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Buub
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Re: The new iPod Shuffle is horrible

Thu Mar 12, 2009 11:20 am

I don't understand why they didn't go with the dongle in the first place. That's how the original iPod came out (or at least the 2nd gen, which I own). You get a dongle that (optionally) plugs into the headphone jack, and you plug your headphones into the dongle. It has play/pause, forward/backward, and volume buttons on it. It's optional, of course, because you can do all these things on the iPod itself, but it's convenient because you can put your iPod in a backpack or pocket and just use the dongle.

Sounds like they're returning to their roots, but saving 2/10 of a penny by making the dongle and ear buds in one unit, and making you buy the stand-alone dongle separately.
 
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Re: The new iPod Shuffle is horrible

Thu Mar 12, 2009 11:47 am

Buub wrote:
I don't understand why they didn't go with the dongle in the first place. That's how the original iPod came out (or at least the 2nd gen, which I own). You get a dongle that (optionally) plugs into the headphone jack, and you plug your headphones into the dongle. It has play/pause, forward/backward, and volume buttons on it. It's optional, of course, because you can do all these things on the iPod itself, but it's convenient because you can put your iPod in a backpack or pocket and just use the dongle.

Sounds like they're returning to their roots, but saving 2/10 of a penny by making the dongle and ear buds in one unit, and making you buy the stand-alone dongle separately.

Many a CD player has a similar dongle. I personally never used the one's on mine *shrug*
 
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Re: The new iPod Shuffle is horrible

Thu Mar 12, 2009 12:15 pm

Buub wrote:
I don't understand why they didn't go with the dongle in the first place. That's how the original iPod came out (or at least the 2nd gen, which I own). You get a dongle that (optionally) plugs into the headphone jack, and you plug your headphones into the dongle. It has play/pause, forward/backward, and volume buttons on it. It's optional, of course, because you can do all these things on the iPod itself, but it's convenient because you can put your iPod in a backpack or pocket and just use the dongle.

Sounds like they're returning to their roots, but saving 2/10 of a penny by making the dongle and ear buds in one unit, and making you buy the stand-alone dongle separately.


EXCEPT you're forced into the dongle no matter what with this Shuffle if you want to use ear buds besides their stock ****. That's what Apple's ear buds are that ship stock (and their premium ones are fairly in line, though if they'll work on the new Shuffle dongle free I haven't seen confirmed). This is a total design set back. It is completely wrong from every aspect. There is a point where diminishing size gives you no benefits and all negatives and Apple has hit that. The previous Shuffle was a good, although over priced, product. The controls worked well, within a weeks time you could use them without looking at the device and it was already very small. This new Shuffle forces you into a costly dongle, make the product even more over priced, and it's control scheme is basically against every natural human input out there. Button pressing sequences are not intuitive or easier to memorize. Will you memorize them? Yes, but again why introduce a more difficult method without any benefit? The voice over system could have been built into the existing shell, other products of existing size do it all already. The previous Shuffle was, after all, the most featureless product in that market. If everyone else could integrate a mic, FM turner, and screen into their like sized players then why couldn't Apple throw in a mic? They could have, but forcing their consumers into buying extras such as dongles (oh why hello miniDisplayPort) is what Apple does all the time.

I realllllllllllllly want to like an Apple product. I even praised the Mini in another thread. But I absolutely refuse to purchase a product from a company that is so clearly anti-consumer. Vote with my wallet.
 
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Re: The new iPod Shuffle is horrible

Thu Mar 12, 2009 12:31 pm

derFunkenstein wrote:
I am using Safari 4 on both Windows and OS X and I don't see hardly any difference in the UI, and I CERTAINLY don't see a standard Windows interface.

They can do whatever they want with tool bars / menus. It' when you do your own custom windowing elements that I get irked about. From what I've seen in the new Safari, they use the standard minimize/maximize/close buttons, and the actual window border. And standard scroll bars. It's just speculation in my part, but I feel that that's a part of why iTunes is so unresponsive to window-resizing.
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derFunkenstein
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Re: The new iPod Shuffle is horrible

Thu Mar 12, 2009 1:48 pm

OK, I kinda see where you're coming from, and you might be onto something. But the Safari 4 beta still has and uses Apple's Core Graphics "port" for Windows rather than more "standard" Windows drawing tools. My theory (unsubstantiated) is that they've been updated and optimized.

