#301897 - 06/09/2007 14:43
Re: The new iPods
[Re: drakino]
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carpal tunnel
Registered: 25/12/2000
Posts: 16706
Loc: Raleigh, NC US
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Apple is also (still) advertising not only HD-based players but also flash-based with 1-billion byte GB. So that 16GB of flash is actually 14.9GB. Whhy aren't we seeing class-action lawsuits against PC makers and HD companies to get this advertising deception stopped?
You missed the lawsuits apparently. I think the end result was simply the "1GB = 1 billion bytes; actual formatted capacity less." disclaimer stamped on everything now. Similar to the old monitor size lawsuits resulting in every CRT going to "15 inches, 14.1 viewable".
This two-by-four that I just bought is only one-and-a-half inches by three-and-a-half inches! I demand a full-size two-by-four!
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Bitt Faulk
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#301898 - 06/09/2007 14:44
Re: The new iPods
[Re: drakino]
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addict
Registered: 25/06/2002
Posts: 456
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Well, that's in the best case scenario. The poor dude that bought one on Monday has had $100/day of coolness factor depreciation.  On the other hand, if this surprises you, then you haven't been watching Apple's new product introductions since, oh, say, 1980 or so. They ALWAYS crank up the price for the early adopters, and then generally issue a product with far improved specs at a much lower price within short order. And there is NEVER a migration path for the early adopters and there is ALMOST ALWAYS a serious mis-feature or limitation of the Gen 1 product which is corrected on Gen2. Brilliant marketing, really. Think about it. You get a large population of people who say "this whizzy new product is super-expensive, but it's so cool it's ALMOST worth it." Then when a price cut comes along they think, "Damn, I seriously thought about buying this when it cost way more. It's a no-brainer to buy it now straightaway (at an only _somewhat_ premium price)." Quick history recap (off the top of my head so numbers may be slightly inaccurate): - Lisa: $10,000
- Original 128K Mac w/o hard drive: 2500-2800 dollars (I.e., $5000+ in today's dollars)
- First LaserWriters: $7000
- Original Pricing on Cinema Displays: $mucho
- Original crappy iPod versus competitors products: 2x the cost.
- etc.
Also, with respect to the iPhone, I believe this was a phenomenally executed piece of demand management for several reasons. - Introducing the iPhone at a ridiculous price point (seemingly) establishes them as *the* top-of-the-line premium product in this space.
This could have backfired if there had been any major technical screw-ups with the product. But there weren't.
- Guarantees that demand won't exceed supply (by much) while they are ramping up a new and somewhat unfamiliar product.
In fact, one could argue that it would have been irresponsible to their shareholders not to have done this. If they had rolled it out priced significantly less, then all of those PS3-ebay-first-day-flipper-scumbags would have been hawking them on Ebay marked up far above list price. Thus diverting perhaps $50 million or more of profit from Apple's coffers into the hands of scalpers/leeches who provide no real value. In conclusion: Let's get real, guys. Whizzy gizmos for (many) boys are like fashion for (many) girls. You are basically paying a price which is unreasonably marked up for something which nobody actually _needs_ and which nobody will be caught dead using in two years time because it will be too embarassing/obsolete at that point. It's all rolled in together. The very things which make it cool and pricey now will make it uncool and worthless eventually. (Hey remember when those nasty-ugly plastic blue iMacs were considered cool?) [Yes, I realize iPhone ownership is 47% female, and that many guys spend big money on stupid trendy shoes and moisturizer. So please forgive me using the dated stereotype of boys=gadgets, girls=fashion. The point is valid no matter which sex is buying what.]  Get over it, have fun with the iPhone til your contract runs out, then put it in your closet alongside the Member's Only jacket, parachute pants, Newton, Palm Pilot, giant earrings and shoulder pads, lower back tattoo, boxed copy of Netscape 2.0, enormous stack of dot-com stock certificates, and your "Don't Vote Me Off The Island" T-shirt.  P.S. I still love my iPhone, despite it's flaws. And I mentally and emotionally wrote off the entire $2000 total lifetime cost of ownership the minute I walked out of the Cultic Lifestyle Harmonization Mothership, excuse me, Apple Store. Sure, it's a rip-off. A shiny, whizzy, fun, unable to put down, finger-scrolling, sideways turning, music-playing, YouTube watching rip-off. And you can't have mine.
