iPod Video Dissection 83
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?"
The 3 reasons for the iPod's rule (Score:4, Interesting)
Of all the MP3 players, I've seen numerous ones that I liked, but the iPod won out mostly because the dame of the house prefers the interface. She has two.
The three reasons for the iPod rule, from what I've been able to deciper, are:
1. Marketing -- massive marketing
2. De-geeked interface (including copying songs)
3. Marketing
There has not been a bigger marketing campaign of any device, and in the long run I think it is marketing that helps to win the battle when everything else is equal. Yes, the de-geeked factor was a big reason for success with the girlfriends, parents and even grandparents, but I don't think it is the main reason for success.
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.
Side note: Has it really been over 10 years since I first downloaded an MP3?
Re:The 3 reasons for the iPod's rule (Score:5, Insightful)
I have the exact opposite opinion. The iPod acceleration works quite well. It takes a second or two of frantic spinning to get it going, but once it does, I usually end up hitting the end of the list in no time.
Re:The 3 reasons for the iPod's rule (Score:2)
And so do I, which is usually quite annoying as I'm rarely after the last artist in my library. While I think the iPod has got closer to handling large libraries than any other MP3 player that I've used, but it's still far from ideal.
Re:The 3 reasons for the iPod's rule (Score:2)
Re:The 3 reasons for the iPod's rule (Score:2, Informative)
Re:The 3 reasons for the iPod's rule (Score:3, Interesting)
By comparison, typing "so
Re:The 3 reasons for the iPod's rule (Score:2)
I've been thinking about the iPod interface for weeks now, trying to think of interesting ways to get from A to B to X to Y faster. No solution has come to me yet, but serendipity is an amazing thing.
Will someone come out with a better interface? I have no idea
Re:The 3 reasons for the iPod's rule (Score:2)
Well, the only thing I can think of is that on the 5G iPods, if a song is already playing, the framerate for the song browser decreases significantly, which is kinda annoying. This wasn't the case on the 3G iPod that I used to have. I'm probably one of the few people who doesn't work by playlists, since I don't know what I want to listen to until about 30 seconds before I play it. And I have an over 400 CD collection, which makes it worse. Still, I have to admit, it's pretty incredible how fast I can get to
Re:The 3 reasons for the iPod's rule (Score:2)
Yeah....the playlist is a strange paradigm to me too...I ran into it the first time when trying to use iTunes to carry some songs to a vacation in MX. The search did seem to revolve around assuming you had playlists set up.
I have most all my collection on a linux box 'media box', all ripped to flac. I usually just drag and drop songs at will say, in the morning on a
Re:The 3 reasons for the iPod's rule (Score:2)
Try this when you get an iPod: sit down in the morning, use iTunes to drag some songs to a playlist (say, Today's Songs), synch with your iPod (only takes a second for a new/modified playlist) and away you go... your playlist for today.
I actually didn't use playlists at all for a long time because the genre selection was fine. Now I use smart playlists to give me selections that contain multiple genres, like instrumental and vocal.
Did you read my post? (Score:2)
This is exactly why I said this was not an option for me.
30 seconds: the song right before it. By that I meant that my "playlist" for the day is adaptive, on the spot. It doesn't matter if I setup a playlist of songs 10 seconds before I start it playing, then the second song on the list will be wrong. I mean, this is an exaduration, but I'm trying to make a point. I don't wake up thinking, "What kind of music do I want to li
Re:Did you read my post? (Score:2)
You said you sit down in the morning, grab some songs for the day, then go? Right? That's a playlist. I never EVER listen to anything in order. Always random, hit the skip button if I don't like what popped up. As you say, the iPod makes it easy to scroll to a particular song if you don't like my skip method.
I suggested the playlist because that's what you seemed to be doing -- paring down your massive collection into something
New iPods on Tuesday! (Score:2)
Re:The 3 reasons for the iPod's rule (Score:1)
Absolutely right - and yet I understand that somehow Apple was allowed to patent it. So now no other company can incrementally improve on the interface in the way Apple originally did. It's a damn shame - my Zen Sleek, for example, was obviously designed by someone who understood the problem of navigating long lists, because it gives you the ability to jump to a particular letter in a list of tracks/artists/whatever,
Re:The 3 reasons for the iPod's rule (Score:2)
Vertical List Wrap.
Of course the cursor should go all the way to the top of the list before it wraps, and all the way to the bottom before it wraps the other way. And it should require two 'click-units' to jump from top to bottom or vice-versa.
Patent Me.
