RE: Audio iPod and MCE



Actually, when it comes to DAPs, it's an Apple world. 3/4 of the market is
Apple, 80%+ of the digital music market is Apple. In this sense, it is
Microsoft's fault for not support Apple's standards.

PlaysForSure hardly guarantees a seemless experience. Have you looked at the
support forums for Creative or iRiver products? The firmware updates required
for many "PlaysForSure" players can brick them! The updates required to
Windows and said players can also cause enough damage to the Windows
installation that a full format and reinstall of the OS is needed to even get
the PC to recognize the player.

Furthermore, a lot of the hardware manufactured by Creative and iRiver have
problems. The Zen Micro was known for a faulty headphone jack that went bad
after just a few months of regular use. And iRiver is known for poor firmware
that can't even organize music properly.

As I said, Apple has over 3/4 of both the hardware and digital downloads
market. Microsoft is the one that is refusing to adhere to standards. Them
and their hardware partners who couldn't make a reliable piece of hardware if
their life depended on it are the ones who are hurting the consumers.

Apple has sold over 1 billion songs through the iTunes Music Store. I
guarantee you that the combined sales of ALL WMA stores wouldn't even come
close to half of that total.

Apple sold over 20 million iPods last year. The combined total sales of
"PlaysForSure" devices wouldn't even equal half of that number.

Somebody is doing something wrong and it sure isn't Apple.

I know I'll get branded as an Apple fanboy. But the only reason I'm posting
this is because Microsoft needs to open their eyes. They've fallen way behind
Apple, not only in the online music market, but in the OS market too. Their
overbearing DRM standards show that the have lost touch with consumers and
will continue to lose consumers unless they change their tactics.

I can't even install my legally purchased copy of Windows XP on my desktop
PC anymore, without calling to have it activated, because of their DRM and
the fact that they've lost touch with consumers and decide to treat them like
criminals instead of people.

"Scottitude" wrote:

The tool you need is a different DAP. iPods are great...if all your hardware
is Apple or if you don't know any better. It's a Windows world my friend and
practically everyone but Apple makes a DAP utilizing "Plays for Sure"
technology which guarantees a seamless Windows interface. Practically every
iPod-comparable DAP out there has better output and a better sound.

My choice was a Creative's ZEN Micro and I haven't regretted it. WMP
intuitively recognizes it and syncing is a breeze. Plus, I can load numerous
file types instead of trying to convert everything to a proprietary Apple
format.

iPods are the most over-rated gadgets on the market and Apple's refusal to
support Windows hardware is just pathetic arrogance that only "hurts" the
consumer.

~S~

"Fil Mackay" wrote:

I have been trying to get my iPod to sync with my MCE. Easy I thought. Yeah
right.

The best I came up with is XPlay (commercial product for WMP not really
MCE), but it has issues: bugs, and it converts to MP3 before syncing.

What I am looking for is a seamless sync (native in MCE) to iPod, where the
songs will be converted to AAC format (not MP3!) from my library (lossless
WMA).

Does anyone know of a tool to do it? If not, I'm going to write one.

.



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