Topic: I'm Nano-iPodded

[Cobra951]

Oh, it does more than just clean up.

iPod to iTunes Track Transfer
This feature lets you quickly and easily transfer tracks from your iPod into iTunes, without having to use a .txt file. By transferring tracks using this feature you will also keep your ratings and play counts.

Unless there's something I'm missing, this would allow you to copy a whole music library into any computer after installing iTunes.  I'm not sure Apple would be happy with that.  Anyone can do this if they put some effort into it.  (The music is in a hidden folder with the names changed to a few alphanumeric characters.  The extensions stay correct, and the tags are all there still.  I'm sure there are programs that can rename music files based on tags--maybe even iTunes.)  But this just makes it too easy to copy iPod music all over.

Sandy let me have the red Nano.  It's a special 8GB model tied to some charitable event.  (The 2nd generation of 8GB Nanos is officially only black.)  This one works great.  I reinstalled iTunes and used the same approach of syncing only to the top-rated playlist, then 5-starring the music I wanted on the go.  I ended up with 881 tracks weighing in at around 5.7 GB.  She still wants to fix the black one, though.

She also gave me this gadget that plugs into the car's cigarette lighter, and broadcasts the iPod music into an FM radio frequency.  I've yet to try it.  Hey, this would work with the black one, since the unchargeable battery wouldn't be an issue.  Hmm.

Edit:  Perfect.  It works, and makes the black iPod useful.  It's this thing.  Comes with 3 preset frequencies, which can be changed.  Sounds good for FM.  Very clear.  It doesn't use the earphone jack on the iPod, which surprised me.  I'm guessing the multi-pin plug has a line-level output to work with dockable speakers and what not.

[scottws]

I'm sure there are programs that can rename music files based on tags

Foobar 2000 can do that.  It's pretty powerful, but can get hairy.

Sandy let me have the red Nano.  It's a special 8GB model tied to some charitable event.  (The 2nd generation of 8GB Nanos is officially only black.)

Untrue.  I have a 8 GB G2 iPod Nano that's red.  Is the "charity event" you are talking about (PRODUCT)^RED by any chance?  They sold those on Apple.com.  That's how I got mine.

She also gave me this gadget that plugs into the car's cigarette lighter, and broadcasts the iPod music into an FM radio frequency.  I've yet to try it.  Hey, this would work with the black one, since the unchargeable battery wouldn't be an issue.

I have one of those from Monster Cable.  I use it every day.  The only thing I don't like is that the best station for me to use is the lowest one on the FM radio dial because in Cincinnati it is the only one that doesn't have another station the next frequency in either direction.  However, the device doesn't go that low.  It cuts out the lowest two frequencies for some reason.

[Cobra951]

"Choose (PRODUCT) RED Special Edition iPod models and iTunes Gift Cards, and Apple gives a portion of the purchase price to the Global Fund to fight AIDS in Africa."

[scottws]

Yes, I know all about (PRODUCT)^RED and that's why I got it.  The reason I mentioned it is because it is untrue that the 8GB 2G Nano is only black.  It's black or red.  The red one is only special in that part of the proceeds to Bono's charity.  It's not more money, and it's not special in any other way.

[gpw11]

Aren't all Product Red items a tiny bit more money?  I kind of thought that was the point.

[Cobra951]

Nope.  Same price.  Just checked here.

[gpw11]

Interesting.  I always thought they got the extra money by charging a few extra dollars per unit.

Speaking of Nanos; you know what sucks about the new (4G) one?  The fucking accelerometer.  Rotate for coverflow?  Pure pain in the ass.  If you accidentantly rotate into it you have to reorient the ipod in order to adjust volume or single button skip tracks....and that can happen a lot.  Shake to shuffle?  I guess a good idea on paper, but kind of pointless and the sensitivity seems off.  Like, it will shuffle when I drop it into my pocket, but if I want to do it on purpose and try to shuffle it nothing happens. I think you have to shake it suddenly and lightly or something.  Either way, I wish you could just turn it off.

[Cobra951]

You mean you can't?  Oh.  Apple.  I forgot.  They know what you want better than you do.  Can't let customers get too confused with options.  They're such children.

