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Inside Hardware Design - Competing Against the iPod
ihatewinXP writes "FastCompany.com has a behind the scenes article detailing Rio's (and others) attempts to differentiate hardware and compete in the digital music market against the iPod juggernaught. From the article: "We decided that we had to be radically different from Apple. Where Apple was sort of the ivory tower, we were going to be the dark rebel. Where Apple was very geometric, we were going to be smooth and curvy. Apple was so enamored with absolute pure, minimalist design that some designers may argue that ergonomics were compromised.""
You'll know they've got it wrong when...
A feeling of having made the same mistake before: Deja Foobar
Apple was so enamored with absolute pure, minimalist design that some designers may argue that ergonomics were compromised.
I'm sure the head of the iPod department will really give two shits about ergonomics when he goes for his daily swim in his pool filled with crisp $100 bills...
Already getting slow...
Try the coralized link
What are we going to do tonight Brain?
Obliteracy: Words with explosions
Like Archos' players are powered by dilithium crystals! The one company (besides Apple) that does do something technologically novel in their MP3 players, although it's not to my taste, is Neuros.
What I'm listening to now on Pandora...
Wow!
I've gotten so used to articles on the web having 12 pages with 15 sentences on each page so that page was like a breath of fresh air.
I wish all articles were like that.
The Internet is full. Go Away!!!
Apple was so enamored with absolute pure, minimalist design that some designers may argue that ergonomics were compromised.
I thought the exact same thing the first time I saw those earbud headphones. They look like a couple primitive shapes stuck together. Come to find out, they're the most comfortable earbud headphones I've had, even without the foam.
I hate to be an Apple apologist, but I can't think of anywhere they've sacrificed ergonimics for design. I think they just eschew curves and stuff that look ergonomic, but don't actually make the thing easier to use.
c-hack.com |
Worked quite well for Microsoft back in 1995. By the way, did you see the article about Microsoft and Toshiba cementing their HD DVD relationship?
Being a big player means being able to totally fsck-up the next generation of technology and still being able to walk away from it because your other enterprises are so wildly profitable you can afford the losses.
A feeling of having made the same mistake before: Deja Foobar
We decided that we had to be radically different from Apple.
Because, hey, iPods aren't really selling that well.
Where Apple was sort of the ivory tower, we were going to be the dark rebel.
Why would anyone say those so soon after everyone saw Gandalf defeat Sauron?
Don't be a player hater... it doesn't suit you. :x
- Toby
I can pimp up apple iPod with all sort of bling-bling. There is not enough bling available for any other mp3 player.
http://www.apple.com/ipod/accessories.html
If you are virgin here is help
pimp-up is kind of upgrade
bling-bling is accessories
How many people in love with their iPods have tried other MP3 players? I'm curious because there doesn't seem to be anything particulary ground-breaking about them - they play music and have a nice clean shiny white plastic case. The premium you pay for an iPod versus another player helps to pay for the marketing that makes it cool, and that seems to be the primary difference right there.
air and light and time and space
Personally, I would like to see real competition with the iPod. I love mine and wouldn't give it up for the world, but there are plenty of things I would like to see included but Apple really does not have any motivation to do so.
First off, I would like to see an AM/FM tuner included. If they really want to make that something special, they could include a TV/weather band tuner as well.
Also, I would like to be able to replace the battery myself without having to pay a crapload of money for them to do it or risk damaging my iPod if I do it myself.
One of my biggest complaints, and I think just about everyone with an iPod would agree with me on this one, is that if you are into the whole minimalist thing, the iPod looks beautiful right out of the box. However, use it even once and the shiny chromed back is already getting scratched up and if you do not do something to protect the screen, within a year the screen is almost unreadable.
All that being said, real competition would be the motivator for Apple to make the iPod even better and cheaper. And at $300 or so a pop, they had better do something or risk losing their corner on the market.