Re:The 3 reasons for the iPod's rule (Score:1)
Re:The 3 reasons for the iPod's rule (Score:2)
Don't worry, once somebody comes up with a way, everybody will tell you how obvious the solution is ;-)
Re:The 3 reasons for the iPod's rule (Score:2)
Re:The 3 reasons for the iPod's rule (Score:2)
It would help if MP3 enabled phones -- as in: storage of several GB of MP3s, not merely enough room to store a 20 second clip at 8kbps -- which would produce qual
Re:The 3 reasons for the iPod's rule (Score:5, Insightful)
i'm confused... when you say de-geeked interface, i get images of "easier to use." isn't that a good thing? the world doesn't doesn't like compiling their own software, using a CLI, or tweaking every single option just to get a merginal speed boost. that's what i think of when i hear geek interface. that's what i see when i look at other MP3 players with "more features." yes, it's great that it can decode mpeg2, divx, ogg vorbis, and [insert latest codec here], but does it achieve its original purpose easily? people buy these MP3 players (it's become generic... MP3 player = digital music player, though MP3 is still the dominant format used) to play their MP3s. if it does it well, then great!
and the iPod does indeed play MP3s well. no, i don't mean just sound quality, but on how people can actually play their music. people can easily browse and navigate their player to find the songs they want. they can easily create playlists with the provided software, iTunes. they can manage their giant music collections,again easily, and load them onto their iPod. from the clickwheel, to the iPod interface, to the syncing software, Apple has been very keen to look at the minute details on what it takes to actually play one's music.
after that, everything else is secondary. now, Apple's made it easy to watch television shows and music videos on the iPod. i really do think that's the approach all these music player companies should take. first, make sure the very basic features are complate, then work on the added stuff. sure, as a geek i'd love more options and more codecs, but please, PLEASE, for the love of [deity], perfect your original function first before trying to add on other fluff.
Re:The 3 reasons for the iPod's rule (Score:2)
I was thinking maybe there is a way to add letters to the scroll wheel -- sort of like T9. If you scroll the wheel, it enters scroll mode. But if your fingers slightly tape the various locations of the letters, it enters a text entry mode -- not T9, per se, but a predic
Re:The 3 reasons for the iPod's rule (Score:2)
Re:The 3 reasons for the iPod's rule (Score:2)
You might also discover the iPod's special attack capability.
Re:The 3 reasons for the iPod's rule (Score:4, Insightful)
Perfect form factor.
Prior to the iPod you had CD sized large capacity MP3 players, or iPod sized low capacity flash players. The iPod bridged that gap quite nicely by providing high density small size players.
Now EVERYONE has a deck of cards sized MP3 player with touch pad and screen. Before the iPod it was a mess of buttons and UI elements.
So the top three, in order of history:
1) Perfect form factor
2) De-geeked interface
3) Marketing
You can't after all, market crap. There has to be something marketable in the first place.
Re:The 3 reasons for the iPod's rule (Score:2)
Thanks, you did it for us. (Score:2)
*I prefer the English spelling rather than the French one.
Re:Thanks, you did it for us. (Score:2)
Apple - Always Late, Always Cautious (Score:3, Informative)
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 providin
Re:The 3 reasons for the iPod's rule (Score:2)
Re:The 3 reasons for the iPod's rule (Score:1)
Re:The 3 reasons for the iPod's rule (Score:2)
I remember using the word "crony" either here or another forum years back and some people in other parts of the country had no idea what that meant. Looking it up in the dictionary showed me it was usually a Midwest term
Re:The 3 reasons for the iPod's rule (Score:2, Interesting)
Whether you include that under the heading of "marketing" I don't know, but that was one of the big selling points of the iPod for me after dealing with a Creative Jukebox and then an RCA Lyra and their attendant
Re:The 3 reasons for the iPod's rule (Score:3, Interesting)
And when I first got my
Re:The 3 reasons for the iPod's rule (Score:2)
Re:The 3 reasons for the iPod's rule (Score:2)
While it lacks a little bit in user-friendliness with regard to setup, Exact Audio Copy [exactaudiocopy.de] (EAC) is by far my favorite ripping software. You just throw in a recent LAME dll [free-codecs.com] and rip with ease. It also claims to handle burning, though I've never tried that feature. The best selling point of EAC is its slow but extremely reliable "secure copy" mode, which reads the disc "very carefu
Re:The 3 reasons for the iPod's rule (Score:2)
BS. Actually there are 6 reasons.Its not marketing (Score:3, Informative)
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 Wi
Re: Marketing only goes so far (Score:3, Insightful)
The most important factor is that no one else has the whole system (player, software, music store) working as seamlessly as Apple does. Apple has also been aggressive at bringing integration of things like podcasts an
Re: Marketing only goes so far (Score:2)
Re: Marketing only goes so far (Score:1)
Re:The 3 reasons for the iPod's rule (Score:2, Insightful)
* Yeah and a bit of marketing
Re:The 3 reasons for the iPod's rule (Score:2)
FOSS Means Business, Belfast, Thursday March 16th (Score:4, Informative)
As usual, wikipedia has a great article about the iPod [wikipedia.org] (and of course it has less adds than TFA.
