iPod Classic!

[TenaciousO]

Quote:

Originally Posted by jook /img/forum/go_quote.gif You missed one crucial detail in my comparison. I was actually comparing the headphone output of a cheap ($15), unpowered, iPod remote control accessory (that plugs into the dock connector) - to the built-in iPod headphone output. I was not using a headphone amp. The point being that, the simple attenuation done by the remote accessory did a better job than the headphone out implies that the built-in headphone output is still subpar when compared to the sound quality of average consumer products.

Actually, I assumed that you weren't using an amp so I think my comments are still relevant. Again, it's faulty to assume that the headphone out is inferior to that of other players just because the unamped lineout on the ipod sounds better than its headphone out. Take, for instance, the Creative Zen Vision:M. It may not have the best sound quality out there, but the general consensus is that the sound quality through the headphone out is pretty decent. I used to have KSC75s with an inline volume control that I would use to listen to the ZVM through the lineout using the dongle, and just like the ipod, the unamped lineout sounded noticeably better than the headphone out. I think you're concentrating on something that just doesn't really say anything.

 

[Sparky191]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Vinnie R. /img/forum/go_quote.gif . PS: Regarding the bass roll-off with the 4G headphone output, I recall a while back measuing the output caps and they were in fact too small (definitely giving bass roll-off), but the 5G/5.5G uses larger output caps on the headphone out that sets the -3dB cutoff at approx. 23Hz when using 32-ohm headphones. With headphones of higher impedance, this pole is lowered below 20Hz. I'll be sure to measure the caps in the headphone output of the iPod Classic as well and let you know how it compares to the 5G/5.5G.

Be interesting to hear how the Classic compares, and with different impedance.

 

[ZARIM]

Apple will launch 16GB ipod Nano near chrstms(after zune), tricky.

 

[mrarroyo]

Vinnie, any chance that larger caps could be used inside a 4th Gen iPod Photo? To reduce the bass roll off you mentioned earlier. Thanks.

 

[Chef Medeski]

Quote:

Originally Posted by BassheadJazz /img/forum/go_quote.gif I might be the only one, but I think I'm far more excited about the iPod classic than any of the other announcements made. Personally, I think it would've been cool for it to have wifi in order to take advantage of the iTunes wireless store interface, but I'm betting Apple is going to see how sales do before they switch the rest of their lineup to wifi. Either way, 160GB classic for me!

Im there with you! Love the classic. Plus love The Roots as well.

 

[IPodPJ]

There are benefits to the new iPods (the Classic, not the Touch):

1) They have a new aluminum finish that won't scratch like the 5G ones (what a mistake that was, huh? You can't do anything with it without a case for fear it will scratch.) Hey, at least my 5G is in perfect condition if I choose to sell it.

2) It has a whole new interface. Cover Flow is actually a very good feature. I use it in iTunes constantly to find my music. This is only good for people who actually own CDs and know what their CD covers look like. Nowadays though, people buy everything online so they aren't used to holding a CD case in their hands.

3) Improved battery life. Obvious + here.

4) 80GB for the price of the former 30GB. 160GB for the price of the former 80GB. Obvious + here. I use all lossless files so I can't fit all my music on my 30GB. I'm thinking about going straight to AIFF from now on, and if that's the case even the 80GB wouldn't be big enough for me. Being able to have all your music with you at any point in time is a great thing... certainly much better than having to swap out music from your library everytime you want to rotate your collection.

 

[monolith]

Quote:

Originally Posted by IPodPJ /img/forum/go_quote.gif There are benefits to the new iPods (the Classic, not the Touch): 2) It has a whole new interface. Cover Flow is actually a very good feature. I use it in iTunes constantly to find my music. This is only good for people who actually own CDs and know what their CD covers look like. Nowadays though, people buy everything online so they aren't used to holding a CD case in their hands.

I have many hundreds of CDs and I work in a record store. I can identify almost any CD I've seen once by its cover. I still know the name of the music I'm looking for and if I was using iTunes I could find it substantially more quickly that way. I think Coverflow is something people use because it's there rather than because it's necessary or more efficient.

 

[Mr.Sneis]

GAH.

Went to the apple store at open, they didn't get any in. Guy was REAL smug about it too. When I called on the 5th the salesperson said they would likely come in today... guess not.

