Nokia Announces Hard-Drive Phone 410
blorg writes "The new N91 features a 4gb microdrive and a 2 megapixel digital camera, and plays music in MP3, AAC and WMV formats. With this phone, Nokia reckons it has an iPod killer and aims to become the largest seller of portable MP3 players this year, having already outstripped camera manufacturers in the photography market. However, as the BBC points out, people are not necessarily buying these phones for their camera or music features."
Killer Phones (Score:4, Interesting)
The only downside is the long extension cord.
However, as the BBC points out, people are not necessarily buying these phones for their camera or music features."
Really! This pub chef story [bbc.co.uk] was carried by the BBC World Service, this morning (California time) regarding a chef bitten by a spider and had the presence of mind to snap a picture or two of it, which helped identify which spider it was and how to treat the venom. I think this link [itv.com] carries and actual photo from the phone.
Re:Killer Phones (Score:5, Insightful)
That's the most useful feature: the "conveniance" of always having a camera with you. You never know when it can be useful. Took a picture of that big diagram drawn on a blackboard before someone erase it, take a picture or two of that guy who looks like trying to sneak in your neighbor house...
Re:Killer Phones (Score:5, Funny)
The Wandering Spider is one of the world's most deadliest spiders
Is this called a "double positive"?
Re:Killer Phones (Score:2)
n example: in the 1950's, the British philosopher J. L. Austin came to Columbia to present a paper about the close analysis of language. He pointed out that although two negatives make a positive, nowhere is it the case that two positives make a negative. "Yeah, yeah," Dr. Morgenbesser said.
Re:Killer Phones (Score:2)
Re:Killer Phones (Score:4, Informative)
Also fun are double comparitives (more better), and forgetting the correct comparitive or superlative form (gooder, goodest), and of course absolutely bizzare errors: betterer, more gooder, bestest...
In Australia at least, these aren't confined to 4 year olds leaning to speak or uneducated boobs whose main cultural activity involves watching other uneducated boobs in Big Brother, I've actually seen a news reader use a double superlative (it could be argued that said news reader was just an uneducated boob, but is that really an excuse?:)
Re:Killer Phones (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Killer Phones (Score:2)
Give it ten years time, and the government will have a system set up for anyone to instantly send a picture of a crime to a pholice database.
Re:Killer Phones (Score:3, Funny)
You just never know what will show up at that Michael Jackson trial, do you?
Re:Killer Phones (Score:4, Insightful)
Have you seen security video??
These pix may not secure a conviction, but they can certainly point an investigation in the right direction.
Re:Killer Phones (Score:3, Funny)
Me, I'd settle for that computer that matches fingerprints in a state-wide database in what, 10 seconds? The one with so much computing power that it can waste time drawing each compared print onto the screen.
Re:Killer Phones (Score:5, Funny)
That's why I always carry a 2lb fire extinguisher with built-in MP3 player with me just in case.
Re:Killer Phones (Score:3, Funny)
How many? (Score:3, Funny)
Re:How many? (Score:3, Insightful)
Still, this doesn't do much for me though since I didn't see Ogg Vorbis in that list. Seriously... I really dont' feel like re-encoding all my music b/c they were too lazy to add a completely free of charge feature to their phone... I know it's become sort of an obligatory joke to mention the lack of Ogg support in media players, but it really is a serious problem for some of us
Re:How many? (Score:2)
With Nokia's phone's you just copy your own files and tell the phone to use them as ring tones. No hoops to jump through! Imagine, a world where the phone manufactures care more about their customers than appeasing the cellphone phone companies.
As for the cameras, I use mine quite often, but mostly to document stuff. Like if I see a product I like in the store, I take a picture of it. Or if there is piece of paper with text on it,
just a phone, puhleeeez (Score:3, Funny)
Arrrrrrrrrrghhhhhhhhh! So, I guess I see my chances of EVER just buying a phone slipping even further away. Sigh.
