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New iPod Details

ultrafiel said:
Hey, if you noticed it looks like the headphone jack has changed since the third generation. It looks more standard now, at least from what I can see from the Newsweek article. Below are the differences. I thought the 3G jack was quite strange when a freind let me borrow their iPod. Well, whatever... I still would only use an iPod in my car if I had one... can't think about it now, I spent $3000 for a G5. (This image won't be there forever.)

ipodHeadphone.jpg
Click to expand...

No, that's nothing new. I have just my headphones plugged into my iPod right now and always have. You only need the 2 plugs if you need additional uses out of the plug, like using a remote, iTrip, etc...
 
ultrafiel said:
Hey, if you noticed it looks like the headphone jack has changed since the third generation. It looks more standard now, at least from what I can see from the Newsweek article. Below are the differences. I thought the 3G jack was quite strange when a freind let me borrow their iPod. Well, whatever... I still would only use an iPod in my car if I had one... can't think about it now, I spent $3000 for a G5. (This image won't be there forever.)

ipodHeadphone.jpg
Click to expand...

you might want to remove that post...because nothing is different, the above poster is right, and you might end up confusing people at first, like myself (im really dumb)
 
Jalexster said:
About the iPod. I'm actully thinking of getting one, instead of an iRiver. Almost everyone here is convinced that the iPods sound good, so maybe I will take thier opinions onboard, and forget the opinions of everyone with good hearing, and just get a vastly inferior iPod.
Click to expand...

Well, if you'd rather listen to "everyone with good hearing" instead of us, go ahead it's your choice.

I just hope "everyone with good hearing" isn't the same bunch of idiots who are buying gold-plated DIGITAL cables so they won't hear "background noise"... Or that moron who said that "while Apple Lossless sounds a lot better than MP3 or AAC, the real CD still sounds better". 🙄

You're the first person I ever heard to complain about the audio quality of the iPods. In fact, the more I think about it, the more I wish you'll buy the iRiver and stop coming here to bash the iPod based on rumors you heard from "everyone". 😉

The iRiver is supposed to be really good, has support for OGG, etc. Go for it!
😀
 
And still no On/Off switch.

Tighter packed components + less breathing room for HD + more head = dea iPods. I can hear the moans and groans of dead iPod owners already.

So what's the innovation of this supposed 4G iPod again?
 
to everybody out there who complains about the iPod battery life ONLY being "around" 8 hours, try getting a lap top to last that long between charges....
You cant compare an iPod battery life where the battery power is used to access songs on a hard drive against a flash based MP3 player. I do have to say that the claimed 12 hours of battery life sounds great. And in response to all the comments I have seen regarding the lack of change in design and "only" $100 reduction in price, in terms of design it is often better just to tweak a fantastic design than to re invent the wheel. And for price reduction, why reduce the price when most of the competition are the same price or more when you still have trouble getting enough supply to meet demand.

Good to see Apple trying different ways for promoting its up and coming products before they hit the shelf to create a bit of that pent up buying frenzy. Especially before Microsoft gets its act into gear.
 
un ipodian!!!

i havent had time to get thru 12 pages but all the posts ive seen have been about the features but yall are forgetting one of the things that makes the ipod great. the thing is freakin ugly!! i mean look at it-the wheel is a different color, and not exactly a tasteful one. it looks like a colorware job. and are the buttons on a click wheel backlit? that's a real question, not rhetorical, cause i dont know. if theyre not then that's another bad thing. im all in favor of a click wheel, even tho i love my 3g 15gb (only 325 songs, but 5.33gb cause i use lossless) but not if it makes the thing so hideous. i know, i know, form follows function and such truck, but this thing's uglier than that philips ripoff! i could use the battery life, but im sure all the other changes will be in a firmware update. boycott the 4g ipod!!!!!!!!!!
 
wow, there are some mean people out there

g.money said:
I hate when companies use percentages to explain bumps in performance. ooooooh a 50% jump in performance. I know lots of people will look at that and say wow, must be 16 hours of battery (and then, of course, they'll read it again, like I did, and realize they're idiots) 🙁 ... some of us in the world just hate math. I'm on the list, anyone else?
Click to expand...

croooow said:
You must be joking. 50% is about as basic as you can get.

you must know what 50% is. 50% of 100 = 50 therefore a 50% jump in a 100 hour battery would be 100 plus that 50 (the 50%jump) equals 150. So a 50% jump in an 8 hour battery would be 8+(50% of 8, or 4)=12

50% is easy, and it's an even whole number your working with, 8. How pathetic is Canada looking, Ay?
Click to expand...

Boy, do I ever love when I make self-deprecating comments--all in the name of good humour--and someone then turns around and slams my country of birth. Classy, real classy.

