Lets compare the music player giants Zune & iTunes. There are lot of factors needs to be considered while comparing among them. Both iTunes & Zune have excellent & amiss features. But one thing, it is pretty difficult to say which one is better. Lets discuss the factors below,

Importing Songs:

Zune makes it simple to import the database of iTunes automatically to zune. It catches the iTunes playlist to Zune & convert it to its default format. One drawback with Zune is, it does not import the quick-witted playlist. Hence, you would need to begin with that (or) wise playlist does not exists in Zune. If Zune derives the copy protected music from iTunes(Purchased online from iTunes) then its not your day. One more thing, drag & drop feature is missing in Zune, hence, you might require to create folder everytime. It might be useful in a manner but rescanning cannot be avoided when a add new folder everytime.

Online Songs/Music Store:

Apple iTunes songs database might contain double than Zune. Zune needs to work on the songs database, probably it might catch sooner. If you want more music then you might want to go with Apple. But if you want to go for lot of music at very reasonable price, then you might want to go for Zune as there are subscription plans available less than 20 dollars/month where you can get music upto half a terabyte. But both offers simple mode of buying. An Apples account (or) windows live account is enough to buy.

About Playback :

My thought is, Zune sounds greater than iTunes while playing. That is, the same song/mp3 file sounds great in Zune than in iTunes. Even after altering the equalizer/playmode settings in iTunes it was not possible to get quality in iTunes as in Zune. But both iTunes & Zune offers excellent Playback settings, Equalizer adjustments, Sound control settings.

Adding new songs in player:

iTunes offers quick-witted playlists where preferred song selections are very easier. Songs can be selected in interesting combinations & sync to your device. Even Zune offers the wise playlists but in a disguised manner. Microsoft needs to work on this to make this feature easily usable like Apple. Filter methods are pretty cool in both the softwares.

Music exhibition:

iTunes has media library, online/live music store & playlists. Zune too possess the same but has additional marketplace. The view while surfing the media library is simple in Apple(Cover, listing, album view present) & Zune(Icon & Tile type view). Theres not much different in the view. Both are pretty good in that.

Both softwares has onspot filter options while typing. But one advantage in zune is that the search is faster than iTunes. Another advantage in Zune is that when a search does not exists, there is a direct link to the market place where it can be downloaded easily if you are on a subscription plan.

But i’m quite sure if you are planning to go for a Zune (or) ipod, you will be very happy with the music management. Two of them match each other very much in the functionality. If you are already as ipod user you will find little bit difficult to switch over to Zune. That too, if you are a MAC user you are pretty much out of luck.

Truely it will be a puzzle to choose out of them.