[MW Forums]

Another well-respected Wall Street analyst has pointed to Apple's continued success with the iPod as drawing new customers to the Macintosh fold. Needham & Co.'s Charles Wolf has issued a 27-page note to his clients suggesting that Windows users could have 100 million iPods in hand by 2008. If only a small number of those users bought Macs, Mac sales could surge, according to Wolf. more

[Nobody]

Besides the current features, a special or deluxe iPod is required with:
1 - Built-in radio tuner.
2 - Built-in microphone.
3 - Bootable for repairs of Mac OS 9 and Mac OS X.
4 - Bootable to carry all your Mac stuff with you (applications and files).
5 - FireWire 800
If Apple wants to sell more, they must release it.

[veggiedude]

"3 - Bootable for repairs of Mac OS 9 and Mac OS X"
You forgot to add in Windows as another bootable system.

[moose_n_squirrel]

In reply to:

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1 - Built-in radio tuner.
2 - Built-in microphone.
3 - Bootable for repairs of Mac OS 9 and Mac OS X.
4 - Bootable to carry all your Mac stuff with you (applications and files).
5 - FireWire 800

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1 - OK.
2 - Fine.
The last 3 are in question. I think it can do #3 already. #4 requires a hard drive that can stand up to this. The Hitachi drive in the current iPods is designed for intermittent access...load tunes into RAM, then go to sleep to save battery.
And what is up with #5, FireWire 800? Can the iPod hard drive's throughput even saturate FireWire 400? I'm pretty sure it would be incapable of making any use of the additional FireWire 800 transfer rate. Adding FireWire 800 would do bad things:
A. Raise the price (FW800 connectors are more expensive)
B. Waste bandwidth unattainable by the iPod hard drive
C. Shrink the market, if you dropped the other connectors, since only the high-end Macs have FW800
D. If you didn't drop the USB2 and FW400 connectors, FW800 would clutter it up with another connector

[fribhey]

In reply to:

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3 - Bootable for repairs of Mac OS 9 and Mac OS X.

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it already IS bootable. apple just doesn't support it because running an OS on an ipod is suicide because the ipod's HD is not meant to spin that much.

[Rugby]

1 - might as well make it a DAB tuner (and FM)

[Uncle_Deercamp]

How about a feature that makes the iPod price a bit lower?

[Nobody]

You will have it in January.
It is the SS iPod.
Solid state (flash based).

[BillNJ]

I can believe it! Here in New York City it seems as though every other person walking on the street has iPod earphones in their ears. It is truly an amazing sight to see. Apple's competitors have missed the boat. I don't believe that any amount of marketing spend can displace the psychological connection of iPod with users and potential users.