Zune Locking Up

Look. My 80gb zune froze at the end of a video podcast. It tried rebooting it but all I got was just a blank screen afterwords. How do I fix this!!!!!

my zune 30gb just locked up a couple of days (about Feb 1). It is stuck on the #3 screen and says "Please wait". I have tried everything I can think of including letting the power run down and recharging. Please tell me what to do to get it to work agian. It locked up after I updated it.

I have an 80gb zune and idk what happened but i tried turning it on the other day and it came up with 3 and "please wait" on a black and gray screen, it's not responding to the reboot or to deleting the memory!
I'm really POed!
Please help!!!!

-Matt B

@ziuzijin: u can go to zune.net and go to support and than click find what u need help on its really helpful hope it works ^^

ok well i have my zune for about 3 months now. its a red zune those thin ones and its 8GB and anyhoo i was listening to my zune and than i chose another song i wanted to listen to and than it froze on the click to play song screen something like that.. and yeaa i need help on unfreezing it! i don't want to waste money on buying another one plz help D: thanks

I'm having the exact issue. Locks up hard after play wmv files. The reset trick works, but you shouldn't have to do this over and over. It's a MS format for pete's sake.

*i mean holding the left button as well as down

this worked for me....thank you

My Zune is back to normal

I have a 1st Gen. black 30 gig. zune and it locked up with the zune logo and will do absolutely nothing. I thought "great...it's done for". I was wrong and now it works fine. What I did to fix it, is I let the battery totally drain till it was dead and then I kept hitting the play button for quite some time untill the low battery display would not show anymore at all. (this step will take a lot of button pushes on the play button untill the battery is totally drained). Then I let it sit over night to make sure the capacitors were drained and the next morning when I hit the play button nothing would happen. So, I pluged it up to my computer and let it charge and when the low battery logo went away and it started to reboot, I unpluged it immediately and held the back button and up arrow button until the Zune started up normally. I can't believe it worked but it did. I hope this helps everyone with this issue. Have a happy new year everyone.

great. i drive truck and i am leaving tonight. i will have nothing to listen to for the next 2 days if this fix doesnt work.

things like this are the reason the zune doesnt have a bigger market share. people hear "zune crash/ zune 2/9k/zune coma" and i am willing to bet they dont hear its fixed the next day. maybe if they offer a months zune pass <> to compensate us, we would sing the praises of the mighty zune again.

let me know if you find a solution because i am having the same exact problem. its hard for me to take mine back to the store because i am a soldier that is deployed overseas in a warzone. i need my music, it keeps me calm

im sorry tomorrow like the 1-1-09 damn happy new year

i have a zune too there is a bug in them on the 30gb on the first they will unlock they locked because of these being leap year

Wow, this is strange. My has locked up at start-up with the Zune logo and status bar. It worked fine yesterday!!! Now i have no music for my new years party.

Wow...glad to hear it's not just me! Mine locked up too (30gb-first generation) and I can't get it unlocked. It is on the bootup screen (ZUNE) with the progress bar at the bottom. I've let the batery run down and then recharged it again and the same thing happens! HELP!

Gently pop off the black cover where you plug the zune into the computer. Remove the 2 tiny Phillips screws. Then gently run your fingernail or small flathead along the sides until you can pop off the back.

BTW, Mine locked again once I attached it to the PC. When you get yours restarted, see if you can reset it to an earlier date, I suspect the JAN 1st 2009 is causing this.

I have two first gen, 30 gb, brown Zunes that have locked up also. One yesterday and the other today. They are stuck on the startup screen. How do you get the cover off? Just pry it off?

My 80 Gig Zune was locked up tighter than dick's hat band. I could not restart it at all with the left and up circle.

I had to take the back off, disconnect the battery and re-connect it. Its a bit tricky getting the back off, but there was a video on you tube explaining how to do it.

I have a 30 gig first gen zune that locked up last night. It is stuck on the loading screen like many other people here. What is going on!?? All button combos do not reset it anymore and letting the batter drain did not work either. Pls help!!!

Hey do you know what's really weird my zune is showing the same thing and it happened an hour after yours if you figure it out email me please i can't go anywhere without my zune if not i think im just going to call the manufacturer and plead my case.

