Apple iPod touch (32GB; third generation)

Now in its third year, Apple's iPod touch has evolved so many features and uses beyond media playback that we're not really sure what to call it anymore. Some flock to the touch for its first-class mobile Web browser and email support, while others see it primarily as a portable gaming device, and some still pick it up for good old-fashioned music and video playback. No matter how you choose to define the iPod touch, Apple's third-generation version has arrived, flaunting 8GB, 32GB, and 64GB capacities priced respectively at S$308 (US$217.54), S$468 (US$330.56), and S$628 (US$443.57). Its hardware design hasn't changed dramatically from the model we reviewed in 2008, but neither has its status as the world's most feature-packed portable media player.

Design

For better or worse, the first thing we noticed about the third-generation iPod touch is how unchanged it looks. Side by side with the second-generation iPod touch, you'd be hard-pressed to find a way to distinguish the two models from each other. Aside from minor differences in the etching on the back of the touch, the second- and third-generation models are splitting images of each other.

Just like its phone-wielding sibling, the iPhone, the iPod touch is a touchscreen device with a glass-covered 3.5-inch screen that sports a 480 x 320-pixel resolution. In spite of its touchscreen interface, Apple includes a few physical buttons, including a slim volume control on the left edge, a hold switch on the top, and a home button on the face of the player, placed below the screen. The bottom edge of the touch includes the same universal dock port and 3.5mm headphone jack as previous models, piercing the otherwise unbroken expanse of chromed steel that wraps around the back and edges of the device.

The shape and dimensions of the touch also remain unchanged (110 x 61.8 x 8.5mm), defined by a flat-glass front set inside a curved steel backing that feels natural in the hand but makes the iPod a little wobbly when you set it down on a table. Packaged with the touch is an Apple universal dock connector USB cable, a pair of white earbuds that include a microphone and remote control on the cable, and a molded universal dock insert to use with any charging or speaker accessories.

Features

Out of the box, the third-generation iPod touch includes an amazing music player, podcast support, video playback (including iTunes rentals and a YouTube player), a Safari Web browser, photo viewer, an email reader (compatible with Outlook, Exchange, MobileMe, Gmail, Yahoo, AOL, or any POP email service), an integrated iTunes Store for music and video downloads, and a host of smaller utilities (weather, calendar, maps, stocks, notes, voice memos, clock, contacts, and calculator). Provided you become proficient with its touchscreen keyboard, the iPod touch is more pocket PC than an MP3 player.

iPod touch OS 3.0 media features

With version 3.1 of Apple's iPhone and iPod touch firmware, the device's stock features are just the starting point of apps available. An iTunes App Store, accessible from the computer or directly from the iPod touch, lets you download and install thousands of applications, including Internet radio players, games, voice recorders, and social-networking tools. You can also extend the capabilities of the iPod touch using third-party "Made for iPod" hardware accessories such as AV docks, external battery packs, and speaker systems.

Apple first introduced its Genius playlist feature with the second-generation iPod touch, letting you create instant 25-song playlists based on the musical characteristics of a single song. The Genius playlist feature is still here on the third-generation version, giving you an easy and fun way to generate playlists, provided their music collection holds enough songs to make interesting connections. You can create and save Genius playlists directly onto the iPod touch, and with automatic syncing enabled in iTunes, you can also transfer them back to your computer.

With the third-generation of the touch, Apple broadened the scope of Genius selections to include App Store recommendations and extended, genre-based playlists called Genius Mixes. After clicking on the App Store icon found on the main menu, you'll find Genius App picks in a separate "Genius" tab giving you a list of recommendations based on previous app purchases you've made. Genius Mixes are intuitively located in the iPod's Music menu, located by default in the lower submenu strip across the bottom, along with selections for artist, songs, playlists, and more. If you're the kind of person who typically listens to music by hitting shuffle, you might enjoy the way Genius Mixes provide a more curated and genre-specific selection of tunes with a minimum of effort. Those who are more deliberate about their music selections always have the option of knocking the feature into the "More" section and replacing it with a more useful menu item (podcasts, audiobooks, and so on).

