Introduction

iPod (30 GB)
Manufacturer: Apple (product page)
System requirements: PC with USB port running Windows 2000 SP4 or Windows XP SP2; Mac with USB port running Mac OS X 10.3.9
Price: US$299 (shop for this item)

The new iPod was announced by Steve Jobs last week at a highly anticipated "special event" in San Jose, California. In the days leading up to the announcement, a number of rumors had circulated about the possibility of iPods with video capabilities being announced as well as some sort of accompanying video store to feed the new devices. Others speculated that a whole other range of devices were in the pipeline, from new G5 desktops to speed bumped PowerBooks. What we got on the 12th was an updated iMac, the aforementioned video iPod, and a video store to accompany the world's most popular online music outlet.

The new iPod lineup

The introduction of this video iPod resulted in a few changes in Apple's offerings as well. Out is the iPod photo and the U2 iPod (which was really just a black and red iPod photo). Apple has effectively reigned in their product lineup right before Christmas, possibly hoping to entice customers with a simple, easy to understand selection with clearly defined price point and feature delineation.

Now we're looking at the low-end Shuffle for true minimalists, the iPod nano for low storage but some of the premium features (photos, color LCD) and the iPod (large storage space, photos, videos).

You've got questions? We've got answers!

A lot of questions were raised by the tech crowd about the new iPod: what types of video would it play? What happened to the iPod photo? Why release a new iPod so soon after the nano? What's the battery life? What does the video output look like on a TV? Are TV shows really watchable on such a tiny screen? Does it scratch as easily as the iPod nano? Those were just a few of the questions I was barraged with when I told people I had gotten my hands on the new iPod, and were more than enough to warrant a discussion on the topic.

I hope to answer as many questions as possible in this article. I'm first going to explain just what exactly is different between these new fifth-generation iPods and their predecessors and then move into how the device performs at its new task, playing video content.

The iPod no longer comes in the traditional "cube" packaging, instead coming in a box similar to that of the nano. A thin, black box with photos of the iPod on the front, back, and sides. Inside you'll find the iPod itself and an unfortunate lack of accessories. The model being reviewed is the 30 GB white version and this might be different for the larger, 60GB model. Inside was a software disc and Apple stickers, a USB dock connector cable, a universal dock adapter, headphones, headphone covers, and a thin iPod case.

Noticeably absent are the dock, remote, wall charger, and AV cables which can be purchased individually or bundled with your new iPod at the Apple Store. If you're at all interested in video output, the AV cables are a must-have and can be found for around $20 online or at a retail store.

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It's so wide, or is it?

My first impressions upon seeing photos of the new iPod was that it looked, well... awkward. For some inexplicable reason, the iPod looked wider than ever and I kept thinking to myself, "How could Steve sign off on such a weird diversion from the tried and true look of the original iPod?"

While not a radical change, the wider screen evokes a reaction of trepidation from people who are used to the original design. Once I got an actual unit in my hands I was relieved. In reality the new iPod is the exact same width as all previous iPods. Seeing it in person also alleviated my fears of an odd-looking iPod. In person, the iPod looks rather normal, if not for the slightly larger screen and slightly smaller touch wheel. It must just be something weird about how it appears in photographs, because this model doesn't look nearly as jarring in my hands as it did when I first saw Jobs announce it.

So what exactly has changed, appearance-wise, on this new iPod? The most noticeable physical update is that the LCD is larger. It's been upgraded to a 2.5" LCD from the previous 2" LCD and the effect is great. The screen is only marginally bigger, but it feels considerably different. After spending so much time playing on my PSP (Lumines owns me), I had begun to feel cramped on the 3G iPod's 2" screen, so this small update makes me feel just a little less claustrophobic when I'm using it.

Besides the increase in LCD real estate, the other thing changed on the layout is a smaller scroll wheel. The old model's scroll wheel measured approximately 41.67mm across while the new one is 38.10mm. The reasons behind the decision to make the scroll wheel smaller are not readily apparent, but I'm thinking it has something to do with Apple's move from the old Synaptics-designed part to an in-house design. This new iPod is undoubtedly the first full-size iPod to make use of Apple's own in-house scroll wheel design. We first saw this deployed on the nanos and the new design might've been Apple's opportunity to tweak the physical dimensions of the part. Whatever the reason for the change, I've not noticed the difference in my daily use of the player, so it has not been a annoyance or hindrance to speak of.

