Inbox:Last week Apple launched it's new iPod range and, as usual, managed to wow the audience with the new line-up of products.
It's been a while. Apple has taken two years to refresh the iPod and many digital media players have more features these days.
The normal iPod has been renamed iPod Classic (80GB €249, 160GB €349 and, although just slightly slimmer in form, it now sports either an eye-popping 80GB drive or a whopping 160GB model. That equates to up to 40,000 tunes on a single iPod, which is 40 times the number of tunes the original iPod could hold when it was launched back in 2002.
The new Classic has a much improved user interface and has a visual "cover flow" so that you can leaf through album cover art.
Apple's latest iPod Nano (4GB €149, 8GB €199 has been completely redesigned and re-engineered. Instead of being long and thin, it is now short and stout, but lightweight and compact. It sports the same 2-inch screen as the iPod Classic and you can now watch video and play casual games such as Tetris.
The old Nano became the most popular in Apple's line, so it's enhanced video and photo capabilities should keep it at the top of sales.
Apple also unveiled the iTunes Wi-Fi Music Store. This is basically designed to interface entirely with the iPod Touch, allowing you to browse and purchase while on the go.
Apple has also signed a deal with Starbucks to make the iTunes store available in its cafés, but only in the USA for now.
The iPod Touch (8GB €299, 16GB €399) is what many observers have been predicting for a while from Apple: a full, wide-screen iPod with a touch interface and WiFi internet access. The big 3.5-inch "multi-touch" screen responds to two fingers, not just one, allowing you to pinch and squeeze photos or web pages in order to zoom in and out.
In particular, the iPod Touch breaks into a new hardware category which could scare the ultramobile PC/Nokia Tablet world.
Most of the iPod Touch's technology is leveraged from the iPhone. But the iPhone means you have to subscribe to a mobile service. The iPod Touch does not and will appeal to a global audience. It also contains PDA-like capabilities and because it has a web browser it may even make carrying a laptop pointless for some lightweight uses such as web surfing or checking web mail. When a device like this is close to hand, with an instant power-on, people tend to just pick up rather than bother to boot up a PC.
And if customers are disappointed that the Touch will only have 16GB of storage space they may want to watch out for the ability to stream media from a home computer in the next few months, which is almost certain to be in Apple's plans.
It is clear that the iPod Touch is going to be a fascinating device for Apple's future even if, for now, it's really a glorified MP3 player.
