Steve Jobs, iTunes and Cheaper iPod?

[Kid Red]

Apple couldn't put the 5 gig on the streets today for $100?? Come on now.

 

[SiliconAddict]

Originally posted by Kid Red
Apple couldn't put the 5 gig on the streets today for $100?? Come on now.

Sure they could....but not without taking a hit in profits. A 5 GB drive alone is going to cost at least $100. Now couple a battery to that, and an ARM, CPU, LCD, ROM chips, suport boards, USB2/firewire controller, etc and you get something above $100

Now maybe $200. 😕

 

[Kid Red]

Originally posted by SiliconAddict
Sure they could....but not without taking a hit in profits. A 5 GB drive alone is going to cost at least $100. Now couple a battery to that, and an ARM, CPU, LCD, ROM chips, suport boards, USB2/firewire controller, etc and you get something above $100

Now maybe $200. 😕

Really? Even being so dated now? I figure the value of the drives would have dropped a lot by now. Plus, if i were Apple, I'd assume they could drop a serious amount of $100 iPods and getting a bulk rate from their suppliers.

 

[singletrack]

Re: Apple Pricing

Originally posted by Rod Rod
Retailers do not choose to keep the price of Apple products up. They are contractually compelled by Apple to list prices at the Suggested Retail Price. Your presumption is mistaken. The biggest deviations from Apple's SRP are on the order of $5. MacMall, which sells Studio Dislplays for $50 less than SRP, can only do so as a "shopping cart special," which is different than listing the lower price up front.

The heavy discounts on non-Apple products are there because the other manufacturers give resellers a lot more freedom in pricing.

This practice is ILLEGAL in Europe and I'd have thought so in the USA also but if you say otherwise then consider me enlightened.

In Europe the retailer is free to sell products at any price they feel is appropriate. If Apple pulled their account because the retailer was discounting the product then the retailer could take them to court.

Apple products aren't discounted because they are good products that people are prepared to pay premium prices for and retailers would rather have a big margin than sell low-margin products if they can. They can get by with lower margins on PC products because of volume.

 

[Mac Dummy]

Re: iPod possibility

Originally posted by Rod Rod
Another iPod possibility is moving away from HD storage and into flash memory type storage (similar to SD/MMC/xD, but not necessarily removeable from the device, maybe an SD/MMC RAID of sorts).

Only, of course, if the latter storage method becomes price competitive, cheaper and as dense or denser than hard drives.

The major advantages could be durability and longevity because of no moving parts to break down.

Given the popularity of the iPod, maybe Apple could realize economies of scale quickly on the chip-based storage.

I just found out about the MPIO FL100, its a Korean made flash based MP3 player that comes in either 128MB, 256MB or 512MB sizes with a SD card slot for added storage. I was reading some reviews @ Amazon.com and they seemed positive, I recently saw this player at Best Buy as well.