OSNews: http://www.osnews.com/story/19027/The_iPod_Touch Exploring the Future of Computing en-us Copyright 2001-2009, David Adams adam+nospam@osnews.com Tue, 10 Nov 2009 10:43:33 GMT http://www.osnews.com/images/osnews.gif OSNews.com http://www.osnews.com XviD is MPEG-4 http://osnews.com/thread?289787 http://osnews.com/thread?289787 Just FYI, XviD is MPEG-4. They're the same on-disk format.

The key is that none of Apple's products support MPEG-4 inside an AVI container file, which is how they are most often found; they only support it in MP4 and MOV container formats. However, there exist many tools to repackage an AVI file into an MP4 file without having to re-encode the video or audio. On *nix systems, ffmpeg and mencoder can both do it. It only takes seconds! Mon, 10 Dec 2007 08:25:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (resistor) Comments RE: XviD is MPEG-4 http://osnews.com/thread?289788 http://osnews.com/thread?289788 Just FYI, I am not a newbie in video technologies (you possibly missed my filmmaking/video blog).

The point is, it's not just the .avi container problem, but the fact that XViD is usually muxed with mp3, not AAC, which is another detail that needs to be taken care of, should Apple decide to support XViD. In reality it's a strategy/policy issue, not a technical one. Mon, 10 Dec 2007 08:29:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Eugenia) Comments RE[2]: XviD is MPEG-4 http://osnews.com/thread?289792 http://osnews.com/thread?289792 The lack of avi support (namely divx and xvid)in the ipods has always been a turn off for me. I had this same issue when I bought my mac mini long time ago. Was expecting that I could just download divx and play my collection of avi file I've collected over the years only to find that quick time hates .avi so I used VLC.

I want to get an iPod touch for what amounts to a portable internet tablet, but hate the idea of having to transcode movies to play on it. So right now i'm up in the air about getting an iPod touch and having better internet or getting a archos 605 and having better media but worse internet. Mon, 10 Dec 2007 08:42:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Square) Comments RE[3]: XviD is MPEG-4 http://osnews.com/thread?289795 http://osnews.com/thread?289795 Yes, the Archos has much better format compatibility. But it's not as nice to use and it's much bulkier. Hopefully when Apple offers an SDK it also allows for media plugins. Mon, 10 Dec 2007 08:49:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Eugenia) Comments RE[2]: XviD is MPEG-4 http://osnews.com/thread?289801 http://osnews.com/thread?289801 Not only that, DivX/Xvid are MPEG4-ASP, which allows more features than MPEG4-SP (B-frames, QPel, GMC and others). If the iPod only decodes SP, it won't play Xvid even when it's remuxed with AAC in an mp4 container. Mon, 10 Dec 2007 10:21:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (pxa270) Comments OGG http://osnews.com/thread?289811 http://osnews.com/thread?289811 Is there a way to get these things to play Ogg Vorbis?

I have a large collection of my music in it, and prefer it over mp3/AAC. Mon, 10 Dec 2007 11:44:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anon) Comments RE: OGG http://osnews.com/thread?289812 http://osnews.com/thread?289812 No, except if Apple releases a plugin SDK for their iPod application. Mon, 10 Dec 2007 11:45:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Eugenia) Comments RE[3]: XviD is MPEG-4 http://osnews.com/thread?289813 http://osnews.com/thread?289813 Quoting Square: "Was expecting that I could just download divx and play my collection of avi file I've collected over the years only to find that quick time hates .avi so I used VLC."

Quicktime is just missing the appropriate codecs. Try this, its a real lifesaver:

http://perian.org/

Perian enables QuickTime application support for additional Media Types:

* AVI, FLV, and MKV file formats
* MS-MPEG4 v1 & v2, DivX, 3ivX, H.264, FLV1, FSV1, VP6, H263I, VP3, HuffYUV, FFVHuff, MPEG1 & MPEG2 Video, Fraps, Windows Media Audio v1 & v2, Flash ADPCM, Xiph Vorbis (in Matroska), MPEG Layer II Audio
* AVI support for: AAC, AC3 Audio, H.264, MPEG4, and VBR MP3
* Subtitle support for SSA and SRT

Its also free and opensource.

