Apple Unveils iPod nano

seraph · Posted: Thu Sep 08, 2005 1:49 pm Post subject: Apple Unveils iPod nano

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A revolutionary full-featured iPod, iPod nano holds 1,000 songs yet is thinner than a standard #2 pencil and less than half the size of competitive players. The iPod nano features an ultra-portable, lightweight design with a gorgeous color screen, Apple’s patent-pending Click Wheel and the ability to hold 1,000 songs or 25,000 photos. The iPod nano is available immediately in a 4GB or 2GB model, available in stunning white or black designs.

http://www.apple.com/ipodnano/

gsga · Joined: Jul 22, 2004 Posts: 267 Location: allentown, pa

Cool toy. And the price is right. I've reeeeally resisted buying an ipod...

Anybody have an ipod port on their car stereo? Work ok? I've heard that those fm transmitters are pretty spotty.

I don't know. I really hate the quality of mp3s. But it would be nice to have alot of music in the car w/o having to carry/scratch up all your cds.

Thoughts?

elektro80 · Posted: Thu Sep 08, 2005 4:48 pm Post subject:

If you really want to, you can rip CDs using a compressed non lossy format. Then you get your soundfiles at 1:1 with aboslutely no compression artifacts.

jksuperstar · Posted: Thu Sep 08, 2005 6:15 pm Post subject:

Hmmm...somewhat related question:

I have my CD's archived in single file .flac format (all songs, tags, and lists are within 1 single file). Anybody use this type of archive beside an iPod/iTunes?

1st anniversary is coming up, and this looks like a nice idea...

opg · Posted: Thu Sep 08, 2005 6:16 pm Post subject:

I wonder what mp3 player companies base their max amount of song storage on - that is what compression? I just assumed it was 44100 stereo 128 kbps.

elektro80 · Posted: Thu Sep 08, 2005 6:19 pm Post subject:

AFAIK you can convert this to acc or mp3 or the apple nonlossy format.
Works fine AMP.

elektro80 · Posted: Thu Sep 08, 2005 6:45 pm Post subject:

Kassen · Posted: Fri Sep 09, 2005 6:27 am Post subject:

elektro80 · Posted: Fri Sep 09, 2005 6:38 am Post subject:

elektro80 · Posted: Fri Sep 09, 2005 6:44 am Post subject:

Apple is just about to release QT/iTunes for Linux.

The AAC encoder is a part of the QT toolbox, so any app that can access this can use AAC.

There are other AAC tools out there too.

Kassen · Posted: Fri Sep 09, 2005 6:58 am Post subject:

I did some looking around. It apears the apple lossless one (which sin't aac, my oops) is based on some work by Emagic, aquiered by Apple.

Supposedly it's closed source and only works with I-tunes. That makes comparing it a bitch because these player wars are screwing it all up. MP3 should sound better then WMA but in windows media player mp3 quality gets intentionally screwed in order to make MS's format apear better.

This is getting realy frustrating; why only work with I-tunes? What is wrong with simply telling the USB port you are a removable drive so everybody can use it and not just customers of MS and MS-jr.? If it would just have a input you could simply record your records to it and not be bothered by software but aparently that's not a option. Looks nice, not all that expensive but not actually usable for me or I'd have to set up a extra computer just to controll it.

Kassen · Posted: Fri Sep 09, 2005 7:05 am Post subject:

elektro80 · Posted: Fri Sep 09, 2005 7:12 am Post subject:

elektro80 · Posted: Fri Sep 09, 2005 7:17 am Post subject:

Kassen · Posted: Fri Sep 09, 2005 8:04 am Post subject:

elektro80 · Posted: Fri Sep 09, 2005 9:20 am Post subject:

Yes, but you gotta use iTunes or 3rd party tools in order to insert the file into the playlist system.

Basically there are two different filestructures here.. 1. the "hidden" music content area.. and 2. the rest of the disk. It isn´t hard at all to get access to the "hidden area".

Apple has in fact implemented the DRM stuff in a very nice manner.