As a result I think that if you haven't yet, you might want to download iTunes 8.1. Performance enhancements supposedly abound. I know that the window is very nice and responsive to resizing now when it wasn't before. That machine is a Latitude D520 with 1.5GB of memory and a 1.66GHz Core Duo (GMA 950 video).
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Spyder22446688
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Re: The new iPod Shuffle is horrible

Thu Mar 12, 2009 2:08 pm

Buub wrote:
I don't understand why they didn't go with the dongle in the first place.


Although I realize that my usage is likely unique, at the gym I route the headphone cable under my shirt. The Shuffle then clips to the pocket of my shorts. The extra cord is neatly tucked into my pocket, preventing it from catching on any of the equipment at the gym. Even with a dongle, getting to the controls would be a pester. I would have to have the dongle stick out. I really just prefer the controls physically on the unit. Also, I give credit to Apply for placing a (remarkably durable) clip directly onto the Shuffle.

In any event, I'd been looking for a player with a screen. I can't decide if I want to go SanDisk or Creative. Right now I am leaning towards the SanDisk Sansa Clip. Any recommendations?
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UberGerbil
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Re: The new iPod Shuffle is horrible

Thu Mar 12, 2009 3:13 pm

Spyder22446688 wrote:
Although I realize that my usage is likely unique, at the gym I route the headphone cable under my shirt. The Shuffle then clips to the pocket of my shorts. The extra cord is neatly tucked into my pocket, preventing it from catching on any of the equipment at the gym. Even with a dongle, getting to the controls would be a pester. I would have to have the dongle stick out. I really just prefer the controls physically on the unit. Also, I give credit to Apply for placing a (remarkably durable) clip directly onto the Shuffle.
Actually, I see a lot of people at the gym routing the cord to their shuffle exactly like that. I run the headphones to my Sansa Clip in the same way, usually. I really like the Clip, btw. The radio seems to eat a lot of battery life, but when you're sticking to strictly MP3/WMA playback it's pretty close to advertised. It pretty much does everything I want -- you can synch it with your media software (including playlists, which I never use) or just use it as pure storage device for drag-and-drop (no iTunes or any other software, yay). And it supports WMA, so I didn't have to transcode the stuff I let WMP rip. Mine is the 2GB model, but now there's a 4GB version (it was hard to find for a while, I think it was a Best Buy exclusive). It's probably not as durable as the shuffle, but I have had no real problems with it (the screen hasn't scratched, and I'm not likely to sit on it or otherwise abuse it anyway) and it's cheaper unless you shop the refurbished section of the Apple store. But I haven't owned any of the Creative players, so I can't compare it to them. If you want more of a screen you could step up to the Fuze, which also sports a Micro SD slot. But then you also have to pay for some kind of holster: that's what I liked about the Clip, there's nothing extra to buy for use at the gym.
 
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Re: The new iPod Shuffle is horrible

Thu Mar 12, 2009 3:28 pm

UberGerbil wrote:
I really like the Clip, btw.


Thanks for the suggestion. I just bought a 1GB Clip directly from SanDisk for $34.99 with $3.99 shipping. That will hold 150-250 songs, which is quite adequate for my intended use. For extended music listening, I'll still rely on my 80GB iPod Classic.
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paulWTAMU
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Re: The new iPod Shuffle is horrible

Fri Mar 13, 2009 12:20 am

I've had a couple of Sansa products now and liked 'em both. Very good bang for the buck, decent sound quality, easy to use. I'm just waiting for the 32 gig model to get cheaper to upgrade.
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derFunkenstein
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Re: The new iPod Shuffle is horrible

Fri Mar 13, 2009 7:50 am

the possibility of alternatives is why iPod threads for Windows users should go in Echo Vale with the other MP3 players. ;)
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Skrying
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Re: The new iPod Shuffle is horrible

Fri Mar 13, 2009 3:13 pm

I would like to thank Apple for making a product that has finally made it 100% possible to tell who is indeed an Apple fanboy. Thank you, you made something easy even easier!
 
derFunkenstein
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Re: The new iPod Shuffle is horrible

Fri Mar 13, 2009 5:28 pm

The MacBook Air called and said, "Welcome to 2008."

