Top 10 Reasons I Hate My iPod
Ten Reasons I Hate My iPod
Ok so I know if I posted this on /. It would get modded down as flamebait, and after reading this half the geeks in the world are going to hate me, but I am going to state this out loud……I don’t like the iPod. I will say that it is the best mp3 player on the market but it could be better. It’s just not great. Maybe it’s the fact that I am not an Apple guru. I live, support, and work in a MS world. Maybe it is that great and I don’t know it because it’s all I have ever used. Maybe I am crazy…..I don’t know…but below are the top 10 reasons I hate my iPod.
1. It doesn’t work well with Windows. – Now I know what you are saying. Who cares? It’s made by Apple. The problem is, if it were made by another vendor, let’s say Creative, it would have great Windows operability built in. 9 out of 10 times I have problems with my iPod it is with the way it communicates with the Windows OS. I have problems were my PC won’t see the iPod and I have to reinstall the software at least once a month. As long as MS owns 90 some odd percent of the market Apple can’t ignore this. Now if you look at just the people who own iPods I would venture to say that it’s a 50/50 market share, but in my opinion it is obvious that Apple made the iPod work just well enough with Windows to make me want to buy a Mac.
2. You have to use iTunes to put music on it. – That’s right. By design, the only way to move music to the iPod is through iTunes. Now there may be applications out there that will get you around this built in limitation, but straight out of the box, with no hacks, you have to add all of your music to your iPod through iTunes. iTunes isn’t bad, but I like some of the other mp3 applications on the market better. I would prefer the ability to just drag and drop files and have the iPod pick them up.
3. The headphone jack is not a perfect line out. – If you want to hook your iPod up to your home stereo or to your car’s stereo deck, the only way to get true, non-distorted audio is to use the line out port that is on the dock. Even with the EQ off, the audio isn’t pure. See reason 4 why that sucks.
4. The accessories are expensive. – My iPod came with one dock, a firewire cable, the USB 2.0 cable, and the power adapter. The problem is that I need two docks. New docks are 39.99 at most stores. That’s not too bad, except it is ONLY for the dock. Add on 39.99 for more cables and then another 39.99 for a separate power adapter and suddenly you are looking at 120.00 for accessories. I might as well just buy an iPod Shuffle. Of course if you own a BMW you might expect to pay to keep it up.
5. You can’t keep it clean. – The iPod is a beautiful piece of hardware. Fresh out of the box, the iPod looks like it belongs in an Operating Room. It’s glossy white front cover and stainless steel back are truly a work of art. Now fast forward 6 months. The white is turning brown and for the life of me I can’t keep the fingerprints off the steel case. And everything it comes in contact with scratches the shit out of the player.
6. You can’t find a decent case that still allows you to dock the iPod – Speaking of scratches; I thought that I would buy as case as soon as possible to prevent scratches on my iPod. I looked all over for a good case that would allow me to dock the iPod and I have found very few. You think it would be easy to design a good case that the bottom snaps off or create a slightly oversized dock that allows you to put the iPod in with a case on it. That would be worth 40 bucks to me. Instead, I had to buy one of those cheap iSkin cases off of Ebay and cut about a ½ inch off the bottom of it. Still scratches the shit out of the iPod every time I dock it.
7. If the battery runs down, you have to Shuffle your songs again. – I have about 9000 songs on my iPod. I use the shuffle feature more than any playlist I have because I like random music. The problem is that if I let the battery die, I have to Shuffle again. This is trivial I know, but Apple could have tied the shuffle memory into a small lithium ion battery backup just like what my PDA has to keep my data save in the event the battery dies.
8. The battery – Just the battery in general. When I first got my unit, I thought the battery was great. It would go for about 13 hours before I had to charge it. Which is awesome…but in 5 short months, that time has dropped to about 7 hours between charges. Once it dies, the only way to replace it is to send it to Apple. This is something else they could have done a better job with. If I can change the battery in my PDA, my cellphone, my cordless phone at home, and my digital camera, I should be able to swap it out in my iPod without killing the warranty or frying the unit.