Press, press, press, press, press, press, press..... Send..... Shoot! Was just trying to call home, and created a playlist, no wait!, took an upskirt (illegal in WA) and sent it to Mom, no wait!, ordered pizza from Amazon!
Re:just a phone, puhleeeez (Score:4, Insightful)
Not in the states (Score:5, Informative)
You can't buy a pre-paid SIM in the USA. The closest thing we have is pre-paid phone cards. You buy a $50 phone card, and then using your manufacturers pre-chosen phone, you call it in and add the money to your account.
Last time I checked, those Virgin Moble and TracPhone cards were very expensive, over a dime a minute. If you talk 10 minutes a day, every day, that is 300 minutes a month, or $30 bucks in pre-paid. Many monthly plans start at $30 a month and give closer to 1000 minutes.
I would love to see the pre-paid market get in touch with reality. No more crap like "you must buy a card every X days or lose your credits and phone number" or "we only have 2 phones to chose from".
If I could get a motorola flip phone and use prepay without losing my credites just because I don't use them all in 30 days, and not be threatened with losing my phone number if I don't buy more credits, I would consider pre-pay. Also, if the yearly contracts can get you 2 cents per minute, why do some pre-pay charge 25 cents per minute. It is dumb.
Re:Not in the states (Score:2)
Re:Not in the states (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:It may seem like that but... (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Not in the states (Score:2)
Re:Not in the states (Score:2)
My parents were on it-- they would by 300 minutes at the beginning of the year for $50, and by the end of the year they usually had 50 minutes left. The cell phone cost $50 or so. $100 a year for a cell phone plan is a very good deal.
It's not available to new customers as far as I can tell. The minutes for Cingular's new prepaid cell phone plan expire in 30 - 90 days. So you pay $30 for 300 minutes, and need to use it in 30 days. It costs the same as a regular cell
Comment removed (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Not in the states (Score:2)
Actually, some of the plans can be a very good deal-- if the minutes don't expire in 30-90 days.
Most people I know don't need to need a 300 minutes/month plan for their cell phone.
They need 10 minutes one month, 100 minutes the next, etc.
Some of these prepaid plans used to have an option where you could buy a phone for $50, and buy 300 minutes for $50. The minutes would expire in one year. That's $100 for a cell phone plan, which is much cheaper
Re:just a phone, puhleeeez (Score:2)
On Hold (Score:2, Funny)
If it's priced right, I'd buy it. (Score:3, Interesting)
Nokia kills iPod... (Score:2, Funny)
Ipod killer? (Score:5, Funny)
Different case (Score:4, Insightful)
The difference is that ipod is very easy to kill. It's an mp3 player, there is nothing special about it.
A gaming platform is a different thing altogether, because it represents a different level of "commitment", and is influenced by such things as availability of games.
Re:Different case (Score:3, Insightful)
I don't think you understand what ipod really is... It definitely is not just a music player: People are proud of their ipods, they like to show them to their friends -- People are happy not just because they can listen to music with their ipod, they're also happy just to own one. It would be foolish to think that people buy music players based on technical quality only.
Nokia is an impressive compan
Jack of all trades, a master of none (Score:4, Insightful)
I am quite looking forward to the time when I only have to carry one device around, and it will do everything! (including allowing me to SSH into my home computer)
Re:Jack of all trades, a master of none (Score:5, Interesting)
I am quite looking forward to the time when I only have to carry one device around, and it will do everything! (including allowing me to SSH into my home computer) :)
I agree. But I think they are moving in the right direction. Thank god the did away with those HUGE palm looking phones. Those were so big. Smaller is nicer when it comes to something you want to keep in the pocket.
The 2MP is a huge jump forward for cell phones. For the longest time, finding a reasonably priced 1MP phone was difficult. Even the less than 1MP phones were well over $150. I hope this new 2MP phone pushes prices down a bit.
But the huge winner is the 4 gig hard drive. It is a breakthrough for a cell phone.