Hope this helps. :-) Mon, 10 Dec 2007 12:03:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Governa) Comments Touch Rocks. http://osnews.com/thread?289815 http://osnews.com/thread?289815 I have to agree with the positive review. The iPhone was very lust-worthy, but the last thing I need is another phone - I already have several - so I waited. When the Touch came out I bought it and it has been a lifesaver.

The video through iTunes has been my savior in many, many airports where I can sit through delay #5 by watching a video. The wireless has even been useful at times.

My only complaint is that you can't enter notes directly. I've had to use contacts to get around it, but it's a kludge. Mon, 10 Dec 2007 12:23:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (elwebst) Comments I gotta say it, I love my touch http://osnews.com/thread?289817 http://osnews.com/thread?289817 I've had it for just over a month and it's fantastic. Mobile Safari is much better than the other phone browsers I've seen. I do use it to play music or videos occasionally, but for the most part I think of it as a small internet tablet and from reading a ton of discussions about it, that's how a lot of others perceive it too. The problem is, I don't think Apple sees it that way. From the beginning they've marketed the iPhone and iPod Touch as iPods that just happen to have some neat new features. Maybe they had long term plans to turn it into a full platform, but it seems like they got caught with their pants down by user demand.
It all hinges on what they do in February. Will they allow IM programs? Codecs? Will everyone be allowed to program for it? If they don't, If they keep it closed like all the other iPods, then it becomes much less interesting. It stays just an Ipod with a pretty interface and not the 'next big thing'. Mon, 10 Dec 2007 12:42:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (ihaveabuginmyeye) Comments RE[4]: XviD is MPEG-4 http://osnews.com/thread?289819 http://osnews.com/thread?289819 Furthermore, Apple has updated its codecs page here
http://www.apple.com/quicktime/resources/components.html
I've found that I only needed an XVID codec to play most of the files. Perian never worked for me for some reason... Mon, 10 Dec 2007 12:52:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Buck) Comments Honk! Honk! http://osnews.com/thread?289820 http://osnews.com/thread?289820 I like my iPod Touch, if only because it's a nice pocket computer that blows the Windows Mobile offers out of the water technically.

I hope the SDK will be a decent one allowing access to all of the features, plus allow to implement plugins for the media framework.

What concerns me however is the talk about mandatory signatures. I'd figure, if manually loaded ELF objects don't need signing (only the starting application itself), someone may write a signed loader stub to get around this. But then again, I'll see Apple shutting it down the certificate faster than you can cough. Mon, 10 Dec 2007 12:53:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Weeman) Comments Terminal http://osnews.com/thread?289823 http://osnews.com/thread?289823 The most useful app is the OpenSSH server. Then, instead of a crazy terminal, you can just SSH over from your computer. I used that to make my iPhone have a "disk mode" and also to create my own Summerboard themes. Mon, 10 Dec 2007 13:20:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Adam S) Comments What about tracker formats? http://osnews.com/thread?289824 http://osnews.com/thread?289824 Maybe rockbox is better anyway , i never seen an ipod that could play tracker formats(.xm .mod .s3m etc) and rockbox is slowly getting there it at least plays nsf , mid and spc .
Which Music formats does Iphone/ipod touch play?
I hate to be locked into some specific formats with a player Mon, 10 Dec 2007 13:24:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (WyldStylist) Comments RE[5]: XviD is MPEG-4 http://osnews.com/thread?289831 http://osnews.com/thread?289831 Of course, on the desktop OS X, Divx/Xvid was never much of a problem. It is after all the second most widely used general purpose OS, it would be laughable if you couldn't get them to work. But the iPods/iPhones still have very limited video format playback option. Hopefully a solution will emerge for either the hacked devices or with the upcoming official SDK.

