Apple MB533LL/A Prices, Reviews, Sales, Compare
 |
Apple MB533LL/A Prices, Reviews, Sales, Compare.
Product: Apple MB533LL/A Amazon Price: Too low to display Availability: In Stock |
Compare Prices on Apple MB533LL/A
One year ago I purchased the 16GB recent iPod Touch. At that time, I found that even though it had some flaws, the over-all package made it one of the best iPods available. Now, one year later, Apple has released the next generation Touch. I've now had it for a few days, and here's what I found: the second gen iPod Touch is a marked improvement over the the first gen, and comes even closer to perfection. Keeping this in mind, this review will expose one stout, and a number of smaller shortcomings. It may also be difficult to explain upgrading from the 1st to 2nd gen unless you simply must have one of the few hardware improvements, and can live with the fact that you may have to re-purchase some of your accessories.
Size and Dimensions
The iPod Touch now sports a more rounded originate on the aid, making it behold slightly thinner and more like the iPhone than the novel did (it is not really thinner than it's predecessor, objective looks that blueprint) . Unfortunately, the abet plate is unexcited made from stainless steel, and this plate attacts fingerprints and scratches almost magically. After one year of near-constant utilize the backplate of my first gen Touch looks a bit like a wild etch-a-sketch (I carry the Touch in my pocket) . Interestingly, the glass on the front appears (after one year of heavy employ) to be absolutely scratch-resistant. It's the backside (that also carries the custom engraving) that like a flash becomes blemished. I would have preferred a brushed metal/aluminium backplate. I had to watch it up, but the current Touch is slightly lighter (a few grams) - but it looks thinner (thanks to the tapered edge invent) . The rounded edges produce it fit my palm slightly better, making it feel objective lawful (to be fair, the fresh Touch was already very, very expedient in this respect) . Other than that the outside dimensions exactly match that of the unusual Touch. The most visible change from the front is that the steel from the backplate now frames the glass remarkable like it did on the unique iPhone.
Touch Veil and Controls
The hide is simply ravishing. It's shining, crisp, has gargantuan difference, and can adapt it's brightness to the ambient light. In boom sunlight, noteworthy like it's predecessor it becomes difficult to read correctly. In shade it's perfectly readable -- a feat considering how quick-witted a reveal has to be to do that. Color temperature of the exhibit has shifted slightly downwards (or, to sound less pompuous: the display's colors have shifted slightly from a blueish to a golden tinge, something you wouldn't inspect unless you have the two devices side by side) .
The touch camouflage is very responsive, and as I stated before, absolutely scratch-resistant. Surviving a fat year in my pocket along with metallic objects such as my keys is a testament to it's durability (looking at the stainles steel backside is a constant reminder unprejudiced how badly it could have been scratched) . As with the new Touch, the same problems occur when you try to control the scheme 'blind' (i.e. while it is in your pocket) : without looking at it, you simply can't. Fortunately, Apple has addressed the most distinguished drawback with this design: a hardware volume control. The screen's resolution remains at 480x320, which is very noble (certainly better than my iPod Classic's) . Interestingly, I've found out that ripping videos to this resolution does not necessarily yield noticeably better results than for the iPod classic's (320x240) shroud, so I now rip to that resolution, conserving some memory.
iPod / iTunes
After one year of owning the novel Touch I have to remind myself that this design originally is an iPod -- or rather a digital music player. As it turns out, although I also exhaust it for music playing, this function has more and more been relegated to a background task -- a task, nontheless, that it handles really well. The coverflow, browsing and point to functionality has evolved nicely from the current (1.0 and 2.0) versions, and are unruffled the best in the market. The interface improvements relieve nice touches such as displaying a song's lyrics on single tap, bringing up the volume/cue controls on double-tap of the home button, an alphabetic shuffle rule when browsing titles, etc. Tranquil missing is a search function, though. And, especially in light of the aesthetic prove capabilities and the unusual addition of a unusual visualitzer (in additional to the existing ones in iTunes), I would have loved to glance a visualizer on the Touch as well. The biggest (and in my oppinion delibarate (as in testy) ) omission is this: you composed can't enable 'hard drive mode', i.e. utilize the Touch as a mass storage scheme. The biggest boon is improved battery life.
