Electronics: 2/18/07

Thursday, February 22, 2007

Critics on the new iPod video

The new iPod video has a wide range of new qualities and among these, the most important is, without any doubt, the video feature. Due to the fact that the market already had a small and portable device which basically played games, but also played videos, the new iPod video was released with some suspicions of the critics. The video iPod is hardly the first portable video player on the market, as the device belonging to Sony claims to be the number 1 portable video player in the world, but it is principally used to play video games. Even so, the sales of this new product turned out to be surprisingly high, a fact which was obvious shortly after the first semester.

The main concern regarding the product was the fact that due to the small screen, the people willing to watch a serious movie on it would be limited. In fact, studies show that most people prefer to feel the actual movie, while watching it in front of a big screen, like the one in the movie theatres. Even more, the new cell phone with a video feature which was so famous in Asia was used for watching movies only for a few minutes, considering the fact that it had a small screen which couldn’t allow catching all the quality details of the movie. The critics even mentioned the fact that, while being on a bus, in a cab or waiting in line at some office, the video iPod with its tiny screen might be a good solution, after all. This is due to the fact that this activity is considered a great snack or a great break. Based on this, the analysts mentioned that if Apple wanted to really hit the market, they should opt for an iPod with a bigger screen, so that customers would be eager to watch even the long movies on this device.

Another aspect which was highly debated was the fact that the battery life of this new device lasts less than expected. While the play station portable has a battery which lasts up to 8 hours while watching a movie, the iPod video only provides 2 hours of battery life, which is a big disturbance, when trying to watch a full length movie on this small digital device. Another thing that the critics attacked was the fact that the iPod takes too long time to download various movies. If for the play station portable, this task is doable in less than 3 hours, while the QuickTime 7 Pro took almost 12 hours to encode the video in an iPod-friendly format.

The sales of the new iPod video show the fact that the public accepts and wants this new product with a lot of interest, due to the fact that it can play music, store pictures and play movies at the same time, a fact which makes it a multifunctional device. Even if the new item received many criticism, the shirt-pocket-size new video iPod, seems to be one of the most preferred objects of the teens of today, as they use it to store and listen to thousands of music and other audio files downloaded straight from the Internet or from DVD’s, cameras and from the computer files.

Monday, February 19, 2007

Capabilities of the new iPod video

The capabilities of the new iPod video continue the developing process of the old capabilities – software, hardware and compatibility with other devices.

Concerning the software, it is well-known that the iPod in general and the iPod video in particular play MP3, audible audio book, WAV, M4A/AAC, protected AAC, AIFF and Apple Lossless audio file formats. Since the 5th generation iPods there is another possibility of playing m4v and mp4 MPEG-4 video file formats. Only non copy-protected WMA files may be copied to an iPod. Other formats are not possible to be played by the iPod and this is the case of FLAC and Ogg Vorbis formats.

Besides, the iPods are especially designed for matching the iTunes media library software. This online music store appeared in 2003 and it sells songs and it was thought exclusively for the iPod users and not for other portable music players. This may have contributed to the success both the iPods and the iTunes music store and to the great development and improvements of the iPod’s capabilities.

The software of the new iPod video has new features – personalized recommendations and video content that can be played on a Pc or transferred to the iPod. The software was upgraded to Version 6, fact that represents a development and a distinct achievement.

Concerning the hardware of the iPods one may say that the first generation iPods were recharged only through FireWire with the help of a small power adapter. The 4th generation iPods may have been charged over USB. The 5th generation iPod may be charged with the help of a dock connector allowing the FireWire cable to be plugged in for the recharge.

Compatibility of the iPods with Windows is the idea of Apple, realized in 2002, fact that contributed to the creation of a Windows version of iTunes in 2003. The iPods could be made to be compatible with a Macintosh and there is also an iPodLinux project.

Some additional features may be mentioned while speaking about the iPods in general and iPod video in particular. The iPods can display text files, fact which is very useful. There are also PDA calendars, some games that were interesting several years ago but they seem outdated nowadays. The games available on almost every iPod except the iPod shuffle are brick, parachute, solitaire, music quiz. The most interesting game is the music quiz, playing some fragments of some songs and waiting the user to identify the song from a list. The disadvantage of this game is that it uses a lot of battery power.

All these capabilities seem to be improved in the case of the new iPod video except the creation of other games or the introduction of new ones. This may be seen as a disadvantage, but if taking into account the fact that it is a case of a portable music player this aspect does not have such a great importance.

The innovation is of course the video capability, although the main features of the new iPod stress on great improvements in the image and sound quality. The video image is surprisingly smooth and in this way may replace the skeptical attitudes with joyful exclamations.

Although it is not the first attempt of bringing video on a portable handheld device, this achievement seems to be the most successful. This success is due to a lot of required work and complicated changes in the software and hardware as well. In a way or another, Apple seems to be the champion in creating special portable devices and maybe some other steps will be taken in the development of the small video portable devices. In this way, maybe a special compatibility with more devices may be developed, ensuring other periods of great success. Other online stores may appear and develop in the tradition of the iTunes music store. Due to iPods from the Apple Company legal content of the downloaded and paid music or TV shows, episodes or other materials is ensured.