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Rumors of Next Generation of Ipods
xyankee writes "Apple is on the verge of releasing a 60GB iPod that will not only hold a ton of music, but also sport photo-viewing capabilities! Think Secret is reporting that the new iPod will also have a 2-inch high-resolution LCD display, video-out, and enhancements to iPhoto for synchronizing photos. The best part is it'll be just 2mm thicker than regular iPods. Does this mean that iPhoto for Windows might not be far behind? Also, as a note to all the rumor pundits, Think Secret nailed the iMac G5 specs a month before its announcement, so I'm inclined to believe them with this bit as well."
60GB = Lots of pr0n
P0rn to go.....
How handy !(pun intended)
Think Secret, while not 100% accurate, does have a pretty darn good track record for pre-release specs. It's certainly the most credible Mac rumor site out there. I'm inclined to believe them as well. Now I just have to find $500...
didn't the iPod make it because it played MP3s, and played them well?
Think Secret also spent a lot fo time showing the new Apple PDA along with supposed screen shots and that never surfaced...
Produced in Asia -- anyone know where?
Put identity in the browser.
I could see using video out, but still photo output? Seems like a pretty pointless feature for an MP3 player.
That's 2 times bigger than my hard-drive! I know that some people have large amounts of music, but isn't this overdoing it? Who would buy this thing compared to a cheaper 20GB one?
the iPod mini is also rumored to bump up to 6gb. (less is more, suckaz!)
// I will show you fear in a handful of jellybeans.
I hope not. Maybe the photo viewing capabilities could be a good reason to consider a Mac? Or I suppose they could use the media reader. Hm... good point though about iPhoto and Windows.
I'm not sure that the ability to view photos would be an incentive for me to upgrade to a newer iPod; the screen would just be too small to make it worthwhile. However, the idea of integrating the iPod with iPhoto to make it easier to transport photos from one place to another would be appealing. Being able to sync a smart list of recent photos to the iPod before going back east to visit the family would be really cool...
versus what, low-resolution etch-sketch display?
The article says in the next 30-60 days. Although that makes sense in terms of the holiday shopping season, didn't they just come out with the 4th gen ipod, oh, 3 or 4 months ago? You still have problems finding accessories for the 4th gen--most of the cases sold in the stores are still for the 3rd gen ipod.
"Righteous speed demon and trust fund party darling of justice"
Someday they will manage the technological feat of incorporating an FM tuner into the IPod. When I have the option of listening to NPR or my music collection I may switch to the IPod. Right now I will stick with my IRiver player.
I thought the screen was the part on the iPods that broke most often... If that's true, (and it was in my case) I really hope they have better design to go with that larger screen.
This tagline brought to you by 1500 monkeys in just under 17 years.
When I bought my treo, I was so happy to ditch having to walk around with two geeky devices. So of course I ended up buying a 20 gig iPod and still walk around with two geeky devices. Jobs has said the smartphone is the future of the PDA - does that mean an eventual merging of these technologies?
www.lonseidman.com
This rumor seems plausible, but go to macrumors and there's always some rumor or another. Thinksecret may have the best record in getting it right, but their word isn't gold. Having said that:
I'm not that excited about a photo iPod. I worry about battery life, because my 3rd gen gets only about 6 hours. The 4th gen is better, supposedly double, but it seems to me a color screen will severely drain battery life.
Now that my powerbook has a DVD burner, I find it pretty easy to burn a picture DVD in DVD Studio Pro (not free), but it plays pretty much everywhere and the media is now dirt cheap in bulk. And it has music, menus, etc. The iPod just seems like a gimmick in this arena. But maybe Stebe will surprise me!
PS Hey Stebe give me the wifi iPod rather than the photo iPod!
Or is everybody in Starbucks dimension where a cup of coffee + maple syrup costs $5.
That's why it maybe has a TV-Out.
Terrible office day. My secretary went sick, we lost a major contract and a little white dwarf turned me into a banana.
Uh, others have been doing this for years, with bigger screens.
One example
With the option of viewing images, maybe it allow's you to view animated GIF's? If so, it certainly is fesable to convert a whole movie into one big animated GIF to watch on it, especially with 60GB of storage!
Wait a moment... This thing has "sport photo viewing capabilities"? So I can only look at sport photos? I dunno... I prefer to see my sports through a video feed of some sort more than I like still photos. :)
The World Wide Web is dying. Soon, we shall have only the Internet.
People who want to claim it as a business expense is who. A 60GB iPod would be ideal for data transfer as a FireWire/USB2 portable drive. I'd consider buying one for this purpose and could claim it against profits as a business expense.
And if the new iPods can be connected directly to a digital camera to store, sort, review, and manage photos in the field, I'd be able to leave my laptop behind on shoots.
The only time a new feature is a bad thing is if it impairs the access or usage of an existing feature. If Apple can implement picture viewing without changing the UI dramatically, or the input method (click wheel), and doesn't make the form factor too large or the battery life too short, I'm all for it.
I wish companies would stop shoving all those features into the new devices.
I'm sure a bunch of people would find high resolution color displays useful, but i wish someone would concentrate on making a device that simply plays music, is small and has long battery life.
How long until Apple forces this article off the net?
EXCLUSIVE: 60GB iPod to pack photo-viewing features
By Ryan Katz, Senior Editor
October 8, 2004 - After three years of being synonymous with "digital music player," Apple's iPod will widen its horizons and gain photo-viewing capabilities within the next 30 to 60 days, highly reliable sources tell Think Secret.
