Steve Jobs, CEO of Apple, had his annual event to announce all of the new iPods for the 2008 holiday season. What were the big changes, and are they worth upgrading?
The Nano received the most drastic upgrades with an all new form factor, fairly vivid colors (silver, purple, blue, green, orange, yellow, pink, (PRODUCT) RED and black) and new functions in the display that it can do both portrait and landscaping. It will be available as an 8GB version for $149.00 and a 16GB version for $199.00. You will also be able to use the new “Genius” function that allows you to auto-create playlists from similar music.
Should you upgrade? - Of all the updates this year, this one has the most new features. If you bought the “Fatty” last year, you can probably hold off, but if you have one older than that, I would definitely recommend an upgrade.
Last year this was available as a “thin” version with 60GB of space and a “thick” version with a 160GB. This year they are only continuing the “thin” one, but upgrading it to 120GB for $249.00
Should you upgrade? - Well, probably not. It appears the only difference on the Classic this year is thickness and the amount of music it will hold. For instance, I have a 160GB Classic from last year, so these is no upgrade option for me, but if you have a 60GB and have a hankering to carry even more music with you, then yes, this would be the one for you.
My gut is telling me this will be the last year for the Classic as Apple is clearly trying to get away from the physical hard drive based iPods. At most it will have one more year after this, but I doubt it will receive any pgrades from here on out.
iPod TouchThe iPod Touch did receive prices cuts in the 8GB is now $229, 16GB is $299 and 32GB is $399. Other than that, the only notable updates were the addition of external volume control buttons, a thinner form factor and an external speaker for casual listening. While the speaker is a welcome addition, it is a fairly lackluster update.
Should You Upgrade? - No. That’s really about all you need to say. If you bought one of these last year, there is absolutely nothing worth upgrading for. If you are new to iPods, I would recommend this one.
Overall this had to be the most lackluster set of updates that I’ve ever seen Apple put forth. It’s almost like why did they bother? We will be doing a guide tomorrow for first time iPod buyers, but for owners from precious years, it’s look like you get to take a break for a year.
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[...] already wrote New iPods For 2008 over at StarterTech, but I figured I can always talk more bluntly about them [...]