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The scenario in the article assumed that people would replace their players after 18 months (After all, that's how long an iPod's battery lasts ;^). Personally--and maybe I'm not into music or players--I can't see replacing a music player after 18 months, short of planned obsolescence (ie, replacing the battery in the device costs more than a new device would) unless something really new and cool comes along.

For example, I have a 2G iPod nano which works great. I don't see any reason to spend money on a 3G iPod nano. I wouldn't get one unless my 2G iPod nano, for some reason, went belly-up.

So that's the neat question. Will the music be mine as long as I own the device? Or is it more like a cellphone-type contract that I get with the player (eg, free music for 18 months and then I have to pay a "subscription-fee")?

I would imagine there wouldn't be any restrictions on copying your music from one compatible device to another one. After all, when you bought the new device, you paid for the subscription just like you did with the old device.

If you're reading Slashdot and you think the iPhone sucks you really have to ask yourself what your motivation is for that.

Perhaps something like this...

Even the animated UI is not done with little cutaway movies but rather there is an animation engine in there.

Heh, another thing thats great on battery life. If you really believe talk time numbers from any corp (esp Apple) then I have a RAZR for you. Apple not giving the iPhone a user replaceable battery is retarded - there are thinner and smaller phones than the iPhone which have no difficulty with it.

The iPhone isn't going to be a bad phone because of price, features, or carrier - simply because its battery will be dead all the time, rendering it useless as a phone..

Oh yeah, beacause iPods were so successful at working:

http://www.ipodsdirtysecret.com/

http://www.appleipodsettlement.com/ (what a joke)

I've engineered a solution, which is to not give a crap about Apple until they can come out with a product that is well designed, well supported, won't break after two weeks of use, and, oh yeah, can be fixed by anyone when something minor goes wrong - maybe then I'll start groaning at the predictable journalism jokes.

(yes, I know the iPod has had replaceable batteries for a year or so now, but that doesn't change the fact that for three years, they didn't).

Apple has a great product (I own one myself, and I LOVED it), but the ipods have a few flaws, ok,ALOT of flaws.

If Amazon could design a device that a) has a battery that doesnt die after 1 year b) has a hard drive that doesn't die after 1 year I'd be alot happier.

I have a 5 year old mp3 player that still works great (too bad it only holds 128 megs). My 4G ipod just died after 1 year 1 month exactly (never dropped it or anything which would damage it in any way). Now, I understand hardware can die, but for $400, I'd expect it to last more then a year. Luckily I bought a 2 year warranty so I got mine replaced for free, but many other people weren't so lucky and now have a $400 paperweight.

If your ipod isn't under warranty you can always get the battery replaced for around $60-70, if its the hard drive, you might aswell buy a new one. I will never buy another iPod or Apple product again after the stress and fustration this ordeal has caused me.

This last christmas, my sister and her husband decided to buy themselves 2 ipod nanos, they ended up returning them and getting replacements about 5 times because they didnt work (each replacement didnt work either). They eventually gave up on the nano and bought 2 ipod videos.

I'll probably be modded down for speaking out against Apple/ipod.

dead ipods faulty ipods

Ipod Battery Class Action Lawsuit Class Action Lawsuit against Apple for their faulty Ipod Nano Apple settles Ipod Class Action Lawsuit

The iPod Customer Service Story and Other Fairy Tales

http://www.ipodsdirtysecret.com/

Hopefully Amazon's "ipod" will work for more then a year. I could care less about how it looks, it will be in my pocket 99% of the time anyway. So please, design something that is a quality product, not just pretty looking.

Not sure, but I think the claim might have been for the fact that Apple did _not_ provide replacement batteries.

See http://www.ipodsdirtysecret.com/message.html

Not to hurt any fans here on /. but I wonder if the customers have to go to court for something as trivial as a battery, does Apple really deserve the kind of following it actually does.

I first came to know of this battery thing here http://www.ipodsdirtysecret.com/message.html

Its good to have good products, and I believe Apple makes really good products, but I guess they need to be a li'l more flexible with something as trivial as a battery.

• Have a video that documents the iPod was designed as a disposable item.
  
• Subsequently reward Apple with record sales and then
• Sue Apple for selling disposable iPods.

Or he could just wait a few months. Checkout the link it is really good.

For all the shit we give MS$ here I'm just glad Apple never got the monopoly. Had they we would all be on iMacs, with an iMouse, an iKeyboard, with an iPod (which of course can only play music from iTunes), we would be connected to an iPrinter, which can only use iPaper, and of course it would all be plugged into iPower (as all devices would require speical electrical currents) ;-)

Despite how bad MS$ can be, the first think I do every morning and last think I do every night is thank Bill G for saving us from Steve J! ;-)

I assume you plan on dying within a couple of years.

