Slashdot Mirror
iPod Casualties Offer New-In-Box Bargains
An anonymous reader writes "For the last few years makers from Creative to Virgin have proclaimed their latest digital audio player to be an iPod Killer, only to watch those portables flame-out in the marketplace. This doesn't mean there was anything wrong with them, in fact some were pretty decent. They just couldn't compete under all the iPod hype. It turns out that this pattern has created a huge sub-market of new-in-the-box stock, sold for pennies on the dollar to overstock vendors who then pawn them off cheap to the public. For the price of a basic iPod Shuffle you can now acquire some well-equipped units from a few years back. Examples include the 40GB Toshiba Gigabeat F40 and AlienWare's CE-IV with external speaker system."
Difference between an "iPod" and "40GB Toshiba Gigabeat F40"? One is cool and the other is geek speak. Go figure.
that Apple selling billions of dollars worth of ipods and accessories is all hype? I'm sure there have been many decent players that have come to market, but no ipod killer. Why? Because the ipod does what it does very well, it's affordable, and there's a flood of accessories that go with it. I can go into damn near any record, computer, electronics, or fashion store in any mall or town and find at least an ipod skin or cover of some kind, odds that they'll have a gigabeat f40 or zune accessory? I'd say the hype is all in articles talking about decent players being given away at pennies on the dollar, when you've got a similar player that can't be given away, hype is your best friend.
There is nothing preventing anyone from listening to the exact same music for similar prices on equally priced or cheaper players. It's not "hype" that keeps the iPod on top, it's the fact that no company has made a product that competitive.
Dell DJ Series- yes 512 MB not sold at 15$ creative zen- yes 1 Gig 20$ 20 gig 100$ archos- probably 40 gig not sold at 180$ originally 600-700$ they had some problems- people wouldnt buy them [overpriced?] they were comparable as far as the amount of storage to the Ipod but I am guessing this is a case of Ipod's momentum killing off anything that isnt drastically better. why buy something that isnt as well known when it doesnt do anything spectacular compared to the Ipod?
Sigs are too short to say anything truly profound so read the above post instead.
The non-iPod market reminds me of when I look at Linux desktops. I, or almost anyone with a Mac, could stand in front of a two machines and make a giant list of glaring and astonishingly obvious problem with fonts, alignment, the way UI elements operate, how colour is used to convey importance and information, the names of applications, the sets of options presented to the user, how errors are handled, and so on.
I get the same feeling when I see the non-iPod players. The problems with the entire package, player, software, and store(s), is so obvious to anyone with an iPod that one has to think that the companies are absolutely delusional in their development.
You would think they would just need to spend the cash to have a room with:
A Mac running iTunes
An iPod
One iPod user
Their player they are developing
A machine running their software
and let that person point out all the glaring problems these companies have coming up with a complete package like Apple has with the iPod/iTunes/iTMS.
Just remember how clunky the devices were before iPod and how inconvenient online music sales were before iTMS. USB 1.0 use alone meant a PC hung for 10 minutes after you located mp3 files to transfer manually on your hard drive. The use of Firewire, although phased out later, meant that it was now practical to sync your whole library - to a device you could jog with.
Obviously after iPod became a market leader, it's not enough for the same companies that tarnished their image in recent past to come up with a device that has roughly the same features as the iPod for a similar price. Offer one click hardware-accelerated DVD transfer or saving individual songs as MP3s based on info received from over-the-air FM stations and we are off to something. Of course, this product will have to be made in a free country.
I'm gonna sound like an Apple fanboy, although in reality I'm more like the opposite. But it's only fair to acknowledge what Apple did right.
Thing is, before Apple being the #1 player with all the accessories and brand name and all, it was just another player. Everyone could make a HDD based player... and fucked up.