The tricky bit in designing a device to compete with the ipod is going to be user interface. Not just the interface on the device itself, but the software used in transferring files to the device from the computer. Apple has done a superb job on both ends and it will be tough to do as well or better.
This I think is what makes building an ipod competing device so much more difficult than a walkman knockoff cd or tape player. With the cd or tape player, the interface is just a matter of a few buttons. Designing a quality mp3 player is a whole different challenge.
you're a Bloom County fan.
"We decided we had to be radically different from Apple"
Because, hey, contrarian thinking just for the sake of being different (or possibly out of spite) always works.
The Nitrus????? huh? has anyone else heard of that before? No good having a great product if no one knows about it. And then there's sony:In March, we introduced nine flash-based players to the Network Walkman lineup, which includes last year's 20-gigabyte HD3.
Nine flash-based players? How are you going to get a strong message out about nine different players?
Drag n' Drop DVD Recommendations
He's right, from an engineering point of view there is nothing special about the hardware in the iPod. In fact, the processor's battery-life and computational power is not impressive at all. What is impressive is the elegant design and user interface. That's where the iPod wins. The huge marketing budget doesn't hurt either...
"Karma can only be portioned out by the cosmos." -Homer Simpson
Honestly, its iTunes that makes iPOd so great. The complete package is what I think is successful, not Itunes or the Ipod as separately.
Have you tried music match. UGH, its just terrible and slow. I had to use this originally with my Ipod, and it couldn't even sync properly. Musicmatch had to re-copy the entire library to do an update.
Tranlsation:
The engineers at Sony would love to make a good open product. However, we keep getting slapped around like a red-headed stepchild by the lawyers and the content (Movies/Music) division of the company. As a result we'll keep throwing out sucky DRM'ed products that never take off because of that. But, we'll keep doing it. No matter how much it hurts us.
2nd sounds pretty good, till you realise Apple has about 80% market share, so second place is what, 10% market share?
Drag n' Drop DVD Recommendations
Insofar as his comment about the innards of the iPod, are you saying he's somehow mistaken? What exactly do you think is uncommon and impressive about the technology?
Apple uses the same components and the same contractors in Asia to build iPods. The technology itself is available to everyone who wants to make players. What the Archos CEO is saying is that in his opinion the value proposition of the iPod is not in the technology. He doesn't say where he thinks it is though.
I'm surprised that someone at Slashdork would be scandalized by a statement like this - after all, one of the first articles here about the iPod (after Taco's famous "lame" editorialization) was one about some dude dissasembling the thing.
Then again, maybe even people around here are distracted by shiny objects.
The Sony guy blabbing on about their customer focus and listening to the customer and all that shit, when the main reason they didn't have a competitive player 5 years ago is that they insisted that everything had to be stored in that same crap format they used in the minidisc player. What was it called? Atrac or something like that? And when they did bring out a player, they called it an MP3 player but what it really was was a player that played their proprietary format, and software that converted MP3s to their format.
That's really customer focused. Boy oh boy. I can hear the teeming millions saying "what I want from an MP3 player more than anything else is the inability to play MP3s".
The next Cmdr Taco duplicate will be ready soon, but subscribers can beat the rush and see it early!
"Unlike Apple, however, we are not going to spend our money trying to convince people that we are good. We are going to spend our money telling people what we offer. At Creative, more is better. Our products are packed with more features -- an FM tuner and voice recorder, for example -- and we're able to deliver this at a lower price. That's where we can win." If people don't know about the product (and the majority of the world does not thanks to their lackluster marketing) how are they going to demonstrate those wonderful features? Walk before you can run...
Apple's main point of sale is Job's salesmanship. Don't get me wrong - they have great products. But great products don't sell themselves (Which RIO is explicitly trying to do). The iPod is the shit because Job's wants you to believe it is. You can't beat that with a sack of wet noodles (aka better products).
www.olin.edu
Oh please. Ogg Vorbis is a no where format. It's a geek format. Why use Ogg when AAC is as good or better. Look at all the listening tests. AAC is always scoring in the top, and usually bests Ogg.
