Touch Screen Video iPod Coming Soon?
Touch Screen Video iPod Coming Soon?
This video iPod, which has been in development and on the table since before Apple released the 5G iPod last year with video playback, will feature a display that will occupy the entire front face of the device.
Sources who have seen the device report that it features a digital click wheel, one that overlays the touch-sensitive display and appears when a finger touches it and disappears when the finger is removed.
A Think Secret report claims that the new iPod will feature a 3.5-inch diagonal display and shed its mechanical click wheel. “This video iPod, which has been in development and on the table since before Apple released the 5G iPod last year with video playback, will feature a display that will occupy the entire front face of the device,” the site reports.
“Sources who have seen the device report that it features a digital click wheel, one that overlays the touch-sensitive display and appears when a finger touches it and disappears when the finger is removed.”
Apple has been working with at least two other companies to perfect the digital click wheel display technology. While not all the engineering was completed in-house by Apple, sources have said Apple could hold an exclusive license on the technologies it borrowed from other developers for a period of time, limiting the ability of competitors to copy Apple’s design.
Additional details concerning the new iPod have yet to be confirmed, including capacity and a release date, although all indications point to the Spring, possibly as early as late March or early April.
During the Macworld Expo in San Francisco, Apple CEO Steve Jobs alluded to a major announcement on or around April 1, Apple’s 30th anniversary as a company.
Wolf says the growing collection of video content on iTunes is a sign of a new iPod. “In our opinion, the rapid increase in the iTMS’s video offerings is a strong signal that an iPod with a much larger screen is on the way,” he said. Wolf also cites reports from Asia that fifth-generation iPod production has been reduced.
“One hypothesis is that sales of this model have fallen below Apple’s previous expectations for the quarter,” the analyst wrote. “An equally plausible hypothesis is that Apple is draining inventories of the iPod from the distribution channel in advance of its introduction of the new model.”
There are 135 Apple Retail Stores and according to Steve Jacbos, they’re the best place to buy any product in the world (aha!)
There were 26 million visitors during one quarter of the year to the Retail Stores
And the most interesting fact: If my laptop wasn’t such a garbage I could continue watching the Keynote
Address with sound and give more facts. Just watching Steve Jacobs gesticulating doesn’t make my day, nor yours, so you’ll have to watch the video yourself.