iLounge

With this week’s announcement of a completely new iPod product lineup, we have received a lot of questions from you, our readers, inquiring about new features and compatibility of existing software and accessories with the new iPod models.

Now on to your questions...

Q: Do you know anything about the voice memo feature on the new iPod models? Will we be able to record on them like the older models? If so, will the same recording accessories work as those for the fifth-generation iPods? Also, will recordings take up as much space as the fifth-generation voice memo because I recall that earlier generations took up less storage for voice memos.

- Conrad

A: At this point, all of the voice accessories that we’ve tested with the new iPod classic and iPod nano work in much the same way as they did with the fifth-generation iPod and second-generation iPod nano.

Recording formats and size also appear to remain the same, although in terms of file size the new models offer both a “High” and “Low” recording quality setting like the fifth-generation iPod did.

The “High” setting is intended primarily for stereo recording, and records uncompressed WAV files in 44kHz stereo, at 1411 kbps, using approximately 11MB/min of storage for recording. This is primarily intended to be used with a stereo recording accessory in conditions where the quality is necessary, such as music recording.

The “Low” setting on the other hand records uncompressed WAV files in 22kHz mono, at 352kbps, using up approximately 2.8MB/min of storage for recording. This corresponds roughly to the recording formats used by older iPod models, and provides more than sufficient quality for voice recording.

Q: Are both the iPod touch and iPod classic considered to be the 6G iPod or is this strictly for the classic? I watched Steve’s speech at the event and he didn’t say.

- Joshua

A: This is largely a semantic discussion, as the generational identifiers within each iPod model have only traditionally been used for support purposes to differentiate between different product releases.

Until this week’s announcement, Apple has never had more than one main “iPod” model on the market at a time, and has therefore merely referred to this main model as “iPod” with no other designations being required. On Apple’s support site and in their documentation, it was often necessary to make the distinction between model numbers for support purposes (so you could identify your specific model when referring to support articles or documentation), but as far as Apple is concerned, the devices are simply the “iPod classic” and “iPod touch”

The new iPod classic seems the logical evolution in terms of the traditional iPod lineup, and therefore most people will consider it the sixth-generation iPod in principle, however this may be a popular unofficial designation rather than what Apple will actually refer to it as.

For example, keep in mind that at no point did Apple ever refer to the September 2006 iPod release as a “5.5G” iPod—this was a terminology bestowed on it by the media and iPod user community at large to provide a simple distinction between the original fifth-generation iPod and the newer enhanced model. Despite this, as far as Apple was concerned, it was still just the “iPod” for marketing purposes, or “Late 2006 fifth-generation iPod” in their support documentation.

Q: Does the new iPod classic work with the old digital camera adaptor that lets you dump photos from your camera onto the iPod for safe keeping?

- Don

A: Unfortunately, our testing indicates that this accessory is not compatible with the new iPod models.

It is not known at this time whether Apple may address this incompatibility in a firmware update, or whether they plan to release a new product that offers this functionality for the new generation of iPods.

Q: Will the new user interface of the 6th generation iPods be available as some sort of upgrade for the 5th generation iPods? if not, there will be no upgrade at all for the 5th gen iPods?

- Alberto

A: Although there are presently no conclusive answers available to this question, based on previous experience the likely answer is no, for several reasons.

Firstly, it is highly likely that the new iPod models are based on significantly different hardware from the previous generation. This makes it impractical for Apple to re-engineer the newer firmware for the now-discontinued models. Further, it may not even be possible to bring some of the higher-performance features like Cover Flow to the older hardware at an acceptable performance level, again due to hardware differences.

Further, the new iPod lineup is a new product, and the new interface design is as much a selling point of the new product line as the capacity increases and other features. The incentive to provide the same software and interface features to older model iPods would naturally discourage people from buying the newer models.

Therefore, the expense required to bring the full firmware feature set to discontinued models combined with the potential impact on sales leaves absolutely no incentive for any company to expend the time and effort required to do this.

That having been said, firmware updates for the recently discontinued iPod models may still become available to address problems and improve compatibility with newer iTunes features, at least over the course of the normal support cycle of these products.

Q: With the WiFi capabilities in the new iPod touch, can it connect to an Airport to stream tunes? This would make it the ultimate remote we’ve been waiting for.

- Greg

A: At this point, there are no indications that this capability will be present in the iPod touch. It could presumably be added via a firmware update at some point in the future, as the necessary hardware is present to support this functionality, but there is no indication that Apple has any interest in doing this.

Q: I wonder if iPod touch will work with all iPod adaptors in cars etc, like the connector is the same? Can anyone confirm that they will work with previous iPod adaptors for cars? (like from Kenwood etc)

- Grant

Q: Will the new 80 and 160 GB iPods have the same connector interface for attaching chargers, playing the iPod in the iHome clock radio, Bose, etc?

- Harvey

A: All of the new iPod models use the same 30-pin Dock Connector that has been standard on iPod models since 2003, so most accessories should physically be able to connect.

Our tests on the iPod classic and iPod touch thus far seem to indicate that most audio accessories work without any problems. As the iPod touch has not been released yet, it is impossible to confirm accessory compatibility at this time, although it should be noted that the reasons for incompatibility with accessories concerning the iPhone were based on phone-specific interference issues that would not apply to the iPod touch.

Q: Will the new iTunes WiFi Store that was announced on Wednesday be coming to the iPhone as well, or is it only for the new iPod touch?