It's either on the beat or off the beat, it's that easy.
I moderate therefore I rule!
--
He meant cat lick. Cat licks aren't nearly as reliable as Toyota's. Well known fact.
NMG
We have to draw a line between usability and ergonomics. Note the definition of ergonomics: http://dictionary.reference.com/search?q=ergonomic .
While poor ergonomics will ultimately detract from the item's use, it only focuses on the fatigue or discomfort.
The iPod may be very easy to use, but if some ergonomics expert (which I am certainly not!) says it lacks ergonomic design, it may be lacking in the comfort / endurance department. I'd certainly agree that ergonomics has become associated with "curveyness", but being ergonomic doesn't necessarily mean it's usable.
Every one of the interview subjects sounded like a mouthful of sour grapes. Why is it so hard to admit that you got your ass kicked, and are noew attempting to do something to come back?
Every single one of them had some dig at the iPod, and then a marketing spiel about their own POS product that's in the clearance bin at Sam's. Tell us something NEW and we'll consider your product.
Everyone accuses Apple of being obsessed with looks, but it's always other companies and critics of Apple who focus on that. And ironically, that's only part of the picture. Apple really does understand design is a way that other tech companies just don't... and design goes way beyond looks. If that's all Apple had, they would be a lost cause. But as evidenced by the products Apple produces and the interviews with him I've read, Jobs really understands that design is how something works--looks being a side-effect of that.
I'll admit that I didn't RTFA, but it sounds like the same story yet again. Until these companies figure out that it's the combination of the iPod and iTunes and the iTunes Store that have all been designed to work seamlessly together and in a way that makes sense to people, competitors won't stand a fighting chance. It's not the looks. It's not the price. It's not the file format. It's the way it was designed with the user in mind. That's what Apple does best.
I'm a fan of Apple's products so I couldn't give a rip either way, but it's amazing to me that so many companies just can't figure this basic concept out.
--Rick "If it isn't broken, take it apart and find out why."
interesting.
The person at Sony said what customers really want is choice. Actually, most customers don't want choice, or at least they don't want to begiven choices that just get in their way.
What most customers really want is something that will do the job and get out of the way. For most the journey is not destination.
Steve Jobs understands this. Most Linux sellers don't.
They both provide an OS (or an iPod) and while the former says "Here is OS X and Aqua and iTunes and you can hook it up to your iPod and stuff and it just works." the later say "Look at all the configurations you can run this under, you have a __choice!__. But of course that implies you are smart and knowledgeable enough to make a choice."
At which point most people run screaming for an exit because they want anything but choice.
They just to do something and not be bothered with all the geeky stuff. They want to know nothing about how it works under the skin. They just want to enjoy it.
Apple is able to 'get away with "foisting their decisions on the world"' because they select components that do their work and then 'hide'.
MSBPodcast.com The opinions expressed here are my own. If you don't like 'em... Think up your own stuff.
The problem is you can have the best product in all fronts vs. your competor and still loose out.
True. That does not necessarily mean, however, that other products are better than ipods. I don't own one, or any mp3 player. I have a computer pretty much anywhere I want to listen to music. That said, if I were to buy one it would likely be an ipod. The reasons why include:
I'm sure other people have different priorities and would rather have Ogg support and better Linux support. That is fine by me. At the same time though, for me (from what little research I"ve done) iPods are the toyotas in this case. Just because a product is dominant does not mean it is not better.
How many people in love with their iPods have tried other MP3 players? I'm curious because there doesn't seem to be anything particulary ground-breaking about them - they play music and have a nice clean shiny white plastic case. The premium you pay for an iPod versus another player helps to pay for the marketing that makes it cool, and that seems to be the primary difference right there.
