Who's Actually Buying iPods These Days?
birchtree.me
birchtree.me
http://www.zdnet.com/i/story/61/18/017591/zdnet-ipod-nano-si...
Giant clip dominates the back, just large enough of a screen to choose or control music, and just enough space to store way more than I need.
I travel a lot, it's great to have a separate music device. I can listen to music and not have to worry where my phone is. I can clip it onto my clothes while I'm falling asleep in a hostel or whatever. Actually I clip it to my clothes all the time.
I don't understand why it wasn't more popular. I still use it.
I also don't understand why anyone wants to use their phone as a music player. The idea of that sounds needlessly awkward and they'll fill their device's HD up with largely useless music.
Perfect for taking to the gym or hiking. An updated version with the same specs would probably be too cheap to produce now, with Flash so dramatically cheaper. Could you build one for $20?
Also, mass storage mode so you can drag-and-drop files or set up a script to cp all your newest torrented music to it when you plug it in.
The best part is that it you can install Rockbox. Rockbox is such a beautiful piece of software.
I am fiercely protective about my Sansa Clip. I only paid around 35$ for it, but it's way more valuable to me than that now that they are getting difficult to find.
> I can listen to music and not have to worry where my phone is.
If there's ever a time at which my phone isn't in my pocket, I'm worried already. Especially when travelling.
> The idea of that sounds needlessly awkward
Awkward how? My phone already has a bigger, nicer touchscreen than an affordable dedicated media player would. Honestly general-purpose computers are very good at these things - just like years ago when I first got Winamp and it was easier to use than a physical stereo.
> you'd fill your device's HD.
My phone has a 64gb microSD card. Half of that is 20 days' continuous listening. It's really not an issue.
This seems to be what everyone has taken away from my post. It's awkward to have a wire connected from my ears to the pocket I keep my phone in, generally far away. I want to take my phone out and look at it without a wire being in the way or an audio player running on the home screen.
I can take a earphone out if I want to talk on the phone, or quickly view a youtube video. Without finagling with the audio player.
I can plug my phone in anywhere I want to in the room while going to sleep with my ipod in my ears.
It's just awkward to me, ok. The same way it was awkward when people started trying to use their ipod as a watch. So they think having a wire jutting all the way down their arm isn't awkward, and I do.
That sounds much more awkward. Pausing music on my phone is at worst pushing one button on the inline control (or on the lock screen), no need to mess with the earphones. And since my phone's playing my music it knows to pause it if I get a call.
> I can plug my phone in anywhere I want to in the room while going to sleep with my ipod in my ears.
But then you'd need to recharge the ipod separately.
> It's just awkward to me, ok.
Sure. But you were saying you didn't understand people preferring their phone.
You can't run something like Spotify on it without a cell receiver, at which point you've pretty much got a phone.
No weird wideescreen design and you could control it through your clothes.
Notice that the Micky Mouse watch face - now present on the Apple Watch - was only present on that one version of the nano.
My primary use of my phone is as a music player. The second biggest use is as a camera. Between those two (and considering a lot of the music is streamed), the device's storage is never a problem.
What about it sounds awkward? To me it's way more awkward to carry a separate device to play music, given that I'm going to be carrying a cell phone anyway.
So what's the problem with filling up most of the space for music? The only reason I needed storage space in the first place was to put music on it. Everything else (contacts, apps, etc) use up less than 5% of the total used space.
http://www.shophex.com/vision-metal-watch-band-for-ipod-nano...
I absolutely love my classic. It has every song instantly accessible wherever I am. I use it every single day.
It's a shame there's no standout replacement. Sure, you need to spend longer curating your music collection, but the reward is a far more permanent collection of music and playlists which acts almost as a time capsule for your emotions. Plus it always lets you access all your music, regardless of reception, data, record company politics or what you remembered to sync to your phone that week.
Anyone know a replacement?
There's not even that much curating needed with modern storage capacity. SD cards are cheap, large, and so the only limit is how long I wait for FLACs to transcode down to AACs.
> Plus it always lets you access all your music, regardless of reception, data, record company politics
Exactly. I can't fathom why people are so in love with relying on so many unreliable parts to listen to music.
> Exactly. I can't fathom why people are so in love with relying on so many unreliable parts to listen to music.
A phone will do exactly the same thing...
