iPod Video Dissection

alaswhatever writes "HowStuffWorks has gutted an iPod Video and taken pictures of everything.The article talks about exactly what's inside and explains how the touch-sensitive Click Wheel works." From the article: "Although the iPod is an Apple product, it works with both Mac and Windows machines. Since it's the top-selling media player in the United States, probably the big question is: What makes it different from any other digital media player?"

Re:The 3 reasons for the iPod's rule

[mr-mafoo]

Well there is always the roll your own UI. Rockbox has a very customisable GUI, I haven't used it but my cousin has been raving about it on his iRiver. They have a beta for the iPod going - although you have to get it from the CVS iirc. http://www.rockbox.org/ [rockbox.org] then there is iPod linux, and ones own coding skillz.

FOSS Means Business, Belfast, Thursday March 16th

[H4x0r Jim Duggan]

As usual, wikipedia has a great article about the iPod [wikipedia.org] (and of course it has less adds than TFA.

Apple - Always Late, Always Cautious

[meehawl]

Apple took huge risks to earn this reward, but that's how business is: those who risk the most earn the most rewards, if they earn at all.

Actually, Apple has always been a few years behind the curve when it comes to mp3 players - unwilling to jump into a new market but instead preferrig to wait for others to prove its viability and take the legal flak.

Saehan's 1998 MPMan F10 [wikipedia.org] - the world's first flash memory mp3 player.

Diamond's 1998 Rio PMP300 [wikipedia.org] - first major US company taken to court by the RIAA for providing mp3 hardware.

Compaq's 1999 Personal Jukebox [wikipedia.org] - 1st hard-drive based mp3 player.

Archos's 2002 Multimedia Jukebox [wikipedia.org] - first portable video/photo player and recorder.

I don't like the click wheel.

[oedneil]

My 20gb Rio Karma has a variable-scroll thumb wheel. It's more natural to use, and in a more ergonomic position than the click wheel. The player might not be as cute or trendy as an iPod, but I find the interface more intuitive than the iPod's.

Okay, the software sucks, which is why I wouldn't recommend it to any of my friends. But what other MP3 player has an ethernet port for network uploads!

BS. Actually there are 6 reasons.Its not marketing

[acomj]

You can fool some people with marketing but not everyone multiple times. The fact is the ipod works amazingly well. Is it perfect? No. But I think its the best out there and I'd buy another one if this one dies (its 2 years old, and running gread (knock on wood).

David pouge has 6 reasons in His NYTimes article...

In fact, at least six factors make the iPod such a hit: cool-looking hardware; a fun-to-use, variable-speed scroll wheel; an ultrasimple software menu; effortless song synchronization with Mac or Windows; seamless, rock-solid integration with an online music store (iTunes); and a universe of accessories. Mess up any aspect of the formula, and your iPod killer is doomed to market-share crumbs.

http://www.nytimes.com/2006/03/09/technology/circu its/09pogue.html [nytimes.com]

Re:My Take

[lyonsden]

The other thing is that id really like the iPod to have the ability to look for tunes beginning with a specific letter.

You are in luck! You can do that very thing easily using smart playlists.

1. Create a smart playlist for each letter you are interested in (up to 26)
2. Sync it to your iPod
3. Listen to your music the way you want to listen to your music.

Any questions?

Re:My Take

[Anonymous Coward]

but, if instead of 'contains', you used the inclulded 'starts with' feature . . .

iPod's Success is not Marketing Alone

[salesgeek]

I keep reading marketing... marketing... marketing... on reasons why iPod succeeded. There's a lot more to it that slick packaging, good advertising and strategic price/feature positioning:

1) Design: as people like to point out iPod wasn't the first or the most capable device of it's type. It was the most drop-dead easy to use and understand from install to sync to library management.

2) iTunes: solved the real problem with other players: you had to either rip CDs or download pirated music to get any use out of your MP3 player.

3)Focus on customer experience and satisfaction leading to great reputation. While Sony and RCA are busy explaining why their stuff "Works for Sure" people know iPod works because their friends and coworkers will tell them so. iPods are kind of the CrackBerry of music players.