How many people who keep saying "it can't possibly be a superior product, trendy people like it, therefore it's GOT to be 100% marketing" have actually tried it?
Tried it and it's competitors? The whole "try": Getting tracks on it, using it, charging it?
I have a first gen iPod, I had an iPod before the iPod became popular (yeah, yeah, people always say shit like that, but keep in mind it means I have the BIG iPod now, without the cool dock and extra games), and I didn't want it because it was marketed in a shiny way: I wanted it because I hated my MP3 player and this one was offering me a better way to have music on the go.
You can't take the sky from me...
First, pardon my ignorance but is there a RAW->AAC encoder for Linux? I didn't see one when I ripped my CD collection. Second, this is the same kind of debate as the one between MP3 and WMA: WMA is technically superior but forever a closed, non-standard format. Finally, Ogg is the same geek, "no where" format (as you put it) that MP3 was five years ago. I suppose today's flooded MP3 player market appeals to geeks only, right? Even my most non-geek, "what's a microsoft?" cousin wants a digital music player, one that works with MP3, WMA, AAC, and Ogg, all purely, simply, and without DRM nonsense.
It must be Windows. It needs half a gig of RAM and a hardware-accelerated graphics card just to run Solitaire.
Apple might consider implementing ogg support when 1% of the people buying ipods want it. The fact is, virtually nobody has even HEARD of ogg vorbis, much less requiring it for their music player purchases. You need to face the fact that you are in a non-influential minority, and if you want to be have a wide choice of music players, you might want to think about re-ripping all of your cds, because ogg support is at the bottom of the priority list for 99.9% of music player manufacturers and purchasers.
The crisp $100 bills are for lighting your cigar. The shiny nickels and dimes are for throwing at street urchins. The ones are for tipping the valet (tip: fold them over to double your largesse). The twenties are for doing lines of coke with the senator off the ass of a call girl.
Remember etiquette! We are not savage beasts!
People say this kind of crap all the time, but I just don't see it. I have a Toyota Corolla. I have an iPod. And I bought them both for the same reason--they were both good values.
There, I said it. I think my iPod is a good value. I does exactly what I need (and more) with minimal fuss. And it has proven to be very reliable. The same is true for the Toyota. My confidence in both of these purchases was based somewhat on the reputation for quality these companies have. I haven't been disappointed.
I didn't get an iPod to impress anybody. As a matter of fact, I'd rather no one ever see my iPod.
Isn't it possible that the average joe buys an iPod because they've heard that they're pretty good?
A publicly traded company exists solely to make profits for shareholders.
Apple was so enamored with absolute pure, minimalist design that some designers may argue that ergonomics were compromised.
How in the world can anyone claim this?
I can perform the following actions with one hand holding the iPod and my thumb controlling it:
And that's compromising ergonomics? The iPod probably makes the fewest ergonomic assumptions than any other product I own/have owned.
Well, alright, it assumes you are a homo sapien with at least one opposable thumb on one hand. But even with that assumption anyone belonging to the homo genus can use the iPod.
The Luddites were ahead of their time.
I've had other MP3 devices, like watch players. Also tried PDA MP3 playing and a few friends devices like rios.
I have the earlier 5GB iPod and frankly nothing else is as pleasant to use. I actually didn't like the control system of the later ones with the controls moved to the top, but now they are back around the wheel they are doing good. I just bought a Mini for my GF and she loves it - because it's so, so easy to use. The feature that can pitch-shift audio books is worth the whole price alone, if you ever want to listen to podcasts or speeches or seminar recordings.
A lot of people seem to think that people buy into the iPod because of marketing. But I think that's secondary, and the real success of the iPod lies in amazing word of mouth from actual users who really do end up becoming semi-evangelists because when something works decently well it sticks out like a sore thumb in a world of consumer electronics that are half-crap. When I tell people I'm still using an MP3 player I bought years and years ago without a drawer full of others strewn along the way, people go "wow!". When people can get off the upgrade mill and get something that's more reliable and friendly it makes them very happy.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
apple is stylish because typically artists want them and make decisions not on specifications and performance to cost ratios alone but if it looks pretty in their "space".