- Joseph

A: Apple has announced plans to bring the iTunes WiFi Store to the iPhone as well via a firmware update to be released later this month. It is expected that this will work in the same manner on the iPhone as it was demonstrated on the iPod touch.

Q: Does the iPod touch have Bluetooth built in? Can I use Bluetooth headphones with it?

- Crystal

A: Although there have been some rumors that the iPod touch might have the physical Bluetooth hardware in it, at this point there do not appear to be any Bluetooth features enabled or available on the iPod touch itself.

Note that the iPod touch is closely based on the design of the iPhone, and the Bluetooth feature in the iPhone exists merely to support phone headsets, and does not support stereo audio. As a result, the current implementation of Bluetooth in the iPhone would not have any application on the iPod touch.

If the rumors of Bluetooth hardware being physically present in the iPod touch are true, however, its entirely possible that a future firmware update could add Bluetooth stereo capabilities.

Q: Does iTunes 7.4 finally fix the problem with sorting numbers last?

- Andy

A: Unfortunately, no, this behaviour has not changed.

As we discussed in our Secrets and Features of iTunes 7.4, not only has this behaviour not changed, but in fact appears to be a deliberate change on Apple’s part at this point.

We agree with the many iLounge readers who feel that this behaviour is counter-intuitive to the way that most users expect content to be sorted, and certainly hope that Apple will consider changing it back. At this point, however, there does not seem to be any evidence that this is going to happen.

Q: I notice iTunes 7.4 has a new “Closed Captioning” feature, but I’m not seeing any captions on any of the videos I’ve purchased from the iTunes Store. Is there something else I have to do to enable this? Does it work on any video card, or do I need something special? Also, will this work only on my computer, or can my iPod view closed captions as well?

- Sara

A: The “Closed Captioning” feature requires that the captions themselves be specifically encoded within the videos that you have purchased from iTunes. At this time, we have not yet identified any videos from the iTunes Store that actually include this information, although Apple will presumably start providing newer content with this relatively soon. Whether or not this will be identified in any way on the iTunes Store is unknown at this time as well.

Presumably this feature will also be eventually incorporated into some of the third-party encoding tools so that you can encode your own video content from other sources with closed captioning.

The new iPod lineup also supports the closed captioning feature, and it seems reasonable to expect a firmware upgrade for devices like the Apple TV to add this support as well. Whether or not older iPod devices will be upgraded to add this support is uncertain at this point.

Q: Are folders for playlists now supported on the new iPod models?

- Dan

A: The good news is that Apple has brought the playlist folders feature first introduced in iTunes 7 last year to the iPod nano and iPod classic at least. As the iPod touch has not yet been released, it’s impossible to know for certain whether it will also be supported on this device, but we’re certainly hoping so.

This was first hinted at in the changes to playlist synchronization in iTunes 7.4, as we outlined in our Secrets & Features of iTunes 7.4 article. Music synchronization settings within iTunes now provide selection of playlists based on a folder organization, rather than the “flat list” that appeared in previous versions of iTunes.

In addition to this, users who have organized their playlists into folders within iTunes will now see these folders represented under “Playlists” in the new iPod interface. Basically, this has been organized into another level of menus, so instead of seeing all of your playlists appear directly under the “Playlists” menu, you will instead see a list of your playlist folders. Selecting a playlist folder will then show the playlists contained within that particular folder. As an added bonus, you can also play all tracks from all playlists contained within a folder simply by pressing the “Play” button with the folder highlighted (in the same way that the iPod has always worked for any other content-baesd menu item).

Note that this extra folder listing under playlists will naturally only appear for those users who actually have folders, and have synced more than one folder to the iPod. As with most other content, the iPod doesn’t was your time displaying a menu when there are only one or zero possible options.

Another caveat is that this does not appear to yet be supported when using manual management. When dragging a folder to the iPod in manual mode, the folder will simply become a playlist on the iPod, aggregating all of the content from all contained playlists into a single playlist with the name of the original source folder.

Q: Does the new iPod classic support games?

- Gord

A: Both the new iPod classic and iPod nano provide support for games. Unfortunately, they are not compatible with the games presently available on the iTunes Store for fifth-generation iPod models. Apple has announced plans to update some of their games for the new iPod models in the near future, such as Sudoku, Tetris and Ms Pac Man, but it is not clear as to whether these upgrades will be provided free of charge to those who previously purchased these games or whether customers will be required to re-purchase them.

Note that the new iPod models do include some of the iPod games that were previously only available as a separate purchase, however. These are Vortex, iQuiz, and Klondike Solitaire.

Q: Do the new iPod models support output to a TV? Will my existing AV output cables work, or do I need to buy new ones?

- Jon

A: Unfortunately, no. The new iPod models only seem to provide TV output through the Dock Connector interface, and require specific Dock Connector based accessories to provide TV output even in this mode.

The new iPod models do not appear to be support video output through the headphone jack as previous models did, and the “TV Out” option is now unavailable unless a compatible iPod accessory is connected to the iPod Dock Connector port.

As of Wednesday’s announcement, Apple is selling two new AV accessories for the iPod, supporting composite or component output. The existing Apple iPod Universal Dock also seems to enable this option, as does the iPod Hi-Fi (even though this device itself does not provide video output capabilities). It is not certain whether other accessories will provide video output through the Dock Connector or not.

Be sure to read our recent news article on this subject for more information.