I think with cell phones you will always be a couple years behind everything else because the tecnhology needs to shrink. But the days of 10 and 20 gig hard drives on phones are comming.
Since cell phones are so small, I can see new applications like voice recognition tied into the OS. You want to write a report? Talk into your cell phone.
I see so many uses here. This will be fantastic. The only worry I have is with cell phone camera's getting such high resolution, it will invade the privacy of people. Nobody will be free to walk in public anymore and protect their image. For example, say you live down south where black people and white people don't date because of social pressure. You see two kids flirting and take a picture. Post it on the web, and now two people's lives will become miserable.
Or you are in a store and some woman is trying to look at the bottom shelve. Unfortunatly she is wearing a skirt, and the kid clicks a picture. Up on the web it goes.
Re:Jack of all trades, a master of none (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:Jack of all trades, a master of none (Score:3, Informative)
Re:Jack of all trades, a master of none (Score:4, Insightful)
The "quality" of most camera phone cameras has increased to that of a cheap webcam 7 years ago. In no way does a 1MP camera phone come close to the quality of a 1MP Elph.
The Mars rovers took some of the greatest, smoothest pictures yet seen with just a 1MP CCD.
Of course, quality will jump tremendously when we switch over from the RGRB CCDs to tri-color CCD's. Slightly offtopic, does anyone know the progress of this? When will we be able to get true 3-color CCD cameras? About two years ago I had heard this would be in about a year...
SSH on cell phone (Score:5, Informative)
Well, that capability has been out for at least a couple of years. I've been using ssh on my Nokia 3650 for a while now. The version I use is Putty for Symbian [sourceforge.net], but there is another SSH client [xk72.com] written for the Java VM that comes on most cell phones.
Re:Jack of all trades, a master of none (Score:3, Interesting)
In the future, a combined device might be acceptable; but it's likely that dedicated devices will still be better, as the technology for both the convergent and dedicated devices improve. Of course its a tradeoff and matter of preference, but I've decided no more 'convergent' devices for me...
Re:Jack of all trades, a master of none (Score:2)
I recommend the t-mobile sidekick II as a device that can do everything but play music.
I saw a girl today who carried both a mobile phone and an iPod, one on each hip. It looked almost like she had two weapons on her hip, and they were both aimed at whatever hapless person was talking to her at the time.
D
So this will... (Score:2)
I just want a phone with Bluetooth. That's it.
Peace
Re:So this will... (Score:2)
I think in the civilised (GSM) world where your mobile goes everywhere, and we don't even bother with landlines, there is a huge market for this.
Re:So this will... (Score:3, Insightful)
all the now announced n-series have bluetooth.
or hell, just get the n-gage off from somewhere cheapo cheap... it's got bluetooth too.
and would you really pay
Does it support Java? (Score:2)
I also like that the phone has wireless support. This could replace my laptop. Hmmmm.
If this phone can be programmed with the J2ME, this will become a hit. I wonder how much RAM it has.
Price tag... (Score:5, Informative)
http://www.cnn.com/2005/TECH/ptech/04/27/nokia.mp
If the Motorola Razr is any indication, you can't get insurance through Cingular. My boss told me that Lockline refused to insure his Razr when he bought it.
Screw that!
Re:Price tag... (Score:3, Interesting)
the interface matters (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:the interface matters (Score:2)
Re:the interface matters (Score:3, Insightful)
Who cares? A lot of people don't have an iPod becausae they don't think they'll carry it around. My cell phone goes everywhere, but my PDA, MP3 player, Game Boy, Digital Camera, and email client don't. The people attracted to these things aren't likely to be the "Ooo, I can listen to music" types. They're more likely to be the "ooo, now I'll have a music I'll actually take with me to places" people.