If there was ever any doubt that web-apps as the only official SDK is too limiting, just try write a video codec in Javascript ;) Mon, 10 Dec 2007 14:18:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (pxa270) Comments WANT http://osnews.com/thread?289839 http://osnews.com/thread?289839 I've always thought that the iPhone is a terrible smartphone but the best iPod ever. This solves the problem. Apple is getting my cash after all. Mon, 10 Dec 2007 14:33:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (CharAznable) Comments Yawn http://osnews.com/thread?289848 http://osnews.com/thread?289848 Let me know when I can put Rockbox on it. iTunes needs to die.
In fact, you shouldn't need to use iTunes at all especially with this player since the player is pretty much already running iTunes isn't it?
If you can buy a song and download it over wi-fi, then you know the phone itself has the ability to manipulate the proprietary database file to add the song to the library.

So you should be able to just plug it into your computer as a mass storage device, drag your mp3 or aac files over to it and the next time you turn it on, those files are integrated and you can play them.

Apple players piss me off so much. The only reason I have one is because my GF won one at her holiday party, now I run Rockbox because I hate iTunes.

My brother just bought an 80Gb iPod classic, found out how much he hated iTunes and actually traded a friend for an 80Gb Video iPod just because you can't run Rockbox yet on the classic.
He hated it because he put all of his music on it painfully slow with USB 1.1 then he wanted to reformat his computer. To use his iPod as a backup device he had to re-transfer the SAME files as data files because the file "Some Artist - 01 Some Song.mp3" turns into "/DF/7Z/QR9F3.mp3"

ITunes is absolute crap and it is obviously an artificial restriction since it is possible to use an iPod without it because you can with Rockbox. Mon, 10 Dec 2007 15:15:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (FunkyELF) Comments RE: Yawn http://osnews.com/thread?289855 http://osnews.com/thread?289855 He hated it because he put all of his music on it painfully slow with USB 1.1 then he wanted to reformat his computer. To use his iPod as a backup device he had to re-transfer the SAME files as data files because the file "Some Artist - 01 Some Song.mp3" turns into "/DF/7Z/QR9F3.mp3"


Solution 1: For using USB1, assuming a desktop, buy an $8US USB2 PCI card. If it's a laptop, you'll need to pony up $30 for a PCMCIA/Cardbus version.

Solution 2: Yamipod allows you to manage your iPod (including copy songs off of it) without using iTunes.

Both solutions seem a bit easier than running non-Apple firmware. Mon, 10 Dec 2007 15:52:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (MattPie) Comments RE[2]: Yawn http://osnews.com/thread?289856 http://osnews.com/thread?289856 Solution #3: avoid iPod altogether.
iTunes isn't crap if it doesn't do what you think it should do. There are like a thousand other players that do what you want. Mon, 10 Dec 2007 15:54:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Buck) Comments Quality? http://osnews.com/thread?289858 http://osnews.com/thread?289858 Sorry, I don't mean to be too condescending here, but... in a review of a device thats primarily purpose is audio playback, does anyone have more of a detailed description of the audio quality than "top notch"? Maybe compared against some other players, iPods, Zune, or something of the sort? How do the included ear-buds match up against other players? Thanks! Mon, 10 Dec 2007 16:04:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (saynte) Comments The Touch has potential but http://osnews.com/thread?289859 http://osnews.com/thread?289859 I own an iPod Touch (received as a birthday gift from my very generous wife) and a Windows Mobile PDA with WiFi. As things stand right now if I had to give up one device I would keep the PDA rather than the Touch because there are tons of free third party apps for WM. Like any computer, apps are what make it, I hope Apple realizes this and releases a reasonably powerful SDK for the iPhone/Touch. I really want to like my Touch and am willing to wait a while to see what third party devs can do but if the SDK is lame or the apps too costly then the Touch gets the boot. Mon, 10 Dec 2007 16:06:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (plsmth) Comments dealbreaker http://osnews.com/thread?289860 http://osnews.com/thread?289860 max 16 gigs is nowhere NEAR enough Mon, 10 Dec 2007 16:08:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (google_ninja) Comments Comment by Thom_Holwerda http://osnews.com/thread?289871 http://osnews.com/thread?289871 Touchscreen sucks balls. Whether they call it "multitouch" or not. I can't operate this thing blindly, and hence, it is of no use to me.

