Apple sells 100 millionth iPod worldwide

and every member of the family has an iPod.

 

and both my cats also have iPods.

(Actually, I own no music player, and dislike using them)

 

I bought an iPod Nano three weeks ago after extensively researching dozens of players and their features. I came to this purchase with no bias for or against the iPod. I bought it because the device was simple and had the features and 8-gig storage I wanted and flash memory for durability and gym use. I'd also heard good things about iTunes.

Well, I'm happy with the hardware, but the iTunes software has been a screaming nightmare.

iTunes is confusingly simple and yet the instructions don't seem to produce the intended results. Worst of all, it allows me to manage and play pirated files but not the files I've purchased legitimately on CD. I'm in the process of replacing my purchased CD collection with pirated versions, which is a royal pain in the butt. An aquantaince converted his music library and found that iTunes had devoured his entire computer music collection, never to be seen or heard again. He had to re-up the collection from CDs all over again. I've heard iTunes will give you a one-time replacement of any songs you lose, but that only applies to songs you've bought from the iTunes shop.

If I were buying again, I would research more on the synching software and less on the hardware features. iTunes is misleading, too, because it has a segue setting to overlap the end of one song with the beginning of the next song. But this doens't work with every song, and it doesn't work at all on the iPod; it only sort of works when you use iTunes to listen to songs on your computer.

Other features I miss more than I thought I would:

- A way to alter the song tempo, which would make the Nano more useful on the treadmill in the gym. Rather than adjusting the treadmill speed to fit the groove of the song, I'd rather adjust the song speed and run at my desired pace.
- iTunes doesn't tell you what songs it can't convert. It just says some songs weren't converted to the iTunes library and leaves it to you to figure out which ones. Thank fer nothin', iTunes.

It may be that with practice I'll iron these kinks out, but I thought the whole point of the iPod/Apple is to avoid the kinks to begin with.

The Nano is a brilliant design. The interface is superb. But it's backed by frustrating software. I've even heard there are applications design to mimic iTunes but without the kinks I've experienced. Has anyone used their iPod with non-iTunes music management software? I'd be interested to hear if it works better.

 

So you sing all your own music then, do you? :)

 

...wifey "owns" the CD player and buys all the CDs, which I acually rarely listen to. I get most of my musical needs satisfied through live musicals; for instance, in the next month I'm going to My Fair Lady (how do they do cockney in Japanese?) and Elizabeth twice, once in German, once in Japanese.

 

Well, I didn't expect a serious answer to my, ahem, jesting comment, but thanks anyway!
Let us know what the Japanese cockney sounds like!

 

I have a Walkman S705 and an Ipod Nano 2GB.
I use the walkman more because of the noise system reduction which really works..

 

and far superior to ipod in sound quality. The built in power for the noise cancelling is great as an external power source would be bulky. Now, if it had bluetooth capabilites it would be even better. Pity this series wasn't built with a universal USB jack like Willcom mobiles, but I guess you can't have everything. 60 hour battery life with FM radio is fine, but I want 600 hours and with digital radio capabilities... I'm actually shocked to find ipod only lasts from 12 to 24 hours of battery life.

 

quagulosity

And to think it was all developed with American workers. I am SHOCKED

Think again, it wasn't and I'm not shocked.

 

"Think again, it wasn't and I'm not shocked."

Oh really? Then who developed it? Not *manufactured it*, but who developed it? You've obviously never worked at Apple or even been inside an Apple corporate office. Apple doesn't outsource and does all its own in-house development with American workers.

 

The person credited with the design of the iPod is Jonathan Ive, who is English and is senior vice president - design at Apple.
He is also credited with many of the other unique Apple designs.This includes the iMac and G5 Powermac.
Members of his team include Danny Coster from NZ, Italian Daniele De Iuliis and Rico Zörkendörfer from Germany.These designers have also had a great influence on Apple products.

Many of the innards of the iPod are from outsources and Apple work in partnership with them.
PortalPlayer designed the MP3 decoder and chip, codec and DAC are from Wolfson Microelectronics (UK), battery - Sony, hard drive - Toshiba, firewire - Texas, flash memory - Sharp, power management and battery charging - Linear Technologies.Reverse engineered by Portelligent Inc.

So, in fact not actually a lot from Apple itself and as most people know they are assembled overseas, even says so on the label.

Therefore your last statement: Has a kind of hollow ring to it, don't you think?

Like most major products, if you look inside they are made up from various points across the globe and many different people have an input into them.

By the way, you are correct, I've never worked at Apple or have been to one of their offices.

 

Hmmm.... you failed to mention who wrote the software. No mention of that.

And Ive is a U.S. Citizen regardless of what country he is from.

Manufacturing does not constitute design. They may be stamped out in slave labor factories in China but they were designed in America by Americans.

 

There's a Bluetooth adaptor available which I have.. but overall I still prefer the supplied earphones, which works in conjunction with the unit to provide noise reduction..
And I too like the great battery life.

 

for whatever reason and whatever price then it would be a Japanese company? right? and in the history books it would have always been a Japanese company. Not. We all know products are made in whatever country for a whole load of reasons from tax related, staff, CEO's pent house, loaction to distributors and parts manufactures, shipping cost, etc. You could have the HQ of a company anywhere you like and move it every year. So to think that any product is designed in one country is just plain stupid. As for ipod their are a whole range of made manufactured in the US, UE, China (the FAR East) and probably in other countries around the globe.

 

If the Japanese bought or tried to run Apple it would be disastrous. Let's not even think such horrible thoughts.