First Look: The Microsoft Zune HD

This third-generation Zune is a significant, and largely successful, facelift of a media player that has ranked towards the middle of our Ratings of MP3 players, available to subscribers. The upgrade begins with its appearance; measuring 4 x 3.5 inches, the Zune HD is noticeably thinner and more elegant than the first, boxy, and drab-colored Zune models.

Available now, the Zune HD costs $220 in the 16GB version, $290 in the 32GB version.

We'll be adding the Zune HD to our Ratings in a few weeks. Meantime, here are our first impressions of the player:

The display is sharp. The 3.3-in. multi-touch-screen display was quite responsive. And with its 170-dot-per inch (dpi) resolution, it's about as sharp as the 160-dpi display on Apple's iPod Touch, the closest counterpart to the Zune HD in Apple's lineup.Colors on the Zune display, which uses organic light emitting diode technology, appeared vibrant.

The Zune HD also shares these other capabilities with the Touch: You can zoom in on photos by widening your fingers, or double-tap the screen to return them to original size. The screen reorients Web pages and photos when you tilt the player. And there's a virtual keyboard to facilitate searches on its Web browser. Unlike the Touch and other players, however, the Zune HD doesn't support streaming video.

HD Radio is a plus. True to its moniker, the Zune HD is the first portable player with a built-in HD Radio. (Besides simulcasting their main signal digitally, with better sound quality than the analog broadcast, FM stations that broadcast HD Radio signals provide information on the music that's playing and often offer additional programming through what's called multicasting.) Like the new iPod Nano, the Zune allows you to tag songs you hear on its radio for later purchase. And, as promised, you can use the Zune's Wi-Fi capability, a feature the Nano lacks, to download purchases directly to the player, or to wirelessly sync the player to your PC.

Navigation is fairly easy. The Zune HD's Quickplay menu makes it easy to find the music, videos, podcasts, and other content. It allows you to create shortcuts, called "pins," to any item in your collection and also displays your playback history and recent purchases additions. You can peck your way down the menu tree to find a song, album, video, etc. The display also duplicates the appearance of the Zune software on your PC desktop. But that trick can sometimes be a problem, we found, because some elements get squeezed or cut off on the display.

The music never stops. The Zune HD has a Smart DJ feature, akin to iTune's Genius, that creates an "endless playlist" of songs based on your tastes and how the songs are related musically. For $15 a month, you can add the Zune Pass service, which offers users unlimited access to many songs in the Zune Marketplace catalog.

The Zune HD packs a lot of smart, powerful features into a relatively small and sexy package, and may even turn some Zune mockers into admirers. Mac owners won't be among them, however, since the Zune remains Windows-only, even in this new version.

Another drawback: Many of the Ssongs you buy on your Zune account can't be played on other players or unauthorized computers. And Microsoft's payment method remains batty. Instead of currency, you pay for things with "points," which you have to buy in $5 increments. And because the points don't match currency, its hard to tell how much you're spending. —Mike Gikas.