Zune PASS review from users

[gizbug]

Never used Zune Pass. Wondering if some users out there could give their pros/cons with it.
Right now I just have a bunch of albums on my pc, that I sync to my zune, and listen to on the road. When I am at home, I usualy pick a few songs from my albums, and listen to them. What advantage would Zune PASS have for me? Would I be able to stream random songs through winamp/foobar with the zunepass? Does it download a specified amount of songs that fit your listening style to your zune, so you always have new music on your ZUNE HD for road trips?

Thanks.

 

[dlock13]

You can download as much music as you want. You get to keep 10 songs every month meaning you OWN them. Once the Zune Pass expires, you lose the rights to play the songs until you renew your Zune pass, but you still get to keep those 10 songs. You can stream your Zune Pass music through any browser. And if you've listened enough on your Zune HD and the desktop player and rated any of your songs, you should have under the marketplace, the Picks tab. That is what Zune suggests for you to download.

But basically think of it this way, it's a subscription all-you-can-eat buffet where you keep ten songs and can stream your Zune library to any web browser.

There's a 14 day trial for it. You should use it and see how you like it.

Personally, I think it's brilliant. Every Zune owner should have it if they have the appropriate funds.

 

[TheStu]

Originally posted by: gizbug
Never used Zune Pass. Wondering if some users out there could give their pros/cons with it.
Right now I just have a bunch of albums on my pc, that I sync to my zune, and listen to on the road. When I am at home, I usualy pick a few songs from my albums, and listen to them. What advantage would Zune PASS have for me? Would I be able to stream random songs through winamp/foobar with the zunepass? Does it download a specified amount of songs that fit your listening style to your zune, so you always have new music on your ZUNE HD for road trips?

Thanks.

I gave the ZunePass 2 week trial a whirl recently and here are my thoughts, coming from an OS X/iTunes guy.

Zune Software's Mixes are pretty good and I used them to join together into playlists similar music. It was quite as diverse as the iTunes Genius playlists in my opinion (for example, pulling a Mix of The Fray gave me more of The Fray than iTunes does on the same song). This is pulling the same collection of songs, mind you.

Where ZunePass comes into play is that it will also give me music that I don't have in my library. Not just of the same artist, but other artists that I might not have any of. Sort of like the Genius sidebar in iTunes, but it actually 'gives' you the songs as opposed to just linking you to the store.

I use OS X primarily because I prefer it over Windows, and as good as Windows 7 is, I am hard pressed to want to use it as my primary OS. And my primary OS on my primary system is where I maintain my music library. So, because of this, I can't speak to how the ZunePass works on Zune devices, though I wouldn't mind trying. If they ever port Zune to OS X, I will be sorely tempted, but until that day I can just tell you that from the perspective of someone that likes to discover music, and also have a library of it, the ZunePass is very appealing.

 

[gizbug]

Thanks. How does the Zune Pass benefit the home user? As the zune hd is more of a mobile device / on the road, will there be much benefit to the zune pass for work / sitting at the computer at home?

 

[TheStu]

Originally posted by: gizbug
Thanks. How does the Zune Pass benefit the home user? As the zune hd is more of a mobile device / on the road, will there be much benefit to the zune pass for work / sitting at the computer at home?

For discovering new music, it is great.

 

[erwos]

Originally posted by: gizbug
Thanks. How does the Zune Pass benefit the home user? As the zune hd is more of a mobile device / on the road, will there be much benefit to the zune pass for work / sitting at the computer at home?

I pipe music to my home theater system via my Xbox 360. You don't get the fancy mixes (yet?), but you do get whatever else you've downloaded.

I only have a Zune 30, so I'm not sure exactly how I would do things on a Zune HD. But, as it is now, I do most of my searching/discovery from my computer, and then sync up the Zune to it to put the music on there.

 

[Deeko]

I've had ZunePass for about a year now, and its hard to imagine NOT having it. I've since canceled my Sirius subscription (which I've had literally since Sirius launched) because I don't need it anymore. Not only do you get unlimited subscription downloads - you get 10 downloads to keep every month. That alone almost pays the $15 price! ZunePass is awesome, and if you combine it with the new Zune software, it will create SmartDJ playlists for you using songs not just from your library, but it will download them from the marketplace too - so yea, there are uses for it at home and on the road.

 

[maziwanka]

wait, how do you stream your zunepass collection over a browser? the biggest thing for me right now would be able to listen to my collection at work via my work computer (i couldn't install the zune software)

 

[Deeko]

They just added streaming via zune.net with the update that came out 9/15 with the ZuneHD. Now you can stream ZunePass content from your browser.

 

[erwos]

Originally posted by: Deeko
They just added streaming via zune.net with the update that came out 9/15 with the ZuneHD. Now you can stream ZunePass content from your browser.

I had NO IDEA they added this feature. This is going to be super-handy for music exploration while at work! THANKS!

Also, the browser streaming works on a Mac!

 

[Sheep]

Originally posted by: Deeko
They just added streaming via zune.net with the update that came out 9/15 with the ZuneHD. Now you can stream ZunePass content from your browser.

Holy crap, how did I miss this one?! That's great news!

As others have mentioned, if you're not one to listen to the garbage on FM, ZunePass is a great way to find new music. Instead of 30-second clips which typically don't give a good indication of the quality of a song or album, you can listen to the whole thing and delete it if you don't like it...and repeat as many times as you can squeeze into the day. I've found more than a few artists and bands using ZunePass for the past year that I never would've tried if I had to purchase their tracks or albums sight unseen (unheard?).

<--Runs off to check out the new streaming stuff.

 

[Gooberlx2]

I think Zunepass is awesome. I like to spend time in the mixview, surfing "related" and "influenced" artists/albums, and finding new stuff.

I haven't rated enough stuff, but the picks and channels are decent based on my listening habits. The "keep 10" is great, and I tend to search out songs to download as mp3s instead of wma.

Additionally, despite zune-specific DRM (i.e. not plays-for-sure), zunepass stuff will show and play in WMP. Which means you can stream it to any UPnP device. Works perfectly well on my Sonos system, album art and all.

 

[IronWing]

How's the selection for world/classical/blues/folk music?

 

[BabaBooey]

I gave mine up as alot of the stuff I wanted is not available.....so it is not unlimited for me.

 

[idiotekniQues]

i used to have rhapsody to go but when i switched to the zune i had to go zunepass.

generally speaking i think the interface is excellent. now with the zunehd it downloads artist bio, pictures and suggests related artists, even if the songs you put on your zune are your own mp3's you ripped from a cd, the zune software will still download those perks for you onto the zune hd.

i find the electronic music selection to be a bit lacking vs rhapsody to go, but in general, zune has a ton of artists available. you wont find everything you want i'm sure, but there is so much to explore that for most genres, it will probably satisfy 99% of users.

keeping 10 songs a month is a heck of a lot of gravy.