Genius Mixes offer extended playlists of your music, which get programmed automatically by Apple. Think of it as "shuffle" with better taste.

Oddly, the touch's Genius Playlist and Mixes features won't work if you haven't enabled Genius on your computer's iTunes software. If you find iTunes' Genius features too demanding on your computer's resources or too invasive of your privacy (the feature reports your listening habits to Apple), then you'll need to live without the features on your iPod as well.

Not every member of the third-generation iPod touch family is created equally. Essentially, the 8GB iPod touch model is still running on second-generation hardware that uses a slower processor than the 32GB and 64GB models and lacks support for new features such as Voice Control, OpenGL graphic support, and advanced accessibility features. As we've already seen with the first-generation touch, future updates to the iPod firmware may bring features that only the latest hardware will support. Obviously, the 8GB model's S$308 (US$217.54) price tag makes it attractive to prospective buyers, but be aware that the lower price comes at the cost of performance and a few features.

Are you confused about what features are available on the 8GB touch compared with the 32GB and 64GB versions? So were we. For the record, iPhone OS 3.1 features such as Bluetooth audio, Genius Mixes, and voice memo recording are available on all versions of the third-generation iPod touch. Voice Control and accessibility settings, however, are the only features we've found so far that can only be found on the 32GB and 64GB touch models (or iPhone 3GS). In the next few paragraphs, we'll dive into these features a little more to see if they're worthwhile.

Voice control

The Voice Control screen of the Apple iPod touch.

As if touchscreen control wasn't futuristic enough, the iPod touch now includes the capability to control playback using voice commands. To activate this feature, you'll need to press and hold the headphone remote control button until the Voice Control screen appears. Using the microphone built into the included pair of earbuds, you can call out a song, artist name, album, or playlist, and the iPod will interpret your commands and play the request. Playback features such as shuffle, skip, play, and pause can also be controlled using voice commands, but it feels a little unnecessary, since the earbud remote control is available to perform these functions without making you look like a crazy person. One of the coolest uses of the technology is the capability to engage the Genius playlist function by saying "Play more songs like this", letting you steer your listening experience without taking the iPod out of your pocket.

We found Voice Control to be consistently accurate when it came to basic commands, such as "play", "next song", "shuffle" and so on. You do run into some trouble calling up artists with funky names or funky spellings (too bad, P!NK), but that's to be expected. Overall, Voice Control is a fun feature to have, and even more fun to show off. We wish Apple had thought of an easy way to let you to Voice Control while the touch is plugged into a car stereo aux input, but we've no doubt that third-party manufacturers will solve the problem with special cables or in-car charging docks.

Accessibility

The iPod touch accessibility menu.

Touchscreen devices present a unique challenge to users with visual impairment. By digging into the General settings of the 32GB or 64GB third-generation iPod touch, users can now enable features such as screen zooming, white/black reversal, mono audio, home button triple-click, an automatic text reader that will read everything from emails to entire Web pages, and a VoiceOver feature that offers spoken feedback of menus and any item selected by touch (apps launch with double-clicks in this mode). For users who have otherwise felt locked out of the iPod touch and apps experience, the inclusion of these relatively deep accessibility controls is certainly an advantage over previous models of the iPod touch, and a promising direction for touchscreen devices, generally.

iTunes on the go
Both the iPod touch and iPhone let you browse, preview, purchase, and download content from the new iTunes Wi-Fi store. You'll have to hop onto an available Wi-Fi Internet connection to take advantage of the wireless music store, but once connected, you can search for any artist, album, or song in the iTunes music catalog, as well as movies, TV shows, music videos, audiobooks, podcasts, and iTunes U educational content. Store purchases require you to enter your iTunes password as a security measure. Once the download is complete, the audio or video is immediately available to listen to and will transfer to your computer's iTunes music library the next time you sync the device. The feature seems to work without any kinks. Even interrupted downloads pick up once a Wi-Fi connection is re-established.



source

Apple iPod Touch, The Third Generation (first part)

The iPod Touch uses a two-piece design that marries a flat glass-covered front with a single piece of chromed steel that wraps around the back and edges. For a such a thin and seemingly fragile device, the Touch feels surprisingly sturdy and the steel offers a reassuring heft compared to the iPhone's plastic design.