Ok I have been able to get the Zune to come back!!! I removed the cover, unplugged the battery cable and it restarted and worked. BUT then I hooked it up USB to my computer and it locked again. Its a start hopfully someone can build on that.

Found this, for those with bricking 30gb Zune's today.

http://arstechnica.com/news.ars/post/20081231-30gb-zunes-prepare-for-new-year-by-locking-up.html

Add me to the list of people who's 30gb Zune locked up today. Even stranger than the coincidence here is that I didn't even charge it last night, yet I am sure it had a full charge. Now, I get stuck at the Zune load screen.

Could this be a date/year change issue? I can't think of why, but I'm not the only one with this problem specifically today.

I have a year old 30gig that locked up on the load screen this morning. I've drained the battery and powered it back up several times with no results. Of course I haven't been able to get ahold of the Zune help desk, the message says they have a heavy amount of calls... maybe all of the Zunes are failing?!? ....or they're just gone for the holiday....

well ditto here. Mine also locked up yesterday. Hummmmmm Me thinks someone is messing with us.

Removed battery.....worked five min. Now same results.

Oh, when it locked up I left it in the car over night and it go pretty darn cold, and I had it plugged into the AUX cable I use to play my ZUNE through the car, that's when it froze.

Well mine locked up for the first time in the many many years I have owned it. I have a 30 GB Zune and have loved it since I got it, not a single problem, till now. I am on Zune loading screen with the progress bar and no button combo is working. I have no warrenty of any kind and can't afford to simply go out and get a new one. I do however have all the paper work, the box it came in, everything (I am a severe pack rat) So if the battery won't die or this can't be fixed I will play it off as a christmas gift and swap it out for a new one.

Just sucks I have a 15 hr drive in 3 days....

Oh yeah both 30 gigs also

I have 2 Zunes ALSO and BOTH are locked up on the Boot screen as well.
I haven't done anything different and neither one is working.
HELP!!!!!

I have THREE Zune 30G's, and all three have locked up!

ANY FIX OUT THERE?

Any comments from Microsoft?

Mine is the brown 30 gb refurb too.

My Zune did the same thing today. Weird thing was the battery said it was drained and I know it was charged last night and I put it on the dock like I always do here at work and it started charging battery and then I got the zune screen and its locked up. Seems weird that this same thing has happened to others today.

Re-install Zune 3.1 software on Vista 64 and suddenly, found 2 (yes, TWO!) Zune 30GB units locking up.
Goes to the opening logo, bar goes all the way across and then freezes.

Only thing I changed this time around was I added more PodCasts and upped their limits to 10 shows.

Removed the softare and am starting from scratch to see if the new podcasts were causing the issue (old 3.1 software/firmware seemed to work fine, then I removed/re-installed 3.1 for some reason and now having the lockups).

My 2year old 1st rev 30G just lockup for the time. All button combo's didn't have an effect. The HD is just running full speed with the ZUNE boot screen up and load progress bar full ON. I've got no choice but to let it run dead and see what happens. I'll come back and update this as to what unlocked it. I think what locked it up was I had it plug into a cheap remote speaker system during a cold turnon ... it didn't like it. I haven't had any issues with this MSD since I bought it, except for some minor file problems that was fixed with a dump and re-load.

i have a 30gig zune. first generation and it froze on me with the zune logo and the status bar with the backlight on and nothing i tried is working. i cant restart it, or shut it down, the battery wont even die. what can i do???? help me please. my email is brian_stinnett10113@yahoo.com.

Ahh finally! I've had my 8gb (should have gone for something larger) for about a year. Lately it kept locking up, sometimes even unlocking within a minute or two only to lock up on one of the next few songs. This usually when I selected "play all" while in a bands album list. The back and down trick works though. I got my Zune up and running again in seconds. Now time to figure out why I go through so many pairs of headphones and ear buds with my zune, but not with my handed down ipod.

really works man.thank u:]

I've got an 80 GB Zune second version almost a year old. Got from the Microsoft Company Store. Worked impeccably until tonight. Changed albums and it froze up. But holding the left button and down on the circle button worked just fine. Restarted and it runs as before.

My Zune was locked up too. the idea from spyboy worked great. Before that, I tried everything I could think of. I held down every button I could think of, I plugged it in, tried to power it off using the play/pause button. Nothing worked.

