The Zune 4, Zune 8, and Zune 16 are second-generation models of the

Zune Zune was a brand of digital media products and services that was marketed by Microsoft from November 2006 until it was discontinued in June 2012. Zune consisted of a line of portable media players, a music subscription service known as Zune Music ...

lineup, they were first announced on October 2, 2007 and released on November 13, 2007 in the

United States The United States of America (USA), also known as the United States (U.S.) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It is a federal republic of 50 U.S. state, states and a federal capital district, Washington, D.C. The 48 ...

and June 13, 2008 in

Canada Canada is a country in North America. Its Provinces and territories of Canada, ten provinces and three territories extend from the Atlantic Ocean to the Pacific Ocean and northward into the Arctic Ocean, making it the world's List of coun ...

. They are

flash memory Flash memory is an Integrated circuit, electronic Non-volatile memory, non-volatile computer memory storage medium that can be electrically erased and reprogrammed. The two main types of flash memory, NOR flash and NAND flash, are named for t ...

-based players meant to compete with the

iPod Nano The iPod Nano (stylized and marketed as iPod nano) is a discontinued portable media player designed and formerly marketed by Apple Inc. The first-generation model was introduced on September 7, 2005, as a replacement for the iPod Mini, using ...

and the

Sansa Fuze The Sansa Fuze is a portable media player developed by SanDisk and released on March 8, 2008. The Fuze is available in three different Flash memory capacities: 2 GB, 4 GB, and 8 GB and comes in six different colors: black, blue, ...

, both smaller and cheaper than the three

hard drive A hard disk drive (HDD), hard disk, hard drive, or fixed disk is an electro-mechanical data storage device that stores and retrieves digital data using magnetic storage with one or more rigid rapidly rotating hard disk drive platter, pla ...

-based Zune devices, the

Zune 30 The Zune 30 is a portable media player developed by Microsoft, and the first hardware device in Microsoft's Zune brand. It was released on November 14, 2006, simply named the Zune. After subsequent versions with different hard drive capacities, ...

, Zune 80, and Zune 120. They feature music, video, and podcast support, and come with

Wi-Fi Wi-Fi () is a family of wireless network protocols based on the IEEE 802.11 family of standards, which are commonly used for Wireless LAN, local area networking of devices and Internet access, allowing nearby digital devices to exchange data by ...

and

FM Radio FM broadcasting is a method of radio broadcasting that uses frequency modulation (FM) of the radio broadcast carrier wave. Invented in 1933 by American engineer Edwin Armstrong, wide-band FM is used worldwide to transmit high fidelity, high-f ...

Overview

The D-pad of the original Zune has been replaced by the Zune pad, which allows for touch-sensitive controls in addition to 5-way clicking. Wi-Fi is used for wireless synchronization and for sharing photos, podcasts, and music with other Zunes, although shared songs may only be played three times by the receiving Zune. The FM Radio includes

RBDS Radio Data System (RDS) is a communications protocol standard for embedding small amounts of digital information in conventional FM radio broadcasts. RDS standardizes several types of information transmitted, including time, station identificat ...

support for displaying song and station metadata, but does not support HD-Radio. The flash Zune models also feature scratch resistant glass screens, similar to the screens used on the v2 Zunes.

Reception

The Zune 4, 8, and 16 have gotten generally positive reception. Positives and negatives mimic those of the Zune 80 and 120, as the 4, 8, and 16 are very similar devices in a smaller package: the Wi-Fi, user interface, and excellent sound quality are praised. Some reviews have mentioned the lack of TV shows in the Zune Marketplace, it has since been updated with the ability to purchase and rent TV shows and movies.

Specifications

The specifications as listed by the official web site of the Zune: * 1.8-inch color display with 320×240 resolution * 4, 8, and 16 GB flash memory options *

CPU A central processing unit (CPU), also called a central processor, main processor, or just processor, is the primary processor in a given computer. Its electronic circuitry executes instructions of a computer program, such as arithmetic, log ...

