Apple's Newest Stuff: Intel Mini, iPod Hi-Fi, Cases

I agree, the speakers look like an expensive irrelevance.
I tested another way, plugging a Shuffle into the USB of a small hi-fi, the Samsung USB MM-UC8. It sounds disgustingly thin, much worse than the radio.
The reason is that an MP3 player's earphones make the best of low quality sound. On the hi-fi, the best sound comes from the original CD. I am expecting the hi-fi makers to build in optimising filters next: maybe Creative will throw something from their X-Fi into this arena.

Britt Johnston must be listening to MP3s on his iPod instead of the much better AAC format which will solve the issues that he mentions. If you are a real audiophile, then you can use the Apple lossless format.

When I first was deciding to even buy an iPod, I had my family listen to an original CD source and an AAC file played from iTunes on a cheap laptop through a fairly decent Onkyo reciever. I would switch back and forth between the CD source and the iTunes AAC source and they could not tell the difference.

Again, my only problem with Apple. Everything costs alot more $$$ than it should.

I can go nab a decent mp3 player, awesome speakers, fm transmitters, cases, all sorts of crap for HUNDREDS less than iPod. A bit of personal rebellion too....I won't fall for Apple's tactic of trying to get us to beleive we need their stuff to be fashionable. I'd rather pay less, myself.

Everything costs alot more than inferior products. You are right. For people whose time is money, there is a savings of not having to learn how to use the player or 2nd rate player software. Many people assume users know how to use their MP3 player as a hard drive. Those whose time is money, typically do not. Enter the iPod.

I should think such important people would have something better to do with their precious time than listen to an iPod.

jokesandsuch: That is, of course, assuming that iPods are superior to anything else. Frankly, that's not so. There's a few mp3 players out there that allow you to drag and drop, far easier than fudging around with iTunes.

Apple won the mp3 top spot through marketing, not by having a superior product. An iPod is a fine mp3 player, I have no complaints with it. But it's not better than any other, really.

iPods are so convienent & easy to use. No wonder everyone either has one or wants one.

& well... 1 BILLION downloads on itunes speaks for itself.

Yes, it does speak for itself. Apple has an awesome marketing department.

Tell me exactly what makes an iPod better than....well....any other mp3 player? Please!

the ipod does the same as any other player it plays music. personally it has the best controls on it but i havent tried some of the others but the quality of an ipod is no better than any other mp3 player out there.

but you do get fun features when you put linux on them

I don't like the black color front to the ipod speaker dock. I would rather it all white of all black.

Using a high bitrate also makes a huge difference. If you use 128 kbps it's going to sound inferior to using higher bitrates. I have even successfully decompressed high quality mp3s into wave files using Exact Audio Copy.

Who says you have to have an iPod to use itunes music store. 1 Billion downloads on Apple's iTunes store speaks nothing to popularity of the iPod or its status as a top MP3 player. It just means 1 Billion songs were downloaded to be used on any PC/MAC or MP3 player.

IMHO, the iPod is not the best out there. There are certainly better players that can do more, but none of them is as easy to use and looks as good as the iPod. The integration is key. It's like the RAZR. I don't have an iPod and have tried numerous other players at the store, friends', etc. I would take an iPod anyday though. And I love iTunes. I would have liked an iPod with Bluetooth and WiFi so I can listen through Bluetooth headsets and check my email on the go. The iPod Hi-Fi with Bluetooth would have been real cool.

For $599 the least Apple could do is throw in the keyboard and mouse; one shouldn't have to purchase those separately when buying a Mac Mini.

I am one whom uses both Mac's and windows PC's in my work. I am partial to the windows side of things because I am a tweaker and technically savvy.

Apple is squarely aiming for the non-technical crowd. Folks with little desire to understand the inner workings of hardware, software settings and configurations. These folks will not miss out on extended features -they just want things to do work, no matter how basic. If they buy an MP3 player, then they expect it to at least play the music.

In fact, it's folks who believe that time is money would rather spend it on what they do best, and little if any on the small things.

I would buy my relatives apple devices so they would stop bugging me about fixing their windows PC's.

Mr. Jobs is on the right track, and I think he understands his market. However, he must know that he can't expect to play the IPOD card much longer to keep the company afloat and making payroll. Whatever works for the IPOD vs. more featured devices, will be carried over to PC product line, and the Mac-mini is it.

who is this ladiesman?? get a life you apple hater!!

Mac Minis are getting pricier, not cheaper. Which is not what you expect to happen with computers. But even though the base Mini is now $599 rather than $499, it should be a much more powerful machine, with more standard features.

