Tim Cook on iPod Classic: 'We Couldn't Get the Parts Anymore'

For me, the click wheel was the perfect design. I could manipulate it in the dark, in a pocket, or with my eyes closed. Touch screens on tiny devices make NO SENSE from my POV.
 
miguel cortez said:
Plug it into your computer and update it through iTunes. Space is irrelevant.
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I know but that would require me to fire up iTunes and I'm sure update to the latest and greatest since I haven't used it in quite some time. I know it's just a matter of taking the time to do it but since I don't care that much about iOS 8, I haven't done it yet. The last time I reinstalled the iOS on my phone because of an issue, it took me well over an hour having to update iTunes first.
 
RobNYC said:
The Classic is dead but the iPod itself is still around. You can still get a nano. Not sure how long they'll keep that line going but apparently it must be selling enough to make it worth it.
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iPod now makes up a steady 1% of Apple's revenue quarter after quarter.
 
sosull said:
Thirty years from now it might be easier to see one of these in a museum than being used in public.
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That could be said about pretty much any personal device we're all using now.

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SeattleMoose said:
For me, the click wheel was the perfect design. I could manipulate it in the dark, in a pocket, or with my eyes closed. Touch screens on tiny devices make NO SENSE from my POV.
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Totally agreed. It was an amazing and intuitive piece of interface technology. ALL they needed to do was put some flash chips in it.
 
SusanK said:
A little straight talk from him would be appreciated.
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How much straighter do you want? He explained exactly what the situation is: They can't get parts for the existing design anymore, and they don't sell enough for it to be profitable to reengineer the thing to use more modern parts. I thought that was about as straightforward and candid an explanation as we ever get from an Apple exec.

What I find odd is how many people here can't seem to tell the difference between being able to afford to, say, buy a production run of custom 1.8" hard drives, or reengineer the thing to use 160+GB of flash memory (at an almost certainly substantially higher retail cost), and it being profitable from a business perspective to do so. Apple knows exactly how many iPods Classic they sell every year, and they know exactly what it would cost to reengineer the thing or get custom parts made and re-tool the factory to build them. If it had been profitable to do so, they probably would have.

It's almost certainly not, so they didn't. Apple, being a business (and a ruthless one when it comes to killing old products) isn't into wasting money on nostalgic products with dwindling sales.

Heck, given how long those 1.8" HDs have been out of production, they may well have been selling through old stock they had on hand for years, and just ran out now. We don't know what sales were, but if they're low enough, it could have taken a while.

Ardent iPod Classic fans make the mistake that if they, and people they see on the internet, want one, then there must ergo be a profitable market. Apple's the only one that knows what sales actually are, other than they're definitely less than the total of all iPods sold--probably a lot less. There's certain things I want and am willing to pay for, too, but I have the humility to realize that there may not be enough people like me to actually make up a viable market for that item--if there was, there'd be a 17" retina MacBook Pro and more than two episodes of Elf Princess Rane.

Heck, even if there is a large enough market of people using the item, if the rate of turnover is too low to sustain the product it still won't work--after all, if you've got a 160GB iPod Classic that holds your, say, 130GB library, how often do you replace it? So even if you are the market, you may be buying one only very rarely (particularly compared to something like a new phone).
 
Makosuke said:
How much straighter do you want? He explained exactly what the situation is: They can't get parts for the existing design anymore, and they don't sell enough for it to be profitable to reengineer the thing to use more modern parts. I thought that was about as straightforward and candid an explanation as we ever get from an Apple exec.

What I find odd is how many people here can't seem to tell the difference between being able to afford to, say, buy a production run of custom 1.8" hard drives, or reengineer the thing to use 160+GB of flash memory (at an almost certainly substantially higher retail cost), and it being profitable from a business perspective to do so. Apple knows exactly how many iPods Classic they sell every year, and they know exactly what it would cost to reengineer the thing or get custom parts made and re-tool the factory to build them. If it had been profitable to do so, they probably would have.