[Quemaqua]

Are we sure that Apple isn't actually the government?

[WindAndConfusion]

Settings -> Playback -> Shake -> Off

[Cobra951]

Viola!

I had a similar moment with repeat.  At first it seemed that it would repeat one track, the entire library, or nothing.  I was cursing it for not repeating one album, when magically it started doing just that.  I guess when I first enabled Repeat->All, it somehow went into Music->All.

[Pugnate]

I had been avoiding this thread until I finally read through every word of every post during the past 15 minutes.

And that's all I have to contribute to this.

Also, who the hell is Sandy?

[Cobra951]

My girlfriend.  We've gotten very close over the past few months.  She treats me like I descended from Mt Olympus.  No one outside of a few blood relatives has ever been this good to me.  Awesome lady.

[Pugnate]

Well, you deserve someone like that.

[gpw11]

Settings -> Playback -> Shake -> Off

Holy shit, thanks.  I couldn't find it originally and googled it.  The first link I clicked on was a bunch of people bitching that you couldn't turn the shake off without turning off shuffle completely and that you couldn't turn off the "flip to coverflow".  The later was fixed in a recent firmware update, but I couldn't change the shake.  Thanks again.

[gpw11]

Apple press conference today.  I kind of skimmed through it but it seems like they dropped the price and upped the storage on all their ipods.  Furthermore, the Nano now has two great new features:

1.) FM Radio.  Cool that they're finally on par with a mid-80's Walkman, but I can't believe some are losing their shit over this.  It's like they held this back until they couldn't think of anything else to do to make people buy more shit.  Speaking of which.....

2.) 5 MP Camera.  STOP FUCKING STICKING SHITTY CAMERAS ON GODDAMN EVERYTHING. I only need one camera with a shitty lens, and that's already taken up by my phone. Why the fuck would I use this?

Apart from that, who can complain about lower prices and more storage?

[Cobra951]

Nice.  The 4Gs were already 8 and 16 GB.  The camera and FM are new.  I wasn't enthused about the camera either, until I realized it's H.264 video at 640x480@30 fps with AAC audio.  That beats the living shit out of my phone caps.  And the camera doesn't seem to ruin the thin-oval cross section anywhere.  Same prices ($149-199), so it's all a bonus anyway.

My 8GB 2G is doing just fine, though.  No plans to spring for an upgraded 4G at all.

Edit:  Oh, the top price is now $179.  The screen is slightly larger too.  I guess this will be called 5G then.

[gpw11]

Yeah, it's the 5G now.  I actually didn't realize it had such a high resolution for video (Actually, I think it matches my phone).  My problem isn't really the camera itself, but more how the last thing the world needs is another common device with a camera built in.  Phones kind of make sense (now), and go hand in hand as far as sending pictures out and uploading, but I can never really see myself making use of a camera on an MP3 player.   I guess the other thing is that these kind of cameras almost always suck in my experience.  No focus, no optical zoom, cheap lenses, no real image settings.  To give Apple credit, I'm sure the cameras they use are probably some of the best for small snapshot devices, but the picture and video quality is really only as good as the weakest link.

On that note, why do manufactures even bother with LED flashes?  They're uselsess.

[idolminds]

The LED flash is enough to light up a "from slightly above" myspace self portrait or pics of your dick, which is about the only thing a cell phone camera should be used for.

[gpw11]

You're forgetting about taking pictures of you stuffing other people's stuff down your pants...and then texting the pictures when they're using said stuff.

[gpw11]

Just reading up more on the announcements.  Apparently the Iphone is superior to both the DS and PSP because it has like 20,000 more "games" available. The Iphone is pretty sweet for what it is, but you're fucking kidding yourself if you think that it can even touch either of them when it comes to gaming.

[Cobra951]

I read that too, and it made me laugh.  I don't think 20,000 games worth playing have been written yet, across all devices ever produced.  How old is the iPhone now, 5 years?  It doesn't look like much of a gaming machine either, though to be fair, I should at least hold one in my hand before saying much about that.