A music player that you need to look at to operate is useless. For me, that is. Mon, 10 Dec 2007 16:45:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Thom_Holwerda) Comments RE: Comment by Thom_Holwerda http://osnews.com/thread?289876 http://osnews.com/thread?289876
Touchscreen sucks balls. Whether they call it "multitouch" or not. I can't operate this thing blindly, and hence, it is of no use to me.

A music player that you need to look at to operate is useless. For me, that is.


agreed - horrible ipod.

fantastic PDA for apple people though (once you jailbreak it) Mon, 10 Dec 2007 17:00:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (cheezlbub) Comments RE[3]: Yawn http://osnews.com/thread?289885 http://osnews.com/thread?289885 Solution #3: avoid iPod altogether.
iTunes isn't crap if it doesn't do what you think it should do. There are like a thousand other players that do what you want.

Granted, although the original poster apparently already has one, as does his brother-in-law. Perhaps the poster should have dissuaded his brother-in-law from getting one in the first place. ;) Mon, 10 Dec 2007 17:48:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (MattPie) Comments RE: The Touch has potential but http://osnews.com/thread?289887 http://osnews.com/thread?289887 There's already a crap load of third party applications for the iPhone/iPod. You'll need to jailbreak your device though. Maybe things change with the SDK, but that depends on Apple's digital signature policy. Mon, 10 Dec 2007 17:58:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Weeman) Comments The battery life? http://osnews.com/thread?289889 http://osnews.com/thread?289889 >The battery life is remarkable in this little gadget. We measured 20 hours of music, 4.5 hours with >video. Charging is pretty fast anyway, so battery life is not an issue.

This is *not* the battery life, but how long the battery runs on a single charge. The battery life is how many times you can recharge it, and it may become quite an issue. Mon, 10 Dec 2007 18:16:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (gehersh) Comments proprietary to the bone http://osnews.com/thread?289891 http://osnews.com/thread?289891 iPod Touch and iPhone is just not an option for me.
First of all, no USB connection (proprietary connector requering adapter instead).
Second, you MUST use iTunes. There's no option at all here.
Third, it doesn't work as a UMS disk for drag'n dropping your files (then playable) IF you want (I want!).

Fighting third party software also make a huge negative point.
The lack of support for Ogg Vorbis and FLAC is another negative.
In iPhone's case, lack of ringtone personalization (add your custom created ringtones) is just to sell the costumer to the carriers.
The way they've cut third party docks and accessories is just another negative point. If I'm paying for a device, that's it. I don't need to pay you again just because you want to get richer via 3rd party fees. (And not letting me create my own accessories!)
Another negative is the lack of support for replacing batteries. You just have to purchase the service and be have with it... just like Apple like.

I could go on for a long time here, but these are the most important points. The thing is, it COULD be a nice device. But because of apple's choices and politics, it's actually a terrible device compared to simpler ones that "just work" and don't require the costumer to be part of your mindless hive giving up their choices. Mon, 10 Dec 2007 18:18:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (JrezIN) Comments RE[2]: Yawn http://osnews.com/thread?289893 http://osnews.com/thread?289893 Solution 1: For using USB1, assuming a desktop, buy an $8US USB2 PCI card. If it's a laptop, you'll need to pony up $30 for a PCMCIA/Cardbus version.

That isn't a solution, that just lets you do the same crappy thing twice as fast but you still need to do it twice so it is a wash.

Solution 2: Yamipod allows you to manage your iPod (including copy songs off of it) without using iTunes.

Yamipod may be able to reconstruct a useable filename from the artist, track, song info stored in the ID3 tags but you won't get the _original_ filename with the original folder structure.