The new iPod, which will sit at the top of Apple's fourth-generation line-up, will pack Toshiba's new 60GB 1.8-inch hard drive, a 2-inch color liquid crystal display, iPhoto synchronization, audio/video-out capabilities, and will sell for $499.
The new iPod is currently in production in Asia after delays from Toshiba in delivering its new 60GB drive hampered a planned early-September ramp up. Sources confirm Toshiba started shipping the drive to Apple in mid-September and iPod manufacturer Inventec began building the new device in the last two weeks.
The new iPod's form factor will be identical to the existing 4G iPods, sources report, but will be two millimeters thicker than the current 40GB iPod and marginally heavier.
The 2-inch color screen is identical in size to other iPods, but will sport a higher resolution for photo viewing. However, the new device's real shining feature will be its video-out port, which will enable users to tote their photo galleries with them, ready to be plugged into any television for big-screen viewing.
The 60GB iPod will feature only rudimentary built-in software for viewing photos, with no editing tools, sources say. Photo albums will be navigated in a similar fashion to music playlists, and a slideshow feature will provide transitions with user-specified background music, similar to iPhoto. Synchronizing features similar to iTunes will also be added to iPhoto.
The new iPod won't feature built-in flash memory stick slots for downloading photos from digital cameras, although such a feature will presumably be able to be employed through Belkin's $99 Media Reader.
Sources indicate that Apple will market the new photo iPod as being capable of storing 20,000 music tracks and 25,000 photos. As an added bonus for music fans, album artwork will be displayed on screen when it's available for a selected track.
Rumors of a 60GB iPod first surfaced in June, when Toshiba said that it was in the process of developing a 60GB drive and, much to the ire of Apple, confirmed that the iPod maker had already committed to buying it in quantity.
Photos, eh? No thanks. I'm all in favor of throwing some additional functionality into the iPod, but I'm not sure photos should be it, any more than I'm sure that a camera goes with a cell-phone. I for one would rather them port iCal to Windows and add some more advanced PDA functionality to the iPod. People who already want an iPod might finally drop the cash if it was also a decent PDA and could replace their old Palm or what have you. That's something people need. Does anyone really need a a portable digital photo album? If simple transportation is your goal, the iPod already does that. . .
"The problem with internet quotations is that many are not genuine" -Abraham Lincoln
As digital cameras keep producing larger and larger file sizes, it's getting to be quite worthwhile to have someplace to dump the contents of your flash cards.
If this new i-pod has a CF reader built in, I wouldn't need to carry half a dozen 512MB flash cards, I could just fill one card, dump it into the i-pod and keep on shooting.
Devices like this do exist already, but none of them are really easy to use and carry.
They've pretty much just released the 4th gen; no way they're coming out with a 5G so soon.
Simple as that.
Drop it in the toilet of the men's restroom at your office.
ipods lick balls.
So...you can't afford one either, eh?
I'm quite happy with my much cheaper, able-to-play DivX and Xvid movies, Linux-running, JUST AS SMALL AND WITH EQUAL BATTERY LIFE Archos gmini400.
the way of the cell phone? assuming this rumor to be true, are we seeing yet another device have "features" added on to a product who did its job well and is now going to be ruined by unnecessary additions?
The only way to get rid of a temptation is to yield to it.
-Oscar Wilde
What i would like to see is a winamp style visualation feature. Just use a QVGA 16-bit color screen.
I know, you dont NEED it, but it would be better than picture support.
A digital camera adapter
I could see a 4 MP camera that would attach right to the bottom of the iPod. Now that would be cool, an iPod with photo-taking capabilities. There might just be a good market for that. Plus, 60 GB of photos in your camera would be sweet ...
***
why photos? next is will have a phone... then a camera..
why not just let it be for music and leave it be? clearly, i'm no Apple R&D specialist.
Comment removed based on user account deletion
"Think Secret is reporting that the new iPod will also have a 2-inch high-resolution LCD display"
Not if they don't license it....
will be a price reduction on the now-deprecated music-only iPod. Imagine that, a mono-functional portable device! Not to mention, now that the annoying white-headphone yuppie assholes on the subway will have a new top-of-the-line useless gadget to run out and by, I might actually feel comfortably inconspicuous owning an original iPod.
Ut Tensio, Sic Vis
It has a simple interface but a lot of what it does isn't that good - duplicate photos everywhere, lack of support for media types, etc. Better off using something like Directory Opus with its recent media handling improvements, amongst other things.
Damien
n/t
I Photo for window is just stupid. Well, I guess the whole photo book creation thing is cool, but other than that Iphoto is not very impressive. But then again, I'm not impressed with itunes either. SO maybe what ever it is that people like about iTunes is the same sorta thing they like about iPhoto. I do however like grage band, but they really should have just kept going with their branding stratagey and just called it iRock. That would be cool. Almost cool enough to make apple cool. But not quite. I think for certian oddballs such as myself, a technology needs to have rough edges. It must be difficult so that we can feel pride in having accomplished a non trivial task. Like Garage band should behave as if everything is being recorded with equipment that a garage band might have. It starts raining as you're recording so water drips through the crack in the roof and hits the equipment. So it DEVELOPS problems WITH ConTroLinG The VOLUME AND FEEDBACK and feedback.
Wow that was a long winded rambling post. Well, thats what you get on friday.
Well.. maybe. Or Maybe not. But Definitely not sort of.
