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jadam said:
so have any of you who keeping on saying "1gb ipod for $99 is impossible" looked at the recent prices of flash memory

http://www.newegg.com/app/viewproductdesc.asp?description=20-170-604&DEPA=1

$69 for a 1gb SD card, and the company is making a profit off of that. What makes you think apple couldnt come out with a 1gb flash based iPod for $99?

If anything though, this iPod better have an SD slot so I can upgrade the memory on it!

Oh, I don't think $99 is impossible. I just think it is not Apple. They charge a premium price for their products, and $99 is not a premium price. I think I'm being overly optimistic at $129, for that matter.

More opinions:
There will be no expansion slot of any kind on the iPod micro. Want more storage? Buy a mini or an iPod. This device is all about carrying a couple hours of music is a small form factor. Great for exercising and whatnot.
Not only will you be able to sync it up on your Mac/PC, but you will also be able to dl a different playlist from your iPod or mini. This will be a new feature in the mini, and the secret feature hinted about back when the 4G iPod came out.
 
cubist said:
I would imagine that the iPhone would require you to pick a special playlist.

But what happens today if you have too many songs in your iTunes library for your iPod? Does it ask you which playlists to leave off? Is there a way to not sync certain songs to the iPod?

Not sure what the behavior is currently is you try to put too much on your iPod (my iPod still has a running free disk space of around 5-9 GB after I've loaded my music plus the files from work I carry around with me ... haven't had to see the answer to that question yet!)

HOWEVER, if you have a smaller device, you can select which playlists to sync, or manually "uncheck" songs and select to only sync checked songs. For a multi-device setup, the prefered practice would be to sync only selected playlists for any "mini" or "micro" devices most likely (as the checkbox is a per-computer setting and the sync-these-playlists is a per-device setting, IIRC).
 
kenaustus said:
Remember when the mini came out? People were buying them just for the HD. They would rip out the HD and throw away the rest ( :( ) and save around $200 over the retail price of the HD.
... and then those customers found out that the drives are flaky and unreliable when used in non-iPod devices. Apparently, Apple hacked the firmware so that cameras and some computers will be unable to use it, even after reformatting.

Of course, with a flash-iPod, it is likely that the flash will consist of a chip soldered to the main board. It is unlikely that anybody dissecting an "iPod micro" will be able to remove something useful (like an SD card).
kenaustus said:
Apple gets good pricing to say the least.
When you call up Hitachi and say "I'll buy every 4G microdrive your factory is capable of producing", you can be certain of getting an incredible discount. :D
kenaustus said:
As for design, people want an iPod. It needs to look like an iPod and using a mini form factor (with different colors, or using plastic) is a good way for retaining the iPod look and reducing design costs. I don't expect anything radically different on the design side - you'll look at it and know it's an iPod, which is what the customers want.
iPodLounge has recently been running a concept image gallery where readers have been submitting their own original artwork for what future iPods might look like. While some are pretty dumb, there are some good designs there as well. Like this or this.

IMO, as long as you preserve the wheel interface and a UI/menu structure that's similar to current iPods, you can get away with changing almost everything else.

In the case of a flash device, once you no longer have a hard drive taking up most of the space, you can be more creative and go for more radical designs.
 
shamino said:
iPodLounge has recently been running a concept image gallery where readers have been submitting their own original artwork for what future iPods might look like. While some are pretty dumb, there are some good designs there as well. Like this or this.

IMO, as long as you preserve the wheel interface and a UI/menu structure that's similar to current iPods, you can get away with changing almost everything else.

In the case of a flash device, once you no longer have a hard drive taking up most of the space, you can be more creative and go for more radical designs.

Yeah, but that doesn't mean Apple will release a "moving parts" iPod. Sorry but those two designs would be too fragile.

Besides, the iPod and iPod mini look about the same. I really don't think Apple will "dilute" the iPod brand/image with something that looks too different. I'm guessing it'll still have the display on top, the control wheel at the bottom. Classic iPod shape.

This is more likely to be the iPod Flash (if it's not only an iPod mini with a Flash board instead of the 4GB/5GB HD, which would cut in design/production costs even more, to lower the price of both the iPod mini and iPod micro).
 
Yvan256 said:
This is more likely to be the iPod Flash (if it's not only an iPod mini with a Flash board instead of the 4GB/5GB HD, which would cut in design/production costs even more, to lower the price of both the iPod mini and iPod micro).
Definitely. How could they NOT release that. When a flash version emerges, that´s the way it should look..
 
Yvan256 said:
Yeah, but that doesn't mean Apple will release a "moving parts" iPod. Sorry but those two designs would be too fragile.
Not necessarily. Cell phones have had hinged lids for quite a long time. Most are durable enough to survive the abuse most people put their phones through. And phones are usually made from plastic parts.
Yvan256 said:
This is more likely to be the iPod Flash.
Maybe. We'll just have to wait for the announcement.
 
shamino said:
Not necessarily. Cell phones have had hinged lids for quite a long time. Most are durable enough to survive the abuse most people put their phones through. And phones are usually made from plastic parts.

Granted, didn't think about the cellphones. But this argument aside, it would destroy the iPod image (vertical rectangle with a square LCD on top of a click wheel). I'm quite sure Apple will have the iPod micro looking like the one in my previous post.

shamino said:
We'll just have to wait for the announcement.

No! I can't wait! Someone has to break in, take pictures, post them and get sued! We want to see! :D
 
Guys, just so you know, Apple Daily is the Hong Kong/Taiwan equivalent of the Mirror or the National Enquirer. I'd take the content of the article with a large grain of salt. Remember the bruhaha caused by Toshiba accidentally letting on about the 60 gb iPod? If this article is even remotely true, and this company is doing Flash iPods for Apple, then they probably aren't any longer for leaking the info. I don't buy it, given that Apple Daily is the biggest crapfest newspaper in SE Asia.
 
Mindcrime said:
Guys, just so you know, Apple Daily is the Hong Kong/Taiwan equivalent of the Mirror or the National Enquirer. I'd take the content of the article with a large grain of salt. Remember the bruhaha caused by Toshiba accidentally letting on about the 60 gb iPod? If this article is even remotely true, and this company is doing Flash iPods for Apple, then they probably aren't any longer for leaking the info. I don't buy it, given that Apple Daily is the biggest crapfest newspaper in SE Asia.

You kind of killed the thread there, Mindcrime. :D
 
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