Convergence. (Score:5, Interesting)
It is important, however, to reflect upon the advancements of the late twentieth century and how they've impacted our way of life. In particular, have TV, the internet, computers, and all the rest of today's modern miracles made us more virtuous? Have they made us less virtuous? What are the dangers inherent in having everything at our fingertips?
There's a great deal of social criticism these days about the so-called "Generation Now," the sense of entitlement and so forth. These matters are especially important for us, as afficianados of technology, to consider, particularly in an open forum such as this.
Re:Convergence. (Score:2, Interesting)
Technology, afterall, can be only as virtuous as its creators. It can only impact the virtuosity (am I making that word up?) of an individual so far as that individual allows it to.
I, for example, enjoy video games, computers, video entertainment etc just as much as the high schoolers my wife used to teach. Somehow, they came across to me as having an enormous sense of entitlement..
Gadget Convergence (Score:2, Interesting)
I'm all for the convenience of an all-in-one device but have we gone far enough into the technologies that everything works well/reliably? I remember the old 3-in-1 printer devices that weren't all that reliable.
If done well (and compact), gadget convergence would be a great thing. Might as well add a TV remote to it while t
Re:Gadget Convergence (Score:2)
The problem is about user interface. If it takes six button presses to take a picture, the device doesn't work. If it is supposed to fit in your pocket, it can't have sixty buttons.
The things that have killed all convergence devices as viable options are:
Battery Time. Different devices have different expectations on battery life. Integration could work between devices at the "lowest commond denominator" approach only
Re:Gadget Convergence (Score:3, Informative)
Yes. My Nokia 3650 has been doing the phone/PDA/Camera thing quite well since 03.
with all that... (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:with all that... (Score:3, Funny)
I know what you're saying, just picking nits.
Do you remember when... (Score:3)
Maybe they're buying them to...talk on?
Give me a good, solid, long lasting phone with an easy to use interface. Leave the rest of that crap on some other device.
Butt ugly (Score:3, Insightful)
http://www.nokiausa.com/phones/7610
http://www.nokiausa.com/phones/3660
http://www.nokiausa.com/phones/3205
Wake me up when Nokia can make a phone look like this:
http://www.sonyericsson.com/spg.jsp?cc=hk&lc=zh& ver=4000&template=pp1_loader&php=php1_10235&zone=p p&lm=pp1&pid=10235
Yes, I know Nokia is the top manufacturer of phone and their phones tend to work better as phones than other manufacturers, but seriously, they need to hire some designers and usability experts!
Re:Butt ugly (Score:2)
The whole remove-the-battery-to-change-a-catridge thing with the N-gage proves that their designers are completely stupid too. If you choose carefully they still have a few basic models with decent keypads and no fru-fru features like cameras, multiple screens, etc.
From a technical standpoint, Nokia and Kyocera (formerly Qualcomm) are the only manufacturers I'd trust to make a dec
Re:Butt ugly (Score:2)
Sorry Boss... (Score:5, Funny)
100 hours of video! (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:100 hours of video! (Score:4, Informative)
I have a Nokia 7610 with a 512M RS-MMC card in it. I had to try really hard to fill that up :-). Anyway, I hacked a script together that rips dvds and re-encodes them as QCIF h.263 + AMR audio (3gpp videos) for my phone. You have to download some stuff from the 3g site and pass a few extra options to ffmpeg's ./configure (the README documents it and it's not hard).
When I had a Real Job (tm) and I took my lunch breaks I'd prop the phone up and watch episodes of Futurama while eating lunch. It was nice.
For letterbox movies, I rip them to my HD first and crop them to 4:3 (on a 1.5" screen I'm more concerned with everything being big enough to see and couldn't care less about preserving the entire picture) first. On long car trips it keeps me busy (well, the few times I'm not driving).
The only downside is that it eats the battery. If I turn down the backlight to half strength it gets a little better, but I can still only get about a two hours movie in before the battery is too low to make calls with. I can almost fit a BL-6C from the N-Gage into my phone...that'd get me an extra half an hour. If I'm in the car the cigarette light adaptor works. Battery tech needs to advance more, damnit..
