Microsoft announced today that the Zune HD media player will be making its way into retail channels come September 15th, and will be up for pre-order at Best Buy, Amazon, Walmart, and the Microsoft Store today.
There are two favors for pre-order so far – a black 16GB unit for $219.99 and the larger 32GB model in platinum finish for $289.99. Microsoft claims the player will come in five additional colors, but no word what they will be.
Some Can See It before It Goes on Sale
If you live in the Atlanta, Boston, Chicago, Dallas, Houston, Miami, Minneapolis/St. Paul, New York, Los Angeles, Philadelphia, San Francisco, Seattle and Washington, D.C., areas, on on August 22 and 23 select stores wil be have an speak peek. Starting the August 16 you place a pre-order in person at Best Buy.
Features
- Built-in HD Radio receiver. Allows you to listen to higher-quality sound than is available from traditional radio channels, as well as access additional programming through HD2 and HD3 multicast channels.
- HD video output capabilities. Supports HD video playback from the device through a HDMI A/V docking station (sold separately) directly to an HD TV in 720p. This is big gain over the iPod
- 3.3 inch OLED touch screen in a 16:9 widescreen format display (480×272 resolution).
- Built-in Wi-Fi. Allows for browsing, streaming or downloading new music from Zune Marketplace.
- Internet browser. Full-screen Web browsing, optimized for the multi-touch screen with zoom-in and zoom-out gestures. But will it play Flash Video on web sites ? If it did, you think MS would be having it all over it press releases.