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#301899 - 06/09/2007 14:48
Re: The new iPods
[Re: drakino]
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carpal tunnel
Registered: 13/07/2000
Posts: 4172
Loc: Cambridge, England
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Similar to the old monitor size lawsuits resulting in every CRT going to "15 inches, 14.1 viewable".
Hmm, you must have had less-good lawsuits over there. In the UK the mentions of tube size disappeared altogether, or at least into tiny-print footnotes. CRT adverts were completely non-misleading for, ooh, probably about six months just before everyone stopped selling CRTs.
I agree the Gbytes thing is despicable.
Peter
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#301900 - 06/09/2007 15:02
Re: The new iPods
[Re: peter]
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carpal tunnel
Registered: 25/12/2000
Posts: 16706
Loc: Raleigh, NC US
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My problem with all of these arguments is that the size is meaningless anyway. Who goes to the store with a laundry list of all the data they expect to have and buy a hard drive based on that? No one. You go to the store and buy the biggest one you can afford. Nor do you decide how many windows you're going to have on your screen at once and decide how big your monitor needs to be to support them.
Is it wrong that they use GB and inches to mean things other than what they really mean? Yeah, sure. But, in the end, as long as they're consistent, who cares? Of course, nothing but a lawsuit will fix it. I can't imagine that Seagate and Hitachi will release hard drives of the same size, only to have Seagate mark it with a smaller number. Heck, the people who care have made up new terms for the binary-based units, rather than try to (supposedly) reclaim the original terms. In addition, I'm pretty sure that "giga" means "billion" in every other application. And even amongst computer professionals, you almost always have to qualify terms like that in the rare instance when precise measurements are needed.
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Bitt Faulk
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#301901 - 06/09/2007 15:04
Re: The new iPods
[Re: music]
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carpal tunnel
Registered: 08/06/1999
Posts: 7868
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Quote:
On the other hand, if this surprises you, then you haven't been watching Apple's new product introductions since, oh, say, 1980 or so.
They ALWAYS crank up the price for the early adopters, and then generally issue a product with far improved specs at a much lower price within short order. And there is NEVER a migration path for the early adopters and there is ALMOST ALWAYS a serious mis-feature or limitation of the Gen 1 product which is corrected on Gen2.
Thats the problem. I have been watching Apple's history on product releases. I can't verify anything before 2000 as I wasn't watching closely, but I have never seen Apple drop a new product 33% 68 days after release like the iPhone. In fact, I have a hard time thinking of any major tech product that has seen such a dramatic drop that soon after the introduction, especially when sales were doing just fine. The drop in this case turns out to be the rare exception in Apple's standards, not the normal policy. The iPods go for nearly a year before being changed out for newer models at similar prices. The computers average at least 6-8 months before being either price dropped or bumped in specs. This can be seen at the Mac Rumors buyers guide.
I still like the device, and thus far still have no major complaints about it. I was willing to live with gen 1, because it's so damn good. And so far, my Gen 1 products from Apple haven't left me with a feeling of missing a serious feature or have major limitations as you state.
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In fact, one could argue that it would have been irresponsible to their shareholders not to have done this.
While I know I've said in the past short term stock shifts don't mean much, and still stand by that, it is interesting that Apple's stock did tumble nearly 8% yesterday, with the start of the tumble coming around the time the announcements were posted to Apple.com. So overall, it seems the shareholders weren't immediately impressed with the announcements yesterday. My guess is the drop may have been due to people thinking the price drop represents a panic move to try and sell more devices, and is a hint that sales weren't as good as people hoped for. Though to counter that, Apple states they are still on track for their goal of a million to be hit this month, so who knows what the real motivation behind the cut was.
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#301903 - 06/09/2007 15:52
Re: The new iPods
[Re: Dignan]
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carpal tunnel
Registered: 24/12/2001
Posts: 5528
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Hynix 24x stacked NAND Flash for a total of 384Gb. Maybe this will end up in a iPod Touch rev 2? Never buy the first revision of a new device. It will be expensive, buggy and quickly superceded. This applies especially so for Apple stuff.
