RKMBs Forums .::Robegories::. Games and Tech Zune sales plummeted during holidays

There were plenty of weak spots that led to Microsoft's disastrous December quarter, but one that didn't get much attention Thursday was how badly the Zune did.

Tucked away in Microsoft's quarterly filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission, however, was a startling figure.

"Zune platform revenue decreased $100 million, or 54 percent, reflecting a decrease in device sales," Microsoft said. That's quite a drop.

Apple, by contrast, saw its iPod unit sales up 3 percent, while revenue dropped by 16 percent. It still racked up $3.3 billion in revenue, as compared with less than $100 million for the Zune.

In an interview Friday afternoon, Zune marketing director Adam Sohn said a number of factors were to blame.

"It's the category, it's the business, it's the economy," Sohn said, noting that despite a software upgrade, Microsoft entered the holidays with essentially the same hardware it had a year earlier.

In November, Microsoft chopped the prices on its flash-based Zune devices amid both competitive and broader economic pressures.

That meant that revenue was somewhat lower than Microsoft had projected, although Sohn insisted that unit sales were basically in line with what the company had figured on.

"We met our internal plan for (the) holiday," he said, adding that a year ago the company was also boosted by strong sales of a heavily discounted, older 30GB hard drive-based model.

With Microsoft announcing a variety of big cost cuts on Thursday, there were plenty of people suggesting Microsoft should just exit the Zune hardware business entirely.

Had Sony not overpriced the PS3 I suspect they would have been dead last in the gaming consoles this year as well.

zune was nice because you can upload any song you wanted on it, unlike others where you have to buy them to have them on there without a mod.

The transition from Windows to any other operating system would take a long time.
Too many people who own PCs are just not tech savvy enough to switch to anything else, and think Windows is the only operating system out there.

Google is over taking them on the internet...

my understanding of the iPod is that once its on your iPod, a file cannot be transferred back to a PC, and certainly not in MP3 format. (is this the case?)

but you can't simply drag and drop files?

There's hacks you can use but it makes it harder to use itunes.

Its just like any other mac product, they cut down on features to make is easier for the masses.

I can't think of a single song I haven't been unable to load onto an iPod using some freeware (if any).

iTunes is the biggest problem with the iPod over most other MP3 players.
Because of the need for that software, and the whole AAC file format, I have been severely put off by it.

Most other players act as a hard drive, and allow you to just drag and drop like you would do with any other drive.

This also makes it easier for you to transfer to someone elses PC, as my understanding of the iPod is that once its on your iPod, a file cannot be transferred back to a PC, and certainly not in MP3 format. (is this the case?)

Granted, my MP3 is very bulky, which is something the iPod has it beaten on, but thats because I wanted an MP4 player as well, with a decent sized screen.