Bullshit. I mean sure, Apple makes some sales because clueless people with too much money think the look "cool" but that is by no means their main market. You think Linus Torvalds bought a powerbook because he is so artistic and wanted a computer that looked cool and was ignorant about how poorly it performed? You think the dozens of security professionals I work with daily bought macs because they are ignorant of the specifications and cost/performance ratios? Hell no. They bought them because they work better for the task at hand. Raw cpu cycles are by no means the best judge of how suited a computer is to a task. If I want to play Half-life I'm not going to use a cluster of PPC processors even though they provide more bang for the buck because first, they can't run the software and second, I don't need that much CPU power to play a stupid game.
Similarly, many people buy macs because they run OS X, which is the best environment for what they want to do. These people might be artists, or writers, or security professionals, or geneticists, but macs allow them to get their job done better than and other machine available. The number of artists who run macs because they are ignorant is probably a handful compared to the number who run it because the system works better for working with graphics because of the tools available, the better multithreading, the prioritization of input which means when you're painting a line the OS won't suddenly hog the processor and stop recording mouse input for half a second, the color support is much better, and because most artistic software is written for macs with Windows as a buggy afterthought.
Your condescension towards those poor ignorant artists is really annoying and your ignorance about using computers as a professional artist is glaringly obvious.
WMA vs. MP3 isn't a tech thing. It's a what sounds better at what rate thing. You can encode everything you own at 320bit MP3 and be happy as a clam. Its when you start collecting a huge collection that size/quality becomes an issue. Some people can live with 128 Mp3s. Some settle for 192Mp3s. WMA files might give you the same perceived quality of 192MP3s but at 160bits, and a smaller file size.
Ogg is a good compressor. Don't get me wrong. But the consumer doesn't care. They will go with whatever sounds good.
For me, a Musician, with a huge library, I encode all my CDs to iTunes using 160AAC. For Jazz music, which is my love, I can't really hear any difference between 160AAC and CD. If I did the same for 160MP3, I can hear problems. Cymbals don't ring right, etc.
As for the DRM non-sense. That only applies to music that you purchase online. If you own the CD, you can rip it to whatever you want. AAC doesn't have DRM in it. The stuff from Apple's iTunes store does, a protected AAC.
I think it's a moot point in supporting Ogg. It's kind of like, to me, supporting the old Archive format ZOO. Yeah, ZOO had a lot of interesting things, and it compressed well, but, it went nowhere.
It's either on the beat or off the beat, it's that easy.
I moderate therefore I rule!
--
"The Carbon is the second-best-selling midsized player, behind only the iPod mini."
"Early reviews of Sony's newest set of flash-based players say it's a strong contender to take on the iPod shuffle."
"The Gmini 400, launched last September, has outsold the Apple iPod in the 20-GB category in Europe."
"It comes second only to Apple in total market share for MP3 players."
Amazing, they are all beating or close to beating apple it in various ways, or at least that's what the quotes imply. I suspect that apple still ships a ton of players and makes more bucks doing so.
I headed over to one site to find it supports lots of WMA music, which no doubt comes with loads of DRM attached. And it reminded me.
Apple's ipod succeeds because of iTunes, and access to a large library of music that has reasonable DRM for most users. Yahoo is busy shipping Yahoo Messenger with their offering. The subscription WMA offerings were so painful when I tried them ages ago, though I'm sure they are better now.
I'm listening to Dave Brubeck on my iPod Shuttle right now and what I like about it is that is was $100.
:-) As for getting 'bling' to protect their iPods, there is an aisle in their store dedicated to it. If you were too cheap to buy one, to quite a friend of mine, "Suffer Bee-atch."