[gpw11]

Well it's not really.  It's by far the best platform for cellphone games out there, and I've seen some really cool ones, but to think it could ever compete with something like the DS or PSP is just ridiculous. The average game I've come across on people's are basically either the kind of thing you'd find in a flash based browser game from a few years ago (with better graphics of course), or a retooling of some old game (Snake, Space Invaders).  There's certainly stuff out there with more depth, but there's not a lot of it and it really isn't the same.  Like I said, great for cellphone games to keep you entertained for a few min, but that doesn't make it a game machine.

The funny part about it is the numbers they were throwing out.  Highly overinflated I'd imagine.  I'm assuming they're including a shit ton of one time use apps in there to boost numbers such as "Press button to fart!".  Well, that and the price points they pointed out.  "$39.99 for a game!?!  That's too much!  We sell them for $9.99 at most!" You're comparing a Huffy ten speed to a mustang.

[Cobra951]

Both of those can be a lot of fun at the right times. 

I can see an iPhone being casually entertaining, while waiting at a doctor's office, for instance.  I can't see it replacing a DS or PSP.

[gpw11]

Oh yeah, and that's the thing.  I have games on my phone, but I never touch them unless I'm sitting somewhere waiting unexpectedly.  With built in 3d accelerators phones will certainly start having some better games (specifically the iPhone because of it's install base), but when you actually want to sit down and play a game you'll still have to look to your DS/PSP.

[Cools!]

More videos! More photos! Yeah! Cause we don't have enough crap already online!

Apple keeps milking the cow...

[Quemaqua]

Don't forget paying for firmware updates!

[Cobra951]

Really?  For what, the iPhone?

[Quemaqua]

Only certain products, and I think iPhone is excluded.  But the fact that it exists for any product is insane.

[Cools!]

iPod Touch for one.

[gpw11]

You pay for firmware updates on the touch?  Seriously?

[Cools!]

Yes, $10.

[Ghandi]

[Quemaqua]

The iPhone: guaranteed to make flames shoot out of your ass or your money back.

[gpw11]

I'm still amazed about this firmware thing. So you pay for it on the Touch, but not the iPhone?  Because I know they're free on the Classic and Nano.  It just doesn't make any sense to charge for them in the first place, and then charge for just the Touch if you're going to do it anyways.

[gpw11]

Holy shit, I just looked it up.  Wow.

At first I was like "How come I never heard about that before?  It's the kind of thing you'd hear people bitching about for sure"...but then I came across this:

Even if it isn't leaked, I don't care. At least we'll be able to see what it looks like. Another thing is, we all saw this coming. This update is huge, and of course Apple wants to make some money out of it.

That's fine by me though, They worked hard enough on it 

I looked up the hyped new features:

-Landscape Mode outside of Safari.  While this is good, it also should have shipped with this...like every other touchscreen phone ever.

-Copy and Paste.  See above.

-SMS and MMS updates.  Not only pretty much just catching up with phones from a few years ago, also don't apply to Touch.

-Shake to Shuffle.  Still gay.

-Push Email.  This is good.  Every fucking phone should have it, but a lot don't.  Oh wait...doesn't apply to the Touch either.   

That's a good update to bring your shit up to date...but nothing you should have to pay for.

I read it somewhere, I forgot the source, will post it once I find it again. Basically, it has to do with an established law, something along the line that Iphone due to its subscription nature are eligible to receive updates for free, but since ipod touches is an one time sale/trade, all updates will need to be charged. Something along this line, I might have missed a few details here and there.

 

[Cobra951]

Oh, so then Microsoft should start charging for SPs to Windows.  That's a one-time purchase too, even under the license fiction.

What a crock.

[Pugnate]

What shocks me more is how Apple charge $90 for battery changes.

[Quemaqua]

This is yet another reason I hate Apple, and while I compare them to Valve and such.  Because people like them and basically just say, "You know, I will give up any and all reasonable rights because YOU'RE SO AWESOME even though you aren't really anywhere near as awesome as I seem to think you are."  And this is why I can't support these companies.

[K-man]

I love my Ipod video though.  Once the inevitable happens and it goes dead, I'll have to replace it.  As bad as I hate to admit it, I love iTunes