Zune and music service prices revealed

Thursday, September 28, 2006

To keep the possible audience alert about the release of Zune, the so-called iPod rival, Microsoft chose to release every two weeks more details about the gadget. Every time little details about >Zune were added but today the Seattle company revealed a lot more interesting information.

First of all the gadget will be available on November 14th and its price is the same that Apple set for its 30GB iPod: $249. Just like its competitor Microsoft will offer a music service too and it will be called Zune Pass. Zune will come preloaded with songs, music videos and film shorts selected from those available at the Zune Pass store.

Once the user decides to buy more content he can choose between a $14.99 monthly subscription and individual purchases. In the latter case the company introduced the Microsoft Points system that will also work for the Xbox Live Marketplace.

It works by depositing (using credit or prepaid cards) into the user account money that will be converted in points that the user will have at his disposal to buy the content. Microsoft announced that individual songs will cost 79 points (99 cents) each.

As for the content that the users already have Microsoft included the possibility to import it into Zune. The gadget’s software will do itself the work and will accept music and video files and pictures both from iTunes (unprotected files only) and Windows Media Player. The supported formats for audio will be AAC, MP3 and WMA, for video H.264, MPEG-4, WMV and JPEG for the pictures.

Microsoft today also released more information about the Zune accessory kits. They are the Home A/V Pack, the Zune Travel Pack and the Zune Car Pack. The first two are priced at $99.99 while the latter will cost $79.99. If you do not want to purchase the whole kit Microsoft will also sell individually the various accessories.