Frozen Zune Catastrophe Being Dubbed Z2K by Users

Just in time for 2009, here comes the weirdest technology event of the year. According to reports on Electronista.com, hundreds of thousands of the 30GB Microsoft music player, Zunes, crashed in the wee hours of Wednesday morning.

At midnight Eastern time, a number of 30GB Zunes became frozen at the end of the initial boot process. According to Electronista, none of the standard reboot or reset commands have been successful so far, but Zune owners have the option of attempting to fix it themselves. They suggested opening the casing and temporarily disconnecting the battery, however, they also warn owners that this risks invalidating warranties and such an action could risk damage to the Zune.

The utter ridiculousness of such a coordinated and world-wide crash makes one think back fondly on the days when Y2K seemed imminent. Some Zune owners are even calling the event Z2K or Z2K9.

According to news website Huliq, the moniker is appropriate:

"The theory that immediately came to my mind because of the seeming synchronization with midnight was that this was the first leap year since the 30GB Zune was introduced. Others have come up with that idea as well. It has also been reported, though unconfirmed, that older firmware does not have the issue."

As of yet, Microsoft has not yet released a statement on why the Zunes have frozen and any attempt to load the Zune Forums will likely take a great deal of time due to strained servers.

The Zune was first released in November 2006 as an attempt to stop the resilient force from Apple known as iPod and iTunes. Zune's first manifestation was bulky to say the least. It came in only one version, a clunky 30 gigabytes model for $249. According to the Wall Street Journal's review, though the Zune had a larger screen, an ability to exchange songs wirelessly with other Zunes and a built-in FM radio, it was 60% larger and 17% heavier than the sleek, endearing iPod.

The battery life was ridiculous to say the least (at least two hours less than iPod's), you couldn't share music libraries between computers like iTunes and the Zune online store offered fewer songs than the iTunes store.

The later models fixed many of the issues people had with the Zune, including new additions allowing Zunes to communicate with other Zunes to share pictures and songs. In September 2008, Microsoft introduced the Zune 3.0 update, including the ability to tag for purchase songs on FM radio, customized music channels, an ability to purchase songs from the Zune and a few sample games.

In November 2008, the Zune 3.1 update was introduced. It offered additional games, but was primarily a stability-oriented release. Some believe that this update may have something to do with the world-wide crash.

If it's not Z2K, maybe it's just the iPod gods making sure the Zunes don't get too far ahead in the marketplace.

30GB Zune Players Locking Up En Masse, Electronista

30GB Zunes Everywhere Are Frozen. Z2K9?, Huliq News

Walter S. Mossberg, Microsoft's Zune Challenges iPod, The Wall Street Journal

Zune, Wikipedia