I can recharge the battery in my iPod.

iPod's battery lasts only 18 months

I think the term you are looking for isn't "User" but rather Bigot . I use a Mac at work. I even like it. I even didn't mind adding Mac troubleshooting skills to my Windows and Linux skills-- it wasn't that different. I would even go so far as to say that I prefer doing 90% of my Real Work at a Mac. (Games are another story.) But I while I think the iPod is kinda cool, I'm not planning on replacing my Archos Jukebox 20 until it keels over dead... which, incidentally, won't be due to the batteries. I have better ways to waste my money than donating to the Church of Steve.

I'd also disagree slightly with the assessment of the review. Based on what's said, there may be some interest in the material to anthropologists (amateur and professional) who study computer nerds. If I see the book at Barnes & Noble, I might sit down and leaf through it for an hour or two. I might check it out if it hits the local library. I wouldn't spend real money on it, though.

Well, listening to the man from 'Apple' on the http://www.ipodsdirtysecret.com/[ipodsdirtysecret. com] says so... Maybe it's changed since then, or even better, Apple changed their policy.

Will it make your iPod quit working?

No, iPods do that on their own.

As for your sig...

Why are there only 19 people folding@home for slashdot?

In my case it's because their client is buggy. It would launch and quickly proceed to kill off the actual crunching engine. No worries, now that distributed.net is back to running useful projects (like OGR) I can use them.

• Player size in centimeters, grams, and gigabytes.
• 
  The quality of the user Interface.
  The aesthetics of the exterior appearance.
  File transfer speed to your computer.
  The battery life.
  The durability.
  The price.

But I found the happy medium... :-)

I buy music with iTMS. I've also discovered that RealPlayer 10 will play m4p protected AACs purchased from iTMS! Where does this make sense? I own a Sony NetMD minidisc player. (Very cool, not to mention cheap, gadget !) Sony's provided software is psycho-DRM riddled crap (the limitations of copying YOUR OWN FILES are ridiculous -- this was done to appease the Music division of Sony, obviously); however, the Sony NetMD plugin for RealPlayer allows unlimited and hassle free copying from your PC to the device.

Where's this come into play? I buy the music on Apple's store, and use Real's app to transfer it over to my device. Works like a charm! I can drive for hours listening to my Apple-purchased music, and not have to pay a ridiculous amount for an iPod.

To put it in perspective:

Price:

iPod: $350
Minidisc walkman with 6 minidiscs: $69.99

Battery life:

iPod: 8 hours
Minidisc walkman: 50 hours on 1 AA

Replacement battery:

iPod: $255.00
Minidisc walkman: $0.50

Storage:

iPod: xx GB
Minidisc: Unlimited

The iPod is a cool toy, but not practical. If you drop it on the floor, you'd freak. If I dropped my MD on the floor, it would probably keep working, but even if it exploded into a million pieces, I'd only be out $70. You can use the rest to buy a nice high-end set of earbuds and a steak dinner!

With anything you use headphones in you will get static when the headphone jack plug is moving around. So is this problem going on when its just there not moving? It sounds like Apple is going to have another problem on their hands (none of us could forget the infamous iPod battery breaking down and iPod's Dirty Secret

You must be new here...

iPod's Dirty Secret

I find it rather pathetic when everybody jumps at everything that might offer some sort of alternative to a M$ product/format. Esp. when it is Apple. I daresay that had M$ not been as successful as they are today, it would be Apple getting it in the arse everytime they incline themselves at angles greater than 5 degrees. I'm no M$ flag-carrier, but I find it annoying when people dislike Microsoft, but support another company full of equally insitutional techno-babble :S

Apple make way too expensive computers that usually are more hype than anything else.. Their software is very expensive, ugly and buggy.. They too take their customers for a ride, and can be just as obnoxious a company as their lost brethren over at M$..

There's no need for yet another propietary (?) format in the market (esp. one associated with Quicktime :S), and those who invest in it for the sole reason that it is not a M$ product need to be tarred and feathered .. :S People should plainly not support anything even remotely associated with DRM - boycott 'em all, just the same way as everyone should boycott anything vaguely associated with biometrics..

