Microsoft is starting to ship the Zune Player today in the United States. Engadget published a report with lots of screenshots about the Zune software installation. The lengthy setup process got very messy with several crashes.

Even if you leave out the crashes, which could be specific to the Windows Media Center PC Engadget used for testing, the installation procedure is very long and apparently it requires you to create a Zune Tag and login with a Windows Live ID (aka Microsoft Passport, aka Hotmail account). Amongst the required fields for the account creation is the phone number, which goes a bit too far does it not? You just maybe want to buy a song or two with the funny money, uh points.

See all the pretty Zune setup screens on Engadget.
Maybe it is best to wait 24 hours and then check the blogosphere how many Zune software problems appear before you get into yourself into a potential mess.

The Microsoft Zune players in brown, black and white ship today from Amazon.com for $249.99, if you dare to adopt early.