Alex Zaharov-Reutt
Monday, 14 September 2009 12:00
Mobile devices
Page 1 of 2
Although the new iPod Touch was touted to come with a camera, Apple
surprised us all by including a video-only camera (and a host of other
cool features) in its new iPod nano instead, pointing towards yet
another very iPod-y Christmas and holiday shopping season for Apple and
millions of existing and new customers.
When you’re the market leader, do you sit back on cruise control, or rev up the engines and get an even greater lead on your competitors?
With Apple, revving up the engines always drives the company and its products towards usually excellent improvements, just not always in the direction and timeframe that consumers and pundits expect.
For example, the new iPod Touch 3rd generation is missing the still and video camera that was so heavily rumoured, but as expected, it comes with an even faster processor than the iPhone 3GS, and still has a wealth of third party software that competitors are still far from amassing.
The real surprise of the event, beyond the appearance of Steve Jobs himself, was Apple revving up a host of useful features into the still highly popular iPod nano.
With Apple claiming over 100 million sold, why not sell 100 million more? The following features will undoubtedly help:
- 2.2-inch screen instead of the previous 2-inch screen
- Inbuilt FM radio that can record up to 15 minutes to pause and rewind live radio
- Pedometer that works with the Nike+iPod website (without needing to buy a separate Nike+iPod adapter)
- Video camera that records 640x480 standard def (SD) video and offers a host of “special effects” such as sepia, B&W, mirror, kaleidoscope, cyborg and others
- Mono microphone
- A hidden internal speaker (like on the iPod Touch)
- Freely downloadable spoken voice prompts, called “VoiceOver”, as first seen in last year’s iPod shuffle, that are available in a range of languages.
- The promise of an improved “Genius” feature for better automatic music mixes.
Beyond the video camera itself, the inclusion of a built-in FM radio is possibly the most surprising new feature, given Apple’s previous staunch refusal to offer such a feature as standard, despite years of competitors hoping their built-in FM radios would give them a sales advantage over earlier iPod models.
The fact that the radio’s software also offers a pause and rewind feature is such a simple and clever inclusion, it’s almost amazing that no-one ever thought of offering it before.
Sure, today’s fancy and expensive digital radios can do it, but what would you prefer to spend your money on – a new iPod nano, or a much larger digital radio, which is currently only broadcast in Australia’s capital cities anyway?
Continued on page 2, please read on.