I went ahead and ordered an 80gb online through the store... now comes the waiting!

My music collection is currently less than 30GB, I hope I don't find some major reason why I would need to have bought the 160gb.

 

[Sparky191]

Quote:

Originally Posted by monolith /img/forum/go_quote.gif I have many hundreds of CDs and I work in a record store. I can identify almost any CD I've seen once by its cover. I still know the name of the music I'm looking for and if I was using iTunes I could find it substantially more quickly that way. I think Coverflow is something people use because it's there rather than because it's necessary or more efficient.

For years I've used my own mixed tapes, then I used MD and now I use MP3. So I've no memory of Album covers at all. One of the reasons I would buy a classic would be so I can see the album art when music is playing because I'd like to see it more. But for navigation it would be useless. For me anyway. I've started to organise my albums by artist and then release date + Album. So I can listen to the development of an artist over time.

 

[monolith]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Sparky191 /img/forum/go_quote.gif For years I've used my own mixed tapes, then I used MD and now I use MP3. So I've no memory of Album covers at all. One of the reasons I would buy a classic would be so I can see the album art when music is playing because I'd like to see it more. But for navigation it would be useless. For me anyway. I've started to organise my albums by artist and then release date + Album. So I can listen to the development of an artist over time.

I suppose that's true, but at the same time didn't the old iPods display album art when you listened to the music too? Am I just crazy? You have to have the art attached to the files themselves, or else they don't get displayed (as far as I know). Seems to me like Coverflow is just a more unwieldy but prettier way of getting to what you'll get to either way. I downloaded iTunes to see if I could stand using it, and I must admit that Coverflow is cool to play with, but ultimately I never used to access the music I wanted. Even without the lag that would probably occur when using it on a portable unit it's substantially slower than just finding what I want on a list.

As for your way of organising, yeah, that's just about the only good way of organising albums in my opinion. No other way makes sense. That's the main reason I wish the iPods (and most other mp3 players [thank you Cowon]) had file tree browsing. I mean, I know the album chronology of most of the artists to which I listen anyway, but it's good not to have to think about it. It's also good not to have to make a playlist for every split album and such.

Ultimately I'd like the interface to be customisable. The ability to search through just song names is utterly useless to me, as I always listen to whole albums or just go through the artists. Searching through 160GB worth of songs would be ridiculous. It seems like doing things the way the consumer might want isn't high on the list of Apple's priorities though. Or maybe most people really do like having two or three tracks off albums rather than the whole things, or listening to music on shuffle (the thought of doing that is pretty stomach-upsetting to me)?

 

[Sparky191]

I do a tag nasty. I prefix the album name with release year. (Horror) but it works in filetree and on players that just have tags. Usually the ID3 tag is the release of that CD, but not the original release of the album which was probably Vinyl.

I don't have a MP3 player than can display album art. But I do where possible append it to the tag in MediaMonkey so I can see it on the computer.

I have a lot of singles, or one off tracks I've recorded on cassette or MD. Also I've a acquired (over the years some mixes from other people. I also have albums or Artists where I really only liked 1 or 2 tracks off them. So I don't keep all the rest of the tracks I don't like. I usually throw all these into a seperate genre like Rock Various or Pop Various. Or in some cases create an folder/album called "Various monolith" which will usually appear at the end of an artist fulls albums, within the artist folder. Everything else goes into a Genre like Rock Albums etc. I might shuffle through a "various" genre if I wanted background music. or just exploring new music etc.

 

[monolith]

Well, if that works for you then I celebrate your happiness with your musical experience.

I try to think of albums as works in their entirety rather than collections of individual works. They can have high points and low points, but I would never keep one or two tracks from an album and discard the rest, the lone possible exception being certain mixed electronic compilations (which are presented as collections of individual tracks mixed together and to which I'd listen as a whole work). I experimented some time ago with creating my own mixes (thematic ones, "best of" certain artists, etc), but I always found myself missing the contexts in which the individual tracks were presented, so I stopped doing that. If I need to explore new music I get new albums and listen to them. I've occasionally listened to internet radio to be exposed to totally new things, but those always led to album acquisitions. Again, this is just the way I like to consume music.