You'd have to have been nuts to have bought the Mini before it came out in its present config ie Intel based. It's worth the extra bucks, and it'll head down in time, just like every other tech product - the price will drop and the quality will go up.

I intend to buy one of these dudes, dump my wintel box, keep my wintel laptop in the network so as to use wintel software, of which I've got a lot.

I'd not be surprised if some tech stallion has xp running on this machine as I type this in, and maybe in a month it'll be out for us all, which would make this truly the best of both worlds; boot it how you want, maybe boot into both at the same time, toggle between? No telling.

Jobs quit trying to be MicroSoft or beat them at their game a long, long time ago, seems he's happy doing what he's doing and doing it damn well - the guy rocks!

As far as all the comments on the iPods being no better than any other mp3 player, I surely disagree (other than just a bitty flash player for workout/mountain biking) as it is intuitive, very high quality, lots of flash for the admittedly large chunk of cash. I'm glad I've got one, though it was obsolete (4g Mini) within a year of purchase; I still use it, it's still got plenty enough flash for me and enough fun, maybe some day I'll dink around with the linux I've seen for them, have some fun.

It's the perfect machine, except that Apple said this when the first non-intel mini came out:

"Or one 3D game. Go ahead, just try to play Halo on a budget PC. Most say they?re good for 2D games only. That?s because an ?integrated Intel graphics? chip steals power from the CPU and siphons off memory from system-level RAM. You?d have to buy an extra card to get the graphics performance of Mac mini, and some cheaper PCs don?t even have an open slot to let you add one."

The new mini is almost perfect, aside from the integrated intel graphics and the fact that Apple, whom I love, really contradicted themselves...

The new mac mini is pretty snazzy....and for all my Apple hatin' I actually want to get a Mac just kinda for the hell of it. But really, at $599 you're really not getting a good deal. I could get a $499 Dell at the same price and get a monitor, keyboard, and mouse.

It all comes down to preference. I bought an iPod because it integrates with iTunes which I prefer over other media players. You could buy a Dell for cheaper but for most of the Apple faithful their purchases are image (ego) driven.
I've been owned Apples for over 20 years and I've heard a lot of the standard PC (Windows) vs Mac arguments. People who own PC's tout the value per dollar, while Mac users tend to tout style features and ease of use.

It all comes down to preference. I bought an iPod because it integrates with iTunes which I prefer over other media players. You could buy a Dell for cheaper but for most of the Apple faithful their purchases are image (ego) driven.
I've been owned Apples for over 20 years and I've heard a lot of the standard PC (Windows) vs Mac arguments. People who own PC's tout the value per dollar, while Mac users tend to tout style features and ease of use.

I'm no expert on the PC world, so my analysis may be suspect, but one thing cheap PCs do not seem to have, that Macs do have, is great software. Even a Mac mini comes with a boatload of useful stuff. Can cheap PCs match that? Also, there is the ease of use thing. There is also the rock solid steadiness of Mac OS X (I haven't suffered a single crash since switching from System 9 to System 10). There is also the virus/worm/malware thing. I have never even heard of such a thing in the Mac world for many, many years now. How often do PCs get infected? Considering all these factors, Macs may indeed be worth what Apple charges for them.

Michael Reed: Macs don't have virus' because they are super secure, it's because nobody makes virus' for them. If Mac's start getting more popular, you'll have them too.

I will give it to you though, that Macs do come with more software. Of course, in the case of the Mac mini, I can either buy software.....or buy a keyboard, mouse, monitor, speakers, etc. It's a tradeoff.

Wow. The iLemmings are out in full force today.

The truth is, the iPod sucks. It just does. Sure it's pretty. But what good is that when it stops working and demands to be reformatted less than a month after you've had it? What good is it when you can't get it to play video like it's supposed to? What good is it when you find out the batter life isn't nearly what Apple promised it would be? What good is it when the screen gets scratched so bad from being in your pocket, you can't even read the text?

Also, the Mini is a bad investment. It constantly forces you to get rid of it when the new model comes out. There's virtually no upgrading. At least with a PC you can upgrade to your heart's content. And, if you've been paying attention to the news, you'll see that there are concept viruses in the wild for OSX. The *ONLY* thing that makes osx more secure is it's constant and annoying prompt for your administrator password whenever you want to make the slightest change to the system. I'm sorry, but having a PC with a more forgiving architecture and some security software is a much better answer.

Apple people need to see reality: Apple is a rip-off.

