Apple`siPod, a combined MP3 player and storage device, was released in South Africa by Apple country manager, Bruno Verolini, in Johannesburg today. The iPod will be available in local stores soon.
Weighing in at just 6.5 ounces the diminutive, truly mobile iPod is smaller and lighter than some cell phones, yet boasts a 5GB hard drive which can store up to 1 000 songs, or 100 CDs of music (or equivalent data storage). For the average user, this translates into 65 hours of music - allowing the iPod to start playing at 5pm on a Friday and continue until 9am on Monday - without the user ever hearing the same song twice.
The iPod takes full advantage of the MP3 compressed digital music format, widely known to provide excellent audio quality. With a built-in 60m-W amplifier (30 mW per channel), iPod is capable of playing music at very loud volumes for clear listening in even the noisiest environment. Combine all this power with an ultrawide 20- to 20 000-Hz frequency response, and listeners will hear distortion-free music - with heart-thumping bass and crystal-clear highs - for a superb audio experience. In fact, listening to iPod through the headphones is comparable to being in the front row of a rock concert.
The iPod headphones rely on Neodymium transducers, a rare earth magnet that significantly enhances frequency response and overall sound quality. Most other headphones use aluminium, cobalt, or ceramic drivers; at the same size, the Neodymium driver is five times as powerful. Because the strength of the driver increases the accuracy of the sound, the iPod headphones provide a high-energy listening experience while minimising distortion.
FireWire, which enables incredibly quick communication between desktop computers and peripheral devices, is shipped as standard on all Apple hardware products. Utilising FireWire, iPod is able to download an entire CD from a Mac in less than 10 seconds - or 1 000 songs in less than 10 minutes. Another device, which makes use of universal serial bus (USB) transfer, took 2 minutes and 45 seconds to download a George Winston album. iPod completed the same download in five seconds.
iPod`s designers included a 20-minute skip protection system on the MP3 device. So, in addition to the 5GB hard drive, iPod has a 32MB memory cache, made up of solid state memory. This memory has no mechanical or moving parts, and is not affected by movement (great for use in a gym or while jogging). iPod skip protection works by preloading up to 20 minutes of music into the cache at a time so, while iPod plays music from the memory cache rather than the hard drive, even rigorous activities won^1t cause music to skip. At the same time, this feature extends the life of the iPod battery. Because the hard drive requires more power to operate, the skip protection feature minimises the amount of time the hard disk must spin and conserves battery life as a result.
The standard power adapter has a removable "duckhead", an interchangeable portion with prongs for a specific electrical standard. World travellers (a.k.a South African users) can simply swap in the correct duckhead for their destination, without needing to carry additional adapters. In case they don^1t have the right duckhead, the power adapter will use any standard electrical shaver cord. The FireWire connection also makes it easy to recharge the iPod battery. Every Mac shipped has fully enabled 6-pin FireWire, which is capable of powering peripheral devices in addition to transferring data. This means that users don^1t need to carry additional power cables and adapters along with their portable FireWire hard drive. Apple has extended this usefulness even further: FireWire automatically charges the iPod battery at the same time it is transferring music or data, all with a single cable.
Using FireWire disk mode, iPod becomes a travelling hard drive. As with any other hard disk, iPod shows up as an icon on the Mac desk-top, so it^1s easy to drag and drop files and applications. With this added functionality, users can rely on iPod for backing up their data, transferring files between work and home, and even running applications, presentations, and digital movies on the road. Although disk space is shared between music and data, iPod partitions data stored in disk mode and files won^1t be erased the next time iPod is updated with new music.
"iPod is the perfect combination of incredible storage, ultraportability, and the legendary ease of use that you^1d expect from Apple," says Apple Computer Country Manager, Bruno Verolini. "In January 2001, Steve Jobs articulated Apple^1s vision for the third era of personal computing
"The digital lifestyle has emerged with the explosion of digital devices
A great digital lifestyle solution depends on many components: the hardware, the operating system, the application software, the Internet connection, and the integration that ties them all together. The Macintosh is the ideal digital hub, because it combines all these components. In fact, Apple is the only company that designs and controls every piece of the solution, putting Apple in the perfect position to ensure an outstanding user experience," he says.
Caption: Apple Computer Country Manager, Bruno Verolini shows off the Apple iPod, an MP3 player and mass storage device which is the size of the average cell phone but boasts a 5 Gig hard drive.
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