The next thing changed is the thickness and physical design of the iPod housing. There are a few subtle differences that set this model apart from the previous ones. First up is the thickness. Steve Jobs made a big deal about how thin the new models are. Comparing this new model to my old 40GB model made it readily apparent just how much Apple had managed to squeeze out of the new design. The new model is approximately 39% thinner than my fourth generation 40 GB model (which is pretty darn thick) and 28% thinner than my 10 GB, third-generation model.

The other apparent design change is the shape of the case. Previous models (see above) had rounded edges on both the front and rear faces. This has changed on the latest iteration. The front face is now completely flat and, oddly enough, reminiscent of the original iPod. The face material of this new iPod is dual layered with a clear resin on top of white plastic. This differs from previous models which appears to be composed solely of the bright white resin. This change has probably been made for a number of reasons:

1. The LCD is now covered by a hard, clear resin instead of the plastic LCD cover of previous models. This will prevent LCD damage and makes for a clearer looking screen
2. With the advent of black iPods, Apple can produce faces of different colors, and coat them all with this clear outer covering, for a uniform look.
3. This brings a visually consistent look to the iPod lineup, bringing this model in line with the iPod nano. Now the iPod looks almost identical to its smaller cousin, except slightly larger and with a curved rear housing.

The final change to the design of the iPod is the relocation of the headphone jack, which is now positioned opposite the hold switch. This is a departure from the headphone jacked located in the center of the device, and will make a number of accessories designed for the old iPod either incompatible or awkward, at best.

One change that has caused a lot of uproar from long-time Mac users is the lack of Firewire support on these new iPod models. The technical specifications for the iPod omitted any mention of the traditional interface transport, instead opting to mention USB as a requirement. It appeared that all hope of Firewire support had been lost and my trials with the new iPod prove that assessment true. Upon connecting the new iPod via Firewire, you'll see the same screen you get when you try to connect the nano via Firewire:

Most speculation concerning the lack of Firewire support in the new iPods center around the space needed to package the Firewire chipset within the device. Most people who seem to be in the know have said that the amount of board space needed to implement Firewire vastly outweighs a similar USB implementation. Eliminating Firewire altogether seems to have been one of the many tradeoffs Apple had to make to achieve a smaller and lighter device. This may not be much consolation to those users with old USB 1.1 ports, but for many Mac and Windows users, this change shouldn't affect them much.

So... it plays videos?

In case you've been living in a cave for the last week, the biggest feature of the new model is that it now plays videos. While this isn't the only update to the iPod, it is by and far the most anticipated to date. Steve Jobs criticized portable video devices in the past and more recently noted that "no one has been successful with that yet," so one might expect that Apple has done something radical with video playback that no one has ever thought of before, right? Well, not exactly.

It plays video, and that's about it. Imagine your average iPod photo with the ability to play video on a slightly larger LCD or output that video to your TV and you've got it covered. The new iPod does nothing technologically revolutionary or different from how other, similar devices (like the PSP) do video.

However, if one were to delve deeper into what Jobs really meant by his comment about no one doing video right, you might come to the conclusion that he was referring to the supply chain and the ease of use of getting videos onto those portable devices. For all of the PSP‘s widescreen glory, you cannot (yet) output that video to an external display. You cannot hook your PSP up to your PC, open a PSP video store, and upload last night's episode of Lost with one or two clicks of your mouse. PSPs have UMD videos, and they're selling all right, but they're ridiculously expensive for what you get and carrying around a pack of UMD discs is—to me—extremely annoying.

For the new video content, there is a new "Videos" menu available on the iPod, and under that are options for "Video playlists," "Music Videos," "Movies," "TV Shows," and "Video Podcasts." Items like "TV Shows" don't appear until you've bought one from the iTMS and updated your iPod with it. Within those, they act exactly how you'd expect. Apple has made the interface for playing movies extremely similar to playing music. Click the middle wheel once and you control the volume with the scroll wheel. Click it again and you're scrubbing through the video.

