Hi Apple? I'd like an iPhone, but hold the phone.
Apple announces their new iPod line-up and satisfies the many iPhone fans who wished for less, rather than more…
Steve Jobs took the stage today to talk about about all things iPod+iTunes. Without futher ado, here are the highlights:
- Entire line-up of iPods is refreshed
- iPod shuffle comes in new colours including a new (RED) model. Price and storage remain the same
- Owners of iPhones can now create their own custom ringtones from songs that are available on iTunes. Users can select any 30-second segment of any participating track to create the ringtone. Unfortunately, even if you own the full song, you’ll have to pay $.99 to buy/create the ringtone.
- New iPod Nano gets a 2" QVGA screen, handles video, uses a new user interface that matches the iPhone’s wildly popular "Cover Flow" flip-book-like effect, comes preloaded with 3 games including an Arkanoid-style game that will presumably make good use of the iPod’s click wheel, has improved battery life: 24 hours audio / 5 hours video playback. Sadly, storage remains the same at 4 and 8GB which will not satisfy heavy video users at all.
- The iPod itself gets renamed to "iPod Classic" and now comes with the Cover Flow interface and a whopping 160GB optional hard drive size.
- The biggy: the iPod Touch. Essentially an iPhone without the phone capability but everything else remains: touch screen, wi-fi, Safari browser etc. Strangely, storage is 8 and 16GB, which seems small for such a versatile device.
- iTunes Wi-Fi store. This combines the iPhone and iPod Touch’s Wi-Fi capabilities with Apple’s online music behemoth. Users can stream and buy music wirelessly and their purchases sync with iTunes when they reconnect their devices to their PC’s (or Macs).
- Music partnership with Starbucks. Out of left field but significant simply due to the Seattle coffee giant’s immense international footprint. Their CEO is quoted as saying that 7 new Starbucks open every day. Users will be able to walk into any participating Starbucks (roll out plans to be announced), and upon hearing a song they like over the store’s music system, can pull out their iPhone or iPod Touch and buy the song immediately, or search back over the store’s playlist to find other music.
- iPhone price drop: For those in the US of course, the price of an 8GB iPhone goes from $599 to $399. 4GB model seems to have left the line up.
Excitable 
I have to say that for many reasons unknown, even though the iPod "classic", shuffle and nano have hit it big, many people have doubted the powers of the iphone. They say the connection sucks, the touch screen is difficult, the blutooth is bad and a bunch of other garbage like that. I don't know if it's true so I have to ask…is it???
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i don't about this new thing, but I certainly like my nano
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I'm perfectly happy with my 1G Nano at the moment.
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Ipods? pfft I like my mp3 better… 1 it stores more for half the price 2 nobody would steal it if there is an ipod near by!
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I could not care less about buying the stuff Starbucks is peddling, be it edible, drinkable or hearable… everything is unbearable
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I agree Jul, even if you have a $100 40GB mp3 player thiefs will almost always go for the iPod and mking it the iPhone
but as for the iPod Touch imagine how expensive it's going to be just beacuse their using 'Apple's' name in it, the minute another company makes the cheaper alternative I would consider that before anything else, when my mp3 player breaks or somthing.
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Sad little Apple haters – the world has shown they disagree with your whining and the technology proves you're ignorant as well as pathetic.
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Just because Apple seems to have the knack for creating user friendly interfaces does not mean that their technology, overall, is better. It simply means that most humans are too lazy or too stupid to learn to use a machine that has more options and/or flexibility if they actually have to LEARN in order to use it. Now if only Apple worked on creating and selling interfaces while everyone else created the technology with which to interface!
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the battery life is still pitiful. it's sad there are so many sheep out there willing to fork out so much money for a name.
i get 40hours playback from my sony, which i bought 2 years ago.
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After avoiding the deified Ipod for the longest time, I bought an 80 gb video. I really like it. I think a Touch could be cool, but 16GB? How ridiculous is that? Deal breaker. Proves that even Apple can suffer brain farts.
Oh, and a crook will steal whatever he can get his grubby little hands on. He ain't gonna pass it up because it's not an Ipod.
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Love my ipod nano. That said, I wouldn't run out and buy any of the new apple products now or in the near future. Why chuck what you like just because something new comes out.
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Personally, I think Sansa nailed all the things that Apple failed at……Good battery life, sturdy package, user-replaceable battery, memory card slot, and to top it off, a much lower price on an 8Gb model….After all the bad experiences I have heard about with iPods, why would you waste your money on one?