Apple's Cover Flow music menu is a bit useless on the smaller screens of the iPod Nano and iPod Classic, but it's a fantastic way to browse music on the iPod Touch.

CoverFlow is fun, but when you want a more exact way of finding a song, you'll need to scroll though a list. Fortunately, Apple provides quick tabs for sorting at the bottom of the screen, and a fast-find alphabet strip on the right side. By pulling down on the menu, you can also uncover a hidden box for typing in your search request.

Considering all the features crammed into the iPod Touch, including email, internet, music, video, and games--it's a wonder that the device fits so easily in your pocket.

There aren't a lot of differences between the second and third-generation iPod Touch, but we did notice an improved screen quality. Here you can see the second-generation Touch (above) screen is a little more washed out and yellow-tinted compared to the third-gen model set at a comparable brightness setting.

Ever feel like handing the wheel over to Apple's music experts when it comes to figuring out what music to play? Well then, welcome to Genius Mixes. As an alternative to simply hitting shuffle and taking a random stream of music, Apple's automatic Genius Mixes group together songs in your collection into mixes based around common genres.


To be continued.......

Will Apple's New iTunes Put You on Cloud Nine?

iTunes 9 is here. Find out what you should look for, and whether it's worth the download.

Earlier today Apple introduced iTunes 9 at the "It's Only Rock and Roll, But We Like It" media event. iTunes 9 has a number of new features, such as iTunes LP (which tries to bring full-blown album art, liner notes, and so on to the digital world), Home Sharing (which allows you to sync your music across computers in your household), and the redesigned iTunes Store. Though these new features make iTunes an even stronger media-playback app, you may find this version a little disappointing if you were hoping for a major revamp.

Home Sharing and Syncing

With the addition of Home Sharing, iTunes finally gives you a way to sync music automatically among the computers in your home. Once you enable Home Sharing on your computer, you'll be able to access the iTunes library on any other Mac or Windows PC on your network with Home Sharing enabled. From there, you can play music from other computers and import music from those computers as well, so you can have the same music on every machine in your house.

One important note: You'll have to ensure that all your computers are on the same network, and activated with the same iTunes account. This means that you can't share music between your iTunes account and your significant other's, for example, and you can't share music between your home PC and your work PC. Still, Home Sharing is a welcome addition, and it beats manually copying music files onto each of your computers.

A New Look

iTunes 9 sports an updated interface, but the changes are more than skin-deep. The window chrome has a polished-metal-and-glossy-plastic look. It isn't a huge difference, but iTunes 8 users will notice the change. Personally, I'm not a huge fan of this tweak, but you might like it. Windows Vista and Windows 7 users will notice that the iTunes main window finally has a drop shadow.

The updated iTunes Store.

Beyond those cosmetic tweaks, Apple completely redesigned the iTunes Store, and it's a big improvement. The new look is cleaner and more attractive--and easier to navigate, too, thanks to the addition of a navigation bar across the top that gives you easy access to the various parts of the iTunes Store. Album pages have been redesigned, as well. Gone is the split-pane view of old (album details and user reviews on top, songs below)--instead, the songs show in-line on the page, in a more prominent location. As you mouse over songs in a list, a preview button appears; click it, and you get a 30-second preview of that song.

The iTunes Store preview feature.

The rest of the interface has undergone some minor changes. While iTunes 9 is an improvement overall, it takes a step back in some areas. By default, when you view your library or a playlist in grid view, the app no longer gives you the toolbar that lets you change sort options on the fly (you can turn the toolbar on via the View menu). And various controls, such as the buttons for the drop-down genre menus in the iTunes Store, appear only when you mouse over them, making them less obvious than they should be.