It's almost certainly not, so they didn't. Apple, being a business (and a ruthless one when it comes to killing old products) isn't into wasting money on nostalgic products with dwindling sales.

Heck, given how long those 1.8" HDs have been out of production, they may well have been selling through old stock they had on hand for years, and just ran out now. We don't know what sales were, but if they're low enough, it could have taken a while.

Ardent iPod Classic fans make the mistake that if they, and people they see on the internet, want one, then there must ergo be a profitable market. Apple's the only one that knows what sales actually are, other than they're definitely less than the total of all iPods sold--probably a lot less. There's certain things I want and am willing to pay for, too, but I have the humility to realize that there may not be enough people like me to actually make up a viable market for that item--if there was, there'd be a 17" retina MacBook Pro and more than two episodes of Elf Princess Rane.

Heck, even if there is a large enough market of people using the item, if the rate of turnover is too low to sustain the product it still won't work--after all, if you've got a 160GB iPod Classic that holds your, say, 130GB library, how often do you replace it? So even if you are the market, you may be buying one only very rarely (particularly compared to something like a new phone).
Click to expand...

Thank you. Excellent summary!
 
Makosuke said:
How much straighter do you want? He explained exactly what the situation is: They can't get parts for the existing design anymore, and they don't sell enough for it to be profitable to reengineer the thing to use more modern parts. I thought that was about as straightforward and candid an explanation as we ever get from an Apple exec.

What I find odd is how many people here can't seem to tell the difference between being able to afford to, say, buy a production run of custom 1.8" hard drives, or reengineer the thing to use 160+GB of flash memory (at an almost certainly substantially higher retail cost), and it being profitable from a business perspective to do so. Apple knows exactly how many iPods Classic they sell every year, and they know exactly what it would cost to reengineer the thing or get custom parts made and re-tool the factory to build them. If it had been profitable to do so, they probably would have.

It's almost certainly not, so they didn't. Apple, being a business (and a ruthless one when it comes to killing old products) isn't into wasting money on nostalgic products with dwindling sales.

Heck, given how long those 1.8" HDs have been out of production, they may well have been selling through old stock they had on hand for years, and just ran out now. We don't know what sales were, but if they're low enough, it could have taken a while.

Ardent iPod Classic fans make the mistake that if they, and people they see on the internet, want one, then there must ergo be a profitable market. Apple's the only one that knows what sales actually are, other than they're definitely less than the total of all iPods sold--probably a lot less. There's certain things I want and am willing to pay for, too, but I have the humility to realize that there may not be enough people like me to actually make up a viable market for that item--if there was, there'd be a 17" retina MacBook Pro and more than two episodes of Elf Princess Rane.

Heck, even if there is a large enough market of people using the item, if the rate of turnover is too low to sustain the product it still won't work--after all, if you've got a 160GB iPod Classic that holds your, say, 130GB library, how often do you replace it? So even if you are the market, you may be buying one only very rarely (particularly compared to something like a new phone).
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Really don't understand the rant. I hope you feel better as a result.
 
AlecZ said:
Does Tim Cook have to lie about everything? Just say that very few people buy it instead of making up a bogus story about how you can't get the parts.
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Its entirely possible the company's making the parts stopped producing them because they weren't getting enough orders. Thus Apple can't get the parts to keep producing them.


Thats the same thing as saying very few people are buying them. The parts suppliers aren't going to keep a production line open if they aren't getting enough orders.
 
So ... update the parts dipsh.t

Ford: um, i can't get the engine we had for the '72 Mustang anymore. Well crap ... I guess we can't make any more Mustangs. Oh well...
 
Slix said:
Saddening, for sure, but at least there was a good reason to discontinue it.

Here's hoping for an updated touch soon with a 128 GB option!
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I seem to remember a few years ago when an iPhone was released (can't remember which one) because of the extra components and the size of the battery that the iPod touch had higher capacity available than what was available on the iPhone at the time. So we might see a 256 GB iPod touch!
 
