iPod touch Released

[Spades]

For anybody really wondering about how much video an iPod Touch could really store, as opposed to people that just want to whine, from my collection I could fit:

Season 1 of Star Trek Voyager
Star Trek 2, 4, 6, and 7
And then round it out with 7 episodes of The Daily Show

That's 1 two-hour (aired) TV episode, 14 one-hour TV episodes, 7 more half-hour TV episodes, and 4 movies.

That's really not enough?

 

[stuff99]

Actually I've been surfing around a little tonight and as crazy as it sounds for the first time I genuinely believe that Creative, Microsoft, Samsung, Sony and Archos staff, either directly or employed via PR agencies are posing as 'newbies' and are literally flooding the entire internet with crass dumb-ass teen style whining about needing at least 160Gigs of storage - just utterly discounting EVERYHING the Ipod touch is about becuase they just absolutely must carry around every song every made and every movie ever released at all times

Unbelievable...

yah i read some dude had a tetrabyte of music

like wtf

its a safe assumption that he didnt pay for that music lol or else he would be broke

who listens to that many songs...

its like you have so many mp3s u forget what songs u have...it will take u forever just to search it!

 

[paetrick]

AHHHH I LOVE YOU APPLE !!!!, ORDERED RIGHT NOW , ipod touch on it's way...

I don't understand you guys who wants more than 16GB, Are you guys away for 2 weeks everytime you leave ur home computer or what?

Well i guess everyone got different needs, LUCKY THAT I'M HAPPY WITH IT !! /KISS KISS !!! LOVE U APPLE !

 

[acslater017]

I also can't tell if the iPhone has the obnoxiously shiny back panel or if it's matte like on the iPhone and the rest of the current iPod lineup.

The shiny backside is my one tiny disappointment - The all-metal nanos (or previously, Minis) were SO much more scratch-resistant than the reflective stuff. If I'm not mistaken, both the new Nano and Touch have the reflective back. The Classic is described as "All-metal" but from the gallery, it also looks reflective

I dunno if anyone's already said this (I didn't feel like reading all 500 comments), but going flash was probably necessary for use with MultiTouch. I'd imagine that MultiTouch+HDD would have made for an extremely poor battery life and/or form factor.

Personally, I will probably go with the 8 GB Touch - I don't think I can justify an extra $100 for the 16 GB. I'll just have to pick my favorite playlists & movies.

 

[Manic Mouse]

Is anyone else wondering how this will affect the EU iPhone release? We can already get all the best bits of the iPhone with the iPod Touch and can get better phones for free on our contracts...

How are Apple going to sell us the iPhone? You can get better touch screen iPods (larger capacity) and a better phone for free. Why pay through the nose for an iPhone?

 

[CaptainCaveMann]

The shiny backside is my one tiny disappointment - The all-metal nanos (or previously, Minis) were SO much more scratch-resistant than the reflective stuff. If I'm not mistaken, both the new Nano and Touch have the reflective back. The Classic is described as "All-metal" but from the gallery, it also looks reflective

I dunno if anyone's already said this (I didn't feel like reading all 500 comments), but going flash was probably necessary for use with MultiTouch. I'd imagine that MultiTouch+HDD would have made for an extremely poor battery life and/or form factor.

Personally, I will probably go with the 8 GB Touch - I don't think I can justify an extra $100 for the 16 GB. I'll just have to pick my favorite playlists & movies.

You do know that metal can be reflective?

 

[Glenny2lappies]

Is there no-one here from the UK who thinks maybe (just maybe) £260 is a little bit pricey for 16gb?

That = 525.094 US Dollars!

I must be the only brit here.

$399 + 17.5% VAT = $470

It's only a $55 loading (=£22.50)

That's one hell of a lot better than the thieving b'stards in Adobe who charge £1500 for $1500 worth of CS3. Come the revolution...

 

[me354]

wow..

Actually I've been surfing around a little tonight and as crazy as it sounds for the first time I genuinely believe that Creative, Microsoft, Samsung, Sony and Archos staff, either directly or employed via PR agencies are posing as 'newbies' and are literally flooding the entire internet with crass dumb-ass teen style whining about needing at least 160Gigs of storage - just utterly discounting EVERYHING the Ipod touch is about becuase they just absolutely must carry around every song every made and every movie ever released at all times

Unbelievable...