I did notice that seeking to different points in the video were a little less responsive than I'd like, but it wasn't more than 1 or 2 seconds, and I'm not one to complain about a portable device being slightly less responsive than a personal computer.

One of the nicer features—and one that I didn't expect—is that if you quit playing a video somewhere in the middle, the iPod will bookmark the video and remember where you left off when you pull it up later.

Supported video formats

The new iPod plays videos, obviously, but it only plays videos of a specific format and codec. From the specs on Apple's website:

H.264 video: up to 768 Kbps, 320x240, 30 frames per sec., Baseline Profile up to Level 1.3 with AAC-LC up to 160 Kbps, 48 Khz, stereo audio in .m4v, .mp4 and .mov file formats

MPEG-4 video: up to 2.5 mbps, 480x480, 30 frames per sec., Simple Profile with AAC-LC up to 160 Kbps, 48 Khz, stereo audio in .m4v, .mp4 and .mov file formats

This means that anyone encoding their own video for use on the iPod will have to restrict their movies to these specifications. Apple has made this fairly straightforward by integrating a new "Export to iPod" option in QuickTime that trickles down to any other application taking advantage of QT7 for video export. I did some test encodes with Handbrake and FFmpegX and following the guidelines above resulted in perfectly playable video files.

One interesting note in the specifications for the new iPod is the mention of upgradable firmware that will allow Apple to decode audio and video codecs other than those that come standard with the device:

"Upgradable firmware enables support for future audio formats" and "Upgradable firmware enables support for future video formats"

Whether or not this means we'll see OGG on the iPod some day (hint: don't hold your breath) or some obscure video format remains to be seen, but it's nice to know that Apple is thinking about this, even if they're probably thinking about upgrading the devices with their own, DRM-enabled future formats.

Are you nuts? How can you watch video on that thing?

One of the biggest questions about the new iPod is one of whether or not watching video is an exercise in pain or one of joyful bliss. I'm here to report that the actual experience lays somewhere in between. Watching my first episode of Lost on the device gave me a few impressions that I'd like to share here.

First of all, the video is crisp, clear and detailed. I was honestly surprised at the quality of the TV shows I had downloaded, although videophiles will be disappointed that the widescreen versions of these episodes have been cropped for the 4:3 iPod display. Reading the cast names that run by at the beginning of the episode was easily done and so I can only assume that watching videos with subtitles, i.e., Anime, can be done without much eye strain.

Music videos seemed to be hit or miss. I downloaded the music video Thriller (from Michael Jackson's pre-caucasian days) and was throughly disappointed. The video was blocky, color bands were everywhere, and the audio levels were absurdly low. Most of these problems I can probably attribute to the age of the source video, but you'd expect that a decent copy of Thriller exists somewhere. Other, newer, music videos didn't suffer from the same problems

The question of the hour is if one could be expected to sit and watch 45 minutes of video on the iPod's LCD. My answer to that question is "yes" with one caveat. I walk to work and today I tried watching some video on my commute.

Result: disastrous.

I nearly ran into several people and almost injured myself in an accident involving those rows of news paper stands. My recommendation would be to enjoy these video treats on the safety of a bus or train, and please refrain from catching up on your favorite episodes on the walk to work. I would go far as to extend that warning to car commuters as well. Remember kids, friends don't let friends use their video iPod while driving.

iPod, meet TV

The next question on the list is how well the video output looks on a standard TV. I'm just a regular Joe and I'm too poor to own a fancy high-definition TV, so we're going to be doing these subjective tests on a run-of-the-mill 27-inch SDTV. A caveat: you'll need the AV cable for this, which costs US$19.99 from the Apple store.

The iPod presents a few configuration items specifically related to the video output. You can specify if the output should be in NTSC or PAL or if the output should be in widescreen or not, and if TV output should be disabled altogether.

The inclusion of a "Widescreen" option is puzzling, since the iPod cannot display video beyond 320x240 in h.264 and MPEG4 in 480x480. I'm not sure what benefit you'd get from changing this option. Perhaps this setting has something to do specifically with how widescreen televisions expect their video input, but since I live in SDTV land, I wouldn't know. I tried setting the widescreen option to "Yes" on my normal TV and it didn't seem to have any effect.

