Touch Screen the Death of iPod!!

[Pikemann_Urge]

Originally Posted by supra2jz

i say keep the clickwheeel
no touchscreen clickwheel

There won't be a touchscreen clickwheel per se - that would be tacky. The iPhone has no virtual clickwheel at all. If you want a touchscreen interface the last thing you'll want to do is to limit it by making you scroll an image of a clickwheel.

I still think a clickwheel is the best solution to a music player, so I hope that Apple keeps two lines going. One iPod for music (i.e. 5G) and another for both music and video (e.g. iPhone style model). Of course knowing Apple they'll likely keep the nano and ditch the 5G in favour of the (probably in progress) iPhone-like 6G.

[Surf Monkey]

No touch screen interface is ever going to be able to provide the kind of physical feedback that the clickwheel gives. The beauty of the clickwheel is that you can operate most of iPod's functions without looking at the screen. If Apple ditches it for their flagship iPod they'll be making a critical mistake IMO.

[kylo4]

The iPod is known for the clickwheel. Ditching that for a touch clickwheel is a huge mistake. They'd be sacrificing music for video, which wasn't what the iPod was made for.

[kyussmondo]

I say get rid of the click wheel!! Yes it was great at the time and still is a great piece of innovation. However, the touchscreen is infinitely quicker and better in every way. Apple has introduced various methods such as the search feature (which is average at best) and bringing up the letters when you scroll quickly through artists or whatever. Even with these features it is still a pain in the ### especially when you have nearly filled an 80GB iPod with music. This isn't such a concern for people with the iPod Nano, but I think the iPod Nano will be gradually phased out by the iPhone because there is really no need for people to have a Nano when the iPhone has the same capabilities and much more.

It would be nice if Apple were to make a better video player. It is a real pain whenever I go on a long trip that I have to take my iPod as well as my bulky portable DVD player which you also need to bring a case of DVDs, having your movies on the iPod in possible HD (which would be cheaper that buying portable HD-DVD or Blu-Ray) all on to a hard-disk drive. Even better the iPods of the future won't even need a storage medium because Wi-Fi will be so widespread that we will just be able to stream wirelessly off our computers at home, like Apple TV, but on your mobile phone, iPod, or whatever.

I really do believe that this touchscreen technology is the way computers are heading, not just phones and portable devices or kiosk systems but on computers. People who have never used computers before such as 3 year olds being able to physically touch the interface and control it how the human mind expects it to work. Admittedly, touchscreen has always been quite annoying and sometimes unresponsive (the satellite navigation in my car is touchscreen and can be a real pain in the ### sometimes). However, I feel Apple have raised the bar and hopefully it is a hit and more and more time and money will be invested in to touchscreen and it will become more and more reliable and user-friendly.

[kylo4]

Touchscreen will leave a whole lot of fingerprints on anything. But with the iPod nano comment, an iPhone is $500, a Nano is $150. Apple would lose major bucks by dropping the nano in favour of the iPhone, which is a phone, not a new iPod. I'll admit that the "touch ups" of the 6 gen iPod with a touch clickwheel is very cool, but I'm worried with a bigger screen in regards to cracking, more battery usage and dirty fingerprints all over it.

[kyussmondo]

Originally Posted by kylo4

Touchscreen will leave a whole lot of fingerprints on anything. But with the iPod nano comment, an iPhone is $500, a Nano is $150. Apple would lose major bucks by dropping the nano in favour of the iPhone, which is a phone, not a new iPod. I'll admit that the "touch ups" of the 6 gen iPod with a touch clickwheel is very cool, but I'm worried with a bigger screen in regards to cracking, more battery usage and dirty fingerprints all over it.

Somebody said earlier who had actually used the iPhone that the screen does not leave fingerprints very easily.

Why have both though? You could have a Nano and phone in one for the same price, with the added functionality of video playback and all the other features of the iPhone.

[dsf3g]

The iPhone touchscreen is definitely the future of the iPod. It's the future of computing actually. It's amazing what you can do with two fingered/handed touch screen input. I've seen demonstration videos of this interface and for many types of navigation it blows away every other input method I've seen. If Apple fails to follow through, then that will be the death of the iPod. Watch this video (especially the sections after about 2:40) and see what I mean:

http://youtube.com/watch?v=PLhMVNdplJc

And here's the iPhone:

http://youtube.com/watch?v=YgW7or1TuFk

That's how I want to navigate through the music library on my next iPod. I'm not a big cellphone guy, so I'll stick with something simple. But I do want an iPod like that.

[Surf Monkey]

Again, touch interface is nice but it requires you to look at the interface to operate it. Clickwheel has a huge advantage in that most of the major functions can be done by feel alone.

[toothpaste]

Having a touch interface would force me to take my ipod out of my pocket to operate it. That would be a pain when i'm working out and want to just quickly skip a song, or change a playlist.

I hope that some of the ipods, maybe nano, stays unchanged with the clickwheel.

[Jesse Hollington]

Well, even the iPhone has a hard-button volume control on the side, and let's not assume that the iPod is going to look exactly like the iPhone.

My thoughts, if they go down the touch-screen road, is that there will either be hard-buttons on the device for functions like play/pause, volume, and prev/next, or there will be a remote control option, or both.

Regardless, I'm quite sure the Nano will retain it's present form for the foreseeable future, as it still a good design for a player that's primarily designed for music playback, especially playback on the go.

[Surf Monkey]

Intuitive hard buttons would render my touch screen objections moot, obviously. Let's hope Apple has something like that up its sleeve.

[kyussmondo]

Originally Posted by toothpaste

Having a touch interface would force me to take my ipod out of my pocket to operate it. That would be a pain when i'm working out and want to just quickly skip a song, or change a playlist.

I hope that some of the ipods, maybe nano, stays unchanged with the clickwheel.

As well as touchscreen I think that voice recognition is going to change our computing experience in a big way. Microsoft just acquired Tellme, the voice recognition company for $800m, another indicator of the direction computers are changing.

I think it seems weird at this moment in time because we are so used to mice, keyboards and click-wheels. Now I think these technologies that have been around for a while such as touchscreen and voice recognition will be heavily invested in to make them into a viable alternative and let computers be a lot more user-friendly.

[kylo4]

slashjunior, during the keynote on some closeups of the iPhone there were loads of fingerprints all over it. A protective layer will most likely come out for it.

Also, what about on the earbud cords they have a little addon to skip song/pause like they do for some diskmans. Its still a tad annoying but would be easier than taking it out of your pocket and using your finger to skip the track.

[kyussmondo]

Originally Posted by kylo4

slashjunior, during the keynote on some closeups of the iPhone there were loads of fingerprints all over it. A protective layer will most likely come out for it.

Also, what about on the earbud cords they have a little addon to skip song/pause like they do for some diskmans. Its still a tad annoying but would be easier than taking it out of your pocket and using your finger to skip the track.

They used to do earbud remotes until the 3rd generation iPods. I remember my first iPod had one, but they have dropped it completely from their iPod line now, I'm guessing on the basis of cost. However, this is a very dated approach to things, surely we need some new.

[Jesse Hollington]

Actually, the 4G iPods had a wired remote (sold separately) that you plugged your earphones into, in-line. It was of course sold as an extra option, but it worked fairly well.

As of the 5G, they combined it with an FM Radio, but it otherwise still serves the same purpose. In fact, I'm suspecting that at least as a remote (not FM radio), that unit will even work with the iPhone and likely the 6G iPod (the dock connector has not changed).

Moving forward, though, I could see a wireless Bluetooth remote being the next option.