As we now realize, iTunes is a read-only system. It takes your files, but is reluctant to give them back. It will play them back, or sync them to an iPod or iPhone, but it doesn't provide a way to get the digital bits back without going 'under the covers'. This is scary, yet another attempt to appease the DRM powers (Digital Rights Management).
Now comes the thought, how about a portable music player to take our tunes on the road. Because I need a new cell phone, and because I am now locked into iTunes and ALC file format, the iPhone is my best option. It has the advantage of being compatible with ALC file format, syncs naturally with iTunes, and has the highest quality DAC (Wolfson) in the portable device market. Again, digital output is not provided thanks to DRM acquiescence. The current max 16 gb model will hold only ~50 albums in ALC format, so most people's entire music collection won't fit; one must create several 50 album playlists and alternate between them.
Only a purist with high quality earphones puts ALC files on a portable device; the files are too big for available flash, and the added quality is not discernable on earbuds or over a car playback system. For the usual tunes on-the-go, AAC lossy format is plenty good enough, and 5x smaller. Also, AAC is compatible with non-Apple players. However, since my tunes are all ALC, I would have the added complexity of determining:
- how to create a shadow library of AAC tracks in iTunes
- how to manage both sets of formats and keep everything synced
Regarding the iPhone, cost is the deal breaker now, and specifically monthly contract costs. Purchasing and using an iPhone now costs up to $1000 over two years. And surprise, using the GPS will cost additional hundreds. I can see things I would rather have, and would use more, for that money. So I will probably go for a free option phone this time around. It's not about the money, but about the sense of value. We are where we come from, and my background being less-than-privileged, I will always be cost conscious no matter how much discretionary cash I have around.
Where is the portable device capability headed? My wish list contains a single device with a real OS, real camera, a real GPS, full Internet capability, real expandable memory, high quality audio, and all hardware interfaces open to all software developers. This is the complete definition of a smart phone as we now know it.
Smart phones have been around for a while. Dick Tracy wore his on his wrist so many years ago. We carry ours in our pockets. The dark side of smart phones is the mind boggling number of variations. As with many major commercial ventures from banking to credit to insurance to health plans, the smart phone business is dominated by marketing sleaze in the form of seemingly endless variations, obfuscations, restrictions, and buried fees, designed to mine the customer base for every possible penny. We increasingly dwell in the land of caveat emptor.
The iPhone comes closest to my smart phone ideal, coming up short on camera quality, expansible memory, and open hardware access. But price arguing against it for the near future, my solution is likely to become three separate devices (iPod, D's Elph, and free phone plan). It provides me more tunes and a real camera, just lacking a GPS. My pockets are big and the price is right.
The iPod Touch (iTouch) is essentially an iPhone without the phone part and concomitant monthly surcharge. It costs less than a third of the iPhone's deal-breaking costs to purchase a first generation (1G) iTouch with twice the available flash memory. I can keep my free phone and data plan. Although the iTouch 2G has more features than the 1G, Apple cheapened the digital-to-analog converter (DAC) in the newer model. Since my use is mainly as portable computer and music player, the DAC is more important to me than the other features. An 32GB iTouch 1G is on my radar screen. It will hold ~100 hours of tunes in ALC format. Apple still owns me.
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