I always make sure to remove genre tags from my music files as well. Those are usually pretty silly. I find they must either be so general as to be useless (like "metal" or "electronica"), or so specific as to be unwieldy.

As for your album art tagging, that practise should get you the album art displayed on older iPods as well, if I'm not mistaken.

 

[Chef Medeski]

Quote:

Originally Posted by IPodPJ /img/forum/go_quote.gif There are benefits to the new iPods (the Classic, not the Touch): 1) They have a new aluminum finish that won't scratch like the 5G ones (what a mistake that was, huh? You can't do anything with it without a case for fear it will scratch.) Hey, at least my 5G is in perfect condition if I choose to sell it. 2) It has a whole new interface. Cover Flow is actually a very good feature. I use it in iTunes constantly to find my music. This is only good for people who actually own CDs and know what their CD covers look like. Nowadays though, people buy everything online so they aren't used to holding a CD case in their hands. 3) Improved battery life. Obvious + here. 4) 80GB for the price of the former 30GB. 160GB for the price of the former 80GB. Obvious + here. I use all lossless files so I can't fit all my music on my 30GB. I'm thinking about going straight to AIFF from now on, and if that's the case even the 80GB wouldn't be big enough for me. Being able to have all your music with you at any point in time is a great thing... certainly much better than having to swap out music from your library everytime you want to rotate your collection.

Dont forget while space is certainly no longer a problem, that doesn't mean you should run away to the largest format you can find. Cause while yes you could probably fit all your music in AIFF if buying a 160 instead of an 80. But the battery life will be cut in half because in every song it has to run the HD twice as much due to the increased bitrate (now while I realize that HD doesn't take up the full extent, so you're battery won't be cut exactly in half....). I dont think its so wise to get the biggest and largest. Personally I can't hear much of a difference between lossless and 320 VBR without an external amp. So while I could easily fit all my songs in lossless with a 160, I'm taking a 320 to fit it on a 80, cause battery life is a concern. Ill probably get more battery from an 80 running 320 than a 160 running lossless.

 

[monolith]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Chef Medeski /img/forum/go_quote.gif So while I could easily fit all my songs in lossless with a 160, I'm taking a 320 to fit it on a 80, cause battery life is a concern. Ill probably get more battery from an 80 running 320 than a 160 running lossless.

I suggest using LAME V0 for your purposes rather than 320.

 

[Chef Medeski]

Quote:

Originally Posted by jook /img/forum/go_quote.gif That would make far too much sense for Apple to consider. I'll put money on it - they won't have changed a thing with the incredibly crap headphone output. To do so would require them to admit to themselves that there was a problem with the headphone output in the first place, and they're far too stubborn to do that. And the majority of users don't complain or recognize the problem anyway. Most people believe it is a problem with the lossy file formats, and are unable to recognize that the quality of the same MP3 file played back from other sources sound much better (afterall, they'll probably have crappy $10 PC speakers attached to their computer). The other factor is that you're considering purely from a product design point of view. From a production point of view, all they are doing with the new range of products is mix-mashing various components and parts that they already have, to create something new with minimum R&D costs to add. I find it highly unlikely they would spend money on researching designs to improve the headphone output. If there was a drop-in replacement component that could improve the sound, and which was made affordable in recent development (such as what we see with HDD and increasing capacities), then it might be possible, but otherwise, I'll put it down to a possibilty of zero.

Well while it seems that you have been proven wrong and I right. This iPod clearly reprents a pretty good leap in quality in comparison to the last stock iteration. They totally changed the inside signals, so that it uses a system close to the 1G Shuffle. And it has been getting positive reviews. While its certainly no iMod. Its obvious Apple has framed the iPod Classic towards audiophiles, by giving them huge HDs, a much larger cache that benifits those with larger bit rate music, and a much better, cleaner sounding headphone and line-out. Oh and the battery is crazy long. There really isn't anyhing more a audiohphile could have hoped for without charging signficantly more than $250 ( a typical price for a portable AMP!). So I definetely think Apple followed the logic on this one and made their iPod classic much more niche, but in a great way for us. Well I'm unsure if 60,000 members are such a small niche! Especially since anyone using an iPod stock that cares about quality like me will be clammering to get one. (Damn you Apple Canada! Having nothing in stock till Thursday!)