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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."
Weren't there rumours at least of slave labour building iPods in the far East? They certainly couldn't cut the bottom line any lower than that, so the high prices must be a function of corporate greed.
The iPOD is by no means superior to alot of the MP3 players on the market today, not in interface or design. It's a matter of preference in that regard. Personally, I find the Zune, and eSansa (which I own... drag and drop on any OS... yes please!) interfaces much more intuitive. The reason Apple did so well? It's plain and simple... THE COMMERCIALS AND ADS. Outside of Microsoft's Zune (a million units pushed already!?), I haven't seen any other MP3 player even try to do all the hype that the iPOD has. I used 2 devices before the IPOD that were just as good design wise as the ORIGINAL iPOD. But outside of the occasioanl ad in magazine, I can count the number of ads on 2 hands and feet that I saw for them both in roughly two years. Compare that to the media blitz of the iPOD and you will see why it's so popular. People are fancy marketing sheep, and will buy a boxed rock if marketed correctly. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pet_rock
It just kills me when I use my eSansa 260 and people start saying iPOD this and that... I've personally converted about 7 iPOD users. Now many that bought into the fad now moving on to BETTER devices. The mentality of FANY BOYS never ceases to amaze me. But without you guys, I would never get better products cheaper... What a double-edge sword it is! To get better devices I have to listen to the prattle of sheep.
I had written something "in defense of the ipod"
But you know what?
Have a big cup of STFU and swallow your inferiority complex. Then, take a hammer to your Archos, because it makes you rude, long winded, and an asshole.
--
BMO
no radio. why?!
i have never, and will never buy an iPod: no radio
i am now a 3x iRiver buyer... i now have an iRiver clix, and... drum roll please... it has a radio! what an amazing 19th century concept! (smacks forehead)
i've heard the justifications about why iPod has no radio: no good radio in most places, radio programming itself sucks, blah blah blah...
hey iPod lovers: how much does that circuitry cost? 50 cents?
for all the vaunted value of an iPod, the designers couldn't spend 50 cents and put in a frickin' radio?
50 cents of circuitry compared to the value of radio as determined by the biggest radio hater: still worth it!
i never, ever understood that about iPods, ever. why they don't have a radio. to me, that is abysmally stupid
could someone please try to explain to me the reasoning and rationale that had iPod forego radio?
intellectual property law is philosophically incoherent. it is your moral duty to ignore it or sabotage it
That's HILARIOUS.
For the DRM comment, iTMS is popular, but it's clearly not a killer app. A small minority of iPod owners have ever bought a single track.
For "technical" and "design" issues, the article (which you obviously didn't read) fully addresses those. The players being listed are cheaper, more full featured than Apple's offerings, commonly smaller, and got very positive critical reviews.
In conclusion, you are the one who is full of "bullshit" blindly defending the iPod against ALL OTHER music players in the world, even though you've never used any of the competing products in question. It's ironic that while trying to claim that there is no iPod hype, you are showing with your ignorance just how much baseless hype there really is behind the iPod.
Slashdot gets worse every day... Pipedot: News for nerds, without the corporate slant