E.g., I remember going to a few shops in '99 to get an MP3 player. (Yeah, one of those "back in my day" tales;) There was the iPod or there were some things that qualified as one or more of:
A) As big as a fucking brick. (E.g., I remember the Archos brand name just because it was the biggest one on display. It looked like two 3" HDDs stacked.)
B) Overpriced to hell and back. (Oh, they had some extra feature ahead of their time, but not worth paying that kinda premium for it. E.g., there were those offering video playback... except they cost more than a decent laptop, which could play those videos in higher res.)
C) Encumbered by retarded world-domination attempts. (E.g., no Sony could actually play MP3, even after they had started grudgingly calling them MP3 players. If you read the fine print, they offered to convert your MP3s to their own 64kb/s codecs that sounded like playing the song through a cheap old digital watch. I'm sorry, but MP3 is lossy as it is, converting it to another lossy codec just gives you basically a multiplication of that.)
D) Were an interface nightmare. (Creative, I'm looking at you.)
Etc.
I'm sorry, I may not be the most hip and fashion-aware guy around, but if I end up with something the size and weight of a brick on my belt, then at least it better not cost _more_. I ended up buying a CD-based player at that time, since it was a lot cheaper and actually lighter than some of those.
Years later I got a Creative Zen, because it was one of those clearance bargains the summary mentions. It's still bigger than a same generation iPod, and still encumbered by retarded ideas. E.g., I can't actually just plug the USB cable in and drag-and-drop the music files on it, you actually need Creative's software for that. Why? E.g., even if I wanted to start a company producing accessories for it, it doesn't have a little connector like the iPod has. The only accessory you can make for it, will have to be connected through 3.5mm audio jack. I.e., either it's headphones or it's speakers, and not too smart ones either.
What I'm trying to say is: even just saying "but iPod has accessories" makes it sound like some random twist of fate, and absolves Creative and Sony and everyone of all responsibility. It makes it sound like some other people just happened to make accessories for the iPod and not for the Zen or Walkman, dunno why, it must be hype again. In reality there was a time where that market was up for grabs for everyone, and the likes of Creative and Sony just blew it fair and square. That iPod ended up king of the hill and worth making accessories for, simply because (at the time when it counted) it was indeed the better player.
A polar bear is a cartesian bear after a coordinate transform.
"Shit I don't even have a cell phone."
1 58.jpg
i nescc012.jpg
a se.jpg
See, now this I don't understand.
I don't have a land line. Why? The cell phone is _cheaper_. If you're going to be pragmatic, ditch the land line.
It's not about new and hip. It's about being fed up with how the old-fashioned phone company rips you off and charges you out the a$$ for features that simply come included with cell plans.
Plus you can take the thing with you. Nobody could ever get in touch with me when I had a land line. Now, they can, plus I get to screen my calls with caller ID and voicemail for free. Woot.
You can take my barebones nokia from my cold dead fingers.
As for the iPod, it simply works with Linux and has a non-annoying interface. Run Amarok or GTKpod and you're good to go. At least I _know_ it
works. It's not about trendy, though a decent design that doesn't look like ass helps.
Cranky Old Man Rant about electronics design and "WTF are they thinking?":
Minimalist design never gets the chance to look like ass. Steve Jobs knows this. Take a brick. Paint it white. You have a White iBrick. Throw a bunch of buttons, weird shapes on it, and you have an Ugly White iBrick. Same goes for laptops. Apple laptops are all striaght clean lines, single color. Tasteful. Doesn't even get the chance to look like ass. Look at a Dell or (horrors) DellAlienware notebook. Looks like ass.
A KitchenAid mixer looks like...a Mixer. It doesn't look like anything else or try to. Yet it's a classic design with clean streamlined lines. If I erased the logo from it, you'd identify it as a KitchenAid anyway.
Sit there and look like a computer, not a ricer box.