Video is crisp (detached no inequity control, though), and audio playback is unprejudiced as you quiz (again: I'm no audiophile. I'm absolutely gratified with most player's audio capabilities) . Again I'm not using the Apple-provided white and quite sub-par headphones. I'm using separately purchased ones. Novel for the second gen is a built-in speaker. Audio quality here is not actually abominable, but stop. The sound is tinny, primitive, and impartial somehow comes out of the iPod (mono, of course) . I fill that the addition of the speaker has a specific reason different from HiFi: it makes playing games on the Touch without headphones so mighty more toothsome. But for listening to music I would choose headphones or active speakers. To be fair, I win not listening to music from that speaker.
iTunes integration is excellent as before. Some sort of bug-fix now has made data backup worthy faster, and both iTunes and the Touch now sport a modern kind of lustrous playlist that is called 'Genius'. Initially, I wasn't impressed by this feature. Although iTunes 8 has had this feature I regarded it primarily as a well executed unusual arrangement to sell song and hence didn't utilize it. On my iPod, however (which only carries a subset of my library due to memory contraints), this feature literally rocks. On my first day alone it had me re-discover five songs I never knew I had (distinguished less liked) .
On the downside, the Touch detached does not serve playlist groups, which is a constant annoyance to me. I'm also disappointed to behold that the Touch detached can't synch wirelessly, nor can it be stale to access shared playlists (other than downloading them, of course) . An application in the App store offers this functionality, albeit only for non-DRM'd titles, proving the point that this is possible.
Images (from iPhoto) can also be synched to the Touch, and nothing is more fun than showing off your iPod's capabilities using a nice characterize and 'pinch' and 'swipe'. Interestingly (or rather: unfortunately), iTunes appears to down-sample huge images to a smaller resolution, probably to conserve memory. This may manufacture sense, but I would like to be able to have more control over this feature (i.e. resolve myself what the image's resolution on the iPod should be) .
Accessories - the Spacious Abominable Gross
Unfortunately, Apple has changed the pin-out (*again*) for the iPod connector. As a result, some 'made for iPod' accessories either don't work, or don't work fully any more. For example, my Altec Lansing active speakers can't charge the Touch any more (it was able to charge the 1st gen Touch) . This is truly, truly annoying as you don't know if your iPod works with your 'made for iPod' devices any longer, and makes purchasing recent accessories a game of chance. My car has a (hideously expensive) iPod integration that luckily collected works (including re-charging) . Calm, the iPod connector compatibility (or lack thereof) is becoming a titanic mess. Objective imagine you want to purchase an accessory for your kid or friend, and too slow acquire out that it does not work with it.
WiFi / Internet
A year ago I purchased an iPod, and got a fully integrated web accesory kit. As it turned out, the addition of WiFi and corpulent internet access is a killer feature to me. The web browser (a mobile version of Safari) is very beneficial. Mighty has been said about the fact that Mobile Safari does not encourage Flash. This is annoying if you visit sites that consume it. The pinch/slide gesture-based interface works so well that I regularely utilize the Touch for normal web surfing. The general experience has increased over the past few month, no doubt in no slight amounts due to the fact that many sites have beed re-designed with the iPhone in mind. Since the Touch's browser is exactly the same, it inherits the aid. WiFi hasten is gracious (although it collected uses the 802.11b/g, not the n variant) - and mostly depends on the hotspot you are connected to. It remembers the hotspots it has connected to (remarkable like a laptop would), and can also connect using WPA. There are other Web enabled applications that approach with the iPod (Maps, which can pinpoint your site by the location of hotspots conclude to you), Stocks, YouTube, and Weather, which are nice, but mighty. WiFi reception range is average, but definitely below that of some PC laptops.