Getting a smartphone with an SD card slot these days requires some compromise. The iPhone has never had one. Galaxy S6 and Nexus 6 are arguably the current Android flagships setting the standard for quality, and neither of them have SD expansion.
There are people with more than 64GB of music at CD quality who don't want to transcode it down.
I felt the same way for a very long time, and still have both an iPod Video and Classic to prove it, but what's done it for me is a data plan way bigger than I need and iTunes Match. Obviously that fails to meet one very specific requirement - offline availability - but I do keep a decent subset synced to my iPhone for offline listening, which itself is pretty rare. If anything, I prefer the iPhone's interface for finding stuff deep in my library since I can just type out the name of a track or ask Siri to play it.
1) Battery life. I'm a rather heavy user and my phone tends to only barely last the entire workday and commute before running out (if it lasts at all). Having a separate device for music means I don't need to feel guilty about wasting phone battery when listening to music.
2) Storage. I tend to use very little storage on my phone, mostly due to the fact that I keep my 40+ GB music collection on a separate device. This means I can usually go for the model with the lowest storage for any phone I'm interested in, and not have to limit myself to phones with expandable storage (that seems to be on the way out as a trend).
3) Sound quality. I'm not talking about the placebo-heavy issues that audiophiles concern themselves with. Rather, I use very sensitive IEMs and when listening to music on my phone I can always hear intermittent background noise (I believe this could be interference from the cell radios). I've never had this issue with dedicated players.
If I would use my phone to play music the battery would be dead by noon.
If it rains while im on a run, I only risk 120€ not 500-900€.
Not to mention that an ipod is WAY lighter (12.5-31g) compared to a smartphone (130g). Which makes it less iritating when you carry it in your pocket.
I regularly play music from my phone for the entirety of a 10-12 hour flight without using more than 20% of my phone's battery.
Friends have had similar experiences with their Moto G, a Wiko and a cheap non-branded tablet.
The nano is perfect for exercising as it's light and fits in the tiny little pockets on my exercise clothes. I'd much rather use that than put my phone in a big armband.
However, I will say that I wish it had streaming music.
I'm glad (and actually somewhat surprised) that Apple updated the line, rather than axing it. iPod Touch sales must be minuscule compared to iPhones.
It's possible they're in part a way to use surplus parts from the older iPhone lines. They usually lag a generation behind in their look and specs.
I felt old at first but then I realized mp3's started getting really popular 15 years ago, then I felt old for sure.
My grandfather had ~5 of these 100-disc CD changers, fully loaded, in various rooms around the house. Plus wall-to-wall bookshelves, many of them packed with CD cases.
A CD is 700MB of audio. Let's estimate, conservatively, that he owned 800 CDs. That's 70 gigs of audio. He wasn't exceptional in terms of music library size. That's who buys iPod Classic: people with more than 32GB (or recently 64GB) of music who want it all in one player.
iPod Classic also lives basically indefinitely (mine is at least 6 at this point, still works perfectly and the battery life is measured in weeks) and can be operated entirely by feel. Nothing ruins music while falling asleep like having to look at a bright backlit LCD screen to change the song and getting sidetracked into Facebook.
[1] http://www.amazon.com/Pioneer-PD-F908-CD-Changer-Discontinue...
It only stores 2Gb but since I've concluded that I can't hear the difference between 320 kbps and 128 kbps songs, it can hold a substantial number of songs.
In May/June we noticed a shortage of iPods, which was kind of scary since we are eventually going to need several hundreds for our users. It is a relief to see that Apple is continuing the iPod Touch product line.
>I also don't want my kids inadvertently dialing 911 - they don't need a cell connection (even without a plan) as first graders.
Genuinely curious. I certainly managed to get to adulthood without a cell phone but I guess I assumed most parents gave their kids some sort of cell phone these days. When do parents think that kids should have at least very basic feature phones these days?
I'd say when they start going out on their own. Letting first graders wander around town unsupervised is unfortunately a good way to get the police to arrest you, and if they're supervised they don't need a phone.
And, yes, an iPad mini is the next step. Also, the elephant totally absent from the room because it starved to death due to having its breakfast, lunch and dinner eaten - pocket consoles.
1. travel
2. commute
3. outdoors
4. running
5. gym
I miss my old generic MP3 player.
Could this perhaps be explained by a teenager's relative (price, legal?) difficulty entering into a cell contract?
While that may not constitute a viable commercial niche, it does suggest a use case among a tech savvy community.