Hey, remember the iPod Touch? Apple just did Apple is now touting a cheaper iPod Touch with a better camera. The iThing giant said the 16GB iPod Touch model will now come with a five-megapixel iSight camera as well as a price drop, which will see the entry-level Zune-killer fall from $229 to $199 (£159). The 32GB $249 (£199) and 64GB $299 (£249) models will remain …
An A5 chip, which is a 3 year old CPU and graphics chip, with only 512M of memory. An Apple wonders why it doesn't sell many ipod touches? The primary market for the ipod touch is gaming, and they keep killing themselves with a product no one wants. It's already practically obsolete. They dropped support for the A3 with IOS 7, the A4 with IOS 8, and will likely drop the A5 with IOS 9. So enjoy your ipod for one year, then no more updates. P.S. I own a iphone 5s, a Mac Mini, and a Macbook air.
"The primary market for the ipod touch is gaming, and they keep killing themselves with a product no one wants."
Kids want iPod Touches. Parents want iPod Touches. Parents of kids want to give their precious little darlings iPod Touches instead of Nintendo portables. Why? TCO. You can download a brazilian free cool games from iTunes that are totally worth playing. Get a DS->onwards Nintendo machine and you will find yourself and your offspring paying mightily for cartridges, etc. Some of which might not have lasting appeal (no names mentioned to protect the guilty).
Plus, you don't need to take out any sort of PAYG or contract for an iPod Touch.
In short: Not obsolete by any measure.
What the PFY calls it: The iPad Micro.
Unless Logitech et al would release a MFI bluetooth controller for the regular iPad, playing Sonic the Hedgehog 2 on the thing is an invitation for RSI. Can't hold it for more than 5 minutes without suffering pain to the palm.
OTOH, a MFI gamepad for the iPhone fits an iPod Touch just as nicely.
"Kinda like a low end phone, without the comms gear"
That's exactly the point. It's for people who want (or, more likely, have a kid that they want it for) a device that allows them to do 'smartphone' things without the possibility of phone bills, be they PAYG or contract. OK, there are still plenty of ways to talk to people on an iPod Touch - skype, for example - but they're pretty much all free.
It's a 'safe' device, for a specific market. It's not actually a phone or competition for phones and it was never intended to be.
I always thought they should have used the iPod Touch form factor & case as their low-rent smart phone model.
Forget aping the 5s with the 5c. Put a basic smart phone (crap camera, no 4g) in a iPod touch shiny case and it will set like hot cakes. Important - don't lose the slimness. No iphone has ever felt as good in my hand as my touch does.
My 32GB one from 6-7 years ago is still working fine. No I don't use it for the latest games etc but it's still the best way for me to listen to music basically because it will play for 30 hours and it doesn't forget how far through a track it is when I pause it (which iOS7 does and BB media player does).
If I wanted latest processor and games at high speed and all the apps then I'd probably have bought an iPad in the last couple of years.
The problem with the iPod Classic is the rubbishy scrollwheel. It's OK for short lists, but get very tedious, very quickly. And does tend to end up selecting the thing either side of what you wanted. So I don't want to replace mine with another (it's on its last legs now). I want something with around 100GB of storage, but a much better UI. An iPod Touch with decent amounts of memory, or an SD card slot would be perfect. But Apple do like to massively overcharge for storage.
Samsung used to do a similar device, not sure if they still do. Or a cheap 'Droid phone may be an option. I might even look into Neil Young's Pono thingymajig. I quite like the idea of a flourescent yellow Toblerone...
The good thing about the iPod "Classic" etc al is the storage space, namely > 100GB. For ages I wished Apple would have made a 128GB iPod Touch. but they didn't. So eventually I went from my 160GB Classic to a 64GB iPhone 4S. Annoyingly I have ~62GB of music/audiobooks/etc so I have to use a smart playlist to strip things down to fit onto the iPhone.
Now there is a 128GB iPad (insane flash price mark-up, but at least I got mine from the US), which can hold all above media as well as various apps and has enough space for video. So I'm hoping the iPhone 6 (or whatever it's called) comes in a (stupidly overpriced) 128GB flavour, but I'm not holding my breath...
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