I'de actually buy an iPod if it supports ogg vorbis files. I'm too lazy to convert my music collection to m4a or mp3. Does anyone know if its possible to some way mod an iPod to play ogg?
mail to: fckwt@cmdrtaco.info
Does this mean that I can store videos (avi, qm, mpg), and have it played on my TV also?
Now that would make me buy it if I could not only have my music and images, but also a few movies that I can play via my hotel rooms TV when I'm on the road!
Yeah, I hate how their portable digital music player only plays DRM music.
Oh, wait, that is not Apple, that is Sony.
Well, I still hate how their media player software really only wants to rip in a DRM/proprietary format.
Oh, wait, that is not Apple, that is Microsoft.
What is Apple doing again?
Your argument is analogous to not buying a certain car because it comes with a tow-hook standard, and saying "I don't buy into this towing nonsense. I am not buying anything with a tow-hook." The damn car still works fine if you completely ignore the presence of the tow-hook!
News flash: You do not have to use DRM at all on the iPod.
(Not a football field of music?)
How will I lift it, with a ton of music in it?
The best part is it'll be just 2mm thicker than regular iPods.
Yeah, but how much thinner will your wallet be?
I can imagine being able to dump data from your camera to your ipod via firewire on the fly. While compact flash and SD cards are coming down in price, it would still be a whole lot cheaper to have a 60GB storage device ($400?) that would double as a viewer -- saving your camera battery.
Oh, it would be wicked cool if the iPod would display the album art of any songs it's playing - with the song name superimposed over the top. Ahh
Imagine what this capability would do for the interface in general...
Yum. I'd buy.
My antiquated 20 GB Archos Jukebox Multimedia has been playing MP3s and showing photos and videos for a few years (not to mention taking photos and videos through a low-quality camera attachment).
The iPod succeeded because of its tight integration and sync via iTunes and its superior UI. Syncing my Archos is a pain, but it is well ahead in the feature set.
Just so you don't think you heard it from Cringley first:
I predict that, within three years, and using its patent for color-changing plastics, Apple is going to give you an iTV.
I'd also like to take this opportunity to say:
Screw you Gates. Microsoft doesn't innovate shit.
With this new iPod Apple could target movie downloaders. The most common format for a movie is mpeg4-encoded file. A 700MB file containing 1.5 hour movie looks not much worse than DVD on TV screen; and if you spread it over 2 CDs it's almost DVD quality. You can fit almost 100 movies on 60GB hard drive.
Now, many of newer DVD players today can play mpeg4 movies encoded with popular codecs such as DivX and Xvid.
So, iPod will have video-out? Great news. It should alsom inclode those codecs and a player (QuickTime?) to become a portable video device!
You could download collection of movies from you PC on 60GB drive and go visit friends or maybe go on holiday... And play movies anywhere where there is a TV. Apple could grab a hude chunk of market from DVD players...
And then, if you get one of those ridiculous video goggles on... Who needs a TV or a cinema?
--
And I'm not talking about voice notes, either, but CD-quality, stereo, uncompressed audio, from a mic or line input. The iPod chipset is supposed to support this already, so all it would need is a software update. Apparently...
I do concert recordings (with permission), and that would make things so much easier. [fx: sigh]
Ceterum censeo subscriptionem esse delendam.
Why can thy not just do this with a fireware update, unless you really need your pics in color, I gray scale phote might be nice even on todays ipods.
how long before i get all the spam for a 60gig ipod??
iPod 4G is the same form factor as iPod 3G. The accessories are the same. If anything, Apple should be worried about people developing aversions to being early adopters if release cycles are going to be so close together.
What is this, the 5th time iPod video or photo rumors have surfaced? I think if apple wanted to do this, it would have been done a while ago. How long have there been products in this sector, 3 years or so?
I get a "cry wolf" vibe from rumor sites these days.
"I forgot my mantra."
I live in Switzerland, and I ordered an Ipod mini about three months ago. Due to a shortage, however, I waited for two months, and nothing happened. Then I decided I don't want to wait forever, so I'll go with a 4th generation Ipod with clickwheel. Ordered that one instead. After another month of waiting, I gave up completely. Stores all over Europe are complaining about massive shortage of Ipods. The only model they occasionaly have in stock here is the pink Ipod mini.
And now the talk of a new super-cool model! Come on Apple, first things first!
Comment removed based on user account deletion
We're gearing more and more toward the big-ass harddrive PDA MAKE IT ALREADY.
full coverage front screen that double as a touch controller for the music side and the when-you-need-them controls that iphoto has on the mac - you need to do what a tungsten can do and what iphoto can already do - you don't want your breakthru features to be behind existing stuff.
"Win treats sysadmins better than users. Mac treats users better than sysadmins. Linux treats everyone like sysadmins."
But what about all the really cool visulizations your could now run on your ipod screen?
You just know someones going to come up with that now that it has a color screen.....
Yawn...
Archos AV400 supports audio, video (divx/xvid), photos and act as a USB external drive too. 80GB models are available today and work with most any OS.
It seems to me that iPods tend to be more of a status symbol than a breakthrough in technology.
[This is not meant as a flame. I own a 17" Powerbook myself.]
..
Yet I bet Mac-addicts are already swooning over Apple's "innovation" on this one.
I am the maverick of Slashdot
With a big enough screen couldn't the NewtonOS be put on that bugger?
But I would not mess with a phone. With Bleutooth who needs it anyway?
