I'm as happy as the next guy about the nano, but I'm just wondering, why just push out new slightly different versions of the same product? iPod nano is just a smaller iPod, maybe they should really go further to see what they can really do with their product, do something they did back when they lauched the first iPod, something revolutionary.
i think it's getting harder to do something revolutionary given the advances in mp3 players in the last 5 years... if apple wanted to change the whole game again it would have to be some crazy size player that fitted into a pair of headpones or something? (although this has been done already)
i'm just waiting for an ipod phone/camera to come out and then everything will be in 1 gadget, convergence has gotta be the way forward i think...
But I think Apple is just trying to swim deep and not far. The first iPod was not actually revolutionizing as is, but it was more like a logical step that revolutionized the whole thing, put a harddrive in to a media player.
Ofcourse the next logical step was to get videos to play in the player, but that has already been done so what would be next, we added cameras to cellphones, what is the thing that people actually need? Since the dawn of PDAs I have dreamed of functionality beyond support, so that I could just control my tv and computer from single PDA even if they didn't support it straight away, when I come to work I'd like to have all my calls, messages and ta-da lists to my PDA/Cellphone to quickly prioritize my day. All this is in our grasp, but there has not been a company that has been crazy enough to wander there, to actually make something like that.
But I'm just waiting for Apple to realize the potential they have in their hards, if they just looked beyond the entertainment value of their iPod and just combine it with features from a PDA. Information is what I want and need.
But that is what bothers me, mainly if you look at Apple, iPod is their only product that relies solely on entertainment, they don't do games themselfs, their machines are the standard in almost every part of design industry. Only part that combines them to the iPod is that they are considered "hip" and cheaper models are directed at young trendy people.
But I'm not saying that they shouldn't make iPods or it is bad that they make iPods, I mean alot of companies make products outside their own main line of products, like Peugeot and Mercedes with bicycles and that stuff.
But it would be nice if they combined their expertice and what they have learned from iPod, I'd like an Apple PDA *meow*
I actually remember Newton, I still have a finnish computer magazine (Mikrobitti) where it was reviewed, that machine was so awesome :D
There also was another piece of hardware that is now forgotten, it was called eMate 300, small "PDA/Laptop" or something like that. It was mainly sold for schools and administrations but it didn't get much attenttion. I'm still looking if someone sells them, it would be a cool novelty to have.
I'd like to have similar features to those you listed on my pda, kosmo. There will always be the debate of when one piece of technology becomes too powerful or does too much for us, but it would still be cool. I love systems where everything is connected and it just *works* together to do exactly what i want. Unfortunately i dont have one.
I continue to be surprised that apple havent released a PDA yet, and i would be interested to see what they could come up with. A camera/etc in an ipod would be mostly redundant in an ipod imo.
And fyi 3stripe; although i dont entirely agree with convergance, more with connectivity (as mentioned earlier - though it does get irritating carrying 101 gadgets), apple and motorola are releasing an 'ipod' phone in the near future. Alternatively there is the SonyEricsson w800i which is a 'walkman' phone (both are pretty much phones with 512meg card)
i've got a nokia 7610, which is a phone/poor camera/limited mp3+video player/limited web browser/limited pda ... i'd just be interested to see if apple could do something like this as well... either a phone or a pda i guess would be pretty cool
http://www.engadget.com/entry/1234000887049175/ The w800 is a phone/2mp camera which i've been rather impressed with/mp3 player with 512meg. Not really overflowing with web or pda functions but i have a pda for that :)
Yeah but that is it, when iPod came all mp3 players used some tiny memory cards and that is why it was so cool. So why the hell are we just taking steps back (phones as mp3 players with small storage). There are some PDAs with cameras, and you can play music on them, watch videos, you name it, but the main attraction is missing and iPod has it, the HDD and the sleek design.
And besides, there are PDAesque features in iPod, calendar, contactlists and whatnot, so just put a big touchscreen and stylus to it, make it wirelessly connect to your mac realtime (not just some synchronizing bullshit) and it's almost there.
I wonder if the batteries can finally be replaced...
the batteries in the iPod were always replaceable, they were never soldered to the logic board. you can open the case with a plastic screwdriver, and you have to do that every 2-3 years, no big deal. (the only model where you can't change the battery, is the iPod shuffle.)
1. Winamp has always crashed on all of my computers 2. I find the menus confusing and arbitrary 3. I cannot comprehend the visualizations, and 99% of them look like crap or don't work. 4. It's way too small, and most of the skins look ridiculous (why would I want my music player to look like a space-gun?) 5. Repeat 1 - 4
Well, I haven't had any big problems with Winnie, and my only rant about it is that for a player, it takes way too much resources, it's a hog.
I don't know the performance of it in Macs but then again, I don't run anything in it, with the three letters organized in order 'win'. You can get a skin for it that is quite simple, and makes winnie BIG, or you can stop your whining about the smallnes of it and xml your own skin for it. And make the menus not so confusing.
I dunno, mark. I found the previous players a bit annoying as well and yes, they sometimes crashed on me, but I found it easy to use and simple to manage. That's pretty much why I've stuck through it. I'll agree that some of the menu's are completely arbitrary or for better words, a bit redundant they really need to fix some of that. However winamp 5 out of the box is pretty slick, I haven't had the need to change the default skin (which before was rediculously stupid looking and small) and now the shaded mode is sexier than ever.