<sarcasm>A friendly Canadian thank you to all those out there who took the time to explain the fundamentals of arithmetic to poor little lumberjack boy over here (tear) </sarcasm>

Fret not "croooow", that little "ay" crack at the end made me smile, although I assume for reasons unintended--hint: don't make fun of someone's intelligence--check that, a nation's intelligence--without first running spell check on foreign colloquialisms.

But hey, I'm willing to let it slide. Gotta keep up the friendly Canadian stereotype, right? ... back to the ol' igloo I go!
 
Sony players

To some people who mentioned consumers don't know the difference between some things, unfortunately that is true. I know I own (and never use) one of the original Sony memory stick players from about 3 years ago. I'll admit it was a great player, but it has the same downfall all of their players still have: THEY AREN'T MP3 PLAYERS.

Thats right. They are ATRAC. Their software that they provide to upload songs into the player convers the songs to ATRAC. So unless you are encoding directly off the CD, the music begins to degrade pretty quickly.

Sony is so caught up in the "Not invented here" thing that their products do and will continue to suck unless they change their attitude.

Unfortunately, most consumers won't understand this before hand; although I bet once people start buying Sony's players more that this truth will spread and Sony will either lose their position in portable audio that they claim sold "20 million units of the walkman brand" or they will finally change this practice.

Atleast the iPod doesn't force you to convert your library to AAC. Although it would be nice if they added WMA support for good measure to the people who may have music in WMA format.

Now I have a question for everyone else.... Sony claims the Walkman brand has been so popular and that is what they are riding on. Is it just me, or does Walkman sound old and outdated... I hear walkman and think cassette tapes. If I knew little about technology, but had the choice between the other digital players and Sony's new HD Walkman, I think Sony would be at the bottom of my list. I think thats a marketting blunder. Its like bringing back the IBM XT brand name or the Apple Macintosh Quadra. Anyone familiar with the super old version of the product will not be interested in buying. Atleast the Apple iPod has a new and different name over Sony Walkman.
 
g.money said:
Boy, do I ever love when I make self-deprecating comments--all in the name of good humour--and someone then turns around and slams my country of birth. Classy, real classy.

<sarcasm>A friendly Canadian thank you to all those out there who took the time to explain the fundamentals of arithmetic to poor little lumberjack boy over here (tear) </sarcasm>

Fret not "croooow", that little "ay" crack at the end made me smile, although I assume for reasons unintended--hint: don't make fun of someone's intelligence--check that, a nation's intelligence--without first running spell check on foreign colloquialisms.

But hey, I'm willing to let it slide. Gotta keep up the friendly Canadian stereotype, right? ... back to the ol' igloo I go!
Click to expand...

LOL

I HEART CANADIANS.​
 
my thoughts

personally, I am glad they changed the button setup. I have a 5GB model from just a few weeks after the iPod was introduced, and I love it. I love the fact that the wheel actually turns. I can zip through my song list very quickly as the wheel keeps on spinnning when I really give it a ride. I like the buttons around the points of the compass. I know this new one will not have a spinning wheel, but I really like the button config. For the first time I am thinking of upgrading, mainly because of HD size. If I could put a 40GB drive (reasonably) into my 1G, I would keep it forever.

The one feature I would really like to see is an FM transmitter (sorry if that is illegal in the UK). I do not want it to talk to Airport Express, I don't see the point, just broadcast straight to the receiver, wherever you are, and that would be beautiful.

overall, I am pleased with even these slight upgrades.

so, that's my opinion on the matter, 🙂
 
WMA Support...

dguisinger said:
Atleast the iPod doesn't force you to convert your library to AAC. Although it would be nice if they added WMA support for good measure to the people who may have music in WMA format.
Click to expand...

Didn't the last iTunes update include the capability to convert WMA to AAC!??
 
PDubNYC said:
The one feature I would really like to see is an FM transmitter (sorry if that is illegal in the UK). I do not want it to talk to Airport Express, I don't see the point, just broadcast straight to the receiver, wherever you are, and that would be beautiful.
Click to expand...

In my experience, FM Transmitters do a horrible job of getting quality sound out of the output. I recently figured out how to plug the iPod into the disc changer port in the car stereo and it is dramatically better than trying to use FM transmitters. The Airport will read the sound file itself instead of a converted FM signal, which will then transmit the sound with perfect clarity from the output. This is much better!
 
Yvan256 said:
Well, if you'd rather listen to "everyone with good hearing" instead of us, go ahead it's your choice.

