iPod Shuffle Dissection

Can be seen here.

A coworker bought one at Macworld. The sound is good. For some reason, I expected it to sound… plastic, but the volume was cranked up very loud and I had to stab the volume down button repeatedly and thrash my arms like Leta.

Apple will sell millions of these things.

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  • http://www.liksom.net are

    On a side note, but not entirely unrelated:

    A few of you mention iTunes ease-of-use and compatibility. I couldn’t disagree more, especially after purchasing Anapod Explorer (http://​www​.redchairsoftware​.com/​a​napod/) for my pod.

    It does everything iTunes does, everything iTunes should have done and then some.

    (No, I do not work for RedChair, I’m just an extremely happy user.)

  • emily

    I have touched the ‘pod, and played it, and messed and messed at Macworld, and I agree with the original disagreer: this marketing madness will sell these things, but the product, eh…it feels cheap, very cheap, cheaper than regular flash drives. If it had aluminum casing, I’d go for it. If I were a jogger and just wanted to hear one type of music, I’d go for it. As a jump drive with music capacities, it’s a good sell. But I struggle to put it in the same category as the big pods.

  • http://imthemommy.blogspot.com tehmamalara

    well, i don’t know what an ogg is, either. but i am a mommy. i am getting an ipod shuffle for valentine’s day (nevermind that it is not a surprise — it is STILL romantic) so i can go to the gym and make my ass smaller whilst listening to the itunes i so adore. dropping the kids at the gym daycare, shutting out the world with my $99 keychain-sized musical bliss will be SO SWEET! i never thought i’d have an ipod, because previously when i requested one i was told “those are for people on the go — you don’t GO anywhere.” HA! i do so. and with something this small and perfect and priced just right i will GO EVERYWHERE! just watch me!

  • Danika

    I think it depends on how often you use music. For the non-geeks its one of the best on the market. The space for the price is just too good to pass up. The way I listen to music (shuffle all the time) it works to suit my need. I’m sure that there are other players I’d love to have. Ones with even more memory and the cool options (with display) but they are more money than I want to spend. So I will go out and buy the shuffle (when its avail in Canada) and be perfectly happy with it at least until the higher end ones become less expensive.

  • http://calledto.com eli

    So I just bought myself an iPod 40 Gb at Christmas. I love the thing, it is beautifully designed and is now the center of my life.

    BUT! Shuffe addresses a need that all iPod owners have to take into account. iPod is not something that you can take everywhere, all the time. Jogging/walking is pretty safe, but running without the proper equipment results in iPod guts on the pavement after too many spills. Another concern is being able to listen to music and move files in a corporate world that is becomming increasingly hostile to iPod and the massive amounts of data it can store and move. Including corporate secrets and large files.

    Shuffle however is small, lightweight, and simple enough in its design to be dropped ‘safely’. It also fufills the need as a Thumb drive (that aren’t coming up against the same walls as iPod Sr.) as well as music. The Apple logo is also a plus because you know it is from a company that takes great care in designing a good product. (well, that helps me anyway. I am totally Apple’s bitch.)

    Plus! It is quite obvous that anyone who puts it on the lanyard will be magically endowed with the ability to dance and groove like nobody’s business. (ie. new commerical) Display be damned.

  • Zach

    Then we are in agreement, if you are a geek you must point and scoff at the shuffle. If you aren’t must buy one very quickly before it consumes your soul.

  • http://calledto.com eli

    Amen.

  • http://arwen.org donna

    huh. Not necessarily. I’m pretty nerdy, and I still want one.

    Never bought an apple product before, but considering how well the shuffle fits my needs & price range? Can’t go wrong.

    It’ll be my second portable mp3 player. The first one I had was the very first one ever — a rio, about the size of a deck of cards. $350, came with 8mb. For another $150 or so you could expand it to 64mb. Those were the days…

    Don’t assume that just because something doesn’t fit YOUR needs that it won’t fit somebody elses. Nobody is forcing you to buy one. I’d never consider buying a regular iPod, but the shuffle fits my needs perfectly.