Then, the Touch also comes with Mail, Calendar and Adressboock, and these do become killer fieatures, especially when coupled with an Exchange server or (as Apple would choose) MobileMe. Mail supports 'push' technology, meaning that (almost) as soon an there is an incoming mail (and your Touch is connected to a hotspot), you are notified by a cramped discreep 'bleep'. Reading emails, including mails with rich thunder works very well. Composing any but the shortes emails, on the other hand, is bothersome, verging on annoying due to the shrimp virtual keyboard) . Serene, simply being able to do this makes all the contrast. Live Calender updates have saved my bacon a few times already, as you do not have to remember to actively synch your iPod after you have made a change to the calender.
Integration with Exchange (at the point of writing) remains a tad spotty, with no messages appearing for s few hours, and then suddenly many appearing at once (I initially suspected a configuration hiss on the Exchange Server, but this appears not to be the case) . Depending upon how you configure MobileMe on your Mac, the results are similar to what you can put a question to from Exchange (with the dissimilarity, of course, that Apple is running the servers for you) . Unfortunately, MobileMe currently does not synch your Notes.
Nicely executed is the integrated iTunes store. While possibly honest another mechanism to generate sales, I simply like the fact that if I hear or remember a song, I can almost always instantly hold it and have it on my touch within seconds. Songs purchased on the Touch synchronize attend to your main library in iTunes (into a rather amusing 'Purchased on Touch' playlist) . If a download has to quit because the network connection was lost (or for any other reasons), it will continue as soon as the connection to the Internet is restored.
Interestingly, the touch sports (I'm a sucker for lame puns) the required hardware to connect to the 'Nike + iPod' sports accessories built-in (i.e. you do not have to connect the dongle) . I say interestingly because these devices expend the bluetooth frequency band, yet the Touch does not benefit bluetooth devices (headphones, mikes, car integration and printers arrive to mind) . Since I utilize a budge for work-out, this is not a must-have feature for me.
Applications/App Store
If Mail, Calendar and Browser are killer apps, Apple has added another killer feature to the Touch (and iPhone) that expands the device's usability (and customizability) by orders of magnitude: the App store. In appearance similar to the iTunes Store, here you can settle from literally hundrets of applictions (of greatly varying quality, though), acquire and install them instantly. Prices race from free to roughly 10 USD (there are some more expensive titles, but the majority are priced at a couple of USD) . The apps are presented in three different ways ('featured', 'top', browse by category), plus you have the ability to search for keywords.
Although the 'signal to noise' ratio isn't that ample (there are quite a lot of useless or awfully executed applications), there are some jaw-droppingly expedient apps that truly enhance your Touch. Among the first to mention is Apple's bear (free) 'Remote' app, which allows you to remote-control iTunes on your Mac or Apple TV - with real-time beefy visual feedback, and beefy search capability (allegedly, it is also a genuine boon for Apple TV users, as it provides a virtual keyboard as input means. Not having Apple TV, I can't comment on this) . Then there is an application that allows you to stream all your music (well, the unprotecte at least) to your Touch - over the Internet to wherever you are (interestingly, this App was not produced by Apple) .
Greatly enhancing the Touch's usability are eBook readers (the Touch is almost perfect for rading books, giving you that 'Star Trek' info pad feeling) as well as off-line news readers. Another valuable category are applications that enable you to easily transfer (and thought) files from your Mac/PC to the Touch. I would have expected Apple to integrate this feature into iTunes (perhaps rudimentary befriend for PDF), but third party providers are more than pleased to bridge this gap for you. And for the geeks there are VNC and SSH clients that finally allow them to control their server cluster using an iPod.
For those who want radio, there are lots of offerings for IP radios. Of course this means that your iPod must remain in range of a hotspot to spend this feature. Mine does, so I alos now have radio -- and re-discovered unbiased why I never missed it. I'm simply not a radio guy, I guess. I do know that many people miss it, and wish apple had gone the last mile and also added an FM tuner.
