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More iPod Killers Introduced for the Holiday
An anonymous reader writes "MP3newswire.net has just released part III and part IV of their iPod Killers for Xmas list. Standouts are a $1200 24K gold-plated player from Jens of Sweeden, a 137 Gig unit called the Xclef, Sony's first true MP3 player, and iRiver's MPEG-4 video jukebox. If you missed them, here are parts I and II."
Can we do away with the "iPod Killer" thing, it's old. Nothing is going to "kill" the iPod, it has establised itself as the standard for better or worse. It's like the Walkman. In fact, the iPod is the Walkman killer. Nothing that comes out in the short term is going to be an iPod killer.
A house divided against itself cannot stand.
... How much music can you fit in that kind of space? At one meg a minute, typical for MP3, that's... about one and a half seconds. Surely you expect a little more for twelve hundred dollars these days?
Real Daleks don't climb stairs - they level the building.
I wonder if they got the sack.
After spending that much money I don't have any money left for legal music.
Did anyone else get the image of some serial killer known by the name "The iPod Killer" that managed to find someway to turn an iPod into a murderous device?
If not, I blame Daylight Saving Time. (I just moved from a non-DST state to a DST state.)
What?
When flash eventually becomes cheap enough that I can put my music collection on it I'll consider an alternative. Removing the harddrive from the equation will offer a bit more durability and long term health.
I really don't see any advantage to buying something other then a 'proven' iPod when all other comparable products will cost the same price.
Where's the advantage?
Anyone else notice on the "Jens of Sweden MP-400", that besides being nicely compact, it's got an OLED (Organic Light Emitting Diodes) display?
0 .j pg
http://www.mp3newswire.net/Graphics/Jens%20MP40
I work for the Department of Redundancy Department.
Thirdly, a gold played mp3 player is dumb.
Don't be ridiculous; if I had an ipod it would just clash horribly with my gold medallions and my extensive collection of gold rings, including that one that goes on all my fingers at once and has my name spelled out in diamonds.
Some of us have style, man, and that's why we need the gold-plated mp3 players.
I remember having read this 'ipod-killer' story before...
DAMN THOSE EDITORS!!!
Half of these don't even come close to competing with the iPod. The ones that play movies are more in competition with portable DVD players and Game Boys. Others just don't look like good buys compared to an iPod or iRiver. (Why am I going to pay $500 for a 1GB player when I can pay half that for a 6GB player that's not much larger?)
Personally, I think that the thing that really makes the iPod, and which I have failed to see in any competitor, isn't iTMS or iTunes, or the sexy design, or even the fact that you can put a scratch on it by looking at it for too long. It's the interface. Starting with the jog dial (which I haven't seen on anything else. Scroll wheels don't count.) and going to the software UI, I haven't tried out another player that comes close to being as easy to use as an iPod. Heck, the iPod is so much more pleasent to use that I'd gladly take one over a player that sports 20 more GB, costs $100 less, and is HDTV-ready.
First, all the me-too music players seem to forget a few things. Like the fact that sometimes less really is more. It's not about who has the biggest hard drive, or the biggest screen with the most colors. It's not about who has the most features or even the lowest price. It's about hitting the sweet spot with regard to features, battery life, storage capacity, size and price. None - absolutely none - of these would-be iPod Killers has shown that they understand and can execute based on this principle. (And think back: what made the original Palm a success? Sweet spot. It's that simple.)
m -it doesn't mean we should start doing the job of their marketing department by tossing around the "iPod killer" label. I guess if we keep throwing this crap against the wall something will eventually stick. But you'll get no points for prognostication from me.
The other thing that is often forgotten about the iPod's success is the fact that it's achieved damned near jewelry-level fashion accessory status. Put away all the jokes about Apple customers being Gucci-wearing fashion slaves. This technology is finally becoming ubiquitous enough to have to adhere to people's sense of taste and style. Like cell phones. Be glad. You want to make an iPod killer? It's going to have to be something people want to be seen with.