I just hope "everyone with good hearing" isn't the same bunch of idiots who are buying gold-plated DIGITAL cables so they won't hear "background noise"... Or that moron who said that "while Apple Lossless sounds a lot better than MP3 or AAC, the real CD still sounds better". 🙄

You're the first person I ever heard to complain about the audio quality of the iPods. In fact, the more I think about it, the more I wish you'll buy the iRiver and stop coming here to bash the iPod based on rumors you heard from "everyone". 😉

The iRiver is supposed to be really good, has support for OGG, etc. Go for it!
😀
Click to expand...

I would like an iRiver, but I'm not kidding about the iPod. I'm honestly thinking of getting an iPod. But I'm not going to get one quietly. I'll keep insulting the iPod until I get one.

For those who haven't seen an iRiver, here is some images:
H320 (Colour HDD Player) http://www.iriver.com/images/product/4(500).jpg
H140 (HDD Player) http://www.iriver.com/images/product/IHP140-2.jpg
(I decided not to actully post them in my post, so that people with low-bandwidth don't have to download these images)
 
features

This update may not be huge, but its got me sold. I'm going to London to study abroad for next year and there is no way I can bring my CD collection with me. I'd put it on my AlBook, but I only have 2GB left on my drive. I could have bought a 3G, but for me the battery life is about an hour or two too short. I was going to buy an external firewire drive, but I figure for what I can sell my 10GB for (well if i get it fixed - the HD crashed - still under warranty though), getting a 40GB won't be too bad of a deal. I just hope that scroll wheel looks better in real life - I'm not even convinced its grey yet. It could be white or even aluminum - the lighting in the pics I've seen is pretty bad.

Now after sorting through 12 pages of posts there I three things I feel a strong need to get out:

1) Although everybody here seems to think that iPod's audio quality is fine, I have to disagree. I haven't heard many other mp3's players, though so it may be the best of the crop. Still, I'm a bit of a freak about my stereo equipment, and I really think the quality could be vastly improved. As far as listening to on the go though, its fine.

2) ATRAC may sound alright, but its still a Sony-only format. Maybe its just me, but I like to share the music I rip, so its mp3, or AAC for me. Much like as cool as the new T1 digital camera is, it still uses expensive Memory Sticks that nobody else does.

3) FOR EVERYBODY COMPLAINING ABOUT THE LACK OF FEATURES - iPODS RUN LINUX! GO HERE: http://ipodlinux.sourceforge.net These guys have already gotten new games and .JPEG image support on the thing, and have early versions of support for weird codecs like ogg vorbis. If you are a developer please help with this project, because right now the possibilities are looking pretty phenomenal.

-End of Rant-
 
jbembe said:
In my experience, FM Transmitters do a horrible job of getting quality sound out of the output. I recently figured out how to plug the iPod into the disc changer port in the car stereo and it is dramatically better than trying to use FM transmitters. The Airport will read the sound file itself instead of a converted FM signal, which will then transmit the sound with perfect clarity from the output. This is much better!
Click to expand...

this is why I have my computers networked and connected to my receiver. At home, I don't play my music from my iPod. I play it straight from one of my computers. Personally, I would get far more use out of a built-in transmitter, even if the quality is not as good. I have an iTrip and an iRock, and strangely enough (based on other's opinions that I have read) I hate, and don't use the iTrip, and much prefer the iRock. Maybe living in NYC somehow interferes with the iTrip too much for my taste. But I use the iRock ALL the time when visiting other people's homes for the weekend, or in the rental car on the way there. With a decent receiver, I have had it work from 50-60 feet away, even through walls and floors. So I guess a built-in FM transmitter would be my one selfish wish.

Seems as though I am in the minority, so I am not counting on seeing this feature any time soon. :-D
 
Jalexster said:
I'm still convinced that the iPod's audio quality sucks. You need some good headphones to tell the difference though. Sony Nudes are a good choice.
Click to expand...

I'm not convinced you're right at all... My 3G iPod drives both my Grado SR 80s and Alessandro MS1s just fine... Are you using MP3 or AAC encoding to test this theory out? 😕
 
aswitcher said:
Some of the new features seem to be software specific. If so??? why wont we see a patch/upgrade for our 3g pods?
Click to expand...
Duff-Man says...who says we won't? I thought one of the articles mentioned that their *would* be an update for other pods firmware....oh yeah!
 
Jalexster said:
(I decided not to actully post them in my post, so that people with low-bandwidth don't have to download these images)
Click to expand...

Holy **** that thing's ugly!! Scary really. No wonder you didn't want to post it's pic here. Those who didn't have to see it, thank you. But you could of at least put one of those "some viewers may find this image disturbing" warnings on it!

The iPod in its simplicity is a thing of beauty. Just like my Powerbook compared to PC laptops. No one else seems to understand design. Apple's design is almost always simple and easy on the eye.
 
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