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#301904 - 06/09/2007 16:02
Re: The new iPods
[Re: tman]
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carpal tunnel
Registered: 20/12/1999
Posts: 31572
Loc: Seattle, WA
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Maybe this will end up in a iPod Touch rev 2?
I'd hate to see its price. That stacked flash trick is cute, but how much is it gonna cost?
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#301905 - 06/09/2007 16:07
Re: The new iPods
[Re: Cris]
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addict
Registered: 23/12/2002
Posts: 652
Loc: Winston Salem, NC
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What I want is an iPhone with the phone module removed, and the ability to connect to my own mobile so I can choose my network etc... but keep all the functions.
This news make brighten your day, then.
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#301906 - 06/09/2007 16:28
Re: The new iPods
[Re: Cybjorg]
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pooh-bah
Registered: 06/02/2002
Posts: 1904
Loc: Leeds, UK
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This news make brighten your day, then.
Cool! But it's still a WiFi only device at this point. Anyone know of a mobile that can act as a WiFi Hotspot ? 
Cheers
Cris.
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#301907 - 06/09/2007 17:05
Re: The new iPods
[Re: Cris]
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carpal tunnel
Registered: 24/12/2001
Posts: 5528
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Quote:
Cool! But it's still a WiFi only device at this point. Anyone know of a mobile that can act as a WiFi Hotspot ?
Is that a mobile phone WiFi access point in your pocket or are you just happy to see me?
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#301908 - 06/09/2007 17:21
Re: The new iPods
[Re: Cris]
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carpal tunnel
Registered: 20/12/1999
Posts: 31572
Loc: Seattle, WA
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Anyone know of a mobile that can act as a WiFi Hotspot ?
I'll bet you could write a piece of software to run on an iPhone that would do that.
Oh, wait...
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#301909 - 06/09/2007 17:35
Re: The new iPods
[Re: tfabris]
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pooh-bah
Registered: 06/02/2002
Posts: 1904
Loc: Leeds, UK
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#301910 - 06/09/2007 17:50
Re: The new iPods
[Re: drakino]
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carpal tunnel
Registered: 08/06/1999
Posts: 7868
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http://www.apple.com/hotnews/openiphoneletter/$100 Apple credit to all early iPhone buyers. Glad they did something, though a shame though that it was reactionary to the bad press about the cut.
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#301911 - 06/09/2007 18:46
Re: The new iPods
[Re: drakino]
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addict
Registered: 25/06/2002
Posts: 456
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Quote:
Quote:
and there is ALMOST ALWAYS a serious mis-feature or limitation of the Gen 1 product which is corrected on Gen2.
I was willing to live with gen 1, because it's so damn good. And so far, my Gen 1 products from Apple haven't left me with a feeling of missing a serious feature or have major limitations as you state.
Well, for the iPhone, in my opinion, the "limitations" are - lack of 3G,
- not letting me draw on my multi-gigabyte MP3 library as a source of ringtones,
- not having 32GB or 64GB of flash (which will be standard by the time my cellphone contract expires in 2009)
and the "serious mis-features" are - being locked into Suckular for 2 years, and
- not allowing me to run Firefox or at a minimum installing an AdBlocker in Safari so I don't spend EDGE download time waiting for annoying ad banners,
- an almost Microsoftian app/framework tie-in to iTunes/iPhoto/iCal/iMail/AddressBook/Safari
I still think it's swell, though.
And I will shortly be spending the newly announced $100 rebate at the Apple Store on Bluetooth stuff (or a second Mac battery for long plane trips).
Edited to add Limitation#3
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#301913 - 06/09/2007 23:40
Re: The new iPods
[Re: tman]
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carpal tunnel
Registered: 12/11/2001
Posts: 7738
Loc: Toronto, CANADA
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Do they mean GigaBITS? Because 384GB could fit about 192 DVD movies at 2GB per movie or 96 at 4GB, not 25 as they mention (that would make each movie 15.36GB). 384Gb = 48GB which fits 25 1.92GB files.
