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iPod Hi-Fi Introduced

This thing is a joke, right?

Apple HiFi? For MP3s?! $350 for a chinzy speaker cabinet and amplifier?! 6 "D" batteries?! I didn't even know they made "D" batteries anymore! I know you need them for the current draw you're talking about with this thing, but how much more useless can you get?! That, and it looks like something from Fisher-Price, not Apple. And $99 for a leather case that doesn't let you access the controls?! I know Jobs thinks we're all idiots after he was able to sell an iPod without a screen, but any dope who buys these things needs to receive a dunce cap as well. I will build you an "Apple HiFi" for about $50. Seriously, nobody needn't to keep this garbage a secret.

Love my PowerBook and Nano, hate these products.
 
People are morons

You can get a decent amp and a pair of used Maggies for $350, and it will sound heavenly compared to this crappy little box. Why people spend so much on inferior little speaker boxes just because they're "computer speakers" or "iPod speakers" I have no idea.
I'm going back to listening to my CDs on my heavenly Martin Logan Request speakers. Aaaaaaah heaven :)
 
LAME LAME LAME. Pick it up with the ipod in it and it will fall out. Should have had a swivel dock that locks the ipod down in place or something.

Nice mac mini though. Would have liked some DVR hardware and a cable tv port for recording shows. I won't buy another mini until this is out.

Interesting thing though. When you configure the mini and click on more info on the hard drives it says that all of the HDs are 7200. I didn't know anyone had a 120gb 7200 hd out yet. Its a sata drive too.
 
i have some creature speakers that are great, plug them into my computer if i want to listen to my ipod out loud (which i rarely do since the same stuff thats' on there is on my computer) i just unplug it from the computer and plug the jack into the ipod,

i also had some hifi.com speakers a few years back, less than 50 bucks that to me were great, soundworks, something like that, pc works, i dunno...i wouldn't be able to tell you what audiophile sound is, but i can tell you this is way out of my price/interest level

and the leather thing..well first off, i'm surprised that a pretty progressive company like apple is making leather products, when my 5g ipod came with a sleeve that felt like it could have been suede i called to ask if it was, and they said it was synthetic, and the guy told me had gotten the exact same question from a lot of people upset that they thought apple had used a leather product, secondly there are a lot of better cases lol, with access to buttons etc........a real innovation would be making an ipod that doesn't scratch so damn easily
 
who exactly is going to introduce new apple accessories, they seem to love coming in later when money is around and tossing the other players out. its sort of like an abusive relationship.

looks like an original prototype ipod dock that might have lived it the labs.

i'm still waiting for the 'fun new products'
 
cwedl said:
Looks too big for what people want! what a disappointment!
Click to expand...


Ha. And I love that it runs on D-cells too. Like it's a portable boombox or something. Yeah, just like the 80's people are going to be walking down the street with their hi-fi on their shoulder (with a $400 iPod sticking precariously out the top).

Give me a break. Usually I eat this Apple crap up. But this is just crap.
 
what a peice of crap

what crap is this,, apple is now into dupeing the public,, if you care about high end audio,, you've got a reciever and speakers,,, my toothbrush is more powerfull than this thing,, why can't we have a simple black lcd ipod with 100 gigs 48 hour battery life and cmoy amplifier built in,, what the heck is this useful for, yeah, cause the ability to watch a low quality movie on a 2 inch screen really enhances my life,, and i need a 400 dollar boombox with two 2 inch speakers,, my 200 dollar satalites are better than this thing, and i really need to look at photos on my ipod,, so i can show my co-workers every stupid face my kid made last night,...... why can't my 7,000 dollar g5 have a decent sound card, for that matter why doesn't the back of it look like the back of 1,000 dollar reciever, how about component video out????

BELLS AND WHISLES, nothing useful, me thinks this is the beginning of a downward spiral in apple's design capabilities or more designed obsolesence
either way major poo-poo:mad: :mad: that's my rant and i'm sticken to it
 
Another Glorious day for Macdom.

All you people who are causing steve grief- shame on you.
remember, WE hyped this event...not apple. They only invited a small group.

Also, people are treating the HiFi like it is apple's centerpiece...it is not...the macs are...this is just merely a small little goody along the way to apple's real market...a goody for the 90% of the market (apparently most of you are professional-sound-guru-engineer-people with bat hearing.)

I for one enjoy these little tibits here and there regardless if they match exactly what i want....

Remember Post 500!!
 