I held the left arrow and down on the squircle and it shut down within a couple seconds and now works fine. THANKS!

My Zunes been buggin the hell outta me. I had trouble installing the software first, then the cord I had was faulty. And NOW the play button isn't working.

IO can't pause or un pause anything.


And my zune will just randomnly put itself into sleep mode while I'm listening to music and i a minute it'll turn itself back on. PleaSSE HELP ME i'M OUT OF WARRANTY AND CAN'T AFFORD ANOTHER ONE.

mine just started doing the same thing today did you ever find an answer to this problem?

1) I have a song on my Zune that shows up on the Zune screen, but doesn't show up on the software? I want to delete it bc it says "song unavailable" on my Zune. How can i delete it???

2) When I run the Zune software it CONSTANTLY freezes my entire computer, leaving me to do a hard shut down every time.....WTF?

HELP!!!
i have no clue what to do
i got the newest upgrade and you know how it comes with a pass word option? well i turned that on. and a couple days later it has locked up. now usually i would jst reset it like is says to do in the trouble shooting but since it is locked right now i cant do that....not sure if any of that made sence
does anyone have any advice?
im bout to go buy another one but i dont really want to

I'm on my second 30GB Zune. The current Zune locked up on me last week and haven't been able to reset. What do you do when there's no response?

Had the first version for 2 years. After it updated to software version 3, starting locking up. I'd a replacment plan at Best Buy. Thyeyreplaced it with an 80 gig. That locked up the second day. Could not be fixed. They replaced that with the 120GB (for extra money). I've had 2 of those replaced. They both locked up in the first couple hours using it. The last one was able to reboot. I use the Zune in a music trio. As a backup, I've a cheap Sansa. The Sansa has never locked up and got me through many problems at work, caused by the Zune. I wanted the Zune 'cause the screen is large and easy to see at work, but I'm beginning to think getting a different brand would be a lot less hassle at work. I've nice cases for my players and they've never been dropped. If you need something dependable, I'd suggest another brand! If you really like the Zune, be sure and get a long replacement warrenty. You'll need it!

Most of the time this error seems to arrear after the zune has been dropped or bumped really hard. Mine started by giving me an error message soemthing like "File is missing or can't be played..." I would have to reload everything. I dropped it one day and got the error message "5 contact support." The firmware loads the boot, but once the hard drive isn't recognized as working, it goes to screen 5. The most commom cause for this is a failed hard drive. Either find a replacement, or send in for service if your not confident about doing it yourself.

Dropped my Zune 80 and now I can only go from Error Message 5 (turn off; back button+middle button+play) then get error message 3 Please wait until it runs out of juice. Then I can charge it to start the vicious cycle over again. Like my Zune I am...stuck.

I am having th same issue with my zune. Were you able to get yours unlocked? What was wrong?

Oh yeah.....and its just horrible...better features than the iPod but still if it wasn't for the chunkeyness and the locking up...i'd love it

I have a first generation zune...a chunky brown one..ugh....

I have dropped it alot and it still works..for the most part

I have over 700 songs and photos on it

It had been working for several months..but then it started locking up in certain songs and in some it worked. Then all my software stopped working.

It wouldnt let me sync with any others and it wont let me put songs on it or take songs off.

Several of my friends have zunes and theirs is doing the same.

As far as I am concerned

ZUNE= Fat.Crappy.A peice of Junk.

I intend to just get an iPod send me a message at jefferyntori072408@hotmail.com if urs does the same

My 80gb Zune is permanantly locked up and no amoutn of fiddling with the lock button seems to unlock it, however, when I mess with the headphone jack, it's unlocked for a split second and then locks back up.



What's wrong with it? Did something come loose?

Thanks.

~Michelle

I have a zune 80 black it locks up and says

3

Please wait

I tried to reset it by holding the middle of circle button down and at the same time pushing up button on the same circle button and holding them down together for a period of time but nothing happens, can you tell me how to unfreeze it? Thanks, Ralph.

I have have just confirmed my third Zune 8GB as defective. This is the second replacement. First was directly with Circuit City in the second week, About 5 weeks later that unit became a problem and was replaced by Microsoft after about 4 weeks not the 15 days they suggested. Now about a month into the 2nd replacement this one has locked up, And I am returning it again for a replacement.