Genius Mixes

What do you get when you take iTunes' Genius Playlists and merge them with Pandora? You get Genius Mixes. How does a Genius Mix differ from a Genius Playlist, you ask? With a Genius Playlist, you select a song and click the Genius button (bearing an atom icon), and iTunes creates a playlist of 25 to 100 songs that are similar to the one you picked. A Genius Mix, on the other hand, is more like a Genius-powered radio station: It will pull together any and all songs of a similar nature in your iTunes library, and play them in random order. To group similar artists and songs together, Genius will also collect song information from your iTunes library and compare it with what other iTunes users favor.

Genius Mixes did a pretty good job of bringing together similar artists and songs in my collection, but they also seemed to leave out a fair amount of my music. My tunes are largely a mix of alternative rock with some electronic thrown in. Genius created several alternative mixes, each combining different groups of artists, but it didn't create a single electronic playlist. My guess is that I don't have enough of that particular genre for Genius to make anything of it. The differences between my Genius Mixes, style-wise, are so slight that it defeats the purpose to some extent, too; it should work better if you listen to a wide array of music.

One more thing: You can't see what songs iTunes is using in a Genius Mix. It'll show you only icons displaying album covers of some of the albums included in a mix, but you can't see exactly what tracks are included, so you can't pick what song you want to listen to.

Genius on iPhone

The iPhone OS 3.1 update brings additional Genius features to the iPhone. Genius can now recommend apps based on what you already have.

Genius Mixes have made their way to the iPhone as well. Genius Mixes appear to carry over from your computer when you sync your iPhone, as the ones on my phone are identical to what I have in iTunes, and they didn't show up on my iPhone until I resynced it. Unfortunately, as with Genius Mixes in iTunes, on the iPhone you can't see what tracks are in each mix. Boo.

App Sanity!

With iTunes 9 and iPhone OS 3.1, you now have more control over how your apps are organized on your iPhone or iPod Touch. For example, you can pick and choose which apps to sync with your phone, and you can rearrange how your apps appear on your phone.

Overall, I can't think of a reason not to upgrade to iTunes 9 and iPhone OS 3.1 (unless your phone is jailbroken, in which case you might want to hold off for now). iTunes does need something of an overhaul, though. The sidebar, for example, is starting to get very crowded, as Apple tacks more features on. Maybe in version 10 we'll see Apple simplify and streamline iTunes.

source

Apple to debut iTunes LP alongside launch of iTunes 9

It seemed that those reports about Cocktail, a new scheme to "stimulate sales of CD-length music," were true. The new, multimedia-adorned downloads are called iTunes LPs and iTunes Extras, and they require iTunes 9, which comes with a new store.

iTunes LP, likely the official name of Apple's "Cocktail" project designed to spur sales of full albums, is expected to be officially unveiled at today's media event along with iTunes 9.

A new listing on iTunes for a deluxe edition of Bob Dylan's "Highway 61 Revisited," as discovered by AppleInsider reader Cameron Phillips, has revealed both new products. The description states that the album's release date is Sept. 15, 2009, and that the album-enriching iTunes LP will include bonus content in the form of additional recordings, photos and videos. It is listed for $17.00.

"Get this watershed album with iTunes LP (only for use on a Mac or PC with iTunes 9 or later) for 13 bonus recordings taken from the original sessions, live videos recorded at the Newport Folk Festival, photos, and more," the iTunes page reads.

Originally revealed under the codename "Cocktail," the new product is designed to incentivize purchases of full-length albums rather than individual singles. The effort is purportedly a multi-party collaboration between Apple as well as EMI, Sony, Warner and Universal. Reports have alleged it will go well beyond the PDF liner notes often included today.

With Apple's keynote media event just moments away, it is likely that the iTunes LP format, along with iTunes 9, will be unveiled. Previous rumors have suggested that iTunes 9 will include social media integration and Blu-ray support.


The same goes for movies: iTunes Extra gives you a downloadable equivalent of DVD extras, with interviews, extra clips and photo galleries.



source 1
source 2