I hate iTunes. On the Mac, in OS X, iTunes was pretty damn nice — I must admit. However, in the PC/Winders world, iTunes is a bloated dog of an application. I received a free 30GB Video iPod from Spacely Sprockets when they gave me my Surprise Vacation ™, and for what it does, I love it. I can put my music library on it, and it aggregates my podcasts. Arguably, it is responsible for my new podcast habit. So, I love all that about it.

More after the jump…

Enter iTunes. iTunes is the piece of shit software you have to run in order to sync your iPod. Let me get this over with: I’m a Windows Media Player lover. There, I said it. I just LOVE WiMP. It keeps my rather disorganized media collection neat and clean. So, when I first got the iPod, I thought, I’ll use WiMP to sync the media to it. Denied. Can’t say I am surprised. You can actually use WiMP to sync, but the iPod interface wont see the media — thus you can’t play it. Basically your iPod is just a glorified hard drive at that point. Anyway, not surprised. So I hunkered down and plodded forward with iTunes…

Finally, I got sick of iTunes and its bullshit, so I decided to do something about it. What did I decide? I decided to get a Zune. Why? Well, because one of my favorite podcasters, Alex Albrecht of Revision3 fame, highly recommended it. I hope Alex can appreciate the spirit I offer the next statement in. It is with utmost respect I call you a DIrty Bastard, Alex. That said, check out Diggnation because it’s a quality podcast that will keep you laughing the whole way though. :) Moving on…

Enter the Zune. It’s pretty. It’s sleak. It’s light (almost cheaply constructed light). It doesn’t have that stupid ass no feedback jog wheel hippy thingy that the iPod does. Most important — I can’t believe this was a thought I had — it’s a Microsoft product… The logic behind that, is it should work with WiMP, right? I couldn’t have been more wrong.

After I discover that Windows XP 64bit doesn’t automagically recognize the Zune, which I found odd, I inserted the install CD and discovered the Zune required “Zune Software”. Ughh.. This is starting to feel like iTunes all over again. Ok, proceed with the install. WRONG! Zune is not supported on Windows XP 64 bit. I gave that a hearty WTF and hit Google. I found that you can “hack” the install. Basically you copy the files from the MSI directly into your computer, manually register the dlls, and modify the ini to include XP 64 bit… What I found was you didn’t need to modify the ini. It just worked… Mostly… Ok, we’re in. I can sync my shit, and while podcast support is lacking, I got that to work with the horribly buggy FeedMyZune software.

Fast forward to the next day, and I’ve returned my Zune because it was basically the iPod all over again, only worse. Why on earth would you not be able to use a Zune with Windows Media Player!? It was just another reminder that Microsoft bites ass when it comes to portable devices. Don’t get me started on Windows Mobile…

In conclusion, the Zune gets a hearty two thumbs down and a middle finger. Bastards…