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Rumors of Mini iPods
TheKidWho writes "According to Thinksecret: 'Reliable sources inside and outside of Apple have confirmed Apple will announce the new pocket-size iPods in a number of capacities and in various colors, including stripes. Capacities will be 2 and 4GB -- meaning users could store some 400 and 800 songs, respectively. Prices will start at around $100US, Think Secret has learned. It is not known if the new product line will be available immediately after introduction. It is also expected that current iPod models will be revamped to add body colors as well.' With the $99 price tag, it seems these rumored iPods could make big headway in the low end mp3 player market."
But will they introduce a user replaceable battery?
Evil people are out to get you.
Wouldn't it have been smarter to release these BEFORE the holidays? Are they so down to the wire that a Jan. 6 announcement is the last possible day they can release them?
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Can this be true?
Steve Jobs is well known for keeping a clean image on his products - it seems strange to me that he would allow rainbow iPods. Rumour has it he objected to the coloured backgrounds in the iPod adverts.
It seems strange that he would dilute the iPod brand at such a critical point in its existence.
Hmm.
Small iPods - no hard drives, only RAM based??
Time for Ogg Vorbis support too, don't you think?
I am iterested to see what kind of user interface Apple comes up with for such a small device. As a G3 iPod owner, I think the control pad is about perfect. Any smaller, and it wouldn't be as usable. Not to mention the hassle of scrolling through 5 gigs of songs on a smaller display.
But, I am usually impressed with Apple's industrial design, so I'll probably be impressed again (except for the color choices - I mean *stripes*? Ugh).
What kind of storage device would these use?
My first thought was the CompactFlash-sized "microdrive" hard drives developed by IBM (not sure if they belong to Hitachi now). A 1GB microdrive sells for about $200, though. Even with the volume discount Apple would surely get, it's hard to image they could hit that $99 price point at any capacity. And I guess flash memory is ruled out for price reasons too....
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All I want is the iTunes music store in the UK. My new 40G iPod is reading, meerly 2gig full. My credit card is ready, my bank account is ready. I've got enough of a buy list to spend 100 in 30 seconds.
So where the hell's the store!?
ThinkSecret actually has the best track record out of any apple rumor site. And I dont think Thinksecret EVER released any pictures of a forged Apple PDA.
as an AAPL shareholder, I do wonder what the margins would be on these.
Plus, would a new battery cost $99 too?
One thing I'd like to see is an AM/FM module on these. I have an AM/FM radio on my Sony MD player, which is nice.
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Because Apple's bottom line is far better served if a person spends $400 on a 20 gig model than $100 on a 2 gig model.
In that sense, it makes perfect business sense.
The *big* one, speculated about on http://www.macosrumors.com/
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seems more interesting to me. .
Sounds like an ideal companion to a mini-dv camcorder. If one could dump video to it in the field, and possibly do edits to it (portable iMovie?) - that'd be great. I don't really have much use for an ipod - too big for pocket transportability (really). Too small (storage-wise) to be useful as a semi-portable "desktop music server" - (though a G4 iBook serves that purpose pretty well).
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I run at least 18 miles a week with my iPod for the last 14 months or so. So far, no problems.
Of course it can't last forever, but it's lookin' good so far.
Finally - I can deal with a $100 iPod.
Apple tends to think that we all have oodles of money we can just throw at their neat gadets.
My budget has been cut since the economic down turn. Nice to see Apple givin' us po' boys a chance to participate.
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...or at least it would be QUITE a coincidence if they did not use these drives.
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With the $99 price point, replacing the battery is no longer necessary. Just buy a new one when your old one dies.
So you've got:
People buying iPods and exposure to 'Mac Life'
People buying Music to go with their iPods
People re-buying iPods to match their music when their iPod dies.
Is Steve finally giving apple a smart business plan to go along with smart products?