Hmm. Maybe. But only if it is cheap and unobtrusive. Now if you could also RECORD radio on the iPod you'd be talking. But let's look a little further ahead - imagine an iPod with a satellite radio tuner and recording capabilities. Combine that with a car interface, and a home stereo docking station, and you are the bees knees!
My beliefs do not require that you agree with them.
(Yeah, silly name)
dpreview.com (scroll down)
dpnow.com
Looks very interesting...
Cell phones take a lot of abuse and I doubt current HDDs can take it. Flash may be an alternative as most songs probably aren't going to change. Getting their cost to storage ratio down is the key.
One major issue remains. Battery life. How to overcome the battery life issue when you combine all those features? One company recently dropped their "do all phone" because of battery life. Now to toss a HDD in there?
I would lean towards streaming music to a cell phone before throwing a HDD into one.
* Winners compare their achievements to their goals, losers compare theirs to that of others.
After buying my Axim X30 PDA for $260 last week, I can't understand why anyone would spend that amount of money on something that *just* plays MP3s. What??? The new one will show pictures? What a marvelous feat! Not really, I can watch streaming divx movies/TV from my home network from anywhere in the world with a internet connection. I have a touchpad screen that allows me to easily find/change between songs while commuting versus having to use a scroll wheel. Those are just a fraction of the uses. Sure, the most useful features of PDA's might be difficult to set up for non-geeks, but that still doesn't justify Apple ripping people off in the CE market. What? They rip people off in every market they are in? Guess they're just following trend then. I feel sorry for those who are suckered in to the way of the iPod, and any geek who reads /. and has an iPod should be ashamed of yourself. Ditch the iPod, save your money, by a far less expensive PDA and have a much more enjoyable commute. Sure they don't have the storage of an iPod by using CF or SD cards, but when iPods first came out, they held a fraction of the storage they have now, and I didn't here anyone complaining. Buy a gig card, mix some MP3s, movies, games, quake, etc... and you'll be entertained for hours. Do you really need 60gb worth of MP3s at your fingertips? No. I have over 100 gb of MP3s on my home server and I can handle only having 512 meg SD card(s). At least Microsoft's CE supported devices are actually multifunctional. Don't be stupid, don't get an iPod.
I think what he meant to say is "IPODS can now let you watch people LICKing BALLS." ... or something like that.
I'm going to go create my own technology news site, with blackjack and hookers. You know what? Forget the news site.
How long before the iPod comes with a built-in camera? Seems to be a much better device for adding a still/video device to versus a phone. Plenty of space to record large video files, big enough drive to store full-length movies, looks good enough to use as a digital picture frame... -Uncle
BBspot (my site) already reported on the next generation of iPods a few weeks ago.
...for me anyway. That's the only gadget I feel I really need to have with me at all times. Would I like a digital camera, an MP3 player, and a PDA? Hell yes! But I don't want to have to wear the Batman Utility Belt to carry them all. There are some devices that come close, but none really have that Apple touch.
Granted, if you rolled all of those things into one device, the quality of each would probably not be as good as if you kept them separate. But I'd sacrifice some quality (and my cash) for one device that did all of those things.
The day I buy an iPod? When it uses VOIP for communication. When it has a mini iSight that swivels outward for photo taking, inward for videoconferencing, and sideways for storage. When it has not only iPhoto built in, but also iChat and iCal. All of that plus the original MP3 player is enough to make me shell out the cash.
Then again, maybe it's just not possible right now to incorporate all of that in a small enough form factor to make it comfortably portable.
I'm sorry, but your opinion seems to be wrong.
I'd rather have an XM or Sirrus reciever, although I am sure the technology currently wouldn't fit, but as someone mentioned, the whole reason to have an iPod is so that you don't have to listen to crappy programming on FM (NPR, etc, excused).
Yes! Yes! Please!
Give me iPhoto for Windows then I'll have no more Mac envy! (Though I'll still be waiting for a version of Mac OS X that will run on my VAIO.)
Sam
When I say that future iPods may have a WiFi capability (probably just to act as a remote for the Airport Express AirTunes...) I thought that they would have to add some other major features at the same time to justify the price hike that would most likely go along with it. I guess this is it!
In a recent print article for Film & Video (magazine web site), the authors wrote that producers and directors are using iPods to carry digital dailies between sites and VIPs. They did not mention how they viewed the video, however (I'd assume they were using the iPod as a high bandwidth sneakernet).
I did a little searching on the net and found another article that states the iPod was used for digital dailies during production of LOTR.
This upgrade in iPod capabilities seems like a logic step, perhaps even originating from a few Hollywood users....
ipods lick balls.
Now I see why they are so expensive.
*Cheaper iPods*! Not more features. Not color screens. The thing works great already. Break the $200 barrier and I'm in.
mlylecarlin
No, I hope I didn't come off that way. I was explaining how I felt, what I wanted. I never meant for it to seem as if I was recommending what technology should be for EVERYONE. I guess I can sorta understand why you think i have low self esteem. Thats sort of indicitive of the society that we live in. For the most part, our jobs are fairly easy and don't challenge us on a regular basis. So inorder to derive a sense of satisfaction we make easy things difficult and then claim victory after we win. I guess a part of that is true. But on the other hand if we don't exersise that problem solving aspect daily it goes away to die. So if we do things the difficult or creative way even when its not neccisary, we will be ready when it is required. Thats why you see silly things like Linux on XBOX. Or even OSX on Linux on XBOX. By the same margin, you could tell a runner that he's pathetic because it takes him 4 minutes to go a mile, when he could just drive a mile in a minute. But then again he doesn't do it for the ease. Just as he has a need to push himself physically, I have that need to push myself mentally. It doesn't make me better than anyone, no more than the best runner is the best man alive. Its just something that makes me a better me.