The plus side is, I can minimize it all to the task bar, or give it a docked hiding mode to move out of the screen like the taskbar and call on it when needed. So overall they've made several improvements to it. It doesn't seem to be a huge resource hog on this system at all. However I can see slower computers around the 1.4ghz mark with 512 of ram or under seeing a hit in performance.
Simply, if you have a box worthy for some simple 3d games, you should be able to run winamp 5 without any or many problems.
Yeah, well I'm one of those "what is this program x.exe? *gasp* it takes more than 1k memory! time to terminate, I don't care if it is my grandmothers lifesupport, off it goes" guys.
So I'm fond of using foobar2000 or 2.91 version of winnie :D
Basically, if they were to drasitcally change it it wouldnt be an mp3 player anymore. I actually hate the fact that they put pictures in there ( the color screen is nice though )..and then theres a rumor about it getting video....
Is this an mp3 player or a palm ?
That's what i really like about vanilla..its a forum .. period..
but that is the problem, why the hell they make new iPods when they already had four of them? This is just so very Apple of them, they don't continue single product line long enough for it to become cheap to manufacture.
Apple has had few very innovative concepts with iPod and you can clearly see that they aren't just considering it a mere entertainment system, but a left hand for your Mac, no need to go and get a palm, iPod can do it too, but they are balancing on a very fine line of entertainment systems with intergrated information abilities. What I was basically saying, I want a information system (yes basically a palm) with intergrated entertainment system like iPod and not those shitty 32Mb memorycard players or some fake ripoff of a player like that.
They took their sweet time to put HDD in to a video camera, why are they taking their sweet time to put a HDD in a device that actually needs a HDD a freaking palm, I'm suffering here, I have to haul external HDD with me between home and work just to keep myself up to date when I'm working at home, since I'm a graphic designer, I need several gigabytes of space for photos and such.
You got your musical salvation hombre, where is mine!
Nah man, I have looked about every pockie there is, and I'm just not impressed by anyone, I think I have to go for a tablet pc, altho it doesn't get me off from lugging a bag around, it is way better than some half-assed toys.
Oh and why doesn't Apple make Tablet PCs? They seem pretty popular in states, aspecially amongst students, who are actually one of the main demographic for iBook.
i dont quite understand kosmo's second to previous post, but i agree a decent size hard drive in a pocket pc would be a good innovation. At current you can hook up 4gig of storage (2gig SD and CF cards) but that doesnt quite cut it.
@the aloha: Well, suprising as this may sound, I have a few friends who stand by apple hardware. They swear by it, notice I only said the hardware because, they toss OSX out and just load any flavor of linux on the system instead and claim it runs far more stable than it would on any PC configuration. I want to agree with them, but I still don't like the pricetags that come with those systems
One TiBook please...
"Will you be paying with your soul, or your first born?"
I have a LifeDrive (PalmOne) with 4GB built in, and 2 gig SD card. That is PLENTY for a handheld device. Plus it has built in WiFi, so I can connect to my local network (at home and at work and in my neigbours house [to my network... that thief]) and transfer my files if needed.
I also dislike PocketPC. some of the devices are better than the palmOne devices, but I just can't stand the OS.
I've got two debian machines, two xp machines, one apple g4, and one linux firewall. I guess you could say that I subscribe to no particular OS, but use each for my own strange and terrifying purposes.
David, depends on what desktop you're running atop gentoo tho, personally, I like xfce. It's kind of sharp and easy on the eyes. While apple hardware does look nice, I don't care for what it looks like as long as it does it's real job. It's kind of like buying a SUV without taking it offroad making the purchase there rather pointless. In terms of hardware, you could be sacrificing function just to have an overly priced pretty little box. However I will agree that some of the apple cases do look nice, it's what's inside that really counts though.
ooh, xfce is nice. i think the site was down last week when i was looking for other window managers. gnome really hasn't progressed much since 2002 when i was last using linux on the desktop.
/me jump-starts portage
oh...and the other reason i like macs: it just works. i feel like i spend too much of my time in linux fighting libraries and compilers and config files making things work the way i want them to.
I like Macs because you just can't do anything graphics heavy on a PC they just choke, I don't know where the problem is, but if I kick up Painter and start painting with watercolors, the fucker slows down to a crawl (comp. Athlon FX-55, 2Gig ram, GF7800GTX) and when I put it on my Maccy mac, which is way slower when you look at the specs, I can paint with water colors, have photoshop and firefox open and background and my Toon standgin around in world of warcraft. The memory control and processor workload is a charm in Apple comps, they don't reserve mem and cpu for applications running on background like WIN does (get it, win does, windows, haha, I'm a riot).
"It's kind of like buying a SUV without taking it offroad making the purchase there rather pointless" So...basically like 95% of SUV purchases worldwide...?
For the record, i agree with both arguments. I'd love a mac and they are very pretty; but their price tag means i have even less use for them than i would anyway. Which considering most what i do on this pc is browse vanilla, i dont really need much :)
Just a sidenote, if you take SUV offroad, it will propably break it, SUVs are not ment to get offroad. There are literally thousands of Hummer V2s and other such SUVs brought for repairs because the toon tought that he could take a shortcut through a forest with it.