9. The click wheel – In general the click wheel is a great innovation. It keeps the design simple and attractive. My problem with it is that when you have the amount of songs I have on my iPod (800 artists, 1200 albums, over 9000 songs) using the click wheel to scroll through the playlists is a carpal tunnel nightmare. If Apple would just put a hotkey on the iPod to jump 20 or 50 artists/albums/songs down the list it would eliminate this problem.
10. People use it as a fashion statement. – Everyone here has either seen these people or you are one of these people. On the bus, on the way to work, walking through the mall, they are holding their iPod like it’s their first born son, white headphones in their ears, dancing gaily (not as in homosexually as in happily, merrily, without a care in the world) like one of those idiots in the iPod commercials. OKAY SO YOU HAVE AN iPOD. Congratulations. It’s not like anyone with 400 bucks can’t go get one too. Jeez……
Ok so I know if I posted this on /. It would get modded down as flamebait, and after reading this half the geeks in the world are going to hate me, but I am going to state this out loud……I don’t like the iPod. I will say that it is the best mp3 player on the market but it could be better. It’s just not great. Maybe it’s the fact that I am not an Apple guru. I live, support, and work in a MS world. Maybe it is that great and I don’t know it because it’s all I have ever used. Maybe I am crazy…..I don’t know…but below are the top 10 reasons I hate my iPod.
1. It doesn’t work well with Windows. – Now I know what you are saying. Who cares? It’s made by Apple. The problem is, if it were made by another vendor, let’s say Creative, it would have great Windows operability built in. 9 out of 10 times I have problems with my iPod it is with the way it communicates with the Windows OS. I have problems were my PC won’t see the iPod and I have to reinstall the software at least once a month. As long as MS owns 90 some odd percent of the market Apple can’t ignore this. Now if you look at just the people who own iPods I would venture to say that it’s a 50/50 market share, but in my opinion it is obvious that Apple made the iPod work just well enough with Windows to make me want to buy a Mac.
2. You have to use iTunes to put music on it. – That’s right. By design, the only way to move music to the iPod is through iTunes. Now there may be applications out there that will get you around this built in limitation, but straight out of the box, with no hacks, you have to add all of your music to your iPod through iTunes. iTunes isn’t bad, but I like some of the other mp3 applications on the market better. I would prefer the ability to just drag and drop files and have the iPod pick them up.
3. The headphone jack is not a perfect line out. – If you want to hook your iPod up to your home stereo or to your car’s stereo deck, the only way to get true, non-distorted audio is to use the line out port that is on the dock. Even with the EQ off, the audio isn’t pure. See reason 4 why that sucks.
4. The accessories are expensive. – My iPod came with one dock, a firewire cable, the USB 2.0 cable, and the power adapter. The problem is that I need two docks. New docks are 39.99 at most stores. That’s not too bad, except it is ONLY for the dock. Add on 39.99 for more cables and then another 39.99 for a separate power adapter and suddenly you are looking at 120.00 for accessories. I might as well just buy an iPod Shuffle. Of course if you own a BMW you might expect to pay to keep it up.
5. You can’t keep it clean. – The iPod is a beautiful piece of hardware. Fresh out of the box, the iPod looks like it belongs in an Operating Room. It’s glossy white front cover and stainless steel back are truly a work of art. Now fast forward 6 months. The white is turning brown and for the life of me I can’t keep the fingerprints off the steel case. And everything it comes in contact with scratches the shit out of the player.
6. You can’t find a decent case that still allows you to dock the iPod – Speaking of scratches; I thought that I would buy as case as soon as possible to prevent scratches on my iPod. I looked all over for a good case that would allow me to dock the iPod and I have found very few. You think it would be easy to design a good case that the bottom snaps off or create a slightly oversized dock that allows you to put the iPod in with a case on it. That would be worth 40 bucks to me. Instead, I had to buy one of those cheap iSkin cases off of Ebay and cut about a ½ inch off the bottom of it. Still scratches the shit out of the iPod every time I dock it.