Well.. maybe. Or Maybe not. But Definitely not sort of.
Does this strike anyone else as so blindingly obvious that you're amazed it hasn't happened yet?
Equip the iPod with WiFi, marry with a sprinkling of Airport Express units around the house and you shall have music wherever you go.
I guess the power drain could be an issue, but I'd buy it.
Should this come to pass, I hope they do something about the battery life. While the battery life on my iPod is fine for me (makes it through the workday), it seems to be the biggest complaint people have (other than price) when comparing the iPod to the Dell, Archos etc MP3 players. I'm worried that adding a colour screen (including the requisite, brighter, always-on backlight), as well as the TV display will sap too much power.
"Reality is merely an illusion, albeit a very persistent one " -Albert Einstein
This is it. The beginning of Apple's "media center" strategy.
And it's completely different from the way Microsoft and others are approaching it.
Everyone else has been going about it from the respect of making a whole freaking separate *computer* a part of your entertainment/AV center. A computer with its own maintenance and patching needs, another computer that needs to be upgraded, another computer to break, etc.
Apple started it with AirPort Express...a wireless device, that integrates with your existing wireless or wired network, integrates with your entertainment center, has analog and digital optical audio outputs, and seamlessly meshes with the applications and techniques you ostensibly already use (or will switch to) for managing your music collection.
Now, an iPod, with a massive amount of storage, and clearly with a dock or some other capability to attach to an external video device, such as a TV, even if only for viewing photos. This means that some type of interface - whether it's on the TV or the iPod's own screen - has been built to navigate through items that reside on the iPod. Meaning that video playback (as long as the iPod and/or dock can handle the playback/decoding) would be trivial.
Imagine this: download a movie or other video content on your Mac. Perhaps via the iTunes Store. Sync with your iPod. Drop your iPod into its dock at your entertainment center. Select content (a movie?) and play. Simple. Clean. Doesn't require you to have 45 computers.
So, yes, this new iPod is "just as expensive" as a PC someone might build or buy to integrate into your entertainment center as a media PC. But think about NORMAL PEOPLE for a second. Think about how unbelievably cool this is.
Now you can make some connotation about how iPod owners will be art thieves too.
Regards, Steve J.
If this turns out to be true, and the iPod ends up having a nice color screen then Apple could have a real winner on their hands with the iPod + iSight combination. Right now the iSight only needs a firewire connection. With a color screen it would now be possible to use the two as a camcorder if Apple would support this. Apple sent college students to both the democratic and republican conventions with iBooks and iSights to do interviews with the delegates. It seems pretty obvious that that camcorder-like feature is on Apple's radar screen. Personally I could care less about video and more about audio recording. I wish Apple would allow 44.1khz lossless recording with the iPod. Then the iPod (plus external battery) would supplant the portable DAT recorder as the primary tool for LEGAL concert tapers. This is not piracy, but sanctioned recording from the artists. For more information see archive.org/audio
i want to know about the battery life for the new ipod. color screen? 60 gigs? i hope they increase the battery life by another 50% or I'm not buying.
The Archos AV400 supports audio, video (divx/xvid), photos and act as a USB external drive too. 80GB models are available today and work with most any OS. At every turn Apple is playing catch up but seems to have the marketing power behind it. I am suprised that so many geeks have fallen for it. Though, I am thinking less and less geeks hang out on /.
those of us w/ color screen cell phones know they're a bitch to see in sunlight
i assume it'd be the same on the ipod... since a lot of people (city workers, college kids, people who walk to work in general) are gonna be using these outdoors, i think a color screen would just piss a lot of people off.
...and that's all there is to it.
on my PornPod. Cool!
I drank what? -- Socrates
As soon as it has the ability to play back an album as it was originally recorded (i.e. without a 1 second pause between each track) then I might be interested. I mean, other manufacturers have figured it out - what's stopping Apple?
---- Den ene knappen er powerknapp, den andre er Bender voice knapp "Bite My Shiny Metal Ass"
I want to know if the games that come with a standard iPod going to be updated for color support? :-)
(Maybe even supply some new games)As a state gets corrupt, its laws multiply; the most corrupt states have the most numerous laws. (Tacitus, Annales 3:27)
A satelite radio capability would put this over the edge...
from the wired magazine october 2004 piece --
'DSC00234.jpg might as well be labeled DON'T_KNOW_DON'T_CARE.jpg'
time to get around to actually naming those
5000 pics you have lying around in iPhoto, because
thumbwheel search+display appears to work
better for mnemonic things.
The problem here is that iPhoto isn't anywhere near the killer app that iTunes is, even with an iPod. I think it would be smarter for the iPod to be able to display, say, album art and images in a "Pictures" folder on the root level of the disk, and let people use whatever program (or not) they wanted. iPhoto doesn't have much in the way of features. If it wasn't bundled with the OS, I don't think most Mac users would use it.
I mod down pyramid schemes in sigs.
So if its going to offer photo viewing, will it offer a color LRC?
3!
http://www.dpreview.com/articles/canoneos1dsmkii/
This camera has a 16.7M CCD.. maybe eventually this could be used for other semi-pro/pro photographers.