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Apple is driving the world crazy with all these new products, although some of the new ideas are great, thay need to slooooow down. They're rushing ahead of themselves and as a result the new products get more and more "junky". I don't know why they're coming out with more iPods when they really should be focusing on perfecting their iPhone, being that there have been many complaints and even their stocks went down. Their products look really cool but their customer service sucks (paying to get it for another 2 years???). In what am I really investing my money?
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Yeah Apple should perfect their existing products before blasting out new ones. i got a 2gig nano and it still good so,why would i want to go buy a new one that plays vid when it can't even hold that many of them.
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When there no more room in hell…Apple will stalk Earth…well hell must have run out of room because heeeeeeerrrrreeees Apple !!!! And when Apple does return back to hell I swear they have a place in VIP reserved for them, if such a thing is possible. I hate Apple, can you tell ? I hate their products and I'm never buying anything from Apple after this
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I have an ipod nano, and I could not go a day without it. I have had 3 other mp3 players prior to purchasing my nano, and all have broken for some reason or another. So after i had had evough bad experiences with them, I decided i would shell out the little bit of extra money and go for an ipod. That was a great decision. I now know that i got a device that is easy to use, durable, and produces a good sound quality. I have had it for almost 2 years, and no problems at all. Though,i am a little weary about this new line up.
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Ipod should concentrate on getting the old models more affordable when a new product hits the market.Why shoul the customer pay an older Ipod the same price that the one payed when it just hit the market some years ago?
Apple will realize one day that the customer can't be screwed forever.
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apple is good. and they make awsome stuff. you ahters live into now
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Well, I am just a little scared to even try out an iPhone. After all the rumours of how bad some of the things on it are like
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I honestly think it's ridiculous all the new phones they're coming out with.
It's nuts, it basically cancells out everything else, like for example, the LG chocolate has music, so forget about the ipod or Mp3. With technology its always the next best thing, over and over and over. Technology is always going to grow and get bigger. It may be a bit cool, but to a certain point it's crazy. I am happy with my iPod shuffle at the moment, and I'm getting a Razr soon, the Razr only records videos and takes pictures, I'm fine with that.
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i am happy with my 30gb iPod video but i have to ask apple why make new things when your original products are slowly becoming out dated and why not update something you knoe that works instead of making new usless pieces of technology
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APPLE SUCKS
DONT BUY THIS ONE DIMENSIONAL DEVICE
~OVERPRICED AND OVERHYPED
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They are not making new things, they ARE just updating their current product. Why is his so hard for you illiterate twits to understand?
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And since when are they expensive? Futureshop has an 8GB mp3 player for $299. and the iPod with 160GB will be $100 more
And a one dimentinal device that does everything? What is worse than Apple fanboys are the 14 year olds hating it.
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I'm not anti-apple, I'll still never buy an iPod. The new line is expected, Apple was in dire need of an update to match, or at least come close to doing what all the other MP3 players on the market are doing.
I wouldn't suggest everyone abandon their current models and upgrade. And iPods don't have "that" high a failure rate, it just happens when 3 of 5 players sold in retail are iPods, you're OBVIOUSLY going to hear about them failing more often, simply because more people own them than any other type of player on the market.
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The Ipod Itself is a Waste Of money. Get a Cd player Go buy the Cd's.. Support the Artist.. and…! The Radio.. and……. to top it off, STOP STEALING MUSIC XD, The Ipod line up Should just be Illegal!
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I just hate it.
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And it's a waste of money but it's not gonna evr be illegal cauz almost everyone wants one
so ya
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I could tell you people that ipods are not very good and that at my store we have huge defective rates on all models that we sell. You guys are still gonna buy them though so why bother? Just for the record Creative Labs mp3 players beat apple hands down in reliability, and Samsung mp3 units beat them in coolness. They both beat them in not-ripping-the-customer-off factor as well.
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You're forgetting the most important point about MP3 players: Sound quality.
Yes, Ipods are expensive, have low battery life… But Apple and Sony are the only companies that offer a decent music compression software. Instead of looking for the best deal, you should be "listening" for the best deal.
