AppleInsider StaffApple Inc. is gearing up to unveil a NAND flash-based video iPod in late September, which may aggravate the currently observed NAND flash shortages, according to DigiTimes.
"With the launch of the new iPod imminent, together with the recently reported power outage experienced by Samsung Electronics at its fabs, component makers are concerned that overall NAND flash supply may be impacted," the report states.
Apple's current line of video iPods employ bulky 1.8-inch hard disk drives (HDDs), but are the last of the firm's consumer electronics gadgets to do so. Since introducing the iPod nano in 2005, the company has slowly shifted all of its other handheld devices to the more reliable solid-state NAND flash memory.
Analysts have argued that it only makes sense for Apple to progress its video iPod players in the same fashion, as flash storage — which is more compact and lacks the movable parts of HDDs — would pave the way for smaller form factor players, as well as improvements to both battery life and durability.
"We believe that the video iPod transition from 1.8-inch hard disk drives to NAND flash memory may occur as soon as late 2007," Prudential Equity Group analyst Jesse Tortora wrote in a February report. "Our checks indicate that Apple is considering canceling its next generation HDD-based iPod design, with the form factor refresh involving a move to NAND flash memory."
DigiTimes, which makes no mention in its report whether the 16GB video iPod model would include a touch-screen interface akin to the iPhone, has been hit or miss on the subject of Apple rumors over the course of time. However, the publication's most recent round of "hits" have outweighed its misses.
Still, it should be noted that DigiTimes as recently as last month reported that a multi-touch video iPod would arrive in August, as opposed to its most recent claims of late September.
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72 Comments
Isn't 16 gig a bit small for video? What could they put in the iPhone case if they throw out all the phone stuff? Still WiFi/bluetooth?
Isn't 16 gig a bit small for video? What could they put in the iPhone case if they throw out all the phone stuff? Still WiFi/bluetooth?
They would just stuff 2x or 4x the chips in the device to give you 32Gb or 64Gb of RAM.
16gb? most of us who were excited to upgrade to a widescreen touchscreen ipod no longer can. i was looking forward to a 100gb widescreen touchscreen ipod with osx. my 5g has 47gigs, so if all new ipods will be nand-flash only, i guess those of us who want our entire collection on one ipod will have to wait a while longer. how long till a nand based device can handle 100gb and be reasonably priced ($350)?
Isn't 16 gig a bit small for video? What could they put in the iPhone case if they throw out all the phone stuff? Still WiFi/bluetooth?
I was thinking the same. I'm hoping maybe some sort of hybrid flash+hard drive version. I would hate dropping from my 60GB iPod to a new "top-of-the-line" iPod with a mere 16GB of storage. That wouldn't even hold half of my music let alone the vast majority of video. Flash storage to intelligently cache contents so it can idle down the hard drive except when absolutely necessary.
And then there's the flaw of a smaller form factor. Smaller form factor and video player don't really go too well together. You need a decent sized screen to reasonably enjoy watching video. Otherwise you get to listen to a video and watch a couple of pixels move about on screen.
What I'm hoping for is an iPod video with a true 16x9 screen (not the iPhone's almost 16x9 screen) capable of displaying 720p content (to match the AppleTV's highest resolution). It doesn't need to actually fully display 720p, just downconvert 720p content to its screen. Then toss in an update to the iPhone to allow it to display 720p content and announce the arrival of 720p content on iTunes (yeah, I wouldn't buy any movies that way having already jumped to Blu-Ray, but TV shows would be nice).
They would just stuff 2x or 4x the chips in the device to give you 32Gb or 64Gb of RAM.
Possibly using multiples of 8GB would be cheaper if 8GB is less than half the price of a 16GB. I wonder if this would be where ZFS would come in handy with pooled storage. It would be a great way to test out the filesystem in a Mac-related but non-critical way.
Maybe they could get away with adding an SD slot and then that allows the storage to be increased quite easily when future flash developments come about.