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Updated: Audio Outfitters looking for beta testers for new iPod product

I just wish I knew what it was. I hope that it is something really cool.

Posted by Andy on January 20, 2004 at 5:40 PM (PDT)

Updated: Audio Outfitters looking for beta testers for new iPod product

Hmmm…...interesting. I wonder what it is.

Posted by nick954 on January 20, 2004 at 5:39 PM (PDT)

TEN Technology readies Bluetooth naviPlay remote

I used to have the WM-WX808 ( http://www.asahi-net.or.jp/~an4t-tkns/taro/walkman/199302/wm-wx808.jpg ) back in the mid-90s, and that wireless remote had a bigger and more useful screen than this remote, why can’t the screen be on the front than the side??

Posted by voodoo on January 20, 2004 at 5:05 PM (PDT)

TEN Technology readies Bluetooth naviPlay remote

All I’ve wanted since I got my first and second iPod is the ability to utilize wireless headphones.  There is nothing worse than turning your head slighty and yanking out an earphone, or catching a wire on a doorknob or something.  If this product is in any way able to make this desire a reality, I’d order two!

Posted by Mmcxii on January 20, 2004 at 5:01 PM (PDT)

Updated: Audio Outfitters looking for beta testers for new iPod product

hmm… just sent my e-mail.  Hopefully I can be a beta tester.

Posted by iHeartiPods on January 20, 2004 at 4:59 PM (PDT)

"The iPod is the modern-day equivalent of the Samurai sword"

“modern-day equivalent of the Samurai sword”???  puhleeeeeeeez!

I think this poster should fall on his iPod, er I mean sword

iPod simply does what its supposed to very well with elegant and simple user interface - that’s why I bought it and use it everyday. I don’t show it off or carry it as some sort of symbol and comparing any schmuck who can afford an iPod with a samurai is nonsense.

Posted by HeadCheeze on January 20, 2004 at 4:43 PM (PDT)

Korean iPod clone released

OMG look at this pik omg scarey!
http://www.nextway.co.kr/bbs/gallery_view.asp?id=81

Posted by MeshKent on January 20, 2004 at 4:42 PM (PDT)

Updated: Audio Outfitters looking for beta testers for new iPod product

you guys can understand my attempt at english in that last post right?

Posted by Mijman2 on January 20, 2004 at 4:40 PM (PDT)

Updated: Audio Outfitters looking for beta testers for new iPod product

i dont think that they would post a false statement, stated dirrectly by the person in charge of Audio Outfitters…

Posted by Mijman2 on January 20, 2004 at 4:40 PM (PDT)

"The iPod is the modern-day equivalent of the Samurai sword"

i generally don’t like having things that everybody else has.
which is why i broke up with my girlfriend….but i gotta tell ya folks!!!

Posted by NeuroticComedian in Los Angeles on January 20, 2004 at 4:29 PM (PDT)

TEN Technology readies Bluetooth naviPlay remote

I dont think it would be so great for your car. How would you use it there????

Posted by Jon on January 20, 2004 at 4:26 PM (PDT)

"The iPod is the modern-day equivalent of the Samurai sword"

wow - ipodlounge - are we so hurting for news that we have to result to petty opinion stories ?  My ipod is not a symbol of status - goddamn who in this room is soo superficial??  i honestly hide mine at the gym - simply because 1) i hate explaining what it is - not everyone knows ipods 2) for those who know - its expensive and brings 2 much attention of getting stolen or looking like an freakin idiot for paying over $400 for a hard drive -  anyways ur statement “It was a portable symbol of status, power, and class.”  is very idiotic if not perverse -  its a freakin mp3 player - many students own it and barely can afford paying for it - power? the stupid battery doesnt even last longto have power!!!!! hehe!!  get with the program - and screw steve jobs -    (p.s. this ‘news story’ is almost as stupid as the ipod boat install )

Posted by gabe on January 20, 2004 at 4:22 PM (PDT)

Updated: Audio Outfitters looking for beta testers for new iPod product

just because some guy says it’s legitimate doesn’t make it so.  “a leading provider of audio products” and “a leading provider of Audio products for the Apple iPod” wouldn’t have a website just now under development, would they?  And wouldn’t Charlie Bernstein have an email address with “audiooutfitters.com” or something, since Audio Outfitters is obviously such a tech savvy company (see above quotes)?  All I’m saying is, be careful…

