Apple introduces iPod Photo

iTunes 4.7

HAHA I betcha Ballmer is pissing his pants right about now!

That red, & black biache will be mine!

Hmmm, 4.6 seemed to show all of the new Euro stores. Wonder what this little upgrade brings.

Ooopsss. Okay. This little piece of info seems to explain it: iPod Photo works with iTunes 4.7, which was also released today.

And it shows duplicate songs which I guess could be handy.

It also joins multiple tracks for gap-free listening. MANY people have wanted that for awhile. I think that is new anyway

Apple's new iPod lets users carry their entire music & photo library in their pocket.

Apple today introduced iPod Photo, the newest member of the iPod family that lets users take their entire music and photo library with them wherever they go. iPod Photo can hold up to 25,000 digital photos alongside a user's music library and displays them on a high-resolution color screen, allowing users to scroll through their photo library almost instantly using iPod's patent pending Click Wheel.

The iPod Photo also lets users combine music and photos to create slideshows on the iPod, and features TV-out for sharing these creations on big screen televisions and projectors. iPod Photo comes in 40GB or 60GB models which hold up to 10,000 or 15,000 songs, and its extended battery life gives users up to 15 hours of music playback or up to 5 hours of slideshows.

"Having both your entire photo and music collections with you wherever you go is the next big thing," said Steve Jobs, Apple's CEO. "Everyone has a digital camera and wants to enjoy and share their growing library of digital photos wherever they are. Unlike video content, photo content is free and abundant, and there are no copyright issues to deal with."

Featuring Apple's patent pending Auto-Sync technology, iPod Photo makes it easy for users to automatically download their entire digital music and digital photo library onto iPod and keep it up-to-date whenever it is plugged into a Mac or Windows computer using FireWire or USB. Mac users can Auto-Sync their iPod with their photo library in iPhoto and Windows users can Auto-Sync their iPod with their photo collection in Adobe Photoshop Elements, Photoshop Album or their My Pictures folder.

Pricing & Availability

The new 40GB and 60GB iPod Photo models will begin shipping today for a suggested retail price of $499 (US) and $599 (US) respectively, through the Apple Store, Apple's retail stores and Apple Authorized Resellers. iPod Photo includes a dock with audio and video out, earbud headphones, 1.4m AV cable, 1.2m 30-pin to FireWire cable, a 1.2m 30-pin to USB cable, AC adapter, black carrying case and a CD with iTunes 4.7 for Mac and Windows computers.

so other than copyright issues, what are the chanes of seeing video on an ipod?

Anyone notice the svideo connectoer on the iPod Photo dock:

http://www.apple.com/ipodphoto/autosyncphotos.html

It's not the red thats impressive, but I like. Once I have it it will probably look better. I just like the fact there is a black one. I wonder if it's like gun metal black?

Take a look at the dock. Is that a s-video connector I see there?

http://www.apple.com/ipodphoto/autosyncphotos.html

Can we get some thread merging please?

Noteworthy, Apple has managed to not only include an improved *color* screen, which likely is significantly more power-hungry than the old one, but also increase the battery life from twelve to fifteen hours. Impressive!

Typical Apple.

If the color iPod had a visualizer, I'd be sold.

Or if it showed movies.

I think Apple is slowly "inching" the functionality up. Video would be way too much right now.

They looked and said..."Gee...60GB is an awful lot for most music collections...what else can we get on there?" Photos were the answer. They have all of the pieces in place to do SOMEthing related to video here (though I am doubtful about playback on the little screen...more likely through the TV as with the iPod Photo slide shows.)

Two years from now when the 60GB iPod Photo is the low-end ($299) of the line...perhaps the high end will be looking foer still more functionality.

P.S. As an aside...I am a tad surprised they didn't do an iPhoto Windows. Of course they didn't do that right away with iTunes either so...perhaps they are hedging here...wait to see how much people want this...then...MAYBE...port iPhoto.

An iPod with an aqua interface... drool. When this interface becomes the standard one the rest of the iPods and prices drop a little, I'm there. Awesome! This is the first product in a while that I've even wanted to write in a thread about. I've always thought if my cell phone could have a really nice color interface, why can't the iPod. Then they went and aqua-fied it! I love it!

It certainly is. And there's a picture of the iPod connected to a TV. But I can't find mention of the video port anywhere.

I think it is nice, but 600 dollars... That is a huge chunk of change. I guess the 500 dollar unit is a bit better on price, but I can say now I will not be buying one of these. All I want Apple to make is one of these with recording, I have said it for quite a while and will continue to say it. It would be such a good edition to their pro market. Say a 30 or 40 gig recording iPod for 400 dollars. Surely that is not too hard to do, and to do it right. Maybe they could be the first to allow higher than cd quality recording, or Apple Loseless. Those are my thoughts.

Meh, looks like the skip protection is down from "Up to 25 minutes" to "Up to 17 minutes" on the iPod Photo. But on the bright side the battery life is up to 15 hours.

It looks like the iPod Photo comes with a composite AV cable which plugs into the headphone port of the iPod or the line out port of the dock. I guess the SVideo port on the dock is there if you want a better picture (though I guess you'd still need the audio from the composite cable as well).

Things I'd like to see them do:

• Make a cable for connecting the iPod directly to a camera, rather than having to go through the Belkin media card adapter. Most cameras seem to have the same mini-USB connectors it seems.
• Allow the iPod to sync these new pictures back to the location you set the place you sync from on the computer.
• How about giving Keynote the ability to export a presentation to a slideshow in iPhoto, which then syncs onto your iPod?

