Great site! I’ll be back to check it out again. Thanks!…

Great site! I’ll be back to check it out again. Thanks!…

Great site! I’ll be back to check it out again. Thanks!…

SP, thanks for the info. Helps me “get it” all a bit more I understand iPods are subjected to a lot of wear and tear and they’re continually being replaced by newer versions, though I see this as the marketing-consumption side of things. I just think it’d be nice to have the option of keeping an iPod for 30 years (under normal wear and tear blah, blah). Probably wouldn’t do it but the option is nice. Instead of having to replace it in four years because that is its manufactured longevity. I get that people don’t really keep gadgets very long, myself included, but I assume we currently have the means, technology and ingenuity to create a hard drive that’ll last for say fifty years. Maybe we don’t but I assume we do. Do we? And if we do then I’d like to think Apple would create the iPod to last as long as the current technology allows.

Suppose what I’m rambling on about is, if my assumptions were correct, I’d rather Apple or any company make their products to the meet current technological limits instead of creating them based on the consumption habits of its users. Though Joel makes a good point about diminished returns, R&D, and batteries.

Maybe I’m getting too old. Turning into one of those “when I was a kid my Product X would still work after being in a street-fight with a washing machine and a lawnmower.” I fear I’m turning into my grandfather :)

ipods (non-nano/mini) are HDD based devices, and are used in a similar fashion to walkmen. This in itself degrades the expected lifetime of the unit – i’m not sure I’ve seen too many people running around with their laptop in use and being subjected to the same sorts of relatively violent forces that the ipod does incase of comparisons there.

Battery life is another difficult topic. Battery lives have always been problematic – how many people own a phone over two years and continue to get even 75% of new performance from the battery? (Hands up anyone with a phone *over* two years old? What’s that, designed to last two years? ;))

It’s another example of engineering. Sure, you could do more on the front of lifespan of the product, but there’s a diminishing return at some point for extended lifespan from the money put in in both R D and manufacting/parts. No one is forcing you to purchase this product, it’s a choice, one requiring responsibility to understand the limitations before buying in (as with all choices).

On flash-based units, flash memory can usually withstand about 1,000,000 write cycles. Assuming an average song size of, say 4MB, that works out to about 500,000,000 songs for a 2GB unit. So that’s probably not an issue. :-)

However, as someone else pointed out, in both cases, battery may be a weaker link (since its not replaceable in iPods).

Finally, does anyone really keep a gadget around for more than four years anymore? Even if they lasted forever, how many people would keep them forever? If they do, then probably Apple’s marketing/advertising departments are not doing their job. :-) So, I think the whole discussion might be moot…

- The reporter is an idiot (which I think is what you’re saying ‘a reader’)
- They had poor cellphone / phone reception
- They weren’t speaking at all and the quote was in electronic form
- The spokesperson for apple had a cold that day
- The spokesperson for apple isn’t a native english speaker
- The reporter isn’t a native english speaker
… and many others.

The point here (as I said above) is that the correct sentence isn’t “It lasts four years.”, it’s “It lasts for four years.” Based on that alone you can assume she meant ‘for years’ instead of ’4 years’.

Here’s the deal: Repeat out loud after me:

1. It lasts four years.

2. It lasts for years.

Hear anything different? I thought so.

In sentence 1, anyone who’s a native speaker of English will emphasize the word “four”. In sentence 2, anyone who’s a native speaker of English will emphasize the word “years”. There’s no getting around it. No native speaker would emphasize it any other way.

And only a nincompoop listener would fail to detect that difference.

Or maybe an editor thought the story was wrong and changed it behind the writer’s back.

But, sorry, there is *no way* anyone could get those two spoken sentences confused. No way. Ain’t gonna happen.

I know people with 100 Mhz PowerPC Macs that are still used in day-to-day work! Hardware fails, eventually, because there are moving parts that wear out, and silicone boards that short circuit. Age eventually gets to everything.

I’ve had consumer electronics die after 1 year, so if my iPod lasts 4 or more years I’ll be very happy with it. By then I’ll be ready to get a newer model with much more storage and a larger screen.

Of course, many more iPods will last much longer than that. I have a feeling the market for used iPods isn’t going anywhere anytime soon.