WMV? (Score:3, Informative)
Re:WMV? (Score:4, Informative)
The nice thing is that this is an industry standard file format, 3GPP, supported by multiple vendors, operating systems, and software packages.
WMV, on the other hand, is not.
Product Camouflage (Score:4, Insightful)
Then why not make a really good MP3 player? I'm not going to drop another chunk of change just because Nokia crams another "feature" into a cell phone.
If I want a digital camera, I'll buy a good digital camera. If I want a PDA, I'll buy a good PDA. If I want an MP3 player, I'll buy a good MP3 player.
My Swiss Army knife has lots of all-in-one features, but I'm not likely to use it to open my soup or screw in a new door knob. I have real tools for that.
This is all about convenience (Score:3, Insightful)
A. Go home, get camera, return, take picture
B. Whip out the camera phone, take picture, carry on
If your boss calls you up telling you that he would like to see you on saturday at 7pm for a meeting, you could...
A. Remember it, program it into your PDA when you get home
B. Write it down on a piece of paper, program it into your PDA when you get home
C. Whip out your phone and toss it into the c
Re:Product Camouflage (Score:5, Insightful)
I'm tired of people recycling this garbage every time the issue of cell phones comes up. Think about what you're saying. You have a Swiss Army knife. You've probably been somewhere you needed a knife, or pliers or whatever. You whip out your multi-tool and get the job done. Sure, you could have done the job better if you had been carrying a power drill but that makes little sense, right? The whole point of having a multi-function tool is convenience. It may not be the best tool for the job, but you get stuff done.
I can think of several times where it would have been handy to have a camera phone. Usually it's some strange scene, like a funny sign. It would be cool to have an MP3 player on the phone if I run into an unexpected wait and feel like listening to some tunes.
To sum up, if you want to carry all of those devices around all the time, then do it and quit complaining when they add new features for cell phones. There are plenty of folks like myself that would like to have a sort-of digital Swiss Army knife that can do things like check a calendar or listen to some music in a pinch (but not quite at that price--ouch!)
iPod killer? (Score:2, Funny)
Hint: not too well.
Jack of all trades, master of none (Score:2, Insightful)
Major Problem? (Score:3, Insightful)
outstripped camera manufacturers? (Score:2, Informative)
With respect, this is hardly true. Just because they shipped more devices than camera manufacturers doesn't mean they outstipped them in the photography market.
You can't really classify a camera phone as being in the "photography market". They are in the "camera phone" market, and there is a large difference. Anyone looking for decent optics, a zoom, good resolution and a raft other other features that camera phone's lack, will
Convergence is cool... (Score:2)
The problem is that for all of these, there are concessions:
On the plus side - the camera is probably good enough and has enough s
gb (Score:2, Funny)
gb? Is that gram bits or gravity bits?
ogg vorbis (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:ogg vorbis (Score:3, Informative)
It works great. I'm not sure if it supports stereo operation (the standard Symbian sound device was mono-only until recently). If it doesn't, the source is there and everything is well documented so it shouldn't be too hard to change that.
one less box (Score:4, Insightful)
4Gb is a sweet spot on storage, but more importantly *everyone* is already carrying a phone.
if the phone means i don't have to worry about keeping and charging an ipod mini then it's a winner for me and mine.
Re:one less box (Score:4, Insightful)
Everyone who is anyone my friend.
In your world view. Frankly, I pity you. It's worth having a cellular phone for a myriad of reasons, but a person is no less valid if they decide they don't need one. I have a few good reasons to own one that outweigh any benefeit from getting a land line. A lot of my more established friends have a pager and nothing else. If I spent more time around land-line phones or computers, or in places where they are easy to access, I'd probably go that route myself. I dislike my cellular phone, but it's a necessary evil.
Frankly if you live in an area with good coverage you're being grossly inconsiderate to your friends and family by NOT having a phone and forcing them to leave messages. (you do have voicemail right?