Quartz Extreme said:
Apple PowerCD with black AppleDesign speakers

cd01-tb.jpg



Apple Pro Speakers

media.nl


Twentieth Anniversary Mac w/ Subwoofer

20thmac.jpg


AppleDesign headphones

headphone.jpg
Click to expand...

In addition to those they also had beige apple design speakers that were about 12" tall. I remember seeing some of those one time and they sounded really good.
 
thequicksilver said:
But for the average iPod owner, it is high end. That was more my point.
Click to expand...


I'm not sure about that. Considering the asp of an iPod is about 250, it isn't something that a low income person is going to buy, at least without serious thought. Especially considering the iPod is a gadget.

For example, I have a $7500 a/v system(which is only about midrange...) and I still had to give some serious thought about whether it was worth buying an iPod.

I highly doubt this is considered high end by anyone. Other than the pricing. This thing should be about $100. Especially considering you could buy a receiver and speakers for about $450 that will blow the doors off it. And that's with a good quality brand receiver. If you went with weak brands like Sony or Pioneer, you could do it for less.
 
I'm interested to hear what the sound quality is like in the BoomBox, if they were to drop the price by AUD$100 on the Apple Australian Store and the sound quality was pretty good I would consider buying it.


The only other thing is that it's kind of ugly in a mutant steroid enhanced iPod sort of a way.
 
ickies said:
I have a question: besides the internal speakers in iMacs, have there been any apple-branded speakers in recent memory? Ever?

Like a lot of people, I am super-disappointed with today's releases, but it's not like Apple hyped it up like it was going to be ushering in the new world order today (I've still got my fingers crossed for April 1, though!).

But it's interesting - it looks like Apple is firmly planting a foot in the consumer electronics arena. Now that they're selling music players and stereos, an iPhone doesn't seem like such a stretch of the imagination, does it?
Click to expand...


Apple has made speakers before. Back in the 90's.
 
Audiophile? Probably not....

Okay idea I suppose - nice to be able to carry it out to the backyard for example but it is hardly what I would consider Audiophile.

The frequency response is not really all that impressive - only goes down to 53Hz and tops out at 16kHz (oddly low). You'll get much better response out of a set of headphones.
 
JordanNZ said:
The frequency response IS good for what it is.... It's listed as +-3dB, most systems will list as +-10dB or even 20! Most adults can't hear anything over 16khz anyway.

They aren't trying to fool anyone there, which is nice. Most speakers will list something stupid like 50hz-30khz, but fail to mention that it rolls off at 10dB per octave after 10khz.
Click to expand...


Well I can hear at least 18khz. I used to be able to hear 20khz, but not so sure now. And believe me 18-20khz noise bugs the hell out of me. It's like a combination buzzing bug/screeching blackboard sound to me.

Thing is, its easy to have speaker response to 20khz. Just add a real tweeter. Bass is more difficult, since need physical cabinet volume for it.

The speaker specs you talk about are usually listed by lame speaker companies (usually Japanese). Quality speaker manufacturers typically don't do that.
 
Cinch said:
Okay, I'm going to demand that these leather cases be made from the last remaining bison on Yellowstone ground. Holy cow! $99 for a case?:eek:


I think Steve is abusing his power over the media. Calling the media next time won't be so easy, after this dramatic fiasco!

Cinch
Click to expand...

If the media has any sense, they would have realized from the beginning, that the community, the fans, we, we alone hyped this event. Not Apple, they made it low key. No hints (besides the iCal thing but that just meant there was going to be mac related stuff), no big auditorium like most of the major announcements are at, just a simple update with some well fun new products.

This wasn't supposed to be the huge bang, look at all of this stuff, take that competitors kinda of event. This was meant to be, well what it turned out to be. Low key to a point, and cleaning up from keynote.

Now April 1st, that will be the big one. If they screw that up, then I'm sure the media will get angry. But in all reality, the media even predicted what we saw. MSNBC has a report saying we would see the hifi and the mini. I was disappointed but now i think about it, it was my own fault and I am anxious to see what the address looked like and what will come in April.
 
Would have been a home run for me . . .

If it had the Airport Express built in. It's amazing that they didnt do that. What were they THINKING?!?!

Even if it came IN THE BOX, but at that price point. Hmmm. Some neurons not firing.

Detracters will see this day as a chink in the armor, for sure.
 
blilly said:
If it had the Airport Express built in. It's amazing that they didnt do that. What were they THINKING?!?!