Two Apps I'm obvious that will reach soon at the App store is due to another addition to the Touch: back for extenal microphones. Apple's hi-end earphones have both a remote and mike built in, and are said to be compatible with the 2nd (and only 2nd) gen Touch. Audio heed pads, and VoIP apps (a la Skype) that allows phone functionality over WiFi are clear to follow soon (note: I have seen these apps available in the US stores; sadly they are not yet available here in Switzerland Also, I justify Apple's docs that the 2nd gen Touch supports external microphones, as they have not yet shipped the combined mike/remote headphones to me) .
And then there are games. They currently are the biggest category of all applications. The Touch, with it's integrated accelerometer, 480x320 color conceal and touch interface makes a nice gaming design, and developers have approach up with some truly fun and innovative games ('Toy Bot' may attend as a tremendous example) . Apple may have realized that this is becoming an increasingly primary aspect of the Touch: the Gen 2 design sports a speaker that makes miniature sense - except to improve the gaming experience (contain me: playing an accelerometer-based game with headphones on can be verry puny fun when it gets enchanting) . And improving the experience it does. The Touch is ill proper for classic 'control pad' based games (e.g. Tetris, Pac Man), and most of their Touch adaptations suffer accordingly. Other games, however, adapt nicely to touch/accelerometer input (Monkey Ball, Fracture Cart etc), or are a natural fit (Labyrinth, Sudoku, Solitair, Othello)
Super-geeks can also download the iPhone/Touch SDK and develop their gain applications. This is not for the faint of heart, as you first download a few gigabytes (Apple's XCode development environment), and then will have to code in Objective-C (an extension to standard C) and consume the Cocoa framework. Plus, you'll need a Mac to do so. The environment is actually very first-rate, and includes an iPhone simulator to test your software before deployment.
I should mention that most of the improvements (with the exception of the hardware upgrades: mike serve, built-in nike relieve, volume buttons and battery life) can be had for free on your 1st gen Touch (if you have the 2.0 Update), or a couple of bucks if you havn't upgraded yet. Unless you (like me) want the larger memory (my first gen only has 16GB), the decision to upgrade to 2nd gen may be difficult.
Summary:
The 2nd generation iPod Touch is an almost perfect way. It combines noble video/audio, world-class UI, huge casual gaming, hundrets of apps, and pudgy access to the Internet into a single, exquisite package. To sum it up neatly: Untouchable. Well -- almost. It has one great flaw if you have invested in accessories: it may not be compatible with them, as Apple has changed the iPod connector pin-out (again) . With those reservations, I recommend the Touch to anyone. Also great: owners of the 1st gen Touch can accept most of these goodies with a simple, inexpensive software upgrade.
Hits
+ substantial exhibit
+ profitable audio
+ gesture-based interface
+ accelerometer for controls
+ expansive integration with your music library (via iTunes)
+ long battery life
+ wireless music store
+ wireless App store (killer feature)
+ Speaker for gaming
+ Mail, Calendar and Address book with Push
+ WiFi Internet (killer feature)
+ Remote App (free) for your PC/Mac's iTunes/AppleTV
+ SDK freely available for anyone
+ Microphone and remote attend
+ Nike + iPod without dongle
Misses
- contrast with 'made for iPod' devices (poor, dreadful, awful)
- stainless steel backplate (fingerprints and scratches easily)
- no wireless synching
- no wireless playback of streamed iTunes jabber (an Appstore application can stream unprotected state, though)
- no visualizer
- no search function
- no playlist groups (why, oh why? )
- no GPS nor FM radio
- Notes not synched with MobileMe
- no hard drive mode
- no synching documents (except third party Apps)
- downsampling of photos
- currently tops out at 32GB (would have preferred 64)
- no bluetooth
The iPod Touch debuted only one year ago, and this is the first update. I was angry to seize up the novel iPod Touch at the Apple Store because I had never owned a first generation, though I do absorb iPhones.