Also, if you go to a buddies place and want to copy some of your music (non-commercial of course) to their computer you would need to install Yamipod where with Rockbox, its drag 'n drop in any OS. Mon, 10 Dec 2007 18:25:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (FunkyELF) Comments RE[4]: Yawn http://osnews.com/thread?289894 http://osnews.com/thread?289894 Granted, although the original poster apparently already has one, as does his brother-in-law. Perhaps the poster should have dissuaded his brother-in-law from getting one in the first place. ;)

He did but for the big capacity and small physical size there wasn't anything else he wanted.

Anyway, he is now quite happy with Rockbox on his iPod. Rockbox fixed everything he disliked about it.

He actually works at a pizza joint where almost all of his co-workers have an iPod. They play their music throughout the restaurant. Some co-workers insist that if you go and change the song you need to fade the song out and will yell at you if you don't. They found that with Rockbox on my brother's iPod it does a cross-fade by default. Now others are going to convert. Mon, 10 Dec 2007 18:32:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (FunkyELF) Comments RE: Yawn http://osnews.com/thread?289895 http://osnews.com/thread?289895 soooo, if i'm understanding you correctly.. you hate iTunes and love Rockbox..

check. Mon, 10 Dec 2007 18:37:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (godawful) Comments RE[3]: Yawn http://osnews.com/thread?289897 http://osnews.com/thread?289897 Have you timed the process between computers that have USB 1.1 and USB 2.0? If not, it's not logical to state that USB 2.0 is only twice as fast: it's the second major revision to the standard, but it is far faster than USB 1.0, and 1.1, which is only 12.5 MBits/second, while USB 2.0 is 480 MBits/second, so unless you've got a really crappy system that can't keep up with that sort of speed via USB, it should be MUCH faster in practice.

While I doubt anyone will consider the iPod experience the "perfect solution" because of DRM existing at all (from the consumer's point of view) and also because it doesn't absolutely require it (from the big company's producer's point of view) it appears Apple has done far more right than wrong as far as producing something people actually want to use. Perhaps it sucks to some degree, but the key to its success is that everything else sucks more, if only because of the support infrastructure (or lack thereof). If you think the Apple players suck so bad, and iTunes sucks rocks, you really should check out for the sake of comparison everything related to Zune. Mon, 10 Dec 2007 18:46:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (JonathanBThompson) Comments RE[3]: Yawn http://osnews.com/thread?289902 http://osnews.com/thread?289902 He actually works at a pizza joint where almost all of his co-workers have an iPod. They play their music throughout the restaurant. Some co-workers insist that if you go and change the song you need to fade the song out and will yell at you if you don't. They found that with Rockbox on my brother's iPod it does a cross-fade by default. Now others are going to convert.

What sort of play time do you see on single charge? When I looked at ipodlinux a long time ago, it decoded the MP3 stream in software instead of using the dedicated hardware, which killed the battery. Looking around quickly, Rockbox seems to have the same issue.

Also, if you go to a buddies place and want to copy some of your music (non-commercial of course) to their computer you would need to install Yamipod where with Rockbox, its drag 'n drop in any OS.

Sort of. Yamipod is a stand-alone executable on Windows and only depends on GTK2 in Linux (I have no info on Mac), so it runs fine from an ipod directly. Not quite as elegant of dropping file in a folder, but it gives you a search interface so you can find songs based on ID3 info. Mon, 10 Dec 2007 19:34:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (MattPie) Comments RE: Comment by Thom_Holwerda http://osnews.com/thread?289904 http://osnews.com/thread?289904 Not totally sure why I'm posting a me-too comment, but I feel like doing it.

I have a very old fashioned iRiver H120 (or rather iHP when I bought it) that has loads of buttons on it. There aren't that many occasions that I choose function over form, but iPod touch just seems rididulously impractical.

With all my buttons/joysticks I can change track, volume etc without taking the thing out of my pocket. I always have the pause button physically available if I want to quickly stop something (invaluable when using for learning.)

Plus with RockBox I can play asteroids on it with the joystick - and what could be better than that? Mon, 10 Dec 2007 20:04:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Phil) Comments I really want the Touch...... http://osnews.com/thread?289905 http://osnews.com/thread?289905 But I bet there's a 32GB model around the corner. I currently have a 5Gv1 30GB, and I'd have a really tough time giving up that space, given the movie file sizes.

