Apple pipes in new iPods

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these changes will widen the gap between Apple and potential competitors that are trying to chip away at iPod market share."

Aside from adding the camera link to the iPod Photo models, Apple lengthened the battery life of both Minis. Apple says the Minis can now operate for up to 18 hours on a battery charge. Apple has also changed the color lineup slightly for the Mini--retaining silver, dropping gold, and replacing the prior shades of blue, pink and green with "more vibrant" ones, Joswiak said.

In addition, Apple appears to have dropped its 40GB iPods in favor of 20GB, 30GB and 60GB models. The 40GB iPod and iPod Photo models disappeared from the company's Web site Wednesday morning shortly after the new iPod models were announced.

All four new iPods are available now, while the iPod Camera Connector will come out in late March.

The camera connector, Joswiak said, is a small white plastic device, similar in appearance to a small docking station, that has a cable for connecting to the iPod and a USB port for connecting to a camera. It will work with both the new iPod Photos and with earlier photo player models, Joswiak said.

Pictures loaded onto an iPod directly will be able to display immediately on the iPod. But for the photos to be shown on a TV, the iPod Photo will need to be connected to a Mac or PC first.

In addition to the price cuts, there are also slight changes to what comes in the box with new iPods. FireWire, which was the only way to connect the original iPod to a Mac, is now optional, with a cable costing $19. USB 2.0 is the standard.

"There is no doubt that USB 2 is the proper common interface of choice," Joswiak said, adding that Apple will continue to support FireWire as an option.

Also, while the iPod Mini is cheaper, it no longer comes with a power adapter to plug into an outlet. Customers can either charge the player by connecting it to a Mac or PC, or pay $29 for an adapter. Docks are also not included as standard with any of the new players, but one can be ordered as a $39 accessory.

massive price cut

wow...$150 price drop on the photo model. they musta been
rakin it in before! (...or dyin tryin...)

[simcity1976]

Make a $50 Ipod and I might bite!!

(eom)

[drewbyh]

Disappointed!!

I was holding out for Bluetooth in the iPod. I'm sad to see it's not going to be on the new players. Guess I'll keep holding out.

[zarathustra911]

How would you use BT?

Just interested to see what exactly are you looking for with a
bluetooth enabled iPod?

Is it to have BT stereo headset and listen to music? Or is it to
stream to your stereo's BT receiver and listen at home?

I am not aware of a BT solution yet. Any links?

[mortis9]

just what the doctor didn't order:

thank god it doesn't have bluetooth, and if it my ipod did, i'd disable the bt-radio. that's just what i want: instead of a 12 hour battery life, now i only get an hour and a half.

[RKR99]

customers caught in the middle

OK, now I am ticked. I just bought a 40GB 4 days ago, which is now discontinued. The 60GB photo costs an extra $50. I was just going to take it in and exchange it and pay an extra $50, but I just called the Apple store and they want me to pay a $40 restocking fee on top of that. I haven't even loaded a single fricking song, just opened it 2 days ago, have every piece of plastic that was in the darn box including the plastic shrinkwrap for the entire box, and they want $40.

I was pretty excited about my iPod. I think I will be returning it for a refund and not get the new one if this is the kind of customer service I can expect. Total bs.

What I see is that what you got was $100 off

on a player that was $499 only a few days (couple of weeks?) ago. Go back in time 2 weeks and you'll end up paying a TOTAL of $10 less for both 20GB more and a direct camera connection. Sounds like a good deal to me.

Come on

Do just the tiniest bit of research to avoid that sort of situation,
the net was buzzing with the prospect of an addition/change to
the ipod line you should have paid attention then waited till the
time came, when i was upgrading my 3rd gen i listened to the
rumor mill and waited till the release of the photos came, i
decided they werent for me and bought a 20 gig 4g like i had
planned but this way i avoided purchasing something days
before it is replaced by something better. Do some research
before you buy especially if the fact that your device was
replaced is such a big deal to you, it will save you a lot of grief

[j1cumbee]

Finally some sense out of Apple

Lets face it, we all saw this coming. But then again, what a pleasant suprise. Up until recently Macs in general have been kicked to the curb by PC based lower pricing. However, with the introduction of the $500 Mac Mini they're starting to catch on. Also bringing the iPod Mini down to 199 was an excellent choice because there were many 5 Gigabyte models for the same price. Last but not least the lowering of the price of the iPod Photo was one of the greatest things Apple could have done for their lineup. A $150 price drop? Finally, Apple's starting to see the prices that everyone else is using (and they're getting competetive).

It's just plain business

I don't think that Apple finally saw what others are charging. They know very well what the competition is charging. But any business riding a wave of explosive popularity will charge as much as they can as long as they can sustain it. With every addition of a new and improved version of any wildly popular product (in this case it was the 60GB iPod photo) there will always be a those who will pay a 'very high' price just to have the latest and greatest. Once that wave of buyers dries up, then its time to make downward price adjustments and get to the next wave of buyers who will buy at 'high' prices, followed by subsequent price drops for the next level of buyers, and on and on it goes.

But I must say I was quite excited about the rumors that the mini was getting a color screen. That would have been awesome along with 6GB and 18-hour battery life for $249! I was dissapointed that the rumor was wrong, but I suppose I fall into the category of those willing to buy at 'high' prices because I'm going to throw in my $249 for one. I'm tired of constantly having to reload my 1.5GB Rio Nitrus with new music. At 6GB I'll be able to load enough music for week or two. I'd love to go with 30GB and color screen for an extra $100, but I find the iPods too heavy and bulky for how I use a music player.

[Ubber geek]

$500 Mac

http://www.analogstereo.com/alfa_romeo_147_owners_manual.htm

[ajbright]

Still too expensive

For something whose output quality is way below that of CD content (although this is more to do with CD copy protection, and the cheap, crappy default earphones) this product is still way overpriced.

A $100 personal cd player still has far more versatility (compatible with all music download sites, instantly pays any CD - no file transfer necessary) and the sound quality is beyond comparison.

As soon as the price for 2-4GB devices falls under $100, then you'll have something worth buying.

Put it this way, this is supposedly the must have cool gadget for kids. This is fine for parents or kids with large incomes, but for lower income families, there are two issues.

First, obviously, is that kids tend to lose everything - too bad, so sad you might say, but why someone like me would be tempted to buy the thing in the first place, given that they have poor build quality (check out the ipods over 2 years old on ebay, and find out how many still have original batteries that work correctly, or dodgy connections for the earphones ) and are small enough to be lost easily - no thanks.

Now consider that the PSP will have a retail cost of around $250 - can player movies, music, games. They can connect to the internet, with built in wifi, and will almost certainly be updated with productivity software like MS Word for pocket PCs or media on the go applications (Cable TV / satelite radio reception in wifi hotspots), and tell me where the value in an ipod is..