If you're looking for sound quality, buy Apple or Sony. If you're lookig for something else, well, buy something else…
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I have the Ipod video 30gb or what ever and i swear its the most usless thing i ever bought would not consider buying another especially at the price it is good for transferring large files quickly if used as an external hard drive if set up that way reasons for not liking it as follows Pain trying to transfer files, videos are tiny and usually atleast for me are off sync voice and picture off on all my music videos pointless in the first place with that tiny of a screen easily breakable and if u go on a trip it can be a real pain trying to charge it u cant just change batteries and unless u pay a lot of money u need a computer also i have only around 500 songs on it and it dies in like 8 or 9 hours like common and this iphone thing looks very breakable and for a guy that goes through cell phones like kids go through chicken nuggets it just is not at all practicle so i may be a whiner but hey i own the stuff its looks far better on the shelf like just about everything elese these days its starting to seam and i seen around stored 399 for a cheap laptop or 200 for an ipod it dosnt take a genious whats the better deal and they both do the same thing except laptops have bigger screens and can access the internet and get a a little backpack run your head phones through and your set works for me well i hope this helped
Cheers D:crypt
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Wow, full range of opinions here. Mr. Littler, obviously you need to stop looking for illiterate twits and focus on the real issue. You can't spell…"dimentinal" ??? Come on now.
Let's get one thing straight, Apple is in this strictly for the dough. If they weren't the original, FIRST generation iPod would be the best damned mp3 player on the market. But no, every few years, Apple shoves out another new model, smaller, thinner, bigger screen, more colours, just like every other big company out there. This is not new, it's just like Creative, Sony, RCA, Nintendo, Microsoft, the works. Not improving on their original products at all, just kicking out bigger, flashier new ones that make the older ones obsolete. Anyone here have a 3rd generation iPod? Anyone here have Windows 95 running on their computers currently? Unlikely.
These things aren't cheap either. I believe that what Apple REALLY needs to do is work on iTunes. iTunes is a good idea, but it could be improved upon tenfold. Perhaps we should consider how much it costs to make an iPod before we determine if these things are cheap or not. Like a pair of Nike shoes that cost 89 dollars to buy, but around 9 dollars to make. Retail stores lose $4.00 every time they sell an iPod, the rest goes to the company. We all know that Macintosh computers are for the 'more privileged of computer owners' and the iPod is for the more privileged of music fans.
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this new nano looks tite. oh and to you haters apple ipods get 8 hours on a single battery charge, whereas with another mp3 player you may only get up to 4 on a single triple a battery, and remember batteries are expesive beacause of how fast they 're used
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Okay tarrah, it seems you are the illiterate twit as the imac costs close to what a good pc costs. i am not talking gateway or most acers, but a pc package in full, like hp and dell, some acers. windows 98 improved tenfold over 95 and third gen ipods are heavier and hard to carry in a tight jeans pocket. besides the ipod is the best. the ipod touch is about as big as the first gen ipod
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…..Look up the definition of the word "illiterate" Anon.
I'm well aware of the benefits of iPod, blah blah blah, the battery (which Apple had a real issue with if I recall), the svelte design, all of the wonderful accessories, the screen, the other wonderful stuff that just doesn't live up to the hype.
The point I was trying to make before we got caught up on the specifics of the benefits of the iPod over other mp3 players, is that these people expect you to keep doling out money for these new, only minorly improved products, when the last one was supposed to be the iPod to end all iPods.
Whatever you say about the price differences between PC's and Macs, I stand by my original statement.
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I'll give you the [b]real[/b] definition of the word "stupid"… shelling out $200+ on a product from a bunch of greedy money whores who are laughing all the way to the bank at those of you die hard iPod addicts who are paying for their million dollar houses in the Caribbean.
WISE UP SUCKERS!
HAHAHAHAHAHAHA
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I don't know what's worse: finding myself reading people argue about iPod prices and technical problems on Sympatico, or actually buying an iPod. I love mine, and take excellent care of it. I will admit that I do experience problems with the audio jack, but that's only because I have a larger headphone pin (size matters in this case) making the input wiggle every so often.
Go outside, join a band, make your own music, or just don't buy iPods. Geeze…
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Personally, I dont like most of the iPods. Do I think they're good products, certainly. Just overall, I dont like the design, and if anything, w/ the launch of the iPhone, I believe Apple is definatly out for a money grab.
To many drawbacks on the iPhone for it to be simply a bad decision. No expandble memory on a phone? Sealed battery? Look at thier policy on fixing defective iPhones. Tell me that isnt a money grab.
That said and done, would I get an iPod in the future? Maybe. When my current MP3 player dies (a Sony NW-S706F, in the 2 years I've had it, I've dropped it countless times playing sports, and its still working fine).
When I buy something, I dont look at the name, I look for price/quality/ease of use. Which means I wont rule an iPod out if I'm ever in the market for a new MP3/video player.
That said.. I wont be getting a iPhone anytime soon. Not until it drops another $100-200, or reverses some of the crappy decisions such as the sealed battery/no expandable memory w/ flash cards.
Price not worth the quality/options for the iPhone imo.
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