of these kinds of things that are sold, who are going to insist on “analog” instead of digital (if it’s even that much...).
Exactly, analog is not very portable... :-)
“In that case, that would be another instance of possibly sounding better than before.”
Or worse, depends on the starting point.
You said — Or worse, depends on the starting point.
LOL... yeah, I guess that could be true, too... if the original audio was terrible... :-)
you said - if the original audio was terrible... :-)
yep everything is relative. ipods are nice, but expensive. expensive to buy, and expensive to fill with songs.
zunes are just fine for hauling around on your hip.
I am still using my Zune 30 which I got for like 80 bucks a year and a half ago or so.
It has been though some nasty mountain bike crashes and with this audiophile earbuds I got at Costco it sounds GREAT.
Also my whole collection of 140+ CD’s took up only 20 gigs so I still have a lot of free space on this thing.
The newer MP3 players are slimmer and have better screens but I really can not think of a good reason to cough up 200 bones when this old thing still works so well.
Well, I don’t know if you’ve heard the excellent sound that comes out of it, with good earbuds — and — 256 AAC encoded music. It’s absolutely stunning and you can hear it all...
Advanced Audio Coding
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Advanced_Audio_Coding
You can rip it with the good QuickTime components at 256 AAC encoding — or — you can get music from the iTunes Music Store, already encoded at 256 AAC from the music companies, themselves. That’s virtually *uncompressed* for the non-audiophile/non-trained ear... if you will.
Now, once again, I’m not one of those audiophiles so perhaps they may say that they can hear *more* from their special set-up at home with vinyl — but an iPod, with good earbuds and 256 AAC rip — and you’ve got absolute dyn-a-mite.... :-)
I really don’t think you can beat it... AND... if I understand this former Microsoft employee right, it appears he says that Microsoft has “muddied up” the sound in their Zune... that’s something to consider...
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