Re:FOSS Means Business, Belfast, Thursday March 16 (Score:1)
FOSS MEANS BUSINESS, Belfast, Thursday March 16 (Score:2)
And don't forget the one on free software licences [wikipedia.org]. I agree, Wikipedia is great.
Lvl 60 Mobs (Score:2)
error in the first sentence (Score:2)
Re:error in the first sentence (Score:2)
That's a bit of a loaded statement. I don't see how it's really relevant to an article about how the iPod works. Is How Stuff Works by any chance owned by Sim Wong Hoo?
Re:error in the first sentence (Score:1)
The first iPod did, indeed, have a 5 GB hard drive [wikipedia.org]. I fail to see the error. The 'first generation' iPod later increased in capacity to 10 GB, but it was introduced solely at 5 GB.
Re:error in the first sentence (Score:2)
Re:error in the first sentence (Score:1)
Sum of Parts (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:Sum of Parts (Score:2)
http://www.anythingbutipod.com/archives/2006/02/ho w-to-disassemble-the-creative-zen-vision-m.php [anythingbutipod.com]
http://electronics.howstuffworks.com/ipod3.htm [howstuffworks.com]
You will notice, for one thing, that the iPod's PCB is about half the size of the Vision's; this corresponds to the size of the mp3 player, and battery life. 1250mAH for the Vision and 700mAH for the iPod, and they both rate at 14 hours. The size of the mp3 player speaks
Re:Sum of Parts (Score:1)
(In fact, I suspect the Vision M's motherboard is bigger and draws more power simply because it does a lot more than the iPod - it supports a much wider range of video and audio codecs, and can output at four times the resolution in four times as more colours.
Re:Sum of Parts (Score:2)
All I'm implying is that you might be able to glean some of the reasons for the iPod's success despite worthy competitors such as the Vision by it's physical design and engineering:
1) Smaller components (such as motherboard and battery)
2) Higher efficiency (same battery life, but smaller battery)
3) Better layout (smaller form factor because of smaller components)
Those just hint at the physical and philosop
My Take (Score:2, Insightful)
Actually there were some other reasons. Id bought cheaper mp3 players in the past , the build quality was terrible knackered after not very long. I decided that buying a cheap one was a false economy. I'd seen my brothers and the iPod seemed much better built and bigger capacity. The other reason was this click wheel thing everyone was raving about. Now i'll agree that it does to a certain extent make navigation easier - but the click-wheel could be so much b
Re:My Take (Score:2)
Because of the way the iPod works: it keeps track of the songs in a local database that iTunes writes the song info to. The only MP3 player I've owned is an iPod, so I don't get the obsession with treating it like some portable version of WinAmp.
Re:My Take (Score:3, Informative)
You are in luck! You can do that very thing easily using smart playlists.
Any questions?
Re:My Take (Score:2)
Any questions?
(raises hand)
What if my letter appears in some place other than the first position? For instance, "Beck" would show up in Smart Playlists that contain "B", "E", "C", and "K" -- not just under "B". Speaking of, have you ever noticed if you write the word "BECK" on an index card, turn it upside down, and look at it in a mirror, it will say: "BECK"? You have not? OK.
~jeff
Re:My Take (Score:1, Informative)
Re:My Take (Score:1)
I've got an iPod, and I don't use iTunes. There are other alternatives, including EphPhod [ephpod.com] and gtkpod [sourceforge.net] (my personal favorite) which work very well. I send my own gripped, DRM-free mp3 files to my iPod with gtkpod and am able to enjoy my device without the iTunes apron-strings (DRM, Windows, etc.).
I don't like the click wheel. (Score:1, Informative)
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!
Re:I don't like the click wheel. (Score:1)
LOVE the Rio Karma's navation system.
Re:I don't like the click wheel. (Score:3, Funny)
Oh, and how dare you say the karma wheel interface was better! Blasphemy! Frankly, I'm stunned you haven't been properly chastised yet. Lord knows it happens to me whenever I make the mistake of brin
Re:I don't like the click wheel. (Score:2)
Re:I don't like the click wheel. (Score:1)
Anyway...I like the click-wheel (thought I wish the software would let me run 'around the horn'. My son has an iPod mini, and I guess I just can't get on board with the lack of tactile feedback. Just me, I suppose, because
Re:I don't like the click wheel. (Score:1)
Re:I don't like the click wheel. (Score:1)
The interface *was* very good, and it was so small. I liked, but upgraded to a more reliable player about 8 months afterward.
The Big Answer (Score:2, Interesting)
because it's tied to, and works seamlessly with the easiest, most popular online music store in existence. what other company has a complete, one stop shop, all in one solution that works with itunes?
IMO, the big question is: (Score:1)
iPod's Success is not Marketing Alone (Score:3, Informative)
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.
Re:iPod's Success is not Marketing Alone (Score:1)