Compare different reviews on the brand new Microsoft Zune mp3 player, from Chicago Sun-Times, Financial Times and The Wall Street Journal to online forums and reviews.

Andy Ihnatko on the Chicago Sun-Times fears no evil and go straight to the point in his Avoid the loony Zune.

Microsoft's colossal blunder was to knock the user out of that question and put the music industry in its place.
Result: The Zune will be dead and gone within six months. Good riddance.

Paul Taylor on FT's Zune the iPod-killer is bigger, heavier but friendlier is more Zune friendly.

Nevertheless, the Zune has some advantages over the iPod. Among the less obvious is that you can work the navigation pad while wearing gloves. I found the interface easy to use and in some instances simpler than the iPod.

Walter S. Mossberg on Microsoft's Zune Challenges iPod looks like a diplomatic version of his Chicago Sun colleague:

But, this first Zune has too many compromises and missing features to be as good a choice as the iPod for most users. The hardware feels rushed and incomplete. It is 60% larger and 17% heavier than the comparable iPod. It has much worse battery life for music than the iPod or than Microsoft claims -- at least two hours less than the iPod's, in my tests. Despite the larger screen, many album covers look worse than they do on the iPod. And you can't share music libraries between computers like you can with iTunes.

On Why Microsoft’s Zune can’t dent Apple’s iPod at ZDNet.com there's an interesting overview of the whole battle iPod-Zune. In the end looks it's more a run to consolidate a brand and enter markets than giving a nice mp3 player to the masses.

Microsoft’s splintered DRM will kill Zune stress the point on the DRM copyright thing.

From ZDNet again, a bunch of links for the Zune's not compatible with Vista issue. Sometimes I wonder: what's the matter with you Microsoft guys (my own personal comment, here). But again, as the previous link suggest, we (we as in customers)are seeing the thing from a different perspective.

On Zune Thoughts you find The Zune Review, Part 1: The Out of Box Experience and The Zune Review, Part 2: Software Install & Initial Setup.