They have enough money to buy third world countries but can't pay someone to make some parts? BS.
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I also agree that it is an UTTER BS EXCUSE not to make an updated version!

Tim, be honest with us, we understand:
iPod Classic sales where not sufficent to keep supporting it, period.

Its BS excuses that are more worrisome than the competition, it is a sign of profits over purpose.
 
I know....

Mr. Cook cant go blantantly saying "We dont care about the iPod classic"....But where are money and decission, things got made...;)

Now, if Apple finds market for a iPod classic device, redesigned, with added capabilities and so, for sure the Cupertino engineers and Mr. Ive would give the issue a try...

Money is in the iOS devices.Period...


:):apple:
 
SusanK said:
Really don't understand the rant.
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Well, at least DaveP did.

It has nothing to do with feeling better, by the way; you said you wanted straight talk from Cook and I really don't understand how he could have been any straighter than he was--he explained very succinctly the business reason they're not making the product anymore.

Since a lot of people in this thread genuinely don't seem to be getting it, I was trying my best to explain in a little more detail. Unsuccessfully, it would seem.
 
vjl323 said:
I guess I'm a rare breed, then, as I like the physical touch wheel for navigating songs/playlists. It's very useful in the car, and since I never know what type of music I may want to hear, it's nice to have my entire library with me. I do stream Spotify in the car, but that's simply because now I can use the buttons on my steering wheel to forward songs [but not playlists]. I actually like to drive when driving, and not have to fiddle with a touch device while the car is moving.

I may pick up a backup iPod, as they have served me well...I'm sure MacMall and the like still have some that they're anxious to unload!
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More like, "We can't source the parts and we don't want to invest in tooling for this since mobile devices with flash memory and capacitive touch is cheaper to build."
 
This had its day when Apple was set on monetizing iTunes. It is far and away less capable of generating more income for Apple as does newer devices that Apple makes.
 
vjl323 said:
I guess I'm a rare breed, then, as I like the physical touch wheel for navigating songs/playlists. It's very useful in the car, and since I never know what type of music I may want to hear, it's nice to have my entire library with me. I do stream Spotify in the car, but that's simply because now I can use the buttons on my steering wheel to forward songs [but not playlists]. I actually like to drive when driving, and not have to fiddle with a touch device while the car is moving.

I may pick up a backup iPod, as they have served me well...I'm sure MacMall and the like still have some that they're anxious to unload!
Click to expand...

You have a very small library for 2014. Mine is in google cloud since it's free and I can access anything I don't have downloaded on the iPhone through the app.
 
jav6454 said:
And it doubled as a external hard drive if you knew how to set it up.
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These days a 160 gig exteranal HD isn't worth the trouble to set up. Besides, I thought the point of buying it was to store music and video.

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dukebound85 said:
so make it with flash memory in the same form factor!
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Why? at that point, you might as well be building an Ipod touch. There's no need for a bulky device when you're using flash memory.
 
Makosuke said:
Well, at least DaveP did.

It has nothing to do with feeling better, by the way; you said you wanted straight talk from Cook and I really don't understand how he could have been any straighter than he was--he explained very succinctly the business reason they're not making the product anymore.

Since a lot of people in this thread genuinely don't seem to be getting it, I was trying my best to explain in a little more detail. Unsuccessfully, it would seem.
Click to expand...


Please understand. I do not now nor have I ever had an interest in iPod Classic. I am aware of the fact the product has been discontinued. It does not affect me in any way. I don't care, ok?

Cook talks constantly and does not say a word. Talk, talk, talk, talk.

Amazing products, exciting blah, bah, blah. Apple has done nothing but product refreshes and size adjustments on Steve's work. Cook brought nothing new to market.

I am happy for you that Cook pleases you. We will have to agree to disagree on this one.

Have a good day.
 
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