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#301914 - 07/09/2007 01:03
Re: The new iPods
[Re: hybrid8]
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carpal tunnel
Registered: 25/12/2000
Posts: 16706
Loc: Raleigh, NC US
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Yeah. Someone's confused. The press release implies that they're stacking 24 of their current highest-capacity chips, which are 16 somethings. 16 times 24 is 384, so that follows. The only question is the unit. Hynix's tech sheet on their highest-capacity flash clearly states 16Gbit. So yeah, it's 384Gbit.
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Bitt Faulk
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#301915 - 07/09/2007 09:38
Re: The new iPods
[Re: drakino]
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carpal tunnel
Registered: 24/12/2001
Posts: 5528
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Quote:
http://www.apple.com/hotnews/openiphoneletter/
$100 Apple credit to all early iPhone buyers. Glad they did something, though a shame though that it was reactionary to the bad press about the cut.
They're not refunding you the money though. They're just giving you store credit so you can buy more Apple items. It is likely that you'll buy something that costs more than $100 as well.
Nintendo got fined ages ago for doing price fixing. Their punishment was to send everybody a small value voucher so you could buy more Nintendo games/equipment. Big punishment that...
iPhone for $599! $100 worth of accessories included!
The letter implies that the decision to reduce the price was made nearly on the spot but I don't see how they can do that without significant planning.
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#301916 - 07/09/2007 10:16
Re: The new iPods
[Re: drakino]
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carpal tunnel
Registered: 13/07/2000
Posts: 4172
Loc: Cambridge, England
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Is Mr Jobs feeling okay? This sort of touchy-feeliness is not like him. The Steve Jobs of old would be trumpeting the excess $200M Apple pocketed from the first million buyers, and publicly expressing regret that he hadn't priced them at $799 and made $400M.
There was a great Macworld keynote once where he showed consecutive slides with (and I can't remember the exact figures but say) firstly, Ipod sales 40% of US MP3 sales by units (gets applause), and next, Ipod sales 75% of US MP3 sales by revenue (gets standing ovation). Why are you cheering him?, I wanted to yell at the screen, he's just told you he's ripped you all off.
Peter
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#301917 - 07/09/2007 12:46
Re: The new iPods
[Re: tman]
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carpal tunnel
Registered: 08/06/1999
Posts: 7868
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Quote:
They're not refunding you the money though. They're just giving you store credit so you can buy more Apple items. It is likely that you'll buy something that costs more than $100 as well.
I know, and it's part of the disappointment that they didn't even go as far as offering the full $200 back as Apple credit since it's not a real refund. However, I do plan on buying other Apple products in the future, so the $100 won't go unwasted. Leopard comes out in October, so thats $129 right there.
I did also call American Express to see what they were doing, and I have a claim submitted at this point for the full $200 refund along with the tax on the $200. Quite a few people have had success going this route already it seems.
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#301918 - 07/09/2007 15:51
Re: The new iPods
[Re: peter]
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carpal tunnel
Registered: 19/05/1999
Posts: 3457
Loc: Palo Alto, CA
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To be fair, I suspect some of that was that (at the time) they were selling the higher-end players as opposed to the $99 and less players.... Still, Keynote watching is still exciting - as in, I still get surprised - from the inside. A little less frightening than it was at Rio, though Hugo
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#301919 - 08/09/2007 19:50
Re: The new iPods
[Re: Dignan]
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carpal tunnel
Registered: 23/09/2000
Posts: 3608
Loc: Minnetonka, MN
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So are there any new ipod classic users one here. I was thinking about getting one but I tried it at the apple store today and now i'm not sure.
From what I could tell if you want to do something like play a shuffle of several artists you have to add everything to the "on the go" playlist then go play that playlist and you can only append if you suddenly want to hear a particular song. Then for the no playing list it looks like you can only show the currently playing track not a list of all the tracks in the current playlist.
I am guessing the classic must have changed quite a bit over the older ipods because no one in the apple store could tell me how to run it either.
I checked out the Zune some more too and it looks like it operates about the same as the ipod I did prefer the 4 way pad to the scroll wheel though.