I completely agree i have over 18 hours of video and 6 and a half days of music and that would not completely fill a the 16gb hard drive, its plenty for me. The 160gb can hold 5000 DAYS worth of music, thats completely rediculous, unnecessary

the fact is that the ipod touch could simply not practically made with a hard drive, the large bright screen + the hard drive would chew through the battery giving it mayb 2-3 hours of video. This is a great ipod its got everything people have been asking for, be happy-->

 

[surferfromuk]

yah i read some dude had a tetrabyte of music

like wtf

its a safe assumption that he didnt pay for that music lol or else he would be broke

who listens to that many songs...

its like you have so many mp3s u forget what songs u have...it will take u forever just to search it!

Very true. It's certainly not a major life crisis issue if one time your caught on the train without a certain song...

That aside, I'd say most people would be very hard pushed to list 100 of their 'favorite albums'...that's maybe 1000 songs at best!

 

[thesheep]

My guess is that they need to use Flash memory, rather than a HD, in the Touch because the instantly-responsive nature of the iPhone/touch interface requires Flash memory. Apple can be a bit purist, and perhaps when they tried adding on a HDD to the iPhone/touch it just ruined their amazing UI.

The iPod Touch looks great to me, but lack of Email is a real killer. Wish they'd left that in.

 

[freeny]

My guess is that they need to use Flash memory, rather than a HD, in the Touch because the instantly-responsive nature of the iPhone/touch interface requires Flash memory. Apple can be a bit purist, and perhaps when they tried adding on a HDD to the iPhone/touch it just ruined their amazing UI.

The iPod Touch looks great to me, but lack of Email is a real killer. Wish they'd left that in.

Just use gmail. The email function on the iphone aint all that great. Ive dropped using it and prefer just logging in on the net.

Just my opinion

 

[Cloudane]

If I'm slapping down cash for an iPod Touch I'll be taking advantage of the 25% discount I can get by purchasing one from across the pond. $299 is £148.09 (xe.com just this very minute). I know the £/$ thing gets batted around here on the occassion of any new product launch and is probably equally applicable to all manner of consumer goods, but it is irritating and noteworthy nonetheless.

Well if you intend to get it delivered then in all likelihood you'll get stung for 17.5% VAT plus whatever they work out the import duty to be (usually 5% or so I think) plus the courier's fee for releasing it from Customs (usually £10).

That's why they're priced how they are, unfortunately (I don't like being in Ripoff Britain either, but we take it or leave it!)

 

[Analog Kid]

"You can't have video and watch it too"

I think Apple has forgotten that the beauty of the iPod was "everything in your pocket", and that what pulled them out of the gutter 10 years ago was a new CEO who simplified their product matrix.

Now we've got a tiny little shuffle suitable for party favors, a Nano that's great for people with small libraries but that also supports novelty image and video viewing, the Classic for people who want to carry around pictures and video and the Touch for people who want to look at pictures and video.

Or is the touch for people who want an iPhone but don't want to deal with AT&T?

The battery life arguments I'm seeing are missing the point. They made the thing thinner than the iPhone. If they put the RAM in there to cache the video, the hard drive would barely effect the battery life, and if they thickened the thing up enough to hold the drive, they'd have plenty of space around it for battery.

Despite all the back and forth on these boards about "cannibalizing iPhone sales", they went and stuck the Touch right in the place where it will have the greatest impact on iPhone sales-- it's essentially the same device for $100 less. Why didn't they follow the original argument they made which was that the iPhone was for people who wanted a phone and a Nano in one device?

If they had done that, they could have put a hard drive based Touch out at premium and there would be a natural progression: The Touch for the serious iPod user, the iPhone for convergence freaks, the Nano for mass market, and the Shuffle because it's cute.

Instead they've left me, and it sounds like a lot of people like me, stuck in this place where there are not products that meet my needs.

It's possible that Apple is being overly cautious here and they want to make sure people are still happy without the click wheel, but I don't think that's too likely if you view the iPhone success as a referendum on touch.

 

[the Western zoo]

The iPod Touch would be perfect for me, if it had email and more PDA functions!

Especially the email - why oh why have they left that out?

 

[Manic Mouse]

The iPod Touch would be perfect for me, if it had email and more PDA functions!

Especially the email - why oh why have they left that out?

I think they've already cannibalised the iPhone's appealing features too much with the iPod Touch, added email would render the iPhone almost entirely redundant instead of simply slightly redundant as it is now.

 

[slabwax]

yah i read some dude had a tetrabyte of music

like wtf

its a safe assumption that he didnt pay for that music lol or else he would be broke

who listens to that many songs...

its like you have so many mp3s u forget what songs u have...it will take u forever just to search it!

1: If you use wav to down load it is a lot but not over the top. Around 1000-1200 cds.