Computer fashion victims:
http://img.alibaba.com/img/product/11/32/11/11321
It looks like the grille of a Pontiac Aztec.
http://images.planetamd64.com/phatsob/dainescc/da
I know it's a mod, but that will give a 3 yr old nightmares... DAAADDEEEE!!! IT'S COMING TO TAKE MY BRAIIIN!!
http://www.freecomputer.ca/cases2.gif
Is that a jet intake? Yes, not only do I want it to sound loud, but I want it to _look_ loud and what's louder than a jet engine?
Another mod, but damn....
http://otakuscience.sharper.nl/images/game_pc%20c
OMFG, it looks like a Partidge Family lunch box (which is trendy now!) Aaaand it's slightly creepy at the same time! Yes! You too can raise eyebrows at your next LAN party!
Get off my lawn, you kids.
--
BMO
> They just couldn't compete under all the iPod hype.
Bullshit. They failed for technical reasons or for DRM reasons or for a combination of technical and DRM reasons and may get an assist from bad or no design. You are defending the 8-track tape. It is pitiful from a technical perspective. The "PC" technology market did not take over the consumer entertainment technology market as planned. Let it go.
iPod hype hit in like 2004-2005 when the iPod was already years old and had already bested all rivals on technical, DRM, and design merits. Something like 90% of iPods ever sold have color screens, that excludes the first 3 generations entirely, they are just a blip on the radar, but those were sales to a much, much geekier crowd.
It may be a treasure trove for Slashdot readers but maybe that's only because we will have the right combination of diminished expectations and technical know-how to not be disappointed in one of these devices.
Using http://www.rockbox.org/ can give some older or failed (marketing-wise) players new life. Rockbox runs fine on the Gigabeat Fx0 :)
I don't own a cell phone either and don't plan on it. I leave my house to get away from people. Taking a phone with me would prevent this from happening. A cell phone is not cheaper where I live. I've done the math and a it's actually about $5 more a month where I live. I have an answering machine and no need for voice mail. I don't have a use for caller ID either.
As for ipod killers, I have my Creative Zen since before the ipod even existed. It works great and does what I want. If/when it breaks, I'll go back to Creative. I have no need for an ipod, nor its zillion accessories. I have my mp3 player with a case and headphones. I don't want, or need, to plug it into another fifty devices or have interchangable covers or any of the other things you can attach to it. I also don't care what it looks like. I care about how it works and if it gets the job done. I want to listen to music on a reliable player. My Zen does that.
Some people have just grown so accustomed to being constantly connected that they just can't understand that there are other people out there that don't need/want what's the latest gadget, nor do they want to be connected to the world 24/7.
Only when you copy them over using iTunes, then you can only copy them back off on a computer that is "authorised" for that iPod. That is, if you actually want to listen to them - you can freely copy them back and forth from any computer in "data mode", but you can't actually listen to them if you do that.
Unless, of course, you install Rockbox. http://www.rockbox.org/
You (the parent post) probably know this but it bears repeating:
"Harmony" is most certainly not the "regular mp3's" the GP was talking about. Regular mp3's are just that - either ripped fresh from a CD, p2p network, or any other source of non-DRM'd mp3 audio files. In case you didn't know - most media player software anymore tends to at least have some kind of plugin allowing for basic writing to iPod's, and if you don't prefer that method, you can always load Rockbox or iPod Linux (unless your model isn't compatible with iPod Linux) allowing for drag and drop transfer of music and playlists with "/" as the root directory (using Rockbox).
So not only is your point not valid, it doesnt even seem to be on topic - so just how the hell is it insightful? I mean, where the damned hell did "Harmony" get brought up anyway? Again, just in case you didn't catch it, the gp wasn't talking about removing Apple's DRM at all, he's talking about music files of which neither Apple's nor any other DRM exists at all...
You can't put an MP3 onto an (unmodified) iPod in a manner that it will both play, and be capable of being copied back off onto a computer that isn't "authorised" for that iPod. If you copy it with iTunes you can play it, but you can't freely copy it off again. If you copy it in "data mode" you can freely copy it off again, but you can't play it. This is not a bug; this is a design "feature" to make the sharing of free music awkward at best thus making the iTMS seem less cumbersome.
