HiFi Blog: digital audio goodness

You may want to read this introductory post before proceeding.

• iPod mini is gone; “today, we’re going to do something pretty bold—we’re going to replace it [...] an entirely new ground-up design, that also has 1000 songs in your pocket.”


• product page—tagline: “1,000 songs. Impossibly small.”; specs page


• comes in 2 and 4GB versions, priced at $199 and $249 respectively (make that $179 and $229 if you’re a student); available in two colors: black and white (the black color was the infamous “one other thing…” in Jobs’ speech); shipping today


• 1.5-inch color screen (supports photos), click-wheel—think tiny iPod photo here


• the screen supports something called “inverse night mode”—we’ll update you on that one


• battery life rated at 14 hours; charges in ~3hours (1.5-hour fast charge to 80% capacity)


• weighs 1.5oz (42g), measures 3.5×1.6×0.27 in; thinner than a number two pencil, half the iPod mini in thickness, 62% smaller in volume; 1/5th the size of the original iPod and 80% smaller in volume


• the headphone jack is located on the bottom—wha? apparently it’s meant to be worn on the neck, judging from the fact that Apple has got some new lanyard headphones in store ($39)—UPDATE: iLounge: “The lanyard headphones plug simultaneously into the iPod’s bottom headphone port and Dock Connector, using the Connector solely as a securing mechanism and the headphone port as a means to direct headphone audio.”


• USB 2.0 connectivity; charges via USB; doesn’t come with dock (sold separately for $29)


• 30-pin dock connector: plugs in to existing iPod accessories


• new graphical clock (you can add multiple time zones), games, calendar, stopwatch & lap timer (handy for the people that go jogging with it)
  
• screen lock that uses the click wheel like a combination lock; if you forget the password, the lock is opened when the device is docked in the computer
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• more accessories: 5 armband colors ($29), and “nanotubes”, colored skins in boxes of 5 colors going for $29

More iPod nano pictures: 1, 2.

Jobs also mentioned there’s a new iPod “Harry Potter” edition with the crest engraved on the back (pic), and something about Madonna’s catalogue being added to the iTMS but these are weak news compared to the products released today.

UPDATE: Prices in Europe for the iPod nano (2GB/4GB):

• Austria: €209/€259


• France: €239/ unable to find pricing on the 4GB since the Apple Store link redirects to an error page


• Germany: €199/€249


• Ireland: €209/€259


• Italy: €209/€269


• Spain: €199/€249


• United Kingdom: £139 (€205)/£179 (€265)