(What screen?
Apple's already making the iPod in Asia (so production costs can't get cheaper) and charging what their market will allow. I don't anticipate ever seeing an iPod down at Costco or Wall*Mart for $19,95. Sorry but there it is.
MSBPodcast.com The opinions expressed here are my own. If you don't like 'em... Think up your own stuff.
Linux users are the computing equivalent of car enthusiasts. They want the spoiler, the tricked out stereo, the racing stypes, the hand-tuned carburator (sp), the custom muffler, the racing tires, the bling rims, etc, etc, etc - car enthusiasts crack open a parts catalogue and drool.
Most people only give a shit about their vehicle when it breaks. Most people want to just turn the key and GO. They don't want to have to worry about engine timing or oil pressure or RPMs or torque or rather their car parts are metric or imperial because absolutely NONE of this has ANYTHING to do with running down to the store to get groceries.
The failing of linux is that you've got a bunch of hotrod enthusiasts trying to sell The Last Of The V8 Interceptors to people who really just want a commuter coupe - and these hotrodders just can't see that the rest of the world gets absolutely NO pleasure from fucking with things that should Just Work Already.
Let's face it, the iPod is pretty much entrenched as the de-facto standard for mp3/DAPs.
It doesn't matter why, or how, or if it sucks, or if it's cool. The fact is, it's #1, and it's got a ridiculous amount of momentum. I mean, they're making car adapters for the freaking thing. They make stereos with iPod adapters that cost more than the iPod itself.
It's hard to beat that kind of momentum.
In general, you can go high or you can go low. With the iPod, you can't really go low, because of the shuffle. I mean, how can you beat the shuffle? It's cheap, it works, and it's got the iPod brand.
Go high? How? What kind of ridiculous stuff could you put on a DAP that would make it more expensive than an iPod? How could you sell enough of them to make any money?
The fact is, the iPod may be dominant enough that all the other players get killed off...except at the low end, where one-feature USB players might squeak out a living as giveaways. Nobody's making the kind of money that Apple is in the mp3 player market. That trend will likely continue.
From a business point of view, well, the other player manufacturers can see their trends, and they're trending downwards. Would you rather get out now while you're making money, or wait until you start losing money?
Where does that leave the midrange players? Niche verticals?
One thing is they have to change the game, or they'll get squished. Apple has successfully straddled every price point from $100 to $450. There's not a lot of room left for pricing. There's not a lot of room left for features, either.
Maybe the subscription stuff will work out. But one FairPlay subscription license from Apple would kill that whole market dead. Maybe that's what they're waiting for?
One interesting side-effect of on-line music stores is that it makes pricing transparent. For example, a FairPlay DRM'd song is worth $1. A subscription-DRM song costs, well, pennies or less, depending on your plan. A non-DRM'd song costs about $2 (buy the CD). A radio version is free. A Sirius/XM is free. Makes it hard to sue for damages, doesn't it?
Ergonomics means designing equipment, or modifying a workplace to fit the workers (or users) rather than the other way around. This includes things like:
- Comfortable work environments (chairs, desks, etc);
- Intuitive UI design for electronic and mechanical equipment (fax machines, even things like placing a light switch by all doors rather than on an opposite wall);
- Uses of products to increase efficiency. Basically letting the workplace equipment do tedious work, freeing the worker to move on to more important things (like a printer that hole punches or staples automatically).
A little bit of personal research above and beyond the stupid buzzwords people use would give a good idea as to why Apple's iPod is, in fact, much more ergonomic than most players.I really challenge anyone to give a list of reasons why some other player is superior that consists of items beyond "it's comfortable to hold in your hand." Anyone who thinks that ergonomics means how something feels in their hand really needs to think why THAT is their central criterion.
New slang when you notice the stripes, the dirt in your fries.
Then why do Graphic designer houses have all MAC's typically as well as most vieo editing places nowdays
Because their NIC cards won't be recognized on the network without a MAC?