I have to admit, not including a keyboard and mouse with the Mac mini does not make much sense to me. As for iPods, I've never understood the desire to walk around with earbuds stuck in my ear, isolating me from the real world. But hey, I don't get cell phone users either, constantly talking, even while they're driving. What do they have so much to talk about? Maybe I'm just speech challenged.

Perhaps I'm just dense, but I don't follow RFJason's logic. How can a highly secure OS be less desirable than one that requires you to buy extra security software? As for the "annoying" prompts of OS X, there are ways around that, if you understand the intricacies of the system. OS X can also be highly tweakable (is that a word?), especially if one understands the underlying UNIX heart.

Finally, I also don't like the inability of upgrading a Mac mini. I doubt i would own one. But then, I also don't like the inability of upgrading laptops. I too prefer tower type machines because of their upgradeableness (is THAT a word?)

Finally, RFJason must be a lot richer than me if he feels the need to upgrade his machine every time a new model comes out. *Sigh* I wish I had his problem.

I have to admit, not including a keyboard and mouse with the Mac mini does not make much sense to me. As for iPods, I've never understood the desire to walk around with earbuds stuck in my ear, isolating me from the real world. But hey, I don't get cell phone users either, constantly talking, even while they're driving. What do they have so much to talk about? Maybe I'm just speech challenged.

Perhaps I'm just dense, but I don't follow RFJason's logic. How can a highly secure OS be less desirable than one that requires you to buy extra security software? As for the "annoying" prompts of OS X, there are ways around that, if you understand the intricacies of the system. OS X can also be highly tweakable (is that a word?), especially if one understands the underlying UNIX heart.

I also don't like the inability of upgrading a Mac mini. I doubt i would own one. But then, I also don't like the inability of upgrading laptops. I prefer tower type machines because of their upgradeableness (is THAT a word?)

Finally, RFJason must be a lot richer than me if he feels the need to upgrade his machine every time a new model comes out. *Sigh* I wish I had his problem.

But in the PC side, things are always bigger, heavier, uglier, and noisier than things are supposed to be. That's why they are also cheaper.

Miniman couldn't be more wrong. Here's why:

1. PC's, by cubic-inch-per-mhz, are actually smaller than tower Mac's. The G5 is an absolute monster compared to a Dell of equivalent or better power. The mini is equivalent to most lower-end laptops, if you remove their screens and other doesnt-come-with-the-mini accessories.

2. PC's, by being smaller, and by using lighter materials, are also lighter. Again, the G5 tower is an absolute monster by virtue of it's ultra-heavy plastics.

3. I'm sorry, but Apple is not the end-all-be-all of beauty. Many of us do not equate sterile minimalism with beauty. We equate it with bland, drab mundaneness. At least with PC's I can shop among a few hundred designs to find one that suits me.

4. Noise. I'm sorry to beat this horse to death, but have you heard the G5 fly itself in the air with it's 80 billion fans?

PC's win because they have what's called economy of scale. They're cheaper, faster, more reliable, and far more usable than a Mac (assuming you've been using computers for more than 30 days). Why would I want to understand the underlying architecture of unix to make a stupid admin prompt go away when I could just use Windows and make some settings via point-n-click?

Face it, guys. Apple sucks.

Im Just going to get on with life and not dispute which is the better machine and why.

Fact is, I began using a mac from day one and prefer it's ease of use or perhaps It's a case of me not wishing to learn my way round a new operating system

Why cant PC users and Apple users just get along? Also why is it Apple vs the PC? Why not just Apple vs HP or Sony? That would be a fairer competition dont ya think? and easier to resolve.

Both Apple and the markets produce expensive hardware. see Alienware for example.

Anyway this dispute has been around for about 10-15 years and is going to go on and on and on...

I beleive the Mac is a half brother of the PC perhaps they dont always get along and at first they did not even tal to one another. At times they get jealous about one anothers features. But at the end of the day, when the dust settles they will both end up sleeping or on standby together.

XXX

Apple sucks. period. I bought the IPOD photo and was promised that they were going to release the FM Receiver for it. Now that they have an FM receiver, it only works with the video and mini models. What IPOD can we purchase and be comfortable with for a couple of years? Any device you buy will be obsolete in 6 months and Apple doesn't seem to care about making accessories for their older products. My suggestion- screw them. The IPOD isn't any better than some of the other MP3 players on the market.

Madina: I can totally see you're point, which is the exact reason I won't buy a Mac. I don't want to learn a new OS. I can make Windows do whatever I want. I wouldn't even know where to start on a Mac. They seem like they make decent computers; really, any manufacturer makes good ones. But Apple is, always has been, and likely always will be the outcast.