2: I own around 1500. And have paid for all of them over the past 20+ years. (Except for gifts and the such) Alot of my friends have a whole lot more than me. If you have a wide appreciation of all forms of music and are a true music fan you can easily collect 1000s 0f cds.

3: Do you need to rip to wav files and keep all your music with you at all times? Most likely not but 16 gigs is not nearly enough for a lot of people.

I would never use any compression scheme for music at home and that is true for alot of folks. In an Ipod on the road I don't care all that much. But that is me. Please keep in mind we all have different needs my friend.

 

[wilderkun]

I have an issue with all of the people that are complaining about the new iPod Touch. Everyone in the forum has been praying for a phoneless iphone since it came out. Now they get what they asked for, with an option for TWICE the storage space as any iPhone owner can currently get, and at a cheaper price than everyone who purchased an iPhone.
Please PULL YOURSELVES TOGETHER, this is just ridiculous people!
SO what you have 20/30/50/100 gigs of movies. I have well over 400gigs
And I don't expect to be able to fit them on an iPod anytime soon, and I don;t really want to carry them all around. IT IS POSSIBLE TO MAKE SIMPLE DECISIONS!!! You going to take a long plane flight? Do you ever consider bringing every single on of you dvd/hddvd/bd? No, what you do is you choose three or four and sync, maybe keep some on your laptop, and than re-sync. Not a big deal people!

 

[shoelessone]

curriosity:

does this browser support sessions and cookies?

On my campus, a cookie can be stored so that for the remainder of the day you can use wifi as long as you are coming from the same mac address and have a particular cookie. If I register on my campus network, and then shut my phone off/close safari, will my cookies be saved?

Same thing with internet forums (Like macrumors!), are cookies saved?

 

[pubius]

Ok. A lot of you people are whining about whiners.
There are obviously those of us that counted on more capacity.
And here's a couple more reasons why...

The MUSIC capacity argument is moot. Obviously, if this were just about music capacity then all of us would be rushing off to get the new classic. And there will be a group of people that do that, but these will be music collection-centric people. So all you people saying that you have everything you need with your shuffle/mini/nano, that's great, but this isn't about you.

Which brings me to my second point. I really don't think that the ipod touch is directed at the general shuffle/mini/nano crowd (if it was directed at them then that was a serious misdirect). This croud (in general) has a lower annual income, aren't huge music collectors, and wouldn't be in the market for a $400 ipod anyway. Or they have one of those devices because it was small, for the gym, running etc.. I would say that the people that would be the most likely to buy this, are the same people that currently own 40gb, 60gb, and 80gb ipods, and are used to spending this kind of money (and are often ok with spending more) for a 'toy'.

Third. Think back to when the ipod video came out. Shortly after, the widescreen ipod rumors came (think years and years back). We were all enamored by the idea. 'Sure Ipod video looks ok, but think about how this would look on a widescreen ipod!'. This (widescreen video) was the big thing that we were waiting for. Granted, wifi and touch are nice additions, but the idea of widescreen video on an ipod really ignited all of us (macrumors archives). The PSP came out, and we didn't get that for obvious reasons. We want our movies with us. So we loaded them onto our ipod video, and man did they load up fast. With movies around 600mb (or so) each, that leaves less and less room for music (and of course, we like music too). Ok, so movies take up a bunch of room. A widescreen device should have the ability to hold what it plays best (yeah, not coverflow).

Wifi, works here and there. Music only, buy a classic. Touch screen, all fine and fun. But it's widescreen, for VIDEO.

Of course, I would like music in there too, as Apple has gotten us plenty accustomed to having both, at large capacities.

I wanted the ipod that we've all been waiting for. That's all. For now.

p.s. - This post isn't directed at you people that don't live in USA, I know you can't get the iphone yet, so this is a substitute.

 

[AppleiMac]

I must say I'm really blown away and happy with Apple. I absolutely cannot believe people are complaining. It has double the capacity of the iPhone and it's really thin! The future is flash, guys. I totally didn't expect WiFi or Safari, I didn't want to get my hopes up, but that's what I wanted. And it happened! This is an Apple PDA guys, and it's awesome. Thing is, with the iPhone price drop, it only puts it $100 away and it's a phone included. So I think I may be going with the iPhone, because it's everything I need all in one for such an awesome price.


P.S:
Anyone notice the different bottom icon area then the iPhone on the iPod Touch? It looks just like the new Leopard dock. Pretty cool I think, I wonder if Apple will update the iPhone to have that also.