This had better come on the 30 day schedule for Apples sake. Christmas is just around the corner and a late Novermber release will not have the splash that a mid to late October one will. Especially if they keep it under wraps as Steve is prone to do.
Today is a gift. Save the receipt.
In order to be a really useful extension of functionality, the iPod that shows photos needs to be able to read CF-cards as well, so that I can transfers images to it on the go. Otherwise why bother carrying around a tiny 2-inch screen photo album?
Herbert von Kammerstein
Nosferatu Hacker extraordinaire! Well, I wish, anyways...
I'm ready to buy a 60GB Ipod as soon as it's available (have been sticking to my 1st gen. 20GB until now) - BUT it really needs a new version of iTunes, too. A couple of hundred playlists can barely be managed with the current SW, we need hierarchical playlist and we need them now!
[disclaimer: yes I have way too many legally bought CDs and yes I'm a major freak when it comes to sorting my music]
i have (we have three of them at our center) they are worse than a regular one - but there the tradeoff is against collecting six remotes. they mostly cost too much.
but they're not analogous to a music or photo player
they're not horrible, and a palm device is in this sense like a big remote given its soft buttons that are in fact used for music and other controls - so plenty of people use these - palm & pocketpc music controls are on screen, and when you're dealing with pictures you're already looking at the screen.
might not be as bad as you think, definitely worth a comparison to the non-scroll ipod controls and vs the palm controls...
mapping a recessed screen to the ipod scroll wheel micht provide just enough physical feedback on location to make it work...
"Win treats sysadmins better than users. Mac treats users better than sysadmins. Linux treats everyone like sysadmins."
Why would anyone have problems spelling this name?
Thats funny!
currently my 4th gen ipod can only hold a max of ~8 hours on a full charge, and that is with the backlight turned off...
At which point, it'll finally have reached feature parity with EMACS.
-Mark
The real benefit of this type device is that it brings us one step closer to a 'Portable Profile' feature - allowing one to connect to ANY Mac via Firewire and 'login' to their roaming profile. With an iPod to transport LARGE files like A/V and a .Mac Account for managing preferences when you are Internet connected but don't have an iPod. The two (iPod and .Mac) would work well together and would help bolster the recurring revenue stream for Apple.
(PLUS, they would show non-Apple users how much farther ahead Apple is in the user experience game.)
I only came here to do two things; kick some ass, and drink some beer...looks like we're almost out of beer.
Ah, the "Home on iPod" feature that disappeared from the Panther release. I'm rather hoping that it'll reappear in Tiger.
Combine that VideoPod with the iPodder app (http://ipodder.org/), add WiFi, and you've got a really, really tiny and extremely mobile Tivo!
After dropping the 15 gig one (leaving only 20 and 40 gig), it doesn't seem too unreasonable to make a 60 gig one the new top of the range model - bringing you back to the three options you've had on most of the other generations.
Avantslash - View Slashdot cleanly on your mobile phone.
well, though i have no idea if the ipod will have the ability to play it: keynote exports to quicktime.
would be a neat feature; now you only have to convince the conference organizers to have a video connection at the podium. and a working remote...
Lick Busk, Marry Kerry...
"Apple is on the verge of releasing a 60GB iPod that will not only hold a ton of music"
Wait a second... isn't that kind of redundant? I would have thought those two would go together.
Bad karma for correcting people I always say.
That is nice, but I want a 15 gig iPod that lets me backup and use my user folder on the portable harddrive. Auto syncing when I plug in to my laptop, but let me go to a friend's machine and let me log in as me... With pre configured security, obviously... the HDD would be read-only for the most part.
That is what I want. That is what I am waiting for.
fanboy, don't ruin a perfectly fine pair of pants. It's just an iPod. None of the ports are even remotely worthy of this level of adoration.
0 to troll in 4.8 seconds!
"I must not fear. Fear is the mind killer." -Bene Gesserit Litany Against Fear
As digital cameras keep producing larger and larger file sizes, it's getting to be quite worthwhile to have someplace to dump the contents of your flash cards.
If this new i-pod has a CF reader built in, I wouldn't need to carry half a dozen 512MB flash cards, I could just fill one card, dump it into the i-pod and keep on shooting.
Devices like this do exist already, but none of them are really easy to use and carry
Gee, I was wondering what happened to Slashdot, we are already Friday and not a single ipod article this week yet !
I think I liked the SCO articles much more, at least they had some bad guys in.
K.
Over the years I have had two Palms and one iPod lost or stolen. I am not worried about my music collection being out in the wild, but I would be leery of having my entire photo collection in someone else's hands. Especially after this: Why you should never lose your digital media
At least I can buy third party encryption software for my Tungsten.
This could be a huge boon to professional photographers who have moved to digital.
I can see every pro using the vPod as a giant portable depot for photos they take in the field. Even with the largest flash memory you only get a modest number of images before you must download them.
Having the ability to transfer to a vPod in the field would be great. Plus, the ability to view them on a high-res, 2 inch scree would be another huge hit. Organizing them by roll would be another big benefit.
No need to carry a computer around with you just to for storing your pictures and/or pre-screening your shots.
What do real pro photographers think (I'm not one)?
hell yeah. my rev-a 5giger is deleted every month, i've got almost 3 years worth of .dd.tar.gz files of the entire disk image.
.dd's whenever i need a change of music .. sweet to just 'load up', yo!