Bullshit. It is not inconsiderate to want to be out of reach. It is not inconsiderate to turn your cellular phone off when you're in a movie or a restaurant. In fact, I consider it extremely insulting and annoying when some asshole is yakking on his cell in a movie theater or a restaurant, and on more than one occasion I've taken batteries away for it. You can have the damned thing back when the movie is over or when you leave, whichever's first.
It is not inconsiderate to make your friends leave a message. Contrary to what you seem to think, the meaning of life is not to be on call 24/7 for any joker that wants to talk.
Frankly not owning a phone (and carrying it with you charged and on) in areas they work is downright rude.
Bullshit. It is not rude to be out of communication. It is rude to expect that I'm going to rearrange my life so that you can always contact me. If it's important, leave me a message or send an e-mail and I'll return your call when I get a chance. Believe it or not, I have a life that doesn't revolve around my phone, and I have responsibilities that are more important than talking to my friends.
Re: (Score:2, Insightful)
This, from MP3 manufacturers? (Score:2)
"I'm not sure that this represents competition for us," said a spokesman.
"It is endemic of the trend to integrate devices that you lose quality. Separate, dedicated devices are always going to be better," he said.
Does anyone else see the shear irony of these words coming from a purveyor of MP3 players? Sounds like a maker of pocket knives pooh-poohing those Swiss guys with their inferior, do-everything knives.
Look, good enough is good e
Similar design?? (Score:2, Interesting)
Why this is not an iPod Killer (Score:4, Interesting)
- Interface
- Style
- Marketing
Like it or not, Apple has the golden touch of style that Nokia never had, and it seems that Nokia has really gone off the deep end with some of their recent phones (lets not even talk about the DOA N-gage).Specifics? This thing has a joystick, 4 buttons around it (like my clunky T610), a play/pause, forward, back, stop, and (im guessing) a popout-button to shift the playpad down to get the number pad. I'm not going to go into all the possible confusion, but it looks busy.
As if that weren't all.. the color seems to aim for the stylish/classy 20-30s market, but the features (cameraphone, music) seem to really gear towards a younger market (think teens - 20s).
I wish them well, but from just looking at it, it seems a bit misguided.
Nseries launced (Score:5, Informative)
Nokia announced a whole new line of phones, the Nokia Nseries [nokia.com] (press release [nokia.com]).
In this series, three models were introduced:
Anyone bought a 'phoneless' phone?? (Score:5, Interesting)
Has anyone tried this? What was the reaction of the seller, who was no doubt expecting further income from a telephone plan?
Perhaps that is an indicator of when a mobile phone's 'other' services come up to scratch, when people buy them with a view to ignoring the telephone function?
Re:Anyone bought a 'phoneless' phone?? (Score:3, Insightful)
Either way, it'd be cheaper to buy a specialized device, and the spec. device would provide much better quality product.
Re:Anyone bought a 'phoneless' phone?? (Score:3, Insightful)
Well, if you buy it "subsidized" from Verizon or whoever, you have to sign a contract for phone service. If you break the contract it costs more than you saved on the phone.
If you don't buy it subsidized, it's a pretty high price for a camera or music player.
The problem with phones doing more - AIRPLANES (Score:3, Interesting)
Because currently, and I'm sure this applies to a hell of a lot of travellers - I can't turn on my phone mid flight to listen to some music. Do phone manufacturers understand this in the slightest? What's the point of putting all my portable music into a device that I cannot use say in my car on a plane, probably the two most common places other than walking or exercising where such devices are used.
I own a Motorola RAZR V3 and have found it's nowhere near worth $500. The menu system and phone book are a joke, the battery life is negligible if bluetooth or any serious use of the screen comes into play. The interface is absolutely hideous. Internet via cell phone even to check on movie times is nightmarishly slow and pointless and probably costs more than calling a service. The camera often gets smudged by virtue of its placement and the photos arre hideous.