: 399 MHz ARM Core Freescale i.MX31L *

RAM Ram, ram, or RAM most commonly refers to: * A male sheep * Random-access memory, computer memory * Ram Trucks, US, since 2009 ** List of vehicles named Dodge Ram, trucks and vans ** Ram Pickup, produced by Ram Trucks Ram, ram, or RAM may also ref ...

: 64 MB * 802.11b/g

compatible with open, WEP, WPA, and

WPA2 Wi-Fi Protected Access (WPA) (Wireless Protected Access), Wi-Fi Protected Access 2 (WPA2), and Wi-Fi Protected Access 3 (WPA3) are the three security certification programs developed after 2000 by the Wi-Fi Alliance to secure wireless computer n ...

authentication modes and WEP 64-bit and 128-bit, TKIP, and

AES encryption The Advanced Encryption Standard (AES), also known by its original name Rijndael (), is a specification for the encryption of electronic data established by the U.S. National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) in 2001. AES is a variant ...

modes * Built in

Li-Ion A lithium-ion or Li-ion battery is a type of rechargeable battery that uses the reversible intercalation of Li+ ions into electronically conducting solids to store energy. Li-ion batteries are characterized by higher specific energy, energy d ...

rechargeable with up to 24 hours of audio playback (wireless off) and video, up to 4 hours * Size: 41.4 mm x 91.5 mm x 8.5 mm * Weight: 1.7 ounces (47 grams) * FM radio tuner * Audio support: ** CBR and VBR audio, up to 48 kHz

sample rate In signal processing, sampling is the reduction of a continuous-time signal to a discrete-time signal. A common example is the conversion of a sound wave to a sequence of "samples". A sample is a value of the signal at a point in time and/or ...

: *** WMA Standard Up to 320 kbit/s ***

WMA Pro Windows Media Audio (WMA) is a series of audio codecs and their corresponding audio coding formats developed by Microsoft. It is a proprietary technology that forms part of the Windows Media framework. Audio encoded in WMA is stored in a digital c ...

stereo up to 384 kbit/s ***

WMA Lossless Windows Media Audio (WMA) is a series of audio codecs and their corresponding audio coding formats developed by Microsoft. It is a proprietary technology that forms part of the Windows Media framework. Audio encoded in WMA is stored in a digi ...

stereo up to 384 kbit/s *** Advanced Audio Coding (

AAC AAC may refer to: Aviation * Advanced Aircraft, a company from Carlsbad, California * Airborne aircraft carrier, a type of aircraft * Alaskan Air Command, a radar network * American Aeronautical Corporation, a company from Port Washington, New ...

)(.mp4, .m4a, .m4b, .mov) up to 320 kbit/s ***

MP3 MP3 (formally MPEG-1 Audio Layer III or MPEG-2 Audio Layer III) is a coding format for digital audio developed largely by the Fraunhofer Society in Germany under the lead of Karlheinz Brandenburg. It was designed to greatly reduce the amount ...

(.mp3): up to 320 kbit/s * Video Support: ** CBR or VBR for: ***

WMV Windows Media Video (WMV) is a series of video codecs and their corresponding video coding formats developed by Microsoft. It is part of the Windows Media framework. WMV consists of three distinct codecs: the original video compression technolog ...

Main and Simple Profile *** MPEG-4 Part 2 Advanced Simple Profile up to 2.5 Mbit/s

bit rate In telecommunications and computing, bit rate (bitrate or as a variable ''R'') is the number of bits that are conveyed or processed per unit of time. The bit rate is expressed in the unit bit per second (symbol: bit/s), often in conjunction ...

***

H.264 Advanced Video Coding (AVC), also referred to as H.264 or MPEG-4 Part 10, is a video compression standard based on block-oriented, motion-compensated coding. It is by far the most commonly used format for the recording, compression, and d ...

Baseline profile up to 2.5 Mbit/s * Picture Support: **

JPEG JPEG ( , short for Joint Photographic Experts Group and sometimes retroactively referred to as JPEG 1) is a commonly used method of lossy compression for digital images, particularly for those images produced by digital photography. The degr ...

(.jpg)

References

External links

Product overview on Zune.netInformation about the Zune and question / answers
{{Microsoft hardware Portable media players Zune Audiovisual introductions in 2007