5gigs is plenty of tunes for my listening reality, anyway, specially since i swap
; -- the corruption of government starts with its secrets. a truly free people keep no secrets. --
Combine that Video-iPod with the iPodder app (http://ipodder.org/), add WiFi, and you've got a really, really tiny and extremely mobile Tivo!
Wouldn't it be nice if your multimedia phone could communicate with the phone queue of the company you are calling.
Once you get placed in a phone queue and you decide that what they are playing is boring you can pick a play list on your multimedia phone, or you can have a default play list for phone queues that automatically starts playing. When it is your turn the phone queue would send your device a signal and it would fade out your music or your audio book and you can start talking.
It wouldn't be hard to do this from a technical point of view.
The Internet is full. Go Away!!!
I wish Apple would fix the gaps between songs issue in albums where the music is supposed to seamelessly go from one song to the next (a lot of it in Pink Floyd, classical stuff etc.).
I mean, this is supposed to be the best portable player in the world isn't it? Am I the only one that find this unacceptable?
Blah! I just got my 3rd generation iPod just a few months ago!
I've never been that interested in the ipod. As far as music goes, I get by fine with my iPAQ Pocket PC. I just ordered a 1GB SD card and that's plenty of tunes to take to the gym or go for a run with. I'd rather have the features of my Pocket PC with some music rather than a separate device that just does music.
Jim Lynch
Tech Analyst and Community Manager
Comment removed based on user account deletion
I love it how the Apple fanbois have been repeating like a mantra for the past two years "audio only good, video output bad" in drone-like Pavlovian response to the Delphic utterances of their Cult Boss Steve. Despite the overwhelming evidence that there was a healthy market for portable digital video players they persisted in repeating over and throwaway mantras from Big Brother Jobs about how nobody needed video, or colour, or photo support. Even the existence of literally dozens of PVP handhelds in the marketplace failed to convince most of them.
Now, however, that it seems possible that Apple might bless the product category with its sacred magic beans, suddenly portable video is the *coolest* *thing* *ever*! And hey, you know? Apple invented it!
Da Blog
...until I get one. I want to see if I can stick it in my bum.
Not too long ago Apple had posted a job opening for someone who has wireless design experience to work in the iPod group.
WiFi and Bluetooth? Maybe!
Ih-300 series: http://www.iriver.com/product/info.asp?p_name=H340 .ogg support, get an fm tuner, oh wait... get an iriver, it already has those!
had it first, move along, Apple SUCKS. The ipod SUCKS and will continue to SUCK, get a 16 hour battery life, get
Why is Slashdot reporting rumors? I know Think Secret/Apple Insider are usually more accurate than other rumor sites, but what if they are wrong? I've heard things in the past that seemed like a sure thing to not ever make it out of the walls of Apple. Slashdot should wait until this actually happens before posting a news item. I guess they forgot about SpyMac's rumor of the iWalk--a Mac OS X based PDA--and how that product turned out to be faked by some guy with Photoshop! Oops....
- Danny
have always been considered a successful merge of PDA and phone.
I've always thought it would be interesting if RIM licenced its BB technology or got the guys from Apple to design their devices and work with the UI. I think this would really appeal to a lot of consumer buyers by making it a little friendlier looking.
I just do not understand why the Ipod is missing a AM/FM radio. I would have bought one a long time ago if it had AM. How hard could it be?
Buy Steampunk Clothing Online!
Up to now, I have not allowed myself to get forced to by a mobile phone, nor a digital camera, nor... err, well, I made the mistake of bying a 265MB-mp3stick. While this makes me a little bit ungeeky, it might make me the perfect customer for the 5G iPod (not the one mentioned in TFA).
Imagine this: One sweet tiny gadget in your pocket, that
- can store 60GB of data of all kind
- can play sounds over a set of earplugs
- is a mobile phone
- is a digital camera (come on, these things have gotten small enough!)
- is a mobile calender/groupware (like a WiFi-PDA-thingy)
- can record music or all other sorts of noise
- has a built-in fm-receiver (these are very small, too)
- and, most-notably, is from Apple and sports a slick white-plastic and/or _brushed_ metal surfarce.
Well, I'd definitely be willing to spend a few hundred bucks on a thing like this. Okay, it might not be in the 5G-Pod. But that's definitely the future.
Why not put a digicam in the iPod, much like a cell-phone camera? You could then skip the part about adapters, USB cables, etc.
Chip H.
He's right -- the iPod still can't play albums, just single songs. Between every song there is a pause.
This is the one thing that Sony's oh-so-crippled players *can* do right. But the iPod, like most of the rest, can't.
One of the features brandied about when talking about "the photo iPod" is the ability for the thing to plug into a TV and playback slideshows and hopefully one day video.
;)
I propose that this can already be done. Just look at what these guys have accomplished. Think deeply about this. If we can encode IR signals into audio files, why not encode images into audio files, dump that audio out the headphone jack of the iPod into a device with a decoder and an RCA jack, and plug that sucker into your TV?!
In fact they already have something commercially available that can do part of this, converting digital bits into audio-- its called a MODEM (remember those?). The band Information Society was putting samples of MODEM audio onto records and tapes for you to somehow decode back in the 80s! So this idea is really overdue and I believe we are only a few figurative moments away from this becoming a reality, mod this post up to help make it happen or reply with why it won't work
...unfortunately no one can be told what The Mat^H^H^HGoatse is...they must experience it for themselves...
The idea of iPhoto for Windows seems unlikely to me.