7. If the battery runs down, you have to Shuffle your songs again. – I have about 9000 songs on my iPod. I use the shuffle feature more than any playlist I have because I like random music. The problem is that if I let the battery die, I have to Shuffle again. This is trivial I know, but Apple could have tied the shuffle memory into a small lithium ion battery backup just like what my PDA has to keep my data save in the event the battery dies.
8. The battery – Just the battery in general. When I first got my unit, I thought the battery was great. It would go for about 13 hours before I had to charge it. Which is awesome…but in 5 short months, that time has dropped to about 7 hours between charges. Once it dies, the only way to replace it is to send it to Apple. This is something else they could have done a better job with. If I can change the battery in my PDA, my cellphone, my cordless phone at home, and my digital camera, I should be able to swap it out in my iPod without killing the warranty or frying the unit.
9. The click wheel – In general the click wheel is a great innovation. It keeps the design simple and attractive. My problem with it is that when you have the amount of songs I have on my iPod (800 artists, 1200 albums, over 9000 songs) using the click wheel to scroll through the playlists is a carpal tunnel nightmare. If Apple would just put a hotkey on the iPod to jump 20 or 50 artists/albums/songs down the list it would eliminate this problem.
10. People use it as a fashion statement. – Everyone here has either seen these people or you are one of these people. On the bus, on the way to work, walking through the mall, they are holding their iPod like it’s their first born son, white headphones in their ears, dancing gaily (not as in homosexually as in happily, merrily, without a care in the world) like one of those idiots in the iPod commercials. OKAY SO YOU HAVE AN iPOD. Congratulations. It’s not like anyone with 400 bucks can’t go get one too. Jeez……
posted by Josh Corder at 10:30 AM
26 Comments:
Dude, if you hate it, I'll totally take it off your hands.
People shouldn't be dissing this article -- it's a point of view, so get real and realize that everyone in the world has an opinion. I personally disagree strongly on lots of the points made (iTunes is an awesome piece of software and the usability of the iPod is why people fall in love with it when they buy it) but it's an interesting article nonetheless. Glad you weer brave enough to write/post it, dude. :)
Thanks to everyone for their comments good and bad. I wrote the article because I got tired of everyone blowing the iPod day in and day out. It is a great invention and I love mine to death, but it is not the end all be all. It is just as flawed as 90% of the products out there. Thank you again to everyone who has bitched and called me stupid and offered to take the iPod off my hands and even give me props for sticking my foot in my mouth. Later.
lithium ion battery for the "shuffle memory"?
the ipod is a fucking hard drive - THINK.
i suggest ephpod.
it's far better than itunes and even copies music off if you want to snag mp3s from someone else's ipod.
heres a link to where i voiced my opinion on each of ur reasons
http://www.livejournal.com/community/ipod/1411409.html?mode=reply&style=mine
Donut,
I cannot express my appreciation that you would take the time to create a whole page of rebuttal to my bitch about my iPod.
However, arguing online is like getting a gold medal in the Special Olympics. Even when you win, you are still a retard.
People keep forgetting that state plainly that I love my iPod. If I have my pants on, I have my iPod with me. But those are the 10 things I hate the most about the unit.
Freedom of Speech does allow me to bitch.
Thanks again for all the hits everyone!
However, arguing online is like getting a gold medal in the Special Olympics. Even when you win, you are still a retard.
Disgusting.
Item two doesn’t make sense to me. You can use the iPod as a drive like any music player and drag music to it to use.. At least that was true with the 3G (Not sure about fourth generation, I haven’t tried)
Item one maybe a case with you, mine connected the first time with all 4 of our iPods and never had a problem on Windows xp or 2000.
The others are very true whether I agree or not. But you missed more problems, such as the ability to record and transfer audio on the 4G model which is built in but requires accessories.
Speaking of accessories, Hate it $40 bucks less with the Apple iPod Stereo Connection Kit with Monster Cable. Only $79! Wow that’s just the cost of 80 songs (still outrageous isn’t it)
This comment has been removed by a blog administrator.
