Skip to main content

Farewell, Zune: Microsoft will discontinue its iPod rival

zune-cemeteryIt’s been a long time coming. Following whispers for some time now that Microsoft has been in the process of moving Zune to the great beyond, today Bloomberg has confirmation of those rumors. According to the site, Microsoft will terminate all production of new Zune music and video players due to a lack of demand. At the same time, an insider says the company will be shifting “its focus to other devices.”

Last month, Microsoft failed to make any mention of Zune at Mobile World Congress, creating suspicion that the iPod rival wasn’t long for this world. But Microsoft tried to downplay any rumor of Zune’s termination, directly saying “Zune is not dead” and even throwing in a bold “[and] will never die!” for good measure.

Recommended Videos

But we’ve all seen this coming. Microsoft hasn’t released updated Zune hardware since 2009, and the recent buzz surrounding a cloud-based multimedia project codenamed “Ventura” could be the music-host-meets-social media follow-up to the failed PMP. Whatever Ventura’s purpose is, though, for the time being Zune software will live on. It will be integrated into Windows Phone 7 devices and Xbox 360 consoles. A company statement would only go so far as to say, “Our long-term strategy focuses on the strength of the entire Zune ecosystem across Microsoft platforms.”

The Zune never reached Microsoft’s expectations for it. The company believed it could ably compete with – and even threaten – the success of the iPod. And while it found a following of Apple-loathing, Windows loyalists, it never managed to pull in the type of numbers the iPod was able to in its sleep.

Zune, you had a short run at it (a measly five years), and it feels we hardly knew ye. Now, we’re going to continue and keep our ear to the ground for work on the inevitable (we hope) success of the Windows Phone update and perhaps more on what exactly Ventura will become.

Molly McHugh
Former Digital Trends Contributor
Before coming to Digital Trends, Molly worked as a freelance writer, occasional photographer, and general technical lackey…
Apple quietly nixed this Apple Intelligence feature from iOS 18.2
Image Playground on iPad.

One of the most highly anticipated features of Apple Intelligence, Image Playground, has finally launched in the iOS 18.2 developer and public betas. This artificial intelligence tool, announced in June, enables users to create cartoon-like images from text descriptions. Unfortunately, at least in the beta version, one of Image Playground's announced features is missing.

As first noted on X (formerly Twitter) by @nicolas09f9 (via MacRumors), Image Playground was once expected to feature three design styles: Animation, Illustration, and Sketch. For whatever reason, the latter isn't a choice in the beta.

Read more
iOS 18.2 may make charging your iPhone even easier. Here’s how
A close-up view of the App Library page on the iPhone 16.

We've all been in a situation where we need to charge our phone quickly, but it can be hard to gauge just how much time it needs to spend on the charger before it gets a usable amount of juice. A feature coming to iOS 18.2 will tell you how much more time your phone needs, although we aren't quite sure yet when it will be released.

On Monday, iOS 18.2 beta 2 was released to developers. 9to5Mac spotted the codebase for this feature in their breakdown, stating that it will calculate the amount of time needed to reach a certain charge threshold based on how powerful the charger is. The framework was dubbed "BatteryIntelligence" within the code, but although it was present, the feature isn't finished. That likely means it has been added in for testing purposes, but won't be ready for full deployment for some time yet.

Read more
Why this 3-year-old iOS feature is one of my favorite things about the iPhone
Focus modes page in the Control Center on an iPhone 16.

Apple's latest software update for the iPhone — iOS 18 — is a big deal. Between more customizable home screens, a huge Control Center update, and all of the new Apple Intelligence features, this year's iOS update has a lot to like.

However, as I've been using my iPhone 16 over the last few weeks, I've realized that one of the iOS features I use the most has nothing to do with the iOS 18 update. Instead, it's an iOS feature that was introduced over three years ago and remains one of my favorite iPhone features year after year. Yes, I'm talking about Focus modes.
How I use Focus on my iPhone

Read more