  • Zach

    Sorry Donna, your geek card has been revoked. Please kindly mail it in so we can chop it into little piece and then mail back the little pieces for you to feel the shame. (I hope you know I’m kidding)

    I actually saw a shuffle yesterday and your right, I’m not in the target market, I pointed and scoffed. But, I think I’m going to buy one of these for my Mom’s birthday. A digital readout would just confuse her… so in the end, I have found some value in the shuffle.

  • http://www.josephbloggs.com Joseph

    I’m a little perplexed by the assumption that aesthetics is purely a marketing thing. If aesthetics aren’t important to you, fine, but it is to others, some people care what stuff looks like, especially if it’s going to be on their person or in their house.

    As soon as the Mac mini and ipod shuffle came out, my wife was all ‘oh, cute little baby ones ‘, so now I’m going halves on £700 (~$1000) on a Mac Mini and two shuffles, rather than spending ~£1200 (~$2000) of just my money on a second-hand Powerbook off ebay (and all the risks THAT entails)…

    This meets all my needs plus now I get a 1GB shuffle to go jogging with in addition to my 40GB ipod,

    result!

  • Zach

    Do aesthetics effect the functionality of a unit? (notice I said aesthetics, not ergonomics: design of the interface, etc.). Does it make it sound better? Retain more songs? Index the songs? etc.

    Scenario: You have two flash ram mp3 players, both incased in a plain black case. They both store 512 mb of music although one sounds noticeably better than the other. Which one do you buy? Of course the one that sounds better. The performance of the unit itself is the selling factor.

    An example of this, this Motorola Razr. When I saw it on TV I was like “shit that looks hot”. Ran into my mobile phone dealer, purchased the phone under a 15 day trial period. The Razr’s reception and speaker volume was horrible in comparison to my Samsung. I took it back and said no thanks.

    Aesthetics is a marketing device, much like a slick commercial. They add no functionality to the unit. Do beer commericals make the beer taste better?

    Note, I’m not knocking your wife for being swayed by the marketing of the iShuffle/Mac Mini (which initial reports show its a very capable unit). Marketing fuels sales which sales fuel growth.

  • http://lifetheuniverseanddonna.ca donna

    Zach: what you fail to account for is that a) You’re not everyone, and b) Some people care more about the asthetics than the functionality.

    Or if not more, then at least enough that if the asthetics aren’t there, they won’t buy it.

    Take your two plain black mp3 players. Joe Asthetic comes to the store and sees them. They work wonderfully, they have good sound, they do what they want them to… but he’s pretty hung up on how ugly they are, realizes he wouldn’t want that hanging around his neck, and decides to buy nothing.

    Personally, asthetics don’t affect my purchasing choices, but as it turns out, I’m not everyone. :)

    Everything is a selling factor. Asthetics, functionality, company that created it, whether or not your friends have one… just because you don’t take asthetics into consideration doesn’t mean other people don’t.

    Zach, you seem to have a very zach-centric worldview — it seems that if something doesn’t apply to Zach, then it doesn’t apply to anyone. That’s not quite the case in the real world. :)

  • Zach

    Of course there are many selling factors. But your detracting from my original and only argument.

    The marketing sales factors will sell 1 million units. Not the functionality sales factors of the unit itself.

    I never said they wouldn’t sell 1 million units, I never said people outside of the Zach-centric worldview would never buy them. I just stated that the unit itself is lacking in functionality and options and would not be the primary driving factor towards 1 million in sales.

  • http://lifetheuniverseanddonna.ca donna

    Zach: No, but the price will. :)

    At least for us whiny little canadians who really *can’t* get anything close to that price with the features offered. :)

  • http://www.archibaldjude.com seannarae

    D’you know that my next door neighbor has three rabbits??!

  • http://spelunk.blogspot.com spoonleg

    There are a lot of things that I don’t know, like the fact that seanna’s neighbors have 3 rabbits or what the hell an ogg is. But I have an ibook and WANT an ipod. the shuffle seems perfect for me not only because it MATCHES MY iBOOK SWEET MOTHER OF JESUS, but because it is compact, lightweight, affordable and not overloaded with features I’ll never bother to learn how to use. Plus, IT MATCHES MY iBOOK. I think apple will sell tons of these based on the price, the hype, the convenience, the size and the cute factor. I would kill a small rabbit for an ipod photo but life’s just unfair like that.

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