 

[Hattig]

For the record, I store all of my music from CDs in Apple Lossless so this explains why I for one would make good use of much more storage (I also use $$$ earphones to listen to my music). Currently, my 5,000+ songs take up about 130 GB so it would all fit on the new Classic. It's just that once you have an iPhone it's hard to go back to that old interface, especially regarding On-the-Go playlists.

Dear many-tentacled-pasta-lord, the hardware on an iPod is not going to show much difference between a 700kbps Apple Lossless file and a 256kbps AAC file, even with uber-fancy headphones.

Indeed in most mobile situations (at home I presume you will be using a rather more than decent hifi setup?) background noise is a far bigger issue. Although I'd rather have that around town than live in a blissful world of noise-cancellation right before that bus hits me. I rip my music for my iPod at 160kbps and have never had an issue, and 256kbps should be good for all but those with genetic abnormalities relating to their hearing (in typical situations).

Rip once, lossless, then use a batch transcoder for your iPod collection. Bam! Done.

 

[OllyW]

Actually I've been surfing around a little tonight and as crazy as it sounds for the first time I genuinely believe that Creative, Microsoft, Samsung, Sony and Archos staff, either directly or employed via PR agencies are posing as 'newbies' and are literally flooding the entire internet with crass dumb-ass teen style whining about needing at least 160Gigs of storage - just utterly discounting EVERYHING the Ipod touch is about becuase they just absolutely must carry around every song every made and every movie ever released at all times

Unbelievable...

I'm not a teen, don't work for any of the above companies and I'm not a newbie but I want a big capacity iPod.

I've been collecting music for over 30 years and I like to have all my music in one place. The beauty of the new iPod range is there is a model to suit all tastes. To me, the iPod touch is all about gimmicks and flashy nonsense, I just want a great music player. To you it probably all makes sense.

I suppose some people want both the gimmicks and the big disk and they are out of luck at the moment. I'm sure the iPod touch will be a big sucess and the capacity will go up and it will probably eventually replace the classic models.

 

[The Ratch]

I'm sorry to see all this griping! if 16GB is too little go and buy the iPod Classic. It has a new interface which is pretty nice.
I'm getting one of these little wonders ASAP. Gripe all you like I'm happy with the new line up.

Here's My problem. A year ago Apple acknowleged that there is a group out there needing more space on the iPod. When they added movies to the iPod they created an 80GB model with that specific perpose. So it not a matter of "whiners needing a rediculous amount of space for no reason" (I'm summing up previous arguments) - Apple has already acknowleged that they endorse this group. And Today they reinforced it with the 160GB. So everyone that calls the "iPTouch is storage deficiant" group "whiners," you need to realize that Apple is the one who created and heralded this niche and for one reason or another has left us out in the cold today.

 

[iShak]

http://www.apple.com/uk/ipodtouch/gallery/index10.html

^ probably just a retouched iPhone photo, but notice the BLUETOOTH icon next to the battery? haha .. I mean, do these web designers get 2 hour notice to make the webpage before the launch or something?

anyway, 16gig .. more than enough for me .. I'll probably be spoiling myself if I ever make it past 80% full

(been using a 2 gig nano for the last 2 years .. and capacity has never been a problem)

one 16gig ipod touch ... sold!

by the way, when can I get one from the store here in UK?

 

[madmaxmedia]

Which brings me to my second point. I really don't think that the ipod touch is directed at the general shuffle/mini/nano crowd (if it was directed at them then that was a serious misdirect). This croud (in general) has a lower annual income, aren't huge music collectors, and wouldn't be in the market for a $400 ipod anyway.

I don't think that is necessarily the case. When the Mini came out, many complained that it was overpriced. And it was, when comparing price per gigabyte to the full-sized iPod. But most people preferred the Mini form factor to the full sized iPod anyway.

Subsequently, people complained about the first Nano's capacity, because it was smaller than the Mini. But it was also much slimmer, and IIRC the Nano is/was Apple's most successful iPod of all. There's an obvious pattern here...

The Mini/ Nano lines are cheaper in general, which supports what you are saying. But I don't think you can conclude that everyone with a higher budget automatically wants more storage at the expense of size, battery life, or possibly OS X/ UI performance. I personally wonder how smooth the UI would be with a HD (but who knows for sure, maybe it would still run well.)

I think its ultimately a judgement call whether Apple thinks the hipper, thinner but smaller capacity device will sell better or worse compared to the thicker higher capacity device (and not one we can really conclude one way or the other here.) I think down the road we will see additional models anyway.