Symptoms:

The Zune is not charging. It was working fine and had some charge left before connecting to the AC Adapter. When connecting to a USB Port (on several pcs) or to the AC Adapter/Charger, the charge icon flashes but even after charging for several hours, the unit is not responsive. I have gone through all the recommended troubleshooting steps, try a reset, manally depleting the battery by pressing the play/pause button until the empty battery button disappears, recharge over night...to no avail.



In the second two cases the problem occurred after being hooked up on a AC Charger. The Power strip is has a Surge Control. By the way this unit is my Wife's. I have an 80 Gig unit and hook it up to the same AC adapter, same cable with no problems.

We both love our units when they are working, but the 8 gig seems highly problematic. If could get a refund at this point I would and buy another brand. It's too bad because it's great when it working. Once again my 80 Gig has been problem free, other than draining the battery more quickly than the specs and reviews indicated.

Kind regards,

jmk

I pretty much had the same issue with a 1st gen 30gb zune as JimZune. Tried to play a podcast (that works in collection on the PC), nothing. Tried to go play something else... froze. It happened twice. First time I just let the battery drain and reset itself, but the second time the "back button + top of circle" reset worked just fine.

I have a first generation zune. After several months it started locking up and it sounded as if the hard drive was clicking. I would be playing a song then all of a sudden it would freeze, then start up several minutes later (even after reseting it etc, which often would not work). After waiting the battery would typically be drained more than usual, typically going down a 1/3 of the bar.



My fix was eventually to reformat the zune, and do a complete reinstall of the zune, and computer zune software with new profiles and such. I havn't had a single problem since doing this. It is nice and quick now, and with the new firmware updates, even faster and better than before.

i got the zune 80 for xmas. unboxed it, set it up and synced about a third of my collection to it. i played around with it for a few hours [watching podcasts, listening to music while i made dinner etc..] everything was working superbly. i was impressed with the performance!



then i went to sync some more music to it later, and thats when i ran into trouble. i got a windows error bubble saying that a device couldnt be recognized, and on my zune device i got what i take to be the error screen. theres a number '5' in a circle on the top left, and it reads, "contact support." it wouldnt turn off with the play button, so i held the down and back button at the same time.



weird thing is, maybe one out of every 10 times i turn it on, the device loads up, and all my content appears to be there, but nothing will play. i looked at the storage and it says that "74.36 GB are used" and 0 are left, even though i only put about 12 GB on so far. once late last night i even plugged it in, my computer recognized it and i was able, appearedly, to sync it. but when i unplugged it, it stayed stuck on the connected screen. though it did charge my battery.



so now im stuck, ive scanned all the zune.net forums and cant find anything, so im about to call support. im pretty bummed cuz the device was working wonderfully most of the day. so i just hope it will get fixed. *crosses fingers*

My 3 week old Zune 4 locked up and went blackscreen when attempting to play a podcast. I really like the flash Zune so I was a little ticked but no worries now.

I'm running right up against the upper memory limits with less than 100 mb free ... it's not surprising that the Zune locked up.

I went to zune.net > Support > Troubleshooting and "Your Zune device does not respond to button presses or has a black screen."

The reset directions there fixed the problem ... press the back button and press the top of the squircle. The Zune essentially reboots. I did a little podcast housekeeping and I'm back to normal running and I'm happy again. I guess I need a Zune 8!

Had a Zune 80 GB from Circuit City that would either shutdown or reboot anywhere from 5 to 15 minutes into a podcast. Had no trouble listening to short ones or to music, but anything over 30 minutes was frustrating. I exchanged it for a new one and haven't had any more problems.

Mine 80gb locked up only once, which was last week when I got it (before firmware 2.3)



It got very laggy after playing a .wmv file I moved to it (it didn't transcode so I figured the file was ok) but the file had audio but no video (weird).



After that stuff got really slow and then it froze up.



I just held the left button and pressed the bottom (down) on the squircle for a few seconds until it shut down, then restarted it and everything was fine.



It took me a few minutes to figure out how to power it off, I was afraid I'd have to just let it sit until the battery died.