more typical iPod problems

[HejiraNYC]

Originally Posted by Travis

Hey Lee,

Trust me, I’m well aware I’m in the minority here. Again, I totally love the concept of the iPod but I can’t get past the sound quality issue I have. And it’s not my car player because my CDs and tapes sound great. It’s the connection, and for most of us out there, the only option is the tape or radio adapters. No matter how great your stereo may be, listening to your iPod in your car is not a true connection. Some are willing to sacrifice quality for quantity and I can’t, and believe me I tried because I really wanted to like it. I still have a couple of weeks before I decide if I want to return it and I just may give it another shot, but as I mentioned above, I find that I’m actually fooling around with the iPod more than I am the CDs. I can make a perfect flowing CD just to my liking – but there are times I may want to start with track 16 let us say, just cuz I’m feeling tracks 16-20 (they may be a bit more down tempo) and then the CD simply rolls back to the start – you can’t do that with an iPod, they don’t start over, therefore, I’m actually fooling around with the iPod more than I am the CD. Once the CD is done or if I want to hear something else, yes I have to fumble around a bit putting in another CD, however, the same goes with the iPod. If you want to play another play list for example, you still have to “fumble” around with it a bit to locate it. It really isn’t that much different. I have friends that actually pull over spending time looking for the play list they want to play before they find it – that’s what I mean by having access to so much of your library. When you make things too available, you find (or at least I do) I’m not as excited about it anymore – kind of like needy boyfriends ;-)

Who said I was high maintenance?

Well, even dinosaurs were around for millions of years before they were extinguished.

I hate to admit it, but the iPod is, for better or worse, my single most indispensible possession. I feel naked without it. I would say that I am either listening to it or watching movies on it an average of 5 hours per day- walking on the sidewalk, riding my bike, on the train, plugged into my speakers at home, plugged into the car adaptor, etc. And I have been able to see lots of movies (albeit, a few minutes at a time) that I have never had the time to view previously. If I could have an iPod cradle surgically implanted into my hip, I would do it in a heartbeat.

If/when Apple releases an iPod with a large-capacity hard drive as well as WiFi and a QWERTY keyboard, I'm afraid I will retreat from society altogether and stay full time in the iRealm.

[Travis]

Hey HejiraNYC,

I was going to guess that you were younger than me but I see you are two years older than me LOL. I guess it also depends on one’s lifestyle. I don’t live in the city so it’s not like I’m doing a lot of walking in the city, or taking the bus or metro, etc.. I can see where an iPod would come in handy in those situations. I’ll even admit, not this past Sunday but Sunday before last (when I only had the iPod for about 4 days) I hooked up with a friend of mine who I don’t get to see but once every 6 months. I wanted to show her some pictures from my vacation over the summer and it was nice to import the pics into the iPod and just bring that with me instead of the actual pictures. But again, it’s not like looking at the actual bigger picture, so that’s what I mean when I say you sacrifice quality for quantity. I’m also a VJ in DC and for the past 6 ½ years I’ve been playing every Saturday so I guess I’m used to high quality music. So the fact that I have to settle for less than that doesn’t appeal to me. I don’t know, I still may hang onto the damn thing.

[HejiraNYC]

Originally Posted by Travis

Hey HejiraNYC,

I was going to guess that you were younger than me but I see you are two years older than me LOL. I guess it also depends on one’s lifestyle. I don’t live in the city so it’s not like I’m doing a lot of walking in the city, or taking the bus or metro, etc.. I can see where an iPod would come in handy in those situations. I’ll even admit, not this past Sunday but Sunday before last (when I only had the iPod for about 4 days) I hooked up with a friend of mine who I don’t get to see but once every 6 months. I wanted to show her some pictures from my vacation over the summer and it was nice to import the pics into the iPod and just bring that with me instead of the actual pictures. But again, it’s not like looking at the actual bigger picture, so that’s what I mean when I say you sacrifice quality for quantity. I’m also a VJ in DC and for the past 6 ½ years I’ve been playing every Saturday so I guess I’m used to high quality music. So the fact that I have to settle for less than that doesn’t appeal to me. I don’t know, I still may hang onto the damn thing.

I really do not know why you insist that the audio of the iPod is inferior to CDs. Yes, mp3's are compressed, and if you run an mp3 signal through an analyzer, it will definitely look different from the uncompressed CD audio. But to the human ear, it should be virtually indistinguishable. And again, the bit rate of the mp3 is crucial. Also, if you are connecting to your car stereo via the headphone jack, I think the sound is going to suffer from the equalization of the analog signal. You should definitely try and get a direct link via a cradle/dock of some sort.

Another way of looking at it is that on an iPod "Classic," you can store every Fleetwood Mac recording ever released, every FM solo member recording, every FM-related demo, every FM-related live bootleg recording and every video. And you would still have enough room left for the rest of your entire CD collection. It truly is amazing that you have the ability to listen to anything you want whenever you want without getting up and hunting down a CD. Being from the vinyl LP and 45 generation (uh, thanks for pointing out my old age ), this continues to completely blow my mind.