EDIT

I bet this isn't far from the iPod form factor:

http://www.pcworld.com/article/id,126833/article.html

At least hopefully not!Edited 2007-12-10 20:06 Mon, 10 Dec 2007 20:04:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (polaris20) Comments RE[5]: Yawn http://osnews.com/thread?289906 http://osnews.com/thread?289906 Yay for Rockbox and its 50% hit on the battery life. Mon, 10 Dec 2007 20:07:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Tom K) Comments RE[5]: Yawn http://osnews.com/thread?289908 http://osnews.com/thread?289908 I hate to say it, but this is Illegal, playing (publicall audible) recorded music in a public place, or workplace without paying for a license is illegal ;) Mon, 10 Dec 2007 20:58:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (stestagg) Comments RE: XviD is MPEG-4 http://osnews.com/thread?289911 http://osnews.com/thread?289911 I love Sandisk, although it's expensive... Mon, 10 Dec 2007 21:24:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (YouGenia) Comments RE[6]: Yawn http://osnews.com/thread?289914 http://osnews.com/thread?289914 So is playing someone else's music in a cover band. Good luck enforcing it though. Not worth the trouble/effort. Mon, 10 Dec 2007 21:38:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (polaris20) Comments iPot http://osnews.com/thread?289919 http://osnews.com/thread?289919 Why not review record players or at least SACD players instead?

Steve Jobs listens to LP records at home on his 100,000 dollar Clearaudio Statement record player, while he laughs his ass off at all the pimple-faced burger-eating tone-deaf hearing-damaged teenagers who buy his crappy iPots. Mon, 10 Dec 2007 22:10:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (jverage) Comments RE: Honk! Honk! http://osnews.com/thread?289926 http://osnews.com/thread?289926
What concerns me however is the talk about mandatory signatures. I'd figure, if manually loaded ELF objects don't need signing (only the starting application itself), someone may write a signed loader stub to get around this. But then again, I'll see Apple shutting it down the certificate faster than you can cough.


Do you know what application signing is? read up on it, come back here, re-read your post - and laugh at the ignorance expressed in the post. Mon, 10 Dec 2007 22:52:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (kaiwai) Comments RE[6]: Yawn http://osnews.com/thread?289934 http://osnews.com/thread?289934 I hate to say it, but this is Illegal, playing (publicall audible) recorded music in a public place, or workplace without paying for a license is illegal ;)

In the US, clubs that have bands in can get a blanket license from ASCAP (http://www.ascap.com/licensing/termsdefined.html). I'm not sure if a pizza joint would bother. Large chain, probably, small place, probably not.

Edit: Acronym Typo..Edited 2007-12-10 23:24 Mon, 10 Dec 2007 23:23:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (MattPie) Comments Now this I would buy http://osnews.com/thread?289962 http://osnews.com/thread?289962 Forget the overpriced iPhone....THIS is the device I was waiting for. I could care less about video and web surfing, the thought of trying to watch a movie on a 2" screen while squinting for two hours isn't all that appealing. All I want is an excellent sounding, easy to manage/use ipod for music to replace my 3G ipod. I know there are other manufacturer's devices for cheaper, but let's be honest. The iPod is king, everyone else is an imitator. Why settle for less?

I do have one question. It would seem that this is entirely flash based. If that's the case, then, I should probably wait until at least a 20GB version gets released to buy one. Tue, 11 Dec 2007 02:39:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Phloptical) Comments RE[6]: Yawn http://osnews.com/thread?289967 http://osnews.com/thread?289967 I hate to say it, but this is Illegal, playing (publicall audible) recorded music in a public place, or workplace without paying for a license is illegal ;)

Why is everyone so quick to jump to conclusions and assume that the music being played is copyrighted? Everything they play is either downloaded for free with the artist's permission to play freely or is homemade music. Tue, 11 Dec 2007 03:19:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (FunkyELF) Comments Adding music http://osnews.com/thread?289988 http://osnews.com/thread?289988 I take it that it'll be necessary to use iTunes to transfer music to this device?