.. but as Rhapsody morphed into Mac OS X and the Yellow Box became Cocoa, Apple decided not to make it available on Windows.
... but I don't see that happening.
.. if they made a digital camera, then sure, but they don't.
Mostly because they would have to include a Cocoa environment for Windows, which they have been reluctant to do so far. (Unlike iTunes, which is a Carbon app, iPhoto is a Cocoa application written in Objective C. A subset of Carbon is available on Windows as part of QuickTime, which is how iTunes works.)
Back before Mac OS X was released, when they were still calling it Rhapsody, there was a "Yellow Box" for Windows
If Apple did make Cocoa (Objective C runtime + Foundation + AppKit) available for Windows, it would certainly make a lot of developers happy (it would suddenly be very easy to port software to Windows)
The other reason I wouldn't expect to see iPhoto on Windows would be because it's not likely to help them make any money (anyone have numbers on how much they make from print and book ordering? Not much, I'd guess)
-- Tim Buchheim
...is that it can't be used as a straight USB (or FireWire, IIRC) device. You need additional software on the host.
For example, my friend had a hundred-odd megs of remixed music he wanted me to listen to. Schweet, I said, iPod-as-hard-drive to the rescue. Plugged it in to his computer's USB port, and got an error about "unknown USB device".
I can plug it into my Windows box, however, and it will be mounted as a drive, with certain immutable "subdirectories" mapping onto different iPod functions. I suspect that's where the host-side software comes in, since USB doesn't allow for the device to send "oh, and here's how to interpret this filesystem that isn't actually a filesystem" notes. (I hope I'm wrong. Please tell me if I am. USB is not my forte.)
The host-side software is installed as part of iTunes, but I'd rather not go around installing iTunes on every computer I might want to plug an iPod into. Apart from the hassle, iTunes wants to do a few too many things to the iPod automatically (unless the defaults are all changed).
You cannot apply a technological solution to a sociological problem. (Edwards' Law)
How about a online movie store where you could buy movies and download them to your iPod? I'm sure this is the next big thing after iTunes music store! If the new iPod supports video-out you could connect it to any screen/tv/beamer or just use the build in 2" hi-res color display.
I could be wrong, but it seems that some kind of movie download service is coming in some form or another.
And remember, before everyone jumps on that idea, claiming it's already been tried or it's impossible or it would never work... all that was said before iTunes/iPod. I think we're seeing the early moves toward it, but haven't yet seen all of the pieces of the puzzle.
--Rick "If it isn't broken, take it apart and find out why."
The Archos Gmini 400 already has all the features that this article hints at. It doesn't cost much more than the iPod and is of good quality.
I'd say the Gmini 400 is more attractive than the AV400 to most people. Unlike the AV400 it can't record video, has a smaller screen and only limited video playback.
But the Gmini is very small, can play audio, video, display images and has a nice gaming engine. It also is cheap by comparison and a real alternative to the iPod.
He was just one letter off on Hitler's name, so I pretty much believe his iPod quatrains, as well as his fire-belching dragon ones.
Imagine this: download a movie or other video content on your Mac. Perhaps via the iTunes Store. Sync with your iPod. Drop your iPod into its dock at your entertainment center. Select content (a movie?) and play. Simple. Clean
I like that idea and can see how it would work in the future. But I think you've overlooked a couple of things:
- For one, they're going to have to get the download size way down. A few Gig's per movie is going to blow most people's daily usage limits by a big margin. More and more ISP's in the UK are capping 'unlimited' bandwidth at 1GB per day. To most people that's as good as unlimited, but for movies and such, no chance. They'd have to use something more space efficient, like dvix perhaps.
- For two, there's that oh so insignificant matter of piracy and protection. They wouldn't just start distributing raw ripped DVD's over the net, they'd get crucified. So you'd be looking at some new format that:
- And lastly, there's all that licensing crap they're going to have to get over before they can distribute film or tv over the net. And that's going to take as long to figure out as it did with iTMS for music. Especially for global distribution.
Personally I don't think tv/dvd content is anywhere near ready for prime time. We need gobs more bandwidth in the home before it becomes a viable proposition.
Nice idea though.
Digital Camera Link for iPod
iMedia reader for iPod
First one connects to a USB camera, second one directly loads from the flash media.
-T
iPods lick iBalls
I have gas, but my car uses petrol.
New site up already... http://iphotopod.com
Don't expect a full version of iPhoto for windows. Instead I expect iTunes functionality to be increased to include photo handling.
Apple just released an entirely new version of the iPods like 2 months ago.
I don't see this new iPod, if it is REAL, appearing on shelves for 6 months.
and we geeks want to view sport photos....because???
It's tempting to think the poster is just a spoiled brat, but there's a reality in this country that the top of the upper-classes have become very very welathy, and there's no use being bitter about it. I'm looking to get a usb storage/mp3 device for less than $60- that's about what I can afford, but it should also be enough.
Seriously, what is so great about iPods? I mean, they play MP3s, but that's really about it. Wow, they look trendy and, well, that's about it. Can someone tell me why on earth someone would buy an iPod aobve any other media player?
ALLAHCANBESEEN
> Yeah, but how much thinner will your wallet be?
:)
I use a credit card, you insensitive clod
just keeping with the tradition
Quidquid latine dictum sit, altum videtur
Now my iPod will be more out of date and what few accessories I could buy I won't be able to find. That is my main bitch with Apple when the updated items come out they just drop the older items.
Peace, Love, And Oreo cookies