Apple just held another one of their major product announcement press conferences. Lately, these have been disappointing me in some way or another.
This one, however, just made up for it all. Almost everything was iPod related and there are some very pretty things happening with the line. Allow me a moment to detail some of the highlights...
iPod Shuffle
The Shuffle as we knew it no longer exists. It has been replaced by another Shuffle
that is half the size of the original, has a built-in clip on the back,
is encased in aluminum, and comes with a dock. The standard battery
life is 12 hours on a single charge and it's pretty swanky at only an
inch in length. The only thing I don't like is that you no longer can
connect to your computer via the USB plug in. You must use the included
dock. And I just bought a Shuffle for working out. Meh, I still dig
mine. I'd lose this one.
iPod Nano
The new Nano
is even thinner than it once was, if you can believe that. It is now
available in 2, 4, and 8 GB models; has a 40% brighter screen; and
comes in green, silver, black, blue, and a reddish color. Even better,
it's also now aluminum like the old iPod Mini. The only problem is that
not all colors are available in all sizes. Oh, and the new packaging is
bitchin'.
iPod Video
A new 80GB model is now available, replacing
the 60GB, and prices on the 30GB have dropped about $50. Also cool is
that some models have a 3.5-6.5 hour battery life for video. Yikes.
Disney movies are now available with more studios expected to jump on
the bandwagon soon. You can also purchase video games including
Pac-Man, Bejeweled, Mah-Jongg, Vortex, Tetris, and Texas Hold' Em,
among others, for $4.99 to play on your Pod. Very friggin' cool. The
games are compatible with ALL fifth generation iPods in existence. Not
sure if they'll work on the new Nanos, but I would suspect so.
Search
But even cooler is that they are going to launch a
search functionality for iPod firmware so you can just do letter
searches for albums, song titles, artists, and genres. This is going to
be so nice. I hope this update comes as part of a firmware upgrade and
is not just available on new releases.
Seamless Playback
One of the things that drives me nuts is
trying to listen to live tracks on my iPod. There is always a gap in
between songs that just breaks up the natural flow of the music. Well,
seamless playback is now being offered for both audio and video. I'm
hoping that this is something else that will be incorporated with an
iPod firmware or iTunes software update and that we don't have to
re-rip our stuff.
Video Quality
Up to now, the videos that we purchased on
iTunes were in 320x240 resolution. That is now getting a bump to
640x480 making them infinitely more watchable on bigger screens. Not
exactly DVD quality here, but it should now be more watchable on a
computer or lesser quality TV. Now if only we can get free upgrades on
the videos we have already purchased. That would be really nice and
public oriented of them. And with the new download manager, you can
watch videos you purchase as they are downloading instead of waiting
til it's all over.
Earbuds
The earbuds have also been redesigned. They are
quite sleeker and they appear to be one solid piece now. I only hope
they improved the bass response.
Album Art
Free album art is now available for people who
have an account in good standing with the iTunes Store (no longer just
the iTunes Music Store). This goes for ANY music in your library. I
don't know if it will just automatically look it up or what. But this
is pretty sweet considering how much time I spend using my Amazon CD
Art Lookup widget when I rip new CDs to iTunes.
iTV
Of course, not all of it was iPod related. They also
announced iTV (working name only) which is a halfsize Mac Mini meant to
be a media center and connect to your home network wirelessly and
connects either directly to your TV or to your stereo receiver through
one of any number of outlets. It can be used for music, movies, TV,
podcasts, etc.
This is some pretty damn cool swag!
