Is it me or are ipods getting worse?


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It is you that is getting worse.

If you had bad expierences with iPods, why not actually search and ask thru sites (such as Neowin) for cheaper and way better solutions?

hahaha "It is you that is getting worse"? sigh...

I honestly don't understand what you're complaining about. I'm not in need of a new mp3 player as I'm not ready to fork out another 150-odd-dollars. I'm here to simply state my experience with a product that seems to me to be rapidly declining in quality. Perhaps it's the best one out there, but you need to pay attention to what I wrote...I was stating my opinion of Apple's product and not asking for alternatives. yeesh.

Haven't had any problems with Apple products before. Including a 2nd Gen nano and a 1st Gen touch. I know my cousin has a 2nd Gen touch and that's fine.

Depends on personal experience I suppose, as does everything.

I've had two iPods. One was the 1st gen Nano, which I loved. My second one was an iPod Touch, 2nd Gen. I can't really compare the quality, as their two completely different models. But, I haven't had any issues with either of them if that counts.

Now, don't get me started on Apple Headphones though. Those are a joke, yet I continue to buy them. I just unboxed my 7th, yes, that's right, 7th pair. They sound amazing though, compared to how old my 6th pair got.

One thing that Steve Jobs managed to accomplish is to create a fanboy club on a mass scale. This crowd would be happy with whatever they are blessed with from apple. Put an apple logo on a potato bag, I bet you will see fanboys in the streets wearing it. They might even form lines in front of the stores before the launch day.

Come on, you are the customer. You are paying your/your dad's/your mom's hard earned cash. You have every right to complain, ask for more, and whine. And unless you do that, apple will milk you for every little small improvement they put on their products...The product quality will slide...

hahaha "It is you that is getting worse"? sigh...

I honestly don't understand what you're complaining about. I'm not in need of a new mp3 player as I'm not ready to fork out another 150-odd-dollars. I'm here to simply state my experience with a product that seems to me to be rapidly declining in quality. Perhaps it's the best one out there, but you need to pay attention to what I wrote...I was stating my opinion of Apple's product and not asking for alternatives. yeesh.

I'm here to simply state my opinion that you should leave this product/brand which has always been declining and looks for alternatives when it breaks or when you look for a new media player. There are 100s of better and cheaper choices out there.

Im just stating my opinion out of your expierences.

I own a 2nd gen touch, can't say it's low on quality, it's probably the most solid and durable small electronic device I've used for some time. But some design choices are terrible. As someone else said, the metal backplate is so sensitive to scratches it's unbelievable how they could end up putting that on a portable device.

I've owned a 4G iPod (not the color one), an iPod Touch 1G and now an iPhone 3GS.

My first iPod always worked well, but at the end, I could hear some "ticks" from the hard drive, and the battery couldn't last much more than an hour. After like 3 years that...

My iPod Touch 1G lasted a year and a half, because I sold it to someone else. It was pretty great, but thought it was too slow with all my apps installed on it, and the newest firmwares, etc.

Now my iPhone 3GS is perfect, except that the battery life doesn't last me more than a day. Ok, I'm fully using it though. I don't just make 2-3 calls a day, I don't send just 2-3 text messages a day, and I don't just listen to music. It's a full combination of all of these, multiplied by 3-4 :p But seriously, if they had to make a new iPhone with a battery twice, or thrice as good, I'd sell mine and get a new one.

The quality of all these devices is / was awesome for their eras though. I can't say the quality has lowered, more like the opposite. Back then, an iPod was pretty much a hard drive, an audio jack and a firmware. Now it's much more complicated than this. We get Wi-Fi (just getting the Internet on such device makes it 10x more complex already), Photo and video cameras, applications, games (more advanced APIs and firmware), Radio signals, Bluetooth, GPS, compass, etc.

I agree they've had issues.

My first gen iPod Touch was replaced only after I used it a few times. The replacement seems to be working since.

My first gen iPhone was replaced 3 times. The last replacement had a terrible screen. Dead pixels galore, but I was out of warranty, I decided to try one more time and upgrade to the 3G in April this year. So far so good, although as of this week it's starting to randomly shut off. I did a restore and it seems to be working correctly again.

Battery life is terrible though. I can't go a day with out charging... under moderate usage.

I don't think my next phone will be an iPhone.

Like shockz I have an iPhone, but the 3GS. The battery life is laughable, only giving me a full day per charge, unlike my 2g iPhone that gave me 3-4 days.

As for mp3 plays I've had great success with sandisk sansa player, lasting me years already with no issues, other than the outdated interface and unable to update firmware.

Apple it appears, maybe losing their touch, their last press conference was terrible. Hopefully they pick up their game in 2010 and male better iPods or I can see people like you picking up a zune HD

I suggest both of you to jailbreak your phones and install 'sbsettings. From there you can turn 3G off on the fly as well as Wireless, Bluetooth etc, this helps with battery life greatly and I'm sure there are plenty of members here who will agree with me.

I have a first-generation iPod Touch, and I've had no problems with it. With a nice thick, plastic Griffin case, it's survived numerous falls unscathed. My only complaint is the pathetic battery life, especially when using wifi. Jailbreaking it gave me lots of cool options, but it cut about 30% from the battery life. I'm seriously considering buying one of those external battery cases...

I agree their quality control has slipped. I like my iPod touch, but battery life when you have the screen on for something like gaming is truly awful, but its better when MP3's are played. However due to the dumbed down nature of the OS, I am still not overly sure I want to leave Android for an iPhone. Other thing that grips me is the metallic back on the touch scratches and fingerprints really easily, and is a PITA to clean. My G1's plastic is still almost totally scratch free and very easy to clean despite me having had the phone for about 9 months now.

My iPhone seems to be of decent quality. I mean there's nothing that really annoys me too much. What does annoy me is that it crashes a ton however since the latest firmware update it hasn't frozen yet, however it has crashed while browsing or just using an app frequently. I'm probably going to try to get a Zune Phone if one of those ever comes out.

1) With regards to quality, I haven't really had any problems with the iPods I've owned. I've owned the 1st Gen Nano, 4th Gen Nano, 2nd Gen Shuffle, and bought my mother a 1st Gen Shuffle. I haven't had a problem with any of them quality wise.

2) Now, regarding the iPods slipping, I think that Apple is running out of ideas, or at least hitting a wall at the moment. The last releases were abysmal... I was thoroughly disappointed.

Hopefully the Zune HD will get some traction, as it looks like a really nice music player. Until Apple has strong competition, I don't think we'll see the advancement, quality, and price that people are clamoring for.

1) With regards to quality, I haven't really had any problems with the iPods I've owned.

Me neither. I've owned several from several different generations and they have worked well for me.

2) Now, regarding the iPods slipping, I think that Apple is running out of ideas, or at least hitting a wall at the moment. The last releases were abysmal... I was thoroughly disappointed.

I think full featured players is the next generation. The iPod has had a fantastic run but it's day is nearly over. The Touch and even phones with mp3 capabilities will be the next big thing, at least I think so. Why have two or three things doing something one could do?

I still think the Classic is there BEST iPod.

I only wish it had a radio and came in white. I don't care about a camera, or apps, or any of that other stuff. I just want better audio quality.

I rather like my iPod Nano (4G) and I'll probably keep it for a while (past the newest one because it's not a very good upgrade...) so far I've not had one problem. Well apart from 1-2 lock ups, easily sorted though :p

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