Anything else I need to do - I turn on my powerbook, latch onto a wifi connection. Done.
So what I'm left with is an expensive phone that has only served as a status symbol and little more.
For all the talk of iPod competitors, yes it is priced more - but furthermore no single device has music software and an interface anywhere near as good, and that's to say nothing of the preamp and headphones quality. My Razr can play MP3s, horribly, distortedly.
Phones are ubiquitous and not a single sci fi writer saw that coming - but here in the US we are lagging far behind some other worldwide markets in what can be done with such devices.
It's a PHONE. It's made of PHONE. (Score:3, Insightful)
I don't for the same reason I don't want any of that stuff on my PDA. Because telephones have enough battery problems as it is, and it's aggravating and embarassing and even dangerous to have your phone not work because you were listening to NiN and John Denver.
My ideal phone is a 4" long fat old-fashioned Nokia with a monochrome display and hours of talk time. Too bad you can't GET one any more because everyone's making
Why I wouldn't buy one.... (Score:3, Insightful)
1: I drop my cellphone all the time. When I get mad, I throw it against a wall. So far Nokia phones have been the sturdiest, but with a hard drive in it, it wouldn't last me a week.
2: because it's got a hard drive in it, battery life would suck. I'm on call 24/7.
3: I've already got a phone.
4: I've already got a digital camera that does a pissy 5 megapixels.
5: I've got a mini-disc player which plays MP3, ATRAC, and I think WMA (but wfc anyway)
6: I've already got a portable device which plays movies/music -- my laptop. It's got 40GB of drive space.
Ipod? (Score:4, Insightful)
Hello, Battery Life? (Score:3, Interesting)
This one may be a 5.0V, but nonetheless it will sacrafice size and weight (not to mention battery life) if it were used as a music player.
Only so many Watts of power can be crammed into an electronic device these days, and I seriously doubt that one could get even 6 hours of continual, uninterrupted music without a power adapter plugged in. The hard drive and the RAM just consume too much power.
Can the HD survive the punishment?? (Score:4, Insightful)
I've have four Nokia phones as I got a new one with each job i took over the past 7 years. Each on has been dropped on the floor a number of times, and generally subjected to a fair bit of abuse. All four of them work, and I have never had a problem with any them.
I doubt a small hard drive could take this kind of punishment. One hard knock, and somethings going to break. I'd much prefer 1G of flash memory in a phone that I know will last me a few years.
3000 Songs??? (Score:3, Insightful)
Bollocks it does. My 4Gb iPod Mini claims to hold 1000 songs (I actually hit around 800, due to having some long stuff on there), and I don't know anyone that claims 128kbps lossy compression is actually "CD Quality". God only knows how they fudge the numbers to get that value.
no young zapper, the real question is... (Score:2)
Re:Dear Manufacturers, (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Dear Manufacturers, (Score:5, Insightful)
In basic terms you said, I want someone to make this, but I'm not going to buy it
Or to put it realistically, I just want to bitch and moan about something, so I'll complain that phones have too many features...
This is a news for nerds site, celebrate technological advances...
Re:Oooo, oooo, I want to be the first to have one! (Score:2)
The argument is actually reverse: I believe that people are buying iPods so they can be seen in public with their fancy music player, with OMG-white earphones so everybody sees how cool they are.
(Yeah, iPods are good technology, but when was the last time that people actually bought good technology for just being good technology.)
Re:What kind of AAC support? (Score:3, Informative)
The deal is that "AAC" is a public standard (MP4 audio, pretty much) but "Protected AAC" uses Fairplay, which is Apple's proprietary DRM. I'll leave the explanation of why there's no open DRM as an exercise for the reader.
Re:iPod Killer huh? (Score:3, Interesting)
iPod killer? No. iPod mini competitor? Yes.
The target market is obviously somewhat similar to Apple's target for the iPod Mini.