Ohhhh.... you mean Macs!
That's easy: The best graphic design and archetecture software out there (the pro-level stuff, anyway) is mostly Macintosh-based. They are using the right tool for the job.
while the sales drones and managers have cheapies Dell's?
Also easy: Sales drones don't need to run graphic design software. Any $300 shitbox which can run Quicken software is more hardware than they will ever need. It's a shame they must put up with Windows because of this choice, but such is life.
Information wants to be anthropomorphized.
I am a graphic designer by trade. I own an iPod and am reasonably happy with it. Up until recently I owned a mac running OSX but recently chose to install an alternative operating system. Why? I was sickof Aqua and of it's connotations as a design aesthetic.
From a designers perspective, homogonous environments trap the intuition, simply looking at the same interface 12 hours a day, with all its semiotic baggage ionises an approach to thinking about screenspace, to the ends that the work I do becomes permeated with a similar 'sheen' other designers using the platform will inevitably, and subtly become infected with. Apple products, from software to hardware, comfort the user by reducing visual complexity. One cannot argue that this works, and that there's a market for it. However their approach, of making appliances and not contexts for user-defined, unique experiences, is wearing thin amongst Apple users, at least in the design industry.
I hear more and more Mac users I work with saying they are getting sick of Aqua and the Chrome DE, that the Benetton metro-sexualism of the iPod fad is making them ill, that the general ubiquity of the device is killing their interest in the device as a cultural signifier. It is no longer a transgressive vector, merely a commodity default produced by the self-imposed supersaturation of their own iconographic marketing. Ironically, Apple has produced the context for consumer mutiny. Ever eaten too much marzapan?
Apple market their products not in the aesthetic space, but in the cultural space. But what is the culture they append to and propogate? Benevolent Arianism, and it's starting to wear thin. They are a step away from the solipsistic cult of elegance that saw the end of the Deco and Seccessionist periods. To stay edgy they better embrace the hate and start sinning.
That's hardly true today. Pretty much all of the heavy hitter software has version for both PC and Mac platforms.
That wasn't true a few years ago. The only reason the Mac is so strong in this market is inertia, or the fact that some of these places haven't upgraded yet (it's not uncommon to see OS9 still in use!). But I suspect that a lot of them are changing over to the PC because they can get more powerful hardware at a cheaper price that can run the same software.
steven@pc226-2:~$ apt-cache search aac
libvorbis-perl - Perl extension for Ogg Vorbis streams
acx100-source - ACX100/ACX111 wireless network drivers source
daapd - Serves music files using the Apple DAA protocol
faac - an AAC audio encoder
faad - freeware Advanced Audio Decoder player
gstreamer0.8-faac - GStreamer faac plugins
gstreamer0.8-faad - GStreamer faad plugins
gtkpod-aac - manage songs and playlists on an Apple iPod
hymn - Hear Your Music aNywhere
libfaac-dev - an AAC audio encoder - devel files
libfaac0 - an AAC audio encoder - library files
libfaad2-0 - freeware Advanced Audio Decoder - runtime files
libfaad2-dev - freeware Advanced Audio Decoder - development files
libmp4-0 - freeware Advanced Audio Decoder - runtime files
libmp4-dev - freeware Advanced Audio Decoder - development files
realplayer - RealPlayer 10 based on the open source Helix player
xmms-mp4 - a mp4/aac audio player for xmms
steven@pc226-2:~$
That was hard wasn't it
yeah, who the hell would want choices? interesting way to read the parent is to replace "Ogg Vorbis" with "linux", "AAC" with "Windows", and "format" with "OS". all of a sudden the post goes from Insightful to Flamebait.
I think the real question is... do you think Linus Torvalds bought a powerbook? Because that's one I've not heard before. I know he got given a free G5 PowerMac on which he runs Linux but what's this about a powerbook?