They failed because they couldn't support the one DRM that had mass market adoption: iTunes Music Store. No one else in any meaningful numbers bought into any other DRM scheme out there.
I mean shit. They sold hundreds of millions (if not billions) of tracks.
Only in terms of its interface? You say this like it is something trivial. Surely, the interface is a critical aspect of a personal music player that one interacts with? And how does the interface not affect functionality? A good interface makes a device more functional than a device with the same features but a poor interface to access them. As for "styling," I don't think that had much to do with the success of the iPod. Unless by "styling" you mean "form factor." The iPod was smaller and thinner than other devices with equivalent storage. That's very important. It's not just "style." It's part of the function. The whole idea of these players is that they're portable. I don't think many (especially early adopters) bought it because it was stylish - but rather than it wasn't like a brick to carry around. Look at how people laugh at old-fashioned mobile phones that are too big to carry comfortably in your pocket.
There is also the slight problem that the original ipod sounded terrible, it took several models to catch up with the nomad sound quality.Got any evidence for that one, or are you just making stuff up?
... and then they built the supercollider.
- Small form factor. Apple bought up a year's production of 1.8" drives. Everyone else was using 2.5" drives, so their hard drive was as big as the iPod.
- Used FireWire for syncing. USB 2.0 was only ratified as a standard slightly before the iPod was released, and everyone else was using USB 1.0, which took a good hour or so to completely fill the device.
- Integrated iTunes. A lot of people here complain about that, but is it really easier to manually sync your music with your portable player than to have an app that does, and even preserves play counts across the sync?
- Used a simple UI. The iPod did much less than some of its competitors, and managed to turn this into a feature. It followed the UNIX philosophy of do one thing (play music) and do it well.
The first PC versions used MusicMatch Jukebox, which was a horrible piece of software. I am amazed any PC users bought iPods before iTunes for Windows came out (actually, the first few versions of that were pretty terrible too).I'm not sure about the sound quality of the originals - I only got a 3G one - but I seem to recall reading some pretty good reviews. The real killer was the form factor, however. Last time I looked, Creative's players were around 20% bigger by volume. They may cram more features into that space, but if I'm carrying the machine around with me I want it to be as small as possible.
I'm just waiting for a 16GB iPod Nano before I upgrade. You can buy a 16GB USB flash drive for under £100; why are 8GB Nanos still the biggest you can get (and £170)? Maybe Apple don't get the same discounts on Flash they used to...
I am TheRaven on Soylent News
This is an absurd claim. Copying non-DRM songs of an iPod doesn't require any sort of "authorization". The songs aren't encrypted on the iPod and any of a dozen tools can read the database format.
The fact that a sizeable number of Slashdot posters still think the iPod is successful because of "hype" explains why a sizeable number of Slashdot posters will never be as successful as Steve Jobs.
I am a believer of momentum and curves.
Yep, the Cowon's are very good. I've owned an X5 since the week they hit the first market in 2005 (I did pay a premuim price for it) and it's worked flawless for me all that time. The sound quality kicks an iPod's ass, and the unit itself is quite rugged and durable as it has survived a lot of physical abuse.
These are also about the most "hackable" devices on the market too, as there are a lot of both hardware and software mods you can do to them. Go read the "iAudiophile" forums ( http://iaudiophile.net/forums for the user community comments and stuff. This brand of portable media players probably has the second largest following behind the Apple iPods. And for the true Slashdot geek, the iAudio model A2 does run a custom Linux as it's kernel (source available), and it's GUI is written with GTK+.
Oh yeah, THAT'S a real compelling feature...
Anyway, I just want music and iTunes is NOT a positive feature. With these vendors I can get all the function I want, and avoid the Apple Tax!
Blar.