Posted by ck on January 20, 2004 at 4:14 PM (PDT)

Korean iPod clone released

Ok first of all with regardence to your video game comment.  If you ever tried playing UT, Halo, CS, or Warcraft III you’d easily see that Koreans are not the “best in the world.”  However I’m not saying we suck (koreans) since there is one in 3D and Schroet all def toppers in CPL.  Also you have some misconception to think that Korea is some superfast computer network country.  It is no doubt very advanced… lived in korea for 3 years…and the broadband rage.  definately busy in Seoul and surrounding cities since i used to go to the pc rooms all the time to play starcraft…but if you go down to 밀양 (Miryang) they don’t have jack.  Seing that Korea is about the size of Utah I am surprised you are even complaining.  A country already corrupted politically like on SBS news today how Lotte bribed politicians (everyday stuff in korea) you sort of get sick of it.  I’m not bashin Korea since i am connected to it by my parents and so forth, but you can’t avoid reality.  Stay there and talk to people and you’ll see the inevitable fact that the country copies Japan and America.  Coex mall would be a good example other than its use for the world cup.  So would the Inchon airport.  I agree Samsung and LG makes great products and thank God korea has them.  But what makes them great is that they aren’t “borrowing ideas” to the extent that this company did.  THis is just sad.  On a better note korea rules with cellphones. 

Posted by wutever on January 20, 2004 at 4:08 PM (PDT)

Updated: Audio Outfitters looking for beta testers for new iPod product

Well, we all got an answer. It’s pretty cool to have settled this issue in less than 2 hours of posts. I am very curious to see what happens next.

Posted by Hedonist on January 20, 2004 at 4:03 PM (PDT)

Updated: Audio Outfitters looking for beta testers for new iPod product

This is legitamate.  We are developing a new product and will be sending a questionaire out in the next few days.  As with all good products, we believe it should be based on customer feedback and not the single idea of a few people.  We want to make sure this product meets your needs and your feedback is greatly appreciated.  Thank you for your interest. 

The Web site is under development and will be launched shortly.

Charlie Bernstein
Audio Outfitters.

Posted by Charlie Bernstein on January 20, 2004 at 3:59 PM (PDT)

Illegal music downloading up, where's the RIAA?

Among them: the inevitable dropoff in publicity from the RIAA’s campaign, more leisure time for students during the holidays, and the launch of several high-profile legal music downloading services.”

Thus the RIAA will start sueing people for buying iTunes. 

I don’t buy anything off of iTunes for the same reason I don’t buy copy-protected CDs.  Once I’ve paid for it it should be mine, and with DRM systems that’s not the case.  I’m running a PC I built myself with an iPod (A Shuttle SN41G2 to be precise) and I figure in a couple of years I’ll want to upgrade the PC, and then again a few years after that.  I also own a laptop which I will probably want to upgrade in the future. 

An iTunes AAC file can only be copied so many times, after that it makes itself uncopyable.  So what happens in a few years time when I’ve upgraded my computers and maybe my iPod?  Suddenly I can no longer listen to the music I paid for. 

There needs to be more services like Bleep that let you buy DRM-free music at reasonable rates.  But at the moment I don’t even download much music for free because, quite frankly, hardly anybody is making music I want to listen to anymore.  The last album I bought was Furious Angels by Rob Dougan, which is well worth a listen if you’ve not heard it.  But that was more or less the only CD I bought last year.  Its next to impossible to find good music because the radio and MTV just play all that manufactured crap that makes me want to retch.  If I could find the good music out there I’d buy it, provided it’s on an unprotected CD or a DRM free format because its then my data and I want to copy it as often as I may need to

Posted by Fenn on January 20, 2004 at 3:44 PM (PDT)

"The iPod is the modern-day equivalent of the Samurai sword"