It looks good but I wouldn't put up with that restriction.

I don't suppose anyone has developed a drag and drop hack for the iPod? Tue, 11 Dec 2007 12:15:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Dave_K) Comments iTunes http://osnews.com/thread?289993 http://osnews.com/thread?289993 If you hate iTunes, get a mac and be happy.


end the hate with your machine Tue, 11 Dec 2007 14:02:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (ashan) Comments Wow... http://osnews.com/thread?290012 http://osnews.com/thread?290012 ...I won't link directly to the blog post, but it appears VOIP on an iPod Touch isn't too far away, thanks to jailbreaking and the dock connector. All very clever hardware hacking! Tue, 11 Dec 2007 16:52:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (JCooper) Comments RE: Now this I would buy http://osnews.com/thread?290016 http://osnews.com/thread?290016
was waiting for. I could care less about video and web surfing, the thought of trying to watch a movie on a 2" screen while squinting for two hours isn't all that appealing.


The screen is 3.5". Also there is no 'squinting' involved. You just hold it at a comfortable distance from the face and it's no different to watching a bigger screen farther away. What is important is the angle subtended at the eye and the resolution, not the size of the screen (there are limits to this, of course).Edited 2007-12-11 17:35 UTC Tue, 11 Dec 2007 17:34:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Chicken Blood) Comments RE: iPot http://osnews.com/thread?290033 http://osnews.com/thread?290033 Your post adds nothing to the topic, and your "clever" play on the iPod name makes you look very immature.

So OSNews is to review a format developed by Sony that never took off, instead of arguably the most popular portable media player of this decade?

Like it or not, the iPod is very popular, and is purchased by more than just "pimple-faced burger-eating tone-deaf hearing-damaged teenagers", and thus warrants a review.

By your comment are we to assume all mp3/media players are useless due to utilizing compressed/loss formats? Tue, 11 Dec 2007 19:46:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (polaris20) Comments RE: iPot http://osnews.com/thread?290196 http://osnews.com/thread?290196
Steve Jobs listens to LP records at home on his 100,000 dollar Clearaudio Statement record player


Sorry, can't hear you, too busy winding my Victrola... Wed, 12 Dec 2007 11:29:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (StephenBeDoper) Comments Steve Jobs is laughing at you http://osnews.com/thread?290283 http://osnews.com/thread?290283 Most tone-deaf computer nerds wouldn't even know their ass from a real musical instrument, let alone tell the difference between a record player or a CD player. Get yourself a proper home stereo system, instead of listening to music on cheap crappy plastic computer speakers or on iPot earphones...sad losers.

I don't own an iPot or any other portable mp3 player. So sorry, I am not hip, cool or modern and I don't wear glasses. Wed, 12 Dec 2007 18:14:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (jverage) Comments iPot: popular? http://osnews.com/thread?290284 http://osnews.com/thread?290284 The iPot is "popular" because Apple fooled a whole generation of tone-deaf, hearing-damaged, pimple-faced burger-eating teenagers into thinking that they can not be hip, cool or modern without one and to survive in the digital age and be in the cool club, you simply need an iPot.

I got an erection after watching a video on YouTube of an iPot being blended to shreds.

iPot = iShit

Get yourself a record player and discover a whole new dimension in sound. You might actually like it after curing your addiction to crappy lossy compressed formats. Wed, 12 Dec 2007 18:19:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (jverage) Comments RE[2]: Now this I would buy http://osnews.com/thread?290341 http://osnews.com/thread?290341 ...and it doesn't give you a headache trying to focus on small objects moving very fast for so long?

It just seems unnatural to me. Thu, 13 Dec 2007 00:49:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Phloptical) Comments RE: iPot: popular? http://osnews.com/thread?290455 http://osnews.com/thread?290455 Gee, none of the stuff I listen to seems to be available on vinyl. Guess I'll have to "settle" for hearing live music. Thu, 13 Dec 2007 15:16:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Johann Chua) Comments