Apple was hammered by their loyal customers quite a bit last year. Black Cider ripped them a new one for widespread problems with the logic boards in the iBook, and made even more bad press for them by exposing their attempt to convince everyone who complained that they were the only ones having problems. The "screw through the apple" Black Cider T-shirts at MacWorld received a lot of press attention.

Meanwhile, the Neistat brothers distributed a hilarious video protesting the 18 month life of the nonreplaceable battery in the original iPod, forcing Apple into emergency spin control mode which resulted in a $99 battery replacement policy to avoid bad press during the launch of the iPod Mini.

Overall, the past year has seen the devout Apple crowd stand up on their hind legs and protest for a change. I think that's a good thing, even though I also think Apple designs innovative and high quality products. If they were starting to slip a bit, vocal consumers put them back on track, and that's good for everyone. A lesser company would have remained in denial while trying to cling to their shrinking monopoly (and here I'm definitely thinking SCO, Microsoft, RIAA, etc.)

While this doesn't seem like an incredibly safe thing to do, it's certainly nice to see someone actually doing something about his battery instead of just bitching.

Probably not, according to this subversive gentleman. :)

iPod's battery isn't user-serviceable if you want to keep your warranty.

Even worse, originally they wanted to charge like $250 to replace it...ie, iPod is disposable, because for $250 (in 18 months time, when the battery dies) you can get a better iPod with a new battery. See here for more. (WMA movie [sorry] + link to text info)

It's only the result of immense public pressure and a load of lawsuits that have made Apple change their stance and give us a $99 replacement service.

I have an iPod myself and it gets 2-5 hours of use a day (at work mostly) and I'm pretty worried about the battery - Aus$670 is a lot of money for us students.

Don't get me wrong, it's totally sweet to use and it has changed the way I listen to music (of course, don't trust me, I'm hardly Dr. iPod), but if I'm paying US$99 to get the battery changed in 18 months I will be mighty pissed.

~ Tim

You say "The point is that, for the vast majority of music listeners, CD quality is the best they're going to get, unless they invest in a whole new system and replace their entire music library. That doesn't sound very tempting to most listeners."

We aren't talking about most listeners, please understand that, the original question was to the ability of the ipod as an audiophile device. Audiophiles are not "most listeners" They ALREADY have the dream system, they actually CARE about audio quality, they WANT high resolution audio wherever they can get it. The original question was NOT "Will joe blow like the ipod?" The answer is hell yes. The point I made in my original post was that the crowd of people who consider themselves audiophiles would typically not call anything "audiophile quality" that is at or below the sound quality of a Discman.

If you wish to make backups of your DVD-A or SACD you could patch the 5.1 outputs from your DVD-A or SACD player into any recording device you wish, there is no copy protection on those outputs. Is it possible to rip or copy one of these formats in the digital realm? Don't honestly know, I've never had to make one. Hopefully by the time I need to make a copy of a disc I own, someone will have cracked the copy protection, just as they did with DVD.

You said "If not, it's just another attempt for the industry to make more money while not offering much in return, as well as trying to lock-in more customers with their crap formats."
I'm sure many people said the same exact thing about DVD in its infancy. It's hard to say what the future for high res audio is, but any kind of progress to the aging CD Audio is very welcome in my book, just as an update to DVD in the form of HD-DVD is highly anticipated by many.

I actually don't listen to too much indy music. I don't listen to top 40 either. When at home, we will listen to Jazz, blues, some cheesy 80s new wave stuff.

I can agree with you that hopefully there will be a portable player that lets me play DVD-A and SACD. I know that the ipod plays music now at the highest resolution available to the majority, but AGAIN..we are not here to discuss the majority, we are speaking of audiophiles and their taste for quality. The audiophile community is far from "the majority of music listeners"

Yes I own an ipod, 10gig, luckily never had any battery flat out die but the battery life is much shorter than a Discman for obvious reasons, this is to be expected. I really enjoy my ipod for what it is, I even like using it as a portable hard drive, but when it comes to audio quality, I will take a CD player ANY DAY.

You said "It would be great if you would answer the questions I posed.. Would you mind?"
What question is that? If you mean the backup question, I offered some comment to that but don't have a more definitive answer.

About the web site, there's no need to get personal now and I would appreciate it if we would keep things focused here, but since you brought it up...
The company I work for just absorbed another studio and changed names, the old website is gone and there is a placeholder obviously. We recently posted several job listings on industry message boards. Many applicants wanted to see the type of work we do so I put a link to the reel on there for the time being. Our site does not get any traffic other than the job applicants I referred there. I was not really thinking of the general public when I added the link, I will go ahead and change that.