This is my little (semi-long) rebuttal, just to address a few of your points. Note that I'm an avid Mac-non-enthusiast. Hate the damn things.
1. It doesn’t work well with Windows.
From point 2 I guess you are speaking purely in terms of hardware not being recognized. I have found that that is, invariably, a Windows problem. Nothing personal here, but I know the iPod, I know Windows, and I have been working with computers on a professional level for 20+ years now. The iPod, as far as Windows cares, is an external hard drive. That's it. There's no magic there, it uses simple, standard, hard drive drivers. The same drivers that power your tiny little USB drive power *all* iPod connectivity.
2. You have to use iTunes to put music on it.
I'll admit, iTunes and the iPod Updater software do kinda suck. They try to do too much, and they do it badly. Nearly all connectivity related problems are the fault of these programs.
The solution here is obvious: Don't use 'em. That's right. Every major music playing app out there for the PC has an iPod plugin for it:
foobar 2000 has foo_pod (by far the best, better than iTunes in terms of capabilities).
Winamp has mlipod (works great).
There's also EphPod, JRiver Media Center, Anapod explorer, half a dozen others..
The only major exception is Windows Media Player, and if you look real, real hard at the WMP10 SDK, they seemingly went out of their way to disable anybody from writing an iPod plugin for it.
My point being that if you have a 9000+ song library, then you must have some form of organizing program. Odds are that it has something to support the iPod, somehow. If it doesn't, then tell them to contact me and I'll GIVE them the code to do it. Free. Supports MORE functionality than iTunes does. BSD licensed, so they can do anything they like with it. otto at tivofan dot com. Let me know.
3. The headphone jack is not a perfect line out.
Fair enough, but this could be said about any MP3 player. No headphone jack will ever be a perfect line out, because of the need for amplification on that jack. The iPod has a fairly shitty built in amp, but it's passable. Anyway, build a dock into your car or stick one next to the stereo.
4. The accessories are expensive.
No argument here. You do pay the Apple tax to get Apple product. I wish I had something more to add.
5. You can’t keep it clean.
I've had mine for well over a year, and my suggestion is to wash your hands more often. The white turned brown? Seriously? This is the only place I've ever heard that one. The scratches on the back I agree with, but brown? Wow.
6. You can’t find a decent case that still allows you to dock the iPod
Again, no argument. I consider it a design flaw.
7. If the battery runs down, you have to Shuffle your songs again.
I honestly have no idea what you're saying about here. If you mean that if you let it run down and the shuffle order is lost, then yeah, but big deal, reshuffle. Shuffle is random, you know? If you want a technical solution, create some smart playlists to sort at random but which don't include music played in the last X amount of time. The newer iPods are smart, they will keep that up to date in real time. No need to resync to a computer for the playlists to update themselves.
8. The battery
Honestly, I sorta agree here. However, you also mentioned letting the battery die. That's really not something you should do to a LiON battery. Charge early, charge often. You'll get a much, much longer life that way. And since the warrenty does suck anyway, why not buy new batts from ipodbattery.com or any of the other third party battery makers? They're better than the factory batteries, really.
9. The click wheel
No argument.
10. People use it as a fashion statement.
I've honestly not seen this, but still, no argument. People suck. :)
Anyway, that's my rebuttal. Take it for what it's worth.
arguing online is like getting a gold medal in the Special Olympics. Even when you win, you are still a retard.
Betcha think your funny. Yeah, sure you do.
This statement, along with your *ingenious* suggestion of adding PRAM to a hard drive, provides a nice demonstration why evolution tends always to endow the breathtakingly stupid with jawdropping insensitivity ... because without it, the result is inevitably suicide.
Oh my god! The iPods not perfect? That really sucks, every other computer product on the market is perfect, how could this imperfection exist! KILL THE PEOPLE WHO MADE IT! How dare they not make a product that fits every person in every situation with every combination of windows and intel garbage at every moment. Dell is so much better, have you seen that great Dell DJ? In the history of that product only two have ever needed a repair. Of course, they've only sold 16. If it sucks so much why don't you make one that's better? No, you would rather just complain to those of us that work 16 hour days to produce innovative products at Apple.