And then the Power Mac G4 Cube called the Air and said, "Welcome to 2000."

I'm sure the Cube could have gotten a call from some other piece of divisive hardware. The point is you're wrong - Apple has LONG produced divisive hardware.

Really, the weird combination of "X OS on Y desktop/laptop computer", "X iPod (but not other MP3 player, that goes in Echo Vale)", "X Cell phone (but not others, because those go in the mobile tech forum", "X Windows app such as one particular web browser, but not others, those go in General Software", "APPLE SUXXXXX!!!111" and so on makes the Apple forum pretty useless. It really should be a Mac forum for Mac software and hardware...no different than Linux software (and hardware configs). Everything else is just another brand of phone/MP3 player/windows app.

Other tech websites (in particular, Ars) filter the last category into a sort of "tech R&P" for things like MS vs. Linux, Apple vs. The World, console wars, etc. to keep the other forums clean of lame arguments. Probably too soon for a forum reorganization, though, so I'll just shut it beyond this for now.
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paulWTAMU
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Re: The new iPod Shuffle is horrible

Sat Mar 14, 2009 2:01 am

Maybe I'm being dense, but I can't tell if you're pushing for the Apple forum to more or less restricted in topics. Do you want us to not talk about any non-computer apple products in this forum, instead taking them to whatever other forum would fit (iPod in echo valve, etc) or what?
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derFunkenstein
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Re: The new iPod Shuffle is horrible

Sat Mar 14, 2009 7:19 am

Yes. But I'm not a mod, so don't take this as official instruction. The people in charge tend to push those things back in here because they offend their delicate sensibilities in their own forums. I'm just griping about forum organization.
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TravelMug
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Re: The new iPod Shuffle is horrible

Sat Mar 14, 2009 8:06 am

That control scheme is just simply dumb. Size is one thing, but compare it for example the Creative MuVo T100:

[1.8 x 0.7 x 0.3] = Shuffle = 10.7g
[3.0 x 1.0 x 0.3] = MuVo = 17.8g

Is the MuVo bigger and heavier? Yes. Does that bigger size and weight make any difference is real world? Absolutely not.

So for less then half the price you get something easier to use with better functionality. You can also get way better earbuds if you don't like the supplied ones. For example the EP-630 for $30 and connect them w/o any adapter.
 
UberGerbil
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Re: The new iPod Shuffle is horrible

Sat Mar 14, 2009 10:14 am

derFunkenstein wrote:
Yes. But I'm not a mod, so don't take this as official instruction. The people in charge tend to push those things back in here because they offend their delicate sensibilities in their own forums. I'm just griping about forum organization.
Well, I can kind of see your point. Back when Macs ran completely different hardware from the PC world, it made sense to have an all-encompassing Apple Sanctuary (and "Sanctuary" made sense when it was a beaten-down cadre of die-hards). But now it's really just an alternative to Windows and Linux on essentially the same hardware, so you really want a forum called, I don't know, "I'm Too OSXy For My Tech" and then break out iPhone stuff to Mobile and iPod stuff to Echo Vale. Of course then we'll have people debating whether the Mac NetBook / Air Board / Slate / whatever belongs in OSX or Mobile....
 
Spyder22446688
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Re: The new iPod Shuffle is horrible

Sat Mar 14, 2009 12:04 pm

derFunkenstein wrote:
Yes. But I'm not a mod, so don't take this as official instruction. The people in charge tend to push those things back in here because they offend their delicate sensibilities in their own forums. I'm just griping about forum organization.


As the original poster, I was torn where to post my topic, either here or Echo Vale. In the end, I flipped a coin. Sorry.
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derFunkenstein
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Re: The new iPod Shuffle is horrible

Sat Mar 14, 2009 12:27 pm

Spyder, don't take that as an attack on you. If you hadn't posted here, it would have been moved, I'm sure. I'm sorry if it came across that way, it was not what I meant to say.
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Spyder22446688
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Re: The new iPod Shuffle is horrible

Sat Mar 14, 2009 2:21 pm

derFunkenstein wrote:
Spyder, don't take that as an attack on you. If you hadn't posted here, it would have been moved, I'm sure. I'm sorry if it came across that way, it was not what I meant to say.