If the ipods were really going to have battery problems, surely somebody would have noticed during all these transfers.

Anyway, chalk up one more iPod award...

Assisted in obtaining The Return of the King 11 Oscar nominations

All of that data transfer... and none of it got released to the public by "accident?" We should be ashamed at ourselves.

Davak

- twice the battery life

I don't know about that one. To me, "over 8 hours" means 8-12 hours and "up to 16 hours" means 10-16 hours. I don't know if I'd try arguing that the DDJB has twice the battery life of the iPod. Longer life, almost definitely... twice, not likely.

Also, Apple has finally figured out that battery replacement should be an option and will do it for $100. (Which isn't cheap, but at least it is an option.) Does anybody know if the DDJB has battery life issues, if the battery is replaceable, and how much replacement costs?

As long as the battery is replaceable and doesn't blow up, I think I'd be content.

i agree that the average consumer would have little or no use for the ethernet capabilities of a rio, i was just highlighting a nerdy nice to have...

my main point was in the link, suggesting that the "internal, non-replacable battery of an iPod has a lifetime of only a year and a half..."
and before anyone asks, no, i cannot validate that claim, and i have not checked myself as to how true it is that the battery cannot be replaced...

but if that allegation is true, then that just sucks... and when the time comes for me to buy one of these players (and that time is soon with tax returns coming), that fact and that fact alone would dissuade me from even considering an iPod...

(2 cents)

it is a great product at first glance, but if this is true then i will avoid it all the same...

plus a past reader had it right, for about the same price you can get a Rio with ethernet support and ability to be integrated with linux...not so with apple...

At least according to the Neistat Brothers 18 months is the approximate lifespan of the unreplaceable battery. The only option is to buy a new one or spend nearly double to have them refurbish it.

This does not seem reasonable to me.

That's iPod's dirty secret - a little guerilla action which probably helped encourage Apple to actually allow battery replacement ...

A Friend of mine sent me this link....check it out!! IPOD

Don't rechargeable electric razors have the same problem?

SoniCare toothbrushes definitely do, check out their policy. They use NiCd batteries, and their page on battery replacement says that when the batteries die, break the toothbrush base in half and remove the batteries for proper recycling before throwing the rest away! It's a good thing you can't make movies with a toothbrush or the Neistat brothers would be all over this.

(Not in relation to the mini-iPods, as I don't know their specifications, but there seem to be enough idiotic battery posts, so...)

Q: Is the iPod's battery replacable?

A: Yes. Apple has an official battery replacement program for $99. You send your iPod in (any model iPod), and Apple will replace the battery for $99.

Q: Is the iPod's battery user-replaceable?

A: Yes and no. The iPod's case is not designed to be opened, so, in that repsect, it's not what you would generally refer to as "user-replaceable". But, the case can be opened, and there are several third parties that offer replacement batteries for the iPod, such as iPodBattery.com (instructions available at that link) and PDASmart, for as low as $49. Some will even do the replacement for you if you send it it.

Q: What's the deal? Does Apple think the iPod is disposable?

A: No.

Q: I heard that the iPod's battery only lasts 18 months, and then you have to buy a new iPod, is that true?

A: NO! The vast, vast majority of even the earliest iPods, now over two years old, continue to function just fine. Some iPods, however, have had issues with batteries. Lithium ion batteries are only good for 300 to 500 charge/discharge cycles. For this reason, certain customers' usage patterns may cause the batteries to degrade, or fail, sooner than others.

A2: If the battery does fail, and the iPod is no longer under its original one year warranty or $59 AppleCare Protection Plan, or any of numerous third party service plans, you don't have to buy a new iPod. You may replace the battery yourself for as little as $49, or have Apple perform the replacement for $99.

Q: Why didn't Apple use better batteries?

A: Apple used the best lithium ion battery technology available from leading battery manufacturers. This is the best, most cost effective battery technology available given the requirements of the device. The lithium ion batteries Apple uses are no different than lithium ion batteries used by anyone else. The battery should last most normal users several years.

Q: Why doesn't Apple make the battery easily replaceable, then? Or use different batteries, like AA?

A: Because if they did either, the size of the batteries and/or the access panels and mechanisms required to access the battery would make the unit significantly larger than it is, likely by several milimeters in thickness at a minimum, and it may possibly affect other dimensions as well. It was an engineering decision to use an integrated battery; if it were not integrated, the unit would not have the small, sleek form factor that makes it so attractive. Additionally, the iPod's battery is indeed replaceable, as has been discussed above.

Q: Well, no one else does that!