I want to concentrate primarily on the unique features:
First, physical volume buttons are now placed on the side of the iPod Touch as they are on the iPhone. This is very convenient. It allows you to adjust the volume of your music, without having to pull the entire plot out of your pocket and activate the hide. A time saver.
Second, many people requested a built-in speaker for the iPod Touch like is available on the iPhone. Apple listened. However, there is one critical point to originate on this! The iPod Touch is incredibly little, and Apple is forced to keep an incredibly miniature speaker. The speaker in the iPod Touch sounds worst than the speaker in the iPhone. I have compared it side by side, and it's fairly necessary, and the iPhone speaker isn't that gargantuan to open with. However, in a peaceful room, the speaker is serene useful for previewing a song you might want to lift, or for playing games. However, detached, if you want big sound, you need to connect your headphones.
Genius - This unique feature is really surprisingly splendid. When you're listening to a song you luxuriate in, acquire the genius option. It will obtain a playlist for you, with songs that go together nicely with the one you started with. It helps you rediscover stout music from your collection with a playlist obedient to the mood you're in. I didn't reflect it would do a excellent job compiling this list, but it has been quite impressive.
Applications - It's titanic to have the ability to win (or collect some free) applications correct on the iPod Touch. Furthermore, with the software update this original iPod Touch comes with, the Application installation process is so distinguished smoother than it had been even on my iPhone. It now works how you want it to, seamlessly. I like having a weather application that includes doppler radar images, and that is free. I also have several games on it. There is a titanic variety of applications available from hundreds of third-parties accurate on the iPod itself, so you are determined to accept something that interests you. I really like the unique release of Spore, for the iPod Touch and iPhone. Apple is really pushing the games and quietly suggest they are keen Nintendo and Sony. They are innovative and consuming games, but I contemplate they have a ways to go, to challenge those game makers.
Nike + is now built in too, so if you have the shoes and the puck, the iPod Touch is ready to receive the data from it. Battery life is improved to 36 hours audio and 6 hours video according to Apple. I gather the audio number fairly factual if you don't light up the present great, but the video number is a limited bit harder to carry out.
Of course, the novel ipod Touch does spy and feel even better than the first generation, from my petite experiences with the previous one. I also assume it feels cooler than my iPhones, but obviously your interpretation may very. I like the metal benefit on the iPod Touch. It looks classy, though it is prone to scratches.
One of my current features continues to be, when in my home on Wi-Fi, to arrive down for the Touch, expend Safari web browser and peer something up. It's huge.
Overall, it was a solid update for the iPod Touch. I wish the speaker could be better on it, but I maintain that is due to the physical restrictions of the diminutive way. I could have knocked it to four stars for that, but I consider most people realize a built in speaker isn't the plot you want to listen to most audio on an iPod to launch with. I'm impressed by the second generation iPod Touch, and I assume with the third party applications getting better and becoming more well-liked, more people will think the Touch.
Obviously from all these other reviews this is by far the most functional product out there, and I'm not disputing that at all, I loved my Ipod touch, but they have a ridiculously short lifespan. The kicker is that if you as noteworthy as sweat on it or display it to hasty changing temperatures (as is celebrated in the upper midwest) your warranty is voided and your Ipod might not last long at all.
I impartial lost an Ipod touch due to moister condensation from taking it from 30 degree weather to 70 degree weather. That created enough condensation to lumber the water marker inside the Ipod which voids the warranty and shorted out the shroud. To top it off; that one was actually a replacement for another Ipod touch because the first one I got had a phone jack that broke within a month of normal utilize, and then this one had a atrocious conceal due to "water distress" and now Apple conveniently doesn't have to replace it anymore.
Just read some of the discussions on Apples region about Ipods and water hurt, it literally takes unbiased one topple of water to short it out and void the warranty.
So if your getting one my advice is to live somewhere that doesn't acquire too wintry or place you in situations that allow moisture condensation to happen.