Kassen · Posted: Fri Sep 09, 2005 9:29 am Post subject:

Ah, so there is no need at all to have Windows-XP or Mac-OSX at all? Quite strange to write that then, seems to me they could increase their market by leaving out that demand. I was under the impression that this product would be useless to me since I'm not going to install SP2 on my only windows computer.

elektro80 · Posted: Fri Sep 09, 2005 9:42 am Post subject:

Well, in order to have the product actually work the way it is intended to.. you must have XP sp2 or OS X. But now the Linux version is on its way too.. so ..

iTunes is really a pretty convinient application.If you are not interested in using the iTMS part of it, then you can simply ignore that bit. The only real restrictions imposed on you is done by the ITMS DRM stuff.

All things considered, the iPod product concept is pretty cool. The DRM part does of course mean that it is not as open as some other players, but then those players either use the WMA DRM scheme or have ..at times.. pretty bad drivers. The completely non-reretrsicted players are getting fewer and I guess they will disappear form the market pretty soon.

I am also using my iPod with the Belking digicam memory card reader. This means that when my memory cards fill up, I can transfer all the pictures to the iPod. -And I keep lotsa files and stuff on my iPod too. I even have an encrypted directory on it where I keep a copies of all my software license info, email addies, conctact info and my calendar.

Kassen · Posted: Fri Sep 09, 2005 10:15 am Post subject:

Yes, I think the I-pod is a very interesting product too, probably the most interesting Apple thing since BeOS (I once wanted to run BeOS on Apple hardware). It's just... Well, I just don't understand how those companies work.

At least there is still vinyl, vinyl doesn't have any DRM. I made the desision for myself never to support DRM systems, not as a consumer and not as a artist either so while I might get a Ipod in the future I won't ever install I-tunes. Currently some labels I work with are considdering moving to online stores for digital content. I'm keeping a close watch on that and will be encoding my own files. If it's indeed true that in the future no players without DRM will be available then I'll stop releasing recorded music.

One of the best things G.W.Bush has done is invent this wonderfull "they hate our freedom" phrase. I anticipate using it a lot in the coming years.

jksuperstar · Posted: Fri Sep 09, 2005 11:01 am Post subject:

I have an iRiver H340...records to MP3 @ 320kbps, acts like a hard drive so you get compatability with any OS that has USB standards. It plays OGG, MP3, WMA and WAV files. The older H140 models even had optical SPDIF in & out so you could bypass the ADC/DACs.

It *also* supports DRM through a seperate USB port (yes, it has 2), but I've changed that with a firmware upload, and now that 2nd port is actually a USB master...I can connect my digital camera to it in the field and upload pics to my 40GB harddrive. Plus, I can play videos, look at pics, or read text files while listening to music on the plane/train/bus for up to 16hours (battery life) or so.

iPod has a long way to go...

elektro80 · Posted: Fri Sep 09, 2005 11:17 am Post subject:

Well, apart from watching videos.. the iPod is there already.

Kassen · Posted: Fri Sep 09, 2005 12:24 pm Post subject:

elektro80 · Posted: Fri Sep 09, 2005 1:30 pm Post subject:

Not quite, but then that doesn´t matter really. The iPod both has USB/USB2 and Firewire.. same "port". The newest models supports camera input. Personally I am using a Belkin memory card reader for the iPod which connects with Firewire.

mosc · Posted: Sat Sep 10, 2005 7:28 am Post subject:

I picked up an iRiver mp3 player too. I'm very satisfied. I've talked to several audio geeks that claim it is the best sounding, but I've not compared them to the iPods. I like the fact that it plays OGG and that you don't need to load iTunes on your computer. I've had iTunes several times and it is not a good citizen on a Windows computer. t takes over functions you would never imagine. You can't use iTunes to load other mp3 players either. I

Still, I think the iPod is master of this market. I'm not so interested in the Nano iPod but the ROKR

http://direct.motorola.com/hellomoto/rokr/

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Kassen · Posted: Sat Sep 10, 2005 7:40 am Post subject:

That river sounds good, I'll look into that.

As for phones; I'm actually delighted by this design of a mobile phone for the elderly that *doesn't* have all those new features. I have a normal digital camera and a normal alarm clock, I have two consoles for games; I don't want all those thingies in my phone. My friend Tim has one of those realy modern new ones; a true Polka-phone with touch schreen and so on. Once every two weeks it crashes and he loses all of his data......