Steve Jobs Unveils All New iPod Line Up

[Michael Essany]

Calling it the entree of the event, Steve Jobs had quite an announcement for iPod lovers.

Apple has sold 275 million iPods to date, Jobs noted, adding that Apple has never rested on its laurels. This year Apple is rolling out new designs for every iPod model. It's the "Biggest change in the iPod lineup ever."

First up in rolling out the strongest line up of iPods ever released is the Shuffle. The new one has buttons (Jobs indicated that people missed the buttons), voice over, playlists, and serves up 15 hours of battery life. It's even smaller than the second generation iPod Shuffle.

Essentially, the new VoiceOver button located on top of iPod shuffle will enable users to hear the name of the song that is currently playing, allowing for convenient, easy switching between, songs, playlists or Genius Mixes.

"We're making the iPod shuffle even better by combining clickable buttons and VoiceOver technology, so users can find and enjoy their music without ever looking at their iPod shuffle," said Jobs. "With its all-aluminum enclosure and built-in clip the new iPod shuffle is a great workout companion, and at just $49 it's a great entry-level iPod that almost everyone can afford."

It will be available for pre-order today and shipping begins next week.

Info on the iPod Touch
Info on the iPod Nano

iPod Shuffle press release:

SAN FRANCISCO—September 1, 2010—Apple® today announced the new redesigned iPod shuffle® which features both clickable “ring” buttons and Apple’s innovative VoiceOver technology, enabling users to easily navigate their music and playlists without ever looking at their iPod shuffle. The new wearable iPod shuffle has an all-aluminum enclosure with a built-in clip and comes in five brilliant colors—silver, blue, green, orange and pink. With nearly 50 percent more battery life, the new iPod shuffle features over 15 hours of music playback on a single battery charge* and offers 2GB of storage for just $49.

“We’re making the iPod shuffle even better by combining clickable buttons and VoiceOver technology, so users can find and enjoy their music without ever looking at their iPod shuffle,” said Steve Jobs, Apple’s CEO. “With its all-aluminum enclosure and built-in clip the new iPod shuffle is a great workout companion, and at just $49 it's a great entry-level iPod that almost everyone can afford.”

iPod shuffle is based on Apple’s incredibly popular shuffle feature, which randomly selects songs from a user’s music library. The clickable buttons make the new iPod shuffle even easier to use. Press the center button to play and pause, press the outer buttons to skip forward and back or adjust the volume up and down.

The new VoiceOver button on top of iPod shuffle allows users to hear the name of the currently playing song and to switch between songs, playlists or Genius Mixes. VoiceOver speaks 25 different languages and even alerts users when their battery needs charging.

The new iPod shuffle now supports Genius Mixes, the popular iTunes® feature that automatically creates mixes from songs in a user’s music library that go great together. Genius Mixes provide the perfect way to rediscover music users already have, but may not have listened to recently.

iPod® is the world’s most popular family of digital music players with over a quarter billion sold. Apple’s new holiday lineup includes a brand new iPod shuffle for just $49; the remarkable new iPod nano® with Multi-Touch™ starting at $149; the incredible new iPod touch with Retina™ display, Apple’s A4 chip, FaceTime®, HD video recording and Game Center starting at just $229; and iPod classic® in a 160GB model for $249.

Pricing & Availability
The fourth generation iPod shuffle will be available next week for a suggested price of $49 (US) for a 2GB model in silver, blue, green, orange and pink through the Apple Store® (www.apple.com), Apple’s retail stores and Apple Authorized Resellers. iPod shuffle comes with Apple Earphones and the iPod shuffle USB cable. iPod shuffle requires a Mac® with a USB 2.0 port, Mac OS® X v10.5.8 or later and iTunes 10 or later; or a Windows PC with a USB 2.0 port and Windows 7, Windows Vista, Windows XP Home or Professional (Service Pack 3) or later.

*Battery life and number of charge cycles vary by use and settings. See www.apple.com/batteries for more information.