My first test was to watch my favorite music video, Thriller. I was again disappointed with the output of this video. I again suspect it was merely a problem with the encoding process, but the edges of the text that displays at the beginning of the video was chopped off by my TV and the video itself was of horrible quality. Just as it was on the iPod's screen, it was chunky, exhibited a lot of color banding, and the audio was still very low. I've written off Thriller as an exception to the rule at this point because no other music video or television show I've downloaded has been so horrible.

The other television shows I watched were great and looked to my eyes exactly as they do during actual broadcasts. The colors were crisp and clear and the audio sounded decent over the television's built-in speakers. These experiences may or may not hold true for those of you who've got 50" DLPs and monster sound systems, but for me and what I suspect will be the majority of people buying this device, the video and audio quality will be more than acceptable.

One question raised was if the entire iPod interface was displayed on the screen when the device is connected to a television. This is a qualified "no." What was being displayed on the screen during the Stevenote last week was nothing more than clever trickery. The only time anything is output to the screen is when you start a photo slideshow (you have to specifically tell the device to output to TV) or when you begin playing a video (again, you have to specify).

Overall I was very pleased with the video output to my standard definition TV. I'm certain that some videophiles will be disappointed with the low video resolution the device offers, but I'm convinced that a majority of Apple iPod consumers will fail to notice or care about it very much.

What about battery life and those nasty scratches?

I've been really busy over the past few days so after I got the iPod, began playing with it, photographing it, and using it before, during, and after work today, I never really got a chance to charge it too much. I gave the unit a small charge after first receiving it (probably less than an hour) and it has been weaned from the electrical teat ever since. I'd guess I listened for about 3 or 4 hours last night, and this evening while finishing up some cleaning, I just let it sit on my desk and play and play. It's been playing at 3/4 volume for the past six hours and is only now getting into the "red" colored section of the battery indicator. If I had to give any sort of indication, I'd conservatively wager that I've gotten about 10 hours of battery life out of this fresh, improperly charged iPod. Not quite the 14 hours advertised for the 30GB model, but it's close enough for my liking. For what it's worth, the 60GB model is rated by Apple for 20 hours of life (3 hours of video playback).

The other big question is the issue of scratching. There's been a hullabaloo over crazy scratching on the iPod nanos, and now that the iPod is constructed in a similar manner (and also comes in black), people are afraid that this new iPod will also be a scratch magnet. That may be why Apple includes a soft carrying case with this model. I'm not really in the best position to gauge the scratching issue as I have only had this iPod for one day, and got the white model since it was more readily available than the black.

We all know that it's nearly impossible to see the scratches on a white model iPod unless they're really bad. However, from what I've seen over the past day, if you keep your iPod it in its little snug case, scratching will be minimal. After some of the horror tales of nano scratching occurring within the first few hours of use, I'm inclined to think that this model might be holding up a little better. I'll be playing with it over the next week or two and I'll be sure to report on the "scratching situation" on Infinite Loop if I notice it getting out of hand.

Other miscellany

This iPod update also brought the iPod up to speed with the nano in terms of applications. It was only a matter of time before the iPod got all of the new applications that we saw for the first time with the nano and they look ever better on a larger screen. The first new application is the screen lock, which will be useful to those of you who are reluctant to store your entire schedule and contact database around where anyone could steal a peek.

The second new application is "World Clock." As we showed in the nano article, this feature allows you to define several different time zones that you'd like to monitor and have their date and time, along with a graphical depiction of an analog clock listed on the screen.

The final new application is the stopwatch which allows you to time whatever you find needs timing in your life. I personally like to track the amount of time it takes for elevators to reach my intended floor, but that's just me. The timer keeps records of your previous "sessions" and gives you a list of detailed statistics about the laps you recorded.

Beyond those three new applications (which we already saw on the nano) the new iPod's interface is identical to the previous iPod photo. The games and applications are colorized and you get album art when you're playing music.

Vivisection

It wouldn't be an Ars iPod review without a dissection (or in this case, a vivisection since the patient survived) and discussion. Talking about what changes were made on the exterior of the device is fine and well, but the real interesting stuff—to me anyways—is found within. As the old adage says, "it's what's on the inside that counts." With that, I'm dismantling this iPod in the name of science. All went well: I was be able to put to back together and it's working fine.