Even if it came IN THE BOX, but at that price point. Hmmm. Some neurons not firing.

Detracters will see this day as a chink in the armor, for sure.
Click to expand...

Good call...now that would be pretty cool. I'm still waiting for my iPod with 802.11 built in. How bad assed would that be, to be able to walk around with your iPod streaming music to your Airport Express and have full control right at your fingertips at all times?
 
MonkeyClaw said:
If the media has any sense, they would have realized from the beginning, that the community, the fans, we, we alone hyped this event. Not Apple, they made it low key. No hints (besides the iCal thing but that just meant there was going to be mac related stuff), no big auditorium like most of the major announcements are at, just a simple update with some well fun new products.
Click to expand...
Yeah, ok, I would buy that too. EXCEPT that The Steve promised that the Hi-Fi would be "like no other stereo on the market"...How is that? Is there a hidden Nuke in there that he forgot to tell us about? Maybe that's where all the WMD's went...or WMVs, they both suck.

I don't know. I booked it going 80 down the freeway after work to get to the Apple Store. Needless to say, not worth it. Had iGotten a fine I would have been REALLY mad. This was a huge bust. I sure hope Apple can do better than simply rebranding speakers with an Apple Logo and putting Intel chips into things...D/Hell has been doing that for a long time and I sure hate them for it. Unlike most other things Apple makes, this one is not going on the list just yet, if ever. Right now I have a set of speakers that I got at Wal-Mart (I know, I know, Im sorry, but I like to think the profit went to Employee health plans...I can dream, right?) that can actually do a pretty nice job. As a college student, 300 or w/e USD is just too much.

Thanks, but no thanks.
 
Today Apple lacked what it has always been good at: innovation.

The iPod Hi-Fi might be worth the price tag for its sound quality, but it has no ground-breaking features compared to the other third party products that already fill the crowded market of iPod accessories.
Apple is just trying to capitalize as much as it can on the iPod success.

About the leather case: an expensive case made for people that have money to waste.
 
MonkeyClaw said:
If the media has any sense, they would have realized from the beginning, that the community, the fans, we, we alone hyped this event. Not Apple, they made it low key. No hints (besides the iCal thing but that just meant there was going to be mac related stuff), no big auditorium like most of the major announcements are at, just a simple update with some well fun new products.

This wasn't supposed to be the huge bang, look at all of this stuff, take that competitors kinda of event. This was meant to be, well what it turned out to be. Low key to a point, and cleaning up from keynote.
Click to expand...

I'm confused by all the negative reaction, too. I didn't expect much and we certainly didn't get much. The Hi-Fi's too expensive, but I feel that way about all the quality iPod dock stereo speakers. (Most of the inexpensive ones have poor audio quality.) And the Mac Mini, until it becomes a true TiVo killer, just isn't worth getting all riled up for.

Apple might have been better off avoiding the press event altogether for this, in retrospect, even one as low key as this...
 
meinertzhagen said:
Another Glorious day for Macdom.

All you people who are causing steve grief- shame on you.
remember, WE hyped this event...not apple. They only invited a small group.

Also, people are treating the HiFi like it is apple's centerpiece...it is not...the macs are...this is just merely a small little goody along the way to apple's real market...a goody for the 90% of the market (apparently most of you are professional-sound-guru-engineer-people with bat hearing.)

I for one enjoy these little tibits here and there regardless if they match exactly what i want....

Remember Post 500!!
Click to expand...

Which is why a press release would have worked much better. These private events (small or not) build up hype. It's that hype that creates a situation where Apple cannot meet expectations. If your going to have private show & tells it's best to do that when you have WOW products.
 
Revlimit Punk said:
About the leather case: an expensive case made for people that have money to waste.
Click to expand...
Sounds like the same can be said for our "Hi-Fi" friend too....

I'm beginning to think that the post several days ago about the guy that went to the Arizona store is a story. I see nothing here that would make an employee "happy to not be working on Friday" unless they are lazy, dont like working, and should give me their job. that s0x0r5.
 
i think the new hi-fi box looks pretty cool, if it performs well, I think it will sell. (wow, that rhymes)

I'm up for new speakers very soon. mainly for my home office. I'm considering the soundsticks or creatures.. but the new hi-fi is pretty tempting especially offering battery operation (we goto a lot of bbq/picnics, etc).. $550 AUS.. ouch.

I'll wait for the iLounge reviews :)
 
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