Maybe I will just have to get used to the ipod way.
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Matt
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#301920 - 09/09/2007 00:00
Re: The new iPods
[Re: msaeger]
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carpal tunnel
Registered: 19/05/1999
Posts: 3457
Loc: Palo Alto, CA
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If you're used to a Karma, there's a bit of a lack of depth of functionality on either the iPod or the Zune. Rather unfortunate, but I suspect it's to allow first-time users to get round more easily rather than any lack of implementation effort.
I miss now & next type screens too. And tweak order & the rest...
From what I saw, the new non-touch iPods work pretty much the same way as the old ones just with more gloss and a coverflow-style mode (which is pretty cute if you have all your album art in there, and a sad reminder of how badly pieced together your music collection is if you don't).
Hugo
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#301921 - 09/09/2007 02:44
Re: The new iPods
[Re: altman]
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carpal tunnel
Registered: 23/09/2000
Posts: 3608
Loc: Minnetonka, MN
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I haven't been able to find anything that comes close to the karma or empeg. I did play with a zune more and found it does have a now and next type display. I lean more towards the ipod because of the car adapters.
I wonder what the archos is like.
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Matt
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#301922 - 09/09/2007 03:22
Re: The new iPods
[Re: msaeger]
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carpal tunnel
Registered: 08/03/2000
Posts: 12318
Loc: Sterling, VA
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Quote:
I wonder what the archos is like.
I'll take a look at mine sometime to see if it does that shuffle thing you were talking about. I have a feeling it doesn't...
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Matt
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#301923 - 09/09/2007 03:52
Re: The new iPods
[Re: msaeger]
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carpal tunnel
Registered: 23/09/2000
Posts: 3608
Loc: Minnetonka, MN
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This sounds interesting Link
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Matt
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#301924 - 09/09/2007 14:45
Re: The new iPods
[Re: msaeger]
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carpal tunnel
Registered: 08/06/1999
Posts: 7868
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Quote:
I am guessing the classic must have changed quite a bit over the older ipods because no one in the apple store could tell me how to run it either.
Maybe I will just have to get used to the ipod way.
Looking at the videos on the Apple site, I can't see anything to indicate a big change in the interface. It looks like cover flow was added ,and that the menus frequently have art on the right hand side now. Beyond that, the mechanics all seem the same as the first gen Nano I have.
As far as the iPod way, I haven't given in yet. The nano came in handy for podcasts since the Karma didn't understand such concepts, but beyond that it never saw any music use. Most of my iPhone space is also dedicated to podcasts, or videos, with very little actual music on it. If I need music on the go, I still grab the Karma, and thankfully the one I have is holding up decently.
It really is a shame the great features of both the empeg and Karma haven't really reappeared in many other places. I had hoped the iPod would change to add in more advanced features, but at the pace it is going, we might have an iPod equivalent to the Karma by 2030. I'm still surprised iTunes folders for playlist management still hasn't made the sync jump over to the iPods, and that even with the power of the iPhone platform, smart playlists are stuck being static once they move over.
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#301925 - 09/09/2007 14:53
Re: The new iPods
[Re: msaeger]
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carpal tunnel
Registered: 12/11/2001
Posts: 7738
Loc: Toronto, CANADA
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There's no such concept as "current playlist" on any iPod. You're limited to the "On The Go" playlist which honestly, seems like a completely tacked on feature. The problem is that the interface has just seen tacked on features from the first iteration created by Portal Player.
Designing both a friendlier and more versatile interface is definitely possible using the mechanics employed now for input. I doubt Apple will ever improve this to tell you the truth. The iPod interface has always been completely awkward and a slap in the face to ease of use. The product's market dominance and the lack of commitment of any other manufacturer to their own product line is all but a guarantee that the landscape will not change either.
I've never tried a Karma, but I was not at all a fan of the other Rio players (flash based) of the time. Of any product I've tried, Slim Device's Slimserver and SqueezeBox are by far the best, if not the prettiest. Empeg/Riocar close second and in fact has a number of cool features above thhose implemented in any of Slim's default interfaces (Enqueue for one).
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