Apple designs Macs, the best personal computers in the world, along with OS X, iLife, iWork, and professional software. Apple leads the digital music revolution with its iPods and iTunes online store. Apple is reinventing the mobile phone with its revolutionary iPhone and App Store, and has recently introduced its magical iPad which is defining the future of mobile media and computing devices.

[plcrules]

Am i the only 1 that noticed they took the camera outta the nano

[faridsoto]

Me too, LOL

[Barquey]

The new ipod touch is literally the iphone 4 without the cellular radios.

[M4tt Dam0n]

Theyre slowly transiting into touch. 20 bucks the buttons will be gone in 10 years for all models except the classic... Gotta evolve I guess but buttons are great because you don't have to look at the device. But at least theres the headset with the buttons for quick music access.

[flippy]

FINALLY the ipod touch gets a camera

[M4tt Dam0n]

The new ipod touch is literally the iphone 4 without the cellular radios.

Yeah, internet everywhere is what makes the iPhone so much better and it's your phone so you always have it on you. But the thing I like about the touch is that it's so damn thin omg. It's like half the iphone 4.

Do you guys think that Ping thing will pick up? Its built in into iTunes so a lot of people will have access to it easily but I wonder if people will use it as much as facebook.

Someone test jailbroken devices with iTunes 10 lol its out.

[Barquey]

Yeah, internet everywhere is what makes the iPhone so much better and it's your phone so you always have it on you. But the thing I like about the touch is that it's so damn thin omg. It's like half the iphone 4.

I totally agree... and next year it will be as thin as a piece of paper!

[Jahooba]

They finally decided to put a camera in the iPod Touch, which means they finally decided they want my money! I'm ordering an 8 gig as soon as the Apple Store is back online.

Oh, and Holy Cow -- 24 hour music playback on the new Touch. That's actually a good 12 hours less than the 2nd generation. I think this translates into about an hour of 3D gaming

[leathelisor]

They finally decided to put a camera in the iPod Touch, which means they finally decided they want my money! I'm ordering an 8 gig as soon as the Apple Store is back online.

Oh, and Holy Cow -- 24 hour music playback on the new Touch. That's actually a good 12 hours less than the 2nd generation. I think this translates into about an hour of 3D gaming

I'm pretty sure steve said 40 hours of music, but i might be misremembering

[macsoldier]

what impressed me was the size of the touch, I think the touch will be awesome now with the camera, Still not sure to buy one since I have an iPhone and it does everything the same.

[scizod]

Do you think the nano and shuffle will accept normal headphones and not those crappy apple headphones that were shorting out on everyone

[whereswaldo]

I guess the "people missed the buttons" doesn't apply to the nano?

[cb22]

WTF!! He said all the iPods!!! What about the iPod classic???

[jdyates]

I'm glad Apple finally grew the balls to put a camera on the iPod Touch. At least they didn't give the "hardware problems" excuse for 10 years before finally putting on it. And "Facetime" as well? Forget it, I'm DEFINITELY picking a 32GB up!

[PhanaticD]

i want a new touch so bad right now anyone want to buy my 3g touch so i can get this one??

[tudtran]

I'm glad to see the shuffle went back to the button. Cause the headphone buttons doesn't work at all. The new nano is so cool. I never a big fan of the iPod touch. But the iPod touch got a big make over.

[newportgambler]

shuffle will sell huge at the holiday. tudtran, agree on the button w/ the shuffle. small gumstick thing made no sense.

[XChrisX]

shuffle will sell huge at the holiday. tudtran, agree on the button w/ the shuffle. small gumstick thing made no sense.

I've wanted an iPod shuffle for the gym for the longest time but last years shuffle just wouldn't cut it without the buttons. I have a 160gig classic, and a 32gig iPhone 4 so I'm not looking for mass storage by any means, just enough music to get me by in the gym. This fits the bill, but dang if the new nano isn't tempting given the fact that it's only slightly larger, has a touch screen, and also has a clip. Decisions, decisions...