Taking this unit apart is a little bit different than previous models due to the changes in the housing design. Opening it was more akin to the nano and can be accomplished using a flat, hard tool like a screwdriver. Optimally, a plastic device would have been better to cut back on the damage to the case, but I had to make due with what tools were available to me. I was able to use a small eyeglasses screw driver to do the entire pull apart and it worked rather well without really damaging the case.

Once I got the iPod open, I noticed a few things. First is the Toshiba 30GB hard disk, model MK3008GAL, which just rotates off the main circuit board. The second thing you notice is that the battery in this model is super compact. It's actually affixed to the metal backplate and sits above its own power management circuitry and right next the headphone port and its driver circuitry.

With the hard drive pulled away from the main board you can plainly see most, if not all, of the major chips on this device. In the photo below you'll notice the PortalPlayer 5021C-TDF chip which is the same chip that powers the iPod nano. Also similar to the nano is the 32MB of Samsung (534-K9WAG08U1M) SDRAM that serves as the device's buffer memory, the power management chip Philips CF50607.

New, however, is a prominently placed Broadcom "VideoCore" chip, the "BCM2722" which does all of the heavy video lifting. This component replaces the Wolfson audio codec used in the nano and and adds video processing and output. Broadcom put out a press release about this specific chip today, saying:

The increasing popularity of high-end multimedia features in mobile phones and other portable devices has created demand for enhanced video and camera capabilities at price points accessible to mainstream consumers. The new Broadcom processors, the BCM2722 and BCM2724, boast an impressive array of multimedia features including 5 mega-pixel digital camera support, MPEG-4 VGA or H.264 CIF video encoding/decoding at 30 frames per second and TV output. Both the BCM2722 and BCM2724 provide high-quality video, gaming and music capabilities to mid-range mobile phones by integrating 32Mbits and 64Mbits of embedded SDRAM, respectively, with the VideoCore processor in a single package

This unit is the heart and soul of the video output layer of the iPod. It does the TV output and decodes and displays the video content. This chip natively decodes H.264 and MPEG4 video up to 640x480 which is noticeably higher than what Apple's specs state are the maximum allowable video resolution.

Here's a listing of the components within the device and their model numbers.

• LCD: Unknown manufacturer, model no. 1WX510015194, 320x240, .156-mm dot pitch, 2.5"
• Battery: Unknown manufacturer: model no. 5H27086
• CPU/media decoder: Portal player 5021C-TDF (audio decoding)
• Video decoder/driver: Broadcom VideoCore BCM2722 (video decoding, audio encoding, LCD and TV out driver)
• Power management: Philips CF5067
• Voltage regulator: National Semiconductor LM34910 high voltage (40V, 1.25A) step down switching regulator.
• Audio codec: Wolfsom WM87588G (Audio decoding, mixing, driving)

This new fifth-generation iPod shares a lot of technology with the nano and tacks on a new generation of mobile video, audio, and image processing technology with the Broadcom VideoCore chip. As is becoming the norm with Apple engineering, this iPod is a work of art when it comes to the spatial organization of such a complex device. I could almost stare at it forever and keep finding new and interesting things to say about it.

Conclusion

In my opinion, this update to the iPod has been long coming. The design of this model was set in stone the day the nano hit the shelves. Now that Apple has updated the look and visual feel of the full-size iPod, its "high end" offerings have a consistent style. Apple's addition of video playback was a logical, and by some accounts, boring, update to the device.

This is, like it or not, the next logical update to the iPod and Apple doesn't look like it wants to innovate beyond continuing to make the device smaller, lighter, and thinner. Unfortunately, there's a limit to how small Apple can go here and at that point they'll either start to stagnate or have to do some sort of innovating that I'm incapable of imagining right now.

For now, Apple is jumping on the video bandwagon, despite Steve Jobs' being dismissive of it not so long ago. Apple has tailored the UI for video and getting TV shows and music videos on to your iPod with minimum effort as long as you're happy with the small selection of ABC/Disney titles currently being offered.