I've felt for a while that there wasn't any really good options for mp3 players for most users. Flash based mp3 players are either really low capacity (256mbs or less) or start going up significantly in price. The HD based one's seem to be just inflating the size with out decreasing the price and are far beyond the capacity of what most people need. The 2-4gb size range would seem to be the sweet point for me and if apple can put something as slick as thier Current iPods out at the 100-150$ price range I think it's gonna be a huge hit.
I recall some arcticle on slashdot i think about some drive manufacturer working on small 2-4gb hd's that they where trying to decrease cost and power consumption by integrating as many things into a single chip on the drive as possible, eliminating the caching on the drive etc. Basically just simple cheap low power storage for portable devices. Sound like the type of thing they would be using.
This is not at all the case. Copying your music to the iPod happens automatically by default. You can get songs off the iPod with lots of 3rd party software tools. It's much easier than any other mp3 player I've seen.
If you have to mortgage your house for a 50 dollar battery, you need to move anyway.
This is just silly. The only DAPs similar to these 'mini-iPods' are the Rio Nitrus @ US$219.99 SRP and the RCA Lyra RD2760 @ US$249.99 SRP.
So what we are to believe is that Apple is going to put out a 'mini-iPod' that has 3 times the capacity for less than half the price? Make sense: after all, Apple is known for putting out products that are all of sleek, stylish, well-made and cheap.
Wait, no, they aren't; we forgot the Apple Tax(tm)!
I can believe that possibly Apple is reading a 'mini-iPod', but if it's less than US$300 I'll be damned surprised.
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no, not flash, DRAM.
2 GB of flash is currently much too expensive. however, in volume, dram should be sufficiently cheap. yes, it's volatile. but if they have enough battery power to spin up and power a hard-drive, keeping dram alive for a few days at a time should not be a big deal. if you plug it into a usb port every few days, it should never lose power. and if it dies, well, you just have to reload all your music.
pretty clever.
Apple's in a very good position right now - they've managed to get themselves into the good books of both the Free software community and the music industry.
However, if they add Ogg Vorbis support to the iPod then they'll have to
It seems that they are pursuing the third option: ignore Ogg Vorbis and piss off the very small (and to them, not particularly useful) Xiph community.
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Because I'm a software geek, not a hardware geek. Sure, I'll spend a weekend building a PHP/MySQL app to organize my DVD collection, but the most I'll do with hardware is install a new hard drive or memory. I don't get off on "some assembly required" gear, and you can bet my nieces don't either. Now, $250 for 20GB is a pretty good price, but how well does it work? I love how well my iPod works, and it's nice to have all my phone numbers etc with me wherever I go too. Add to that the add-ons like the hookup for dumping photos from a digicam. So yeah it might cost more, but you get a lot more too. There's always a market for quality and features, and even some of us on slashdot shop that way sometimes.
Course, theres also a little bit of economics to consider here:
Lets say, the iPod had the choice of using 2AA batteries. Lets's say you got your AA's at $0.50(too high? too low? i dont have to buy them). Lets's see what youve paid for JUST BATTERIES over the "300-500" charge average lifetime of apples built in battery:
err, $300-$500... I made my math too easy =(
Probably more depending on how much you use the ipod, if the ipod could run on only 2AAs, and what quality battery you buy for it. Still complaining? If you are really desperate, i think some companies offer *gasp* external battery packs. But even at 99 bucks, Apples battery replacement nost likely means your not gonna blow double that much on batteries over the next few years.
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I have the original version of the ipod and I have had it 'come out' of the little pouch I made for it on my mtn. bike handlebars two times. I was going at least 15 mph and it hit the pavement and I thought 'oh #@$%! I just lost my pod! It was scratched and the center of the wheel came off but it works perfectly. Amazing
Most of my songs are over the 5 minute mark. Then I completely blow that away with a 20 minute version of Moby Dick from the Led Zeppelin DVD. Or, In-A-Gadda-Da-Vida. Or a two-hour trance mix from Oakenfold. I've found I just have to limit my playlists on my iPod by MB rather than time.