People keep telling me how stupid I am that I suggested that my iPod should remember it is on song 324 of 9104 when I shuffle the song and the battery dies. But how hard can this be? If every other player in the world can do this, so should my iPod. All it would take would be to right a playlist file to the hard drive with the song order and then a small piece of code that remembers it's place in line. This is APPLE for christ's sake.
Otto, thank you for the first educated response I have seen on this post. Appreciated.
What a bunch of nonsense about nothing!
Jesus Fucking Christ, get off the guys cock already. He stated a point of view and you disagree with it. Boo fucking hoo? Get over it.
I felt a bit torn now that I've read a few of your comments. I guess that this list is really more of a list of things you would really like to see addressed in future mp3 players that are going to try and be better than the iPod.
On first reading, though, it appears that you were running the gambit of every complaint I've heard about the iPod on sites where people are just trying to attack the latest trendy device. If you truely do love your iPod and use it so much, I can see this list as an informed opinion that collects every grumble that your iPod drawn out of you.
You are not alone with these gripes. I've read just about all of them elsewhere, and I think it would quite smart of Apple's engineers to take a good look at them and pick out a few for consideration in the next generation. If they don't, I think it's pretty certain that a great many people with iPods will be switching over to another device.
The Apple-zealot in me bubbles with discontent at reading your thoughts, but the technophile in me is impressed with such as complete listing of the traditional complaints against the iPod. All you really need is a good paragraph giving the iTunes Music Store's DRM a verbal lashing to make it totally comprehensive.
Stephen,
Thanks for the feedback. I actually have no problems with the acc format. Other than the fact that most hardware outside of apple's realm won't read it. Like the mp3 player in my car. I can't burn an acc file to a cd-rw and have it recognize it. But it's their format and I understand it. And there are ways around it :)
Thanks again guys for visiting my rant. If you don't mind, click on one of my sponsor links while you are here.
Thanks again!
I hate the ipod as well. I didn't buy one. I am just as content with my cheesy Lycra MP3 player which provides just enough music for me to workout to ...POwER tO the PeOpLE
The reason why some people (like me) hate ipod so much, is because no matter how many times you tell an ipod owner that there are better things out on the market, much much better, the ipod guy will just turn head sideways, think for about 25 seconds, agree with you, then go about his ipod business. People see white little ipods everywhere, and more people want some, they are epidemic (mainly because of the glossy clean look). The disadvantages are many, and the only thing i could find nice about it is the convenient size. Nothing More!
Also about the "apple tax" because you are getting apple quality/
that is just plain stupid.
do research, compare, think! stop following crowds.
I love having a 24hr battery life. 40 gb of space, better audio quality, and the ability to change the battery as many times as i can without sending in my creative mp3 player back to the manufacturer. I like the drag and drop abilities.. and the organizers, gosh. plenty of them out there that do just as good of a job if not better than itunes software.
Did i mention i also paid $100 less than i would have if i found a comparable iPod?
Cool blog. You have put a lot of effort in here.
I have a mp3 player usb related site.
Come and check it out if you get time :-)
Kerry
Hi Josh Corder, I found your site while doing a search for audio video accessories. You've gor some great stuff here! Although not exactly related to what I was looking for, it still provided for an interesting read. Keep up the good work!
Good blog. I take my hat off to you. You’ve put lots of thought in here. If you are interested, go see my creative mp3 player related site. It’s still growing but you may still find something of interest.
Kerry
Good blog. I take my hat off to you. You’ve put lots of thought in here. If you are interested, go see my creative mp3 player zen related site. It’s still growing but you may still find something of interest.
Kerry
Hey Josh Corder, great blog! Keep it up.
I have a http://www.coolest-mp3-players.com mp3players site. It pretty much covers mp3players related stuff.
Come and have a look if you get time :-)
Wow, I was just messing around and found your page!
Very nice.
If you are interested, go see my digital mp3players related site.
It isnt anything fancy but you might still find something of interest.
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