I still don't think Apple will have a moving disk 500GB iPod. As of now, most iPod owners don't even have a 500GB HD on their computer, never mind a media collection that big. The demand will be too low when iPod-flash has got to 256GB that they won't bother.
Well, most Mac owners don't even have a 160GB HDD in their system. Yet Apple still released a 160GB HDD.
Theres always going to be a market for large HDD based iPods. Especially when it comes to price.
Audiophiles, a growing market, love the large capacity HDD based iPods. HDD based iPods will always be cheaper than large capacity flash based iPods.
Even 1 million HDD based iPods sold during the Christmas season is enough reason for Apple to build and sell them.
Plus its not just about media libraries either. The HDD iPods also function as one of the smallest portable USB HDDs out there. I have the 80GB 5.5G iPod and I use it to hold all of my music and to back up unimportant data for transferring between computers.
I doubt it. Those HDDs aren't expected to debut until 2009. As said before, Apple could just go to a single iPod classic at a lower price point, while the iPod touch nudges down in price a little further.
Depends on who you ask. Some say those drives are already ready to be in the market, some are still working on them.
Apple would be alienating a large market if they dropped the high capacity iPods. They could lower the price, which would be nice. But doing away with them completely would be stupid.
We probably won't see a 64 GB touch until 2009 unless Apple want to make a ridiculously expensive iPod touch. In 2009, I think we'll see the end of HDD based iPods, but for now, HDDs are still good enough to beat flash.
From a capacity standpoint, the iPod touch is already ridiculously expensive. $500 for a 32GB iPod touch? Yeah the iPod touch is cool (I have an iPhone), but why spend $500 for that when the 160GB iPod classic is $150 less?
As I said, the iPod touch is cool. The features are neat, even though Apple has made it clear they're going to nickel and dime people to death with charging for the updates. I think that reason alone will be why the iPod touch never becomes as popular as the other iPods. But anyway, as a pure music player, the iPod touch doesn't cut it. The interface, while neat, is not nearly as simple and straight forward (and easy to use) as the iPod classic and nano for pure music. Theres also the sound quality and storage aspects. The 8GB iPod nano (I have one) sounds better and is much smaller than the iPod touch. It's also a lot cheaper. The iPod classic (especially the 5.5G) is a much better value for capacity and sounds better than both the touch and the nano.
Theres more people out there who want pure media players rather than "wireless platforms" and would rather have devices that are the best at playing music and video. In that sense, the iPod nano and iPod classic are much better overall values. For that reason, the HDD iPods won't be killed off any time soon.
If Apple kills the iPod classic then they essentially hand a market of 10s of millions of people to Microsoft and anyone else willing to get back into the HDD based MP3 player market.
Theres always going to be people who look at both players based on value too, not features. Besides, the features of the iPod touch are mostly for novelty factor anyway. Most people are going to ask why they should spend $400 for 16GB when the $350 160GB iPod offers 10x the storage and, in real world situations, more than double the battery life.
