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macrumors 6502a
Original poster
Jul 22, 2007
582
1
Southern California
The only reason I did not get a 80GB iPod 3 weeks ago with the rebate when I bought my Macbook Pro (I got the Nano instead and sold it to a friend) was because I wanted something bigger (I have over 100GBs of legally obtained music and movies) and I kept hearing rumors of a new iPod. But I keep hearing things about more flash memory, which drives me crazy. I don't care about battery life as much as I do about space, and the limited flash space was the main reason I did not get an iPhone. So basically I am asking what do you think? What are the rumors pointing to? If the iPod "Touch" turns out to be flash based I am going to go to my local store and try to find an 80GB 5.5 Gen to buy.
 

zap2

macrumors 604
Mar 8, 2005
7,252
8
Washington D.C
Well with rumors 4 models, I'm expecting a

shuffle replacement-smaller, maybe more memory, still no screen etc
nano replacment....we've all seen the pics, w/ video, fatter and shotter.
iPod 6G-Hard drive based, click wheel , more storage.
iPod touch-iPhone with out the phone.
 

storage

macrumors 6502
Jun 4, 2005
275
0
I hope for both. 80gb and 120/160gb with 512/1024mb flash memory. General storage on the HDD, most played from your iTunes library or whatever items you want on the flash memory to conserve battery life.

Might take up some extra (physical) space, though.
 

rockthecasbah

macrumors 68020
Apr 12, 2005
2,395
2
Moorestown, NJ
maybe both, definitely hard drive based. Flash is still too limited a capacity for a media device that supports video (i think it taps out at 32GB?) ... Yet i'm sure those components are quite expensive so who knows if we'll even see Flash drives for full size iPods...

You can safely rest assured that you'll get a higher capacity iPod like you want, do not run out and buy a 5th gen now :)
 

Loge

macrumors 68030
Jun 24, 2004
2,821
1,310
England
There is no way Apple is going to risk losing many thousands of customers by discontinuing the HDD based iPod, until there is an alternative that offers similar storage.

Recent developments such as offering higher bit rate songs from iTMS and efforts to expand the range of video offerings, and internationally, all point to hardware with more storage not less.
 

storage

macrumors 6502
Jun 4, 2005
275
0
My guess is that they'll drop the 30gb, and go either 60 or 80gb on the "low end".
 

ds252

macrumors regular
Aug 6, 2007
146
0
It better be HDD or all this waiting was for not, i know i won't use 80 GB so waiting for a 120 or something along those lines was pointless but i just couldn't live with 16GB
 

SactoGuy18

macrumors 601
Sep 11, 2006
4,343
1,508
Sacramento, CA USA
The new full-screen iPod video (6G) will be hard drive based. Reason is simple: video takes up a LOT of storage space even with H.264 compression, and the only way to accommodate multiple movies on the new iPod is to put it on a hard drive.
 

aswitcher

macrumors 603
Oct 8, 2003
5,338
14
Canberra OZ
Well with rumors 4 models, I'm expecting a

shuffle replacement-smaller, maybe more memory, still no screen etc
nano replacment....we've all seen the pics, w/ video, fatter and shotter.
iPod 6G-Hard drive based, click wheel , more storage.
iPod touch-iPhone with out the phone.

Shuffle - I wonder if the shuffle might get a small screen.

Nano - Yeah, nano, bigger flash memory, bigger better screen.

iPod 6G - Yeah HDD maybe up to 160GB. And yeah, maybe not touch but wheel a) thats what the rumours are saying; b) touchscreen may not work well with HDD tech

Pod Touch - Flash memory maybe 8 and 16 GB, so bigger than iPhone but not any bigger because of cost
 

homeboy

macrumors 6502
Aug 23, 2007
467
1
London
The new full-screen iPod video (6G) will be hard drive based. Reason is simple: video takes up a LOT of storage space even with H.264 compression, and the only way to accommodate multiple movies on the new iPod is to put it on a hard drive.

Exactly! The whole point with a big screen is to watch videos on and they take a whole lot of space. 8-16GB is too little to accommodate both video and a whole lot of music. Therefore it is really logical for the iPod touch to feature a HDD and become apple first proper PMP.
 

iTim314

macrumors 6502
Jun 5, 2005
337
6
U.S.

Gen3tix

macrumors newbie
Aug 3, 2007
27
0
Yea, making the full sized iPod flash-based just wouldn't really make much sense. Considering flash is pretty expensive, and comes in smaller capacities, Apple won't make a full switch to flash memory with this refresh. Perhaps in the future? Maybe.

I'm going to say maybe 100 or 120gb hdd's in the next full sized iPod.
 

coryetzkorn

macrumors regular
Jul 23, 2007
109
0
I don't get why 32Gb Flash is so expensive. I can understand why a 32Gb SD card would cost a fortune, but why would this be the same case with the full-size iPod? Can't you just daisy-chain a bunch of 4Gb cards in the same space an HDD would fit into?

Can someone clarify this? Thanks.:apple:
 

zflauaus

macrumors 65816
Nov 19, 2004
1,166
3
I don't get why 32Gb Flash is so expensive. I can understand why a 32Gb SD card would cost a fortune, but why would this be the same case with the full-size iPod? Can't you just daisy-chain a bunch of 4Gb cards in the same space an HDD would fit into?

Can someone clarify this? Thanks.:apple:
Well, using your knowledge, let's take an iPod nano for instance. It's about $90 to make the entire thing, so let's say that $40 is the 4GB chip. 40 x 8 = $320. You also must factor in the cost of other components, so let's just say $320 + 120 = $440. Add a 40% markup carried over from the nano = $616. So it's just not beneficial to Apple or the consumers. Plus also you may have to have flash controllers for every card, and the size of it (considering the 2GB nano had two individual 1GB chips) wouldn't be plausible.
 
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