A: Wrong. Prime example: Dell's new DJ portable music player uses an integrated, non-user-replaceable lithium ion battery, just like the iPod. Dell also has no plan or program to replace batteries outside of warranty at this time.

Q: But, Apple only released their battery replacement service because of all the bad publicity from the Neistat brothers' video.

Wrong again. Apple released the battery replacement program as early as November 14. ipodsdirtysecret.com was only registered on November 20, and started being heavily publicized on November 21. Additionally, Apple had been planning the battery replacement program for months - these types of service programs don't just happen overnight - before Casey Neistat even had his first contact with Apple. The video campaign had nothing to do with Apple's rollout of the battery replacement program.

But they did implement the policy to keep the idiots quiet; they just waited for the right moment. Meanwhile, they maximized the amount of time in the market during which the public largely was unaware of the need to have periodic $99 service performed on the device or replace it at full price. Not only did they achieve higher initial sales volumes with this deception, they also gave buyers time to fall in love with all the good things about the iPod - the large hard drive, the acclaimed interface, the convenience, the iTunes integration, the general coolness. They gave the first wave of buyers enough time to become accustomed to the iPod that most of them can no longer imagine life without it, and now they will (happily or not) pony up another $99-$499 every couple years when their battery dies. Even Casey Neistat (the ipodsdirtysecret.com guy) bought a new one, and now says "We think Apple's new policy is fair.".

He apparently did that

...broke his ipod, and bought a new one...

What a dumbass. He bought another anyway... An experience like that would force me to look elsewhere. I'm sure apple wishes they had more customers like that guy. Spray paint campaign aside, he bought 2 ipods and will probably never use anything but apple anyway.

Yeah, you should really get that ipod

It used to cost $255 to get Apple to replace the battery, but after this guy got the word out, Apple mysteriously dropped the price to $99. Or you could go for a third party battery for $45.

Just remember that you can't replace the battery if it dies.

You will be buying a new IPOD as this unlucky customer found out.

Then tell me they did not produced a one sided piece of biased fluff that they purposely have not corrected.

Well, FWIW: A Message From the Neistat Brothers

To me, the fact that the iPod ships with a non-replaceable battery is pretty inglorious for Apple, to say the least. Many consumer electronic items have swappable batteries that do not require a trip to the shop (wrist watches, mobiles phones, digital cameras, etc., etc., etc.), and I think the iPod should as well. Sell the swappable batteries for $99 each, but don't make a product that has to be shipped in for a freaking battery replacement. Modularity is a good thing, especially as regards your energy source--and especially if your battery only ends up lasting 18 months, which is a complete joke in my opinion (though it's hard to know how much they used the thing--perhaps it's normal wear n' tear?). That said, our consumerist culture produces enough disposable garbage; we should be trying to reduce/reuse/recycle just a bit, no?

www.ipodsdirtysecret.com

That's not true. Until Nov 14, 2003, Apple wanted $255 to service iPod's with dead batteries. PDASmart, the $50 source you refer to, didn't source the battery until June 2003, 20 months after the iPod's introduction. The battery has a lifespan between 1 and 2 years. That means that there are people out there on the wrong side of the Bell Curve who have shelved their iPods because they didn't think paying Apple $255 to replace a battery on a $400 item was a fair shake. May not be a problem to you but ask those people why don't you?

What's really stupid about this is had Apple:

1. Made it easy to change a battery and...
2. Sourced the battery from the beginning.

...none of them were built to still be running by the 2 year mark. There's an interesting bit of indie film making here (requires quicktime) on what looks like the 18 month shelf life of the non-replaceable battery in the iPod. There's some more information here. Brief quote: Brothers Casey and Van Neistat, who collaborate on video projects using Mac editing software, said they were told by a technical support representative at Apple Computer that the cost to replace the dead battery in an 18-month-old iPod would be $255--comparable to the cost of a new device. Irked at what seemed to be the early obsolescence of the music player, the brothers trekked around New York City stenciling the words "iPod's unreplaceable battery lasts only 18 months" on all the iPod posters they could find.

It appears that iPod's DIRTY little secret is a flash-only site. Bravo, AC, for presenting your anti-iPod case in such an easily-accessible manner -- you truly are a Grandmaster of the Interweb!

Replacement batteries? $250 plus shipping: iPod's DIRTY little secret

their batteries will be dead already...

http://www.ipodsdirtysecret.com

yeah you keep telling yourself that fanboy, and we all know how friendly they are to their customers and the greatness of their products egh ?
http://www.ipodsdirtysecret.com/