Neil.
a.k.a. Arnel

The headphone jack has been reworked with an extra band.

External RCA cable splits out from the new headphone.



at the bottom, here

60GB is a good amount of storage, but it remains to be seen ho wthis will work. From what I've read so far, it doesn't look that useful from a photographer's standpoint, mainly because you still need to use another piece of kit -- that ugly belkin card reader thing.

What is needed is for someone to write a driver that works with USB mass storage protocols and a variety of cameras across USB 1.1/2.0 or Firewire. Then it would be worth every penny. Just plug your camera into the iPod, after a few secs the iPod "sees" the camera and starts downloading the pics -- in ANY format, even RAW -- it doesn't need to be able to display them for this purpose, and for large multi-MP pics, it needn't neccessarily display them quickly either. It just needs to be able to get them OFF the camera with a minimum of fuss. You don't really need color at all.

The photo sites are already slamming it for lack of a card reader. They lack vision, what's needed is not a card reader, butthe elimination of it altogether.

And no, CPU power should not be an issue, we're only talking about enough power to run an I/O protocol, plenty of low power devices can.

Digital Camera Rewiew made a very bad report of the Ipod Photo.

The ipod photo lacks a very important things : a card slot reader. It's a shame that the Ipod do not have this feature, if he had it, the Ipod photo would have been extremely usefull for all digital photographers, allowing them to back up their compact card in the Ipod Photo.

Actually, its only great for digital picture enthusiasts who want to carry their pictures around on their iPod, but have no problem needing a computer to first load them into, then using iTunes to transfer them to the iPod.

I would think 'most' digital picture enthusiasts' would have really like it to have a card reader built-in. That would make it great for them.

As for the color, at least it shuts up the "I want a color screen showing the album covers, dammit!" people. Although its about time for them to start complaining about
(a) no video
(b) no recording
(c) lack of toast-making capability
(d) S-video out only on the dock
(e) no built-in version of Doom 3
(f) no wireless capabilities to broadcast pictures over any VHF frequency
(g) no wireless capabilities to send to AirportExpress
(h) no wireless capabilities to surf the internet and get email
(i) lack of "pixelating" feature that allows parents to auto 'block out' the good stuff from porn that their children might try putting on the device
(j) a way to generate lists of features that the iPod is missing and automatically send it to Apple to add to their next version
(k) lack of GPS features
(l) lack of CD-burning/ripping abilities
(m) limited battery life (only 15 hours??? WTF Apple?)
(n) extended battery life (15 hours???? WTF Apple? I only need 8, couldn't you add in something else instead???)

So, let's hear it folks!

I'e seen this comment pop up a couple places. What exactly does it mean, and why would it be handy?

Then again, the need for image tank type products may be moot. The cost of memory continues to fall fast an furious. In a week or so, Sandisk will be shipping 8GB, pause... that's EIGHT GIGA BYTES... of SOLID STATE compact flash type 1 memory for under 1000 USD. T'was not long ago that such capacities cost over 10K !!!

At this rate, we'll be looking at 20+ GB capacities by next Christmas, sub $500 prices on 8GB, and 2-4GB cards in the $100-200 range.

Even with a 16MP camera, thems a lotta GB to fill...

The Photo iPod seems to be more about presentation than photo storage. Like iTunes, it syncs with your iPhoto or PS Album library, and I imagine that it doesn't really know what to do with direct imports, as they would probably be erased when you sync, just like iTunes and iPods now. No, I think it's for bringing the pictures you imported and edited from your computer to your relatives and playing back on your TV. It doesn't replace the Belkin photo reader, and I doubt if Apple will ever add any card reader directly to the iPod. It's still for playback, not recording.

I hope it would be a very good idea to add Keynote synchronization too, and a way to connect to a projector.

Oh, and Matsu is right. CF is the floppy of our day, unreliable if ubiquitous. Microdrives will replace these things, and I'd bet that consumer cameras will eventually have high capacity non-removable mini HDs in lieu of them. (Pro cameras will probably still have replacable drives I'd bet.) The ability to do high-speed transfers without draining batteries for too long and cutting out the middle-man that is the CF card is where things should go. Anyway, the point is moot here.

that's a freakin high resolution



http://www.blargatron-systems.com/fi...creen-size.jpg

Considering the original QuickTime was 160x120, it's sweet.

Sometimes an Artist will take one song and have it on multiple discs, this allows you to weed those type of cuts out, saving disc space. I found 3 such songs on my small library.

o) Its graphics card doesnt support CoreImage.

Do you mean the QuickTake?

Crap! And I bet the sound output doesn't support CoreAudio! Dammit Apple! How can you release hardware and not have it even capable of running all the features of your next OS??

No, no, that's an ADB connector!

No. The first release of QuickTime (video).
1/4 screen resolution in those days was 160x120. Now known as 'postage stamp video'.

And how can they release something with only svideo out??? i want component!!!
people that want a card reader on an ipod can go f*** themselves with a memory stick.
that photo site that bashed the ipod photo claims that many photographers could make use of the slot. umm... i'm pretty sure that there's room in those HUGE photo packs for a 12" pbook.
</pissed off at people that are pissed off>

I need one!

This is NOT an accessory for your digital camera. (Get the Belkin reader if you want that.)

This is a way to view and share your entire photo library. A card reader is irrelevant to that purpose--a purpose which much broader appeal than unloading flash cards, I'm sure.

Yes, both functions can be useful... and iPod supports both if you wish. Don't care about viewing your whole library? Don't get the iPod Photo. Don't care about unloading camera memory cards? Don't get the card reader.