Samurai Sword= ipod
Me likes.  this reminds me of the tv pinup girls when i was growing up.
Everybody had farrah fawcett on their wall, even tho there were other celebs who were better looking or more popular in movies or tv. They had her up because she was ‘it’. If you had a Farrah Fawcett poster, you were cool. Sure there are other players out there, some with better features, better pricing and what not.
But none of them represent the times and the culture like the unreal tech icon, ipod.
But, that doesn’t mean that something less impactful cant be heralded.
For it was Cody Chesnutt who said,
‘we can crown kings in adidas’

ipod, therefor, i am…...neurotic

Posted by NeuroticComedian in Los Angeles on January 20, 2004 at 3:38 PM (PDT)

Updated: Audio Outfitters looking for beta testers for new iPod product

This was a Press Release sent to iPodlounge. I have no idea what the product is. I spoke with Mr. Bernstein on the phone and yes, it’s a legitimate request for feedback on a new iPod product. See his comments below.

Posted by Dennis Lloyd in Irvine, CA on January 20, 2004 at 3:34 PM (PDT)

HP already had an iPod of sorts

You’ve got to put it into perspective - at the time the PJB was designed, the iPod was a twinkle in PortalPlayer’s eye and the cutting edge of sleek was the Archos and Zen. Even then I remember people criticising the PJB for being so damn bulky compared with the Zen. All these players were by modern standards big and ugly, but cheap, and used regular AAa and notebook hard drives.

Apple demonstrated that people would pay a premium for integrated, semi-replacable Li-On batteries and miniature drives.

It’s evolution - it was easy to see 6 months ago when Rio and Creative brought out their 1” drive players that Apple would have to again shrink the iPod to match - and this became the mini iPod. Don’t knock the PJB - it was a necessary precursor to the iPod.

In fact, as a result of the PJB, HP owns the patent for read-ahead buffering to reduce power consumption, which forms a large part of the attractiveness of the PortalPlayer’s chipset and accounts for the iPod’s performance. That was also why the PDJ had, for the time, a large 12MB RAM cache while other players made do with 1 or 2MB.

So for every PortalPlayer-reference design sold (which includes iPods) I think it’s likely that HP are getting a license fee. Look at the system below, Compaq filed for it in early 1999 from work done in 1997 and 1998:
———————-
Low power system and method for playing compressed audio data

Abstract
A portable audio player stores a large amount of compressed audio data on an internal disk drive, and loads a portion of this into an internal random access memory (RAM) which requires less power and less time to access. The audio player plays the data stored in RAM and monitors the amount of unplayed data. When the amount of unplayed data falls below a threshold, additional data is copied from the disk drive into RAM. Because the time necessary to copy a block of data from the disk drive to RAM is much less than the amount of time it takes to play the same block of audio data from RAM, this approach minimizes the amount of time that the disk drive must be operated, and thus minimizes the amount of power consumed by the system.

Posted by perspective on January 20, 2004 at 3:33 PM (PDT)

"The iPod is the modern-day equivalent of the Samurai sword"

you download music.  you have no honour.  i will have your head.

( -.-) / -€    _(xŸx)___

Posted by oblio in sydney's northern beaches on January 20, 2004 at 3:32 PM (PDT)

Updated: Audio Outfitters looking for beta testers for new iPod product

Okay, perhaps it’s not a clue, but the same e-mail address mentioned in this post was the source for the Usenet post found here advertising a security services sales rep job in Utah.

Posted by Sparkey on January 20, 2004 at 3:31 PM (PDT)

Updated: Audio Outfitters looking for beta testers for new iPod product

But maybe they are making like some big opening and expect to be the “leading provider of Audio products for the Apple iPod”...

Hope they are a real company, and we get to beta test some awesome product

Posted by Mijman2 on January 20, 2004 at 3:27 PM (PDT)

Updated: Audio Outfitters looking for beta testers for new iPod product

Hmmm.  Hard to tell with so little information

Posted by Mijman2 on January 20, 2004 at 3:25 PM (PDT)

"The iPod is the modern-day equivalent of the Samurai sword"

This is perhaps the stupidest news story I’ve seen about the iPod -anywhere.- Penny Arcade should stick to video games, Storm Shadow should stick to playing with G.I. Joes, and respectfully, iPodlounge should avoid outside opinion pieces like this one in favor of news.

Posted by Anon on January 20, 2004 at 3:19 PM (PDT)