No no, I didn't take offense. I probably should have used a :wink: to make that clear. I can just understand your frustration, because the conversation did turn to Apple bashing and discussion of non-Apple products. Not sure the best solution is in terms of forum reorganization.
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derFunkenstein
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Re: The new iPod Shuffle is horrible

Sat Mar 14, 2009 4:26 pm

well not reorganization (and that's my fault because the term originated with me), just recognition from the powers that be that an iPod is a portable MP3 player and that an iPhone is a cell phone.

I resent the hardware (iPod) that kept Apple profitable during the late OS 8/9 and early OS X PPC years, don't I? :lol:
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paulWTAMU
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Re: The new iPod Shuffle is horrible

Sat Mar 14, 2009 4:53 pm

yes you do :p not sure why, but hey.
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derFunkenstein
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Re: The new iPod Shuffle is horrible

Sat Mar 14, 2009 5:02 pm

Well, I own a second-gen shuffle and I kinda like it. I'm softening. My wife really really really wants an iTouch, and I might pick it up for her as an anniversary gift (don't tell her, tfp).
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Hance
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Re: The new iPod Shuffle is horrible

Wed Mar 25, 2009 12:29 pm

derFunkenstein wrote:
Well, I own a second-gen shuffle and I kinda like it. I'm softening. My wife really really really wants an iTouch, and I might pick it up for her as an anniversary gift (don't tell her, tfp).


whats up with the the resident mac fanboi and he cant even get iPod Touch right ? I defy you to show me where apple ever called it an iTouch :wink:
 
derFunkenstein
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Re: The new iPod Shuffle is horrible

Wed Mar 25, 2009 12:36 pm

It's a pretty common nickname. Oh, and if you Google iTouch, it's interesting to note what the first link is, eh?
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Hance
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Re: The new iPod Shuffle is horrible

Wed Mar 25, 2009 12:39 pm

derFunkenstein wrote:
It's a pretty common nickname. Oh, and if you Google iTouch, it's interesting to note what the first link is, eh?


Way to dodge the question :lol: iTouch myself all the time does that make my *&^% an ipod ?
 
Spyder22446688
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Re: The new iPod Shuffle is horrible

Wed Mar 25, 2009 12:49 pm

Hance wrote:
iTouch myself all the time does that make my *&^% an ipod ?


Only if you have one testicle, that is made out of brushed aluminum, with non-user replaceable "fluids," and that is craved by millions of liberal artists, writers, and those generally considered "cooth."

[Edit] Oh, and it must get smaller every year! :D :D
Last edited by Spyder22446688 on Wed Mar 25, 2009 1:06 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: The new iPod Shuffle is horrible

Wed Mar 25, 2009 12:51 pm

My wife calls it the iTouch as well *shrug*
 
Hance
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Re: The new iPod Shuffle is horrible

Wed Mar 25, 2009 12:52 pm

Usacomp2k3 wrote:
My wife calls it the iTouch as well *shrug*


Well we own two of them. I have one and my wife has one and the word iTouch has never once been said in our house :wink:
 
derFunkenstein
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Re: The new iPod Shuffle is horrible

Wed Mar 25, 2009 5:00 pm

Hance wrote:
derFunkenstein wrote:
It's a pretty common nickname. Oh, and if you Google iTouch, it's interesting to note what the first link is, eh?


Way to dodge the question :lol: iTouch myself all the time does that make my *&^% an ipod ?

My point was that it's what I call it. It's not the first time it's happened, either. ;)

And if I plug earphones into your pee hole and sound comes out, you damn skippy, your schlong is an iPod. :lol:
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Murso24
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Re: The new iPod Shuffle is horrible

Wed Mar 25, 2009 10:18 pm

regarding the comments about " i dont understand why anyone would not want to be able to change the song or pick the one to listen to". has anyone every thought about the name itself? its called "Shuffle" for a reason. not a fancy line dance or a keyword for small. it says "shuffle" and its basic. not to mention the cheapest iPod out there. but look at the name. it says what it does. it shuffles. and thats it. there's no display to navigate.

makes sense to me.....

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