Finally, Apple is in a really enviable position because of their online music store. They were the first ones to implement a DRM scheme that is both tolerable to most purchasers and most copyright holders, as well as providing a first-rate buying experience. The combination of the best portable player and also the best online music store is an almost unbeatable one-two punch. You want an iPod killer? It'll have to interface with a good - no, very good - online music store. One with a proven recipe for success.
Just because Sony or Dell or iRiver or some other company announces yet-another-little-box-with-ear-buds-dangling-fro
You like your Macintosh better than me, don't you Dave? Dave? Can you hear me Dave?
I've been looking for a while but there doesn't seem to be a player like this ...
I'm envisioning a CD/MP3 Walkman-style device that can read audio off of burned DVDs. I would have imagined there would be portable DVD-Audio players capable of doing this, but I can't seem to find one.
THe closest I can find are the portable DVD players that ALSO happen to support dvd-audio and mp3. But these are far bulkier than I'm looking for, and have far shorter battery life.
I'm thinking a sub-$99 device that could double as a cd walkman, or, with a dvd in it, give me 4.7 gb of mp3s.
anyone seen anything like that?
Design is more than functionality. Design is more than features. It's not about interface, per se. It's not even (as so many claim) that it's about style in the sense of fashion.
It's the whole shooting match.
People who don't grok Apple, don't seem to get that.
I had a can opener. A manual can opener, that I got for about 5 bucks in the early eighties. A maid accidentally threw it out several years ago. Only when it was gone, did I realize how wonderful it was. I searched off-and-on for months trying to find a suitable replacement. I bought 5 can-openers finding each to be annoying to use.
I finally bought one that was about half as good from a mail order place in Great Britain (I live in the US). Nobody in the world makes a can opener like what I used to own. It was the right weight, and had a perfect gearing. It gripped the lid, and neatly dropped it in the trash. The balance, texure, and feel were simply superb. If I were an architect or other design geek, I would have realized how good it was long ago. As it was, only by comparison with alternatives did I realize how nice it was.
The iPod, and other great designs from Apple, exhibit this kind of property.
If you look at a checklist of features, look at particular aspects of functionality, price, or other attributes in isolation, they do not appear special. Through feel, and through use, they just seem right. As a whole, they simply strike many people as right.
You're right, gold-plated, mpeg enabled, or cheaper, a true iPod killer would have to have the "whole package".
What's tricky, is that this requires attention to the details of the design which most people are never actually aware. It will take a great deal to "kill" the iPod.
What you are unknowingly referring to are the Archos MP3 hard drive based players. When the iPod 20 came out, I bought an Archos Jukebox 20 Recorder for exactly half the price. Admittedly, it was a tad larger than the Apple which also gets points for style, but since when did geeks begin caring about carrying around the equivalent of e-jewelry? At the time, it was a more than viable alternative. It didn't hurt that the crazies over at Rockbox Firmware (down right now) rewrote the firmware for Archos systems. You can now develop your own apps for the system as well as enjoy total customization of the interface. They've added a "video" extension, a text file reader, and multilingual support, among other things. Now, with the release of the new 20 gb Archos player, even smaller than the iPod and the around the same size as the iPod mini (2.9" x 2.3" x .7") albeit with a larger screen (2"), I am beginning to believe that a new era of iPod competition is being reigned in.
There's a binary database that the metadata is stored in. Apple's iTunes knows how to access this DB, as do several other programs like ephPod, GNUpod (which I personally have used without any problems whatsoever), etc.
The arcane restrictions and "registration" of which you speak apply ONLY to Apple's "iTunes Music Store", an integrated but OPTIONAL part of the iTunes program (which you don't even have to use). They have nothing to do with music that you obtained elsewhere, i.e. from CD or an MP3 that you already have on your computer. Even if you do buy music from Apple, the restrictions on how many computers you can transfer the music to do NOT apply to the iPod.
Standard USB or 1394 interface. Standard filesystem. Standard audio codecs. Widely-supported metadata handling (GNUpod, for example, is in Debian.) If you're gonna bash the iPod, at least get your facts right.