The BIG iPod touch review
A few weeks ago I got my hands on two 16GB iPod touch devices. Having spent a lot of hands on time with these devices it's time for a comprehensive review. — The iPod touch was for me the first Apple device to come out when I eagerly awaited the release day.
Context & Ripple Effects
The iPod touch arrived in September, when Think Secret reported the touch-screen iPod would take center stage in Apple's lineup, followed quickly by PC Magazine's first formal review. This extended hands-on from Hardware 2.0 — two 16GB units, weeks of use — is the deeper second look, landing days before the December quarter in which Piper Jaffray projects a record 25 million iPod sales.
It also arrives eight months after the iPhone's June debut set the template, so the open question this review answers is whether the touch stands as a product in its own right or merely an iPhone minus the phone.
First-order effects
- Holiday shoppers choosing between the iPhone-class interface and conventional iPods get their most detailed independent verdict on the 16GB touch at the exact moment Piper Jaffray expects a record 25-million-unit December quarter.
- The review's findings feed directly into which device wins share inside that forecast — the touch versus the rest of Apple's own iPod range.
Second-order effects
- With French law forcing Apple to promise an iPhone in France not locked into a long-term Orange contract, a well-reviewed contract-free touch gives carrier-wary buyers a fallback that blunts operator lock-in pressure.
- Rival player makers now face a touchscreen competitor priced below the iPhone, forcing them to respond on interface rather than storage capacity alone.
Third-order effects
- If the touch sells strongly beside the iPhone, Apple's handheld line settles into a two-tier structure — phone and no-phone — sharing one multi-touch interface, displacing the click-wheel as the default iPod interaction.
- That split makes the touch interface, not any single device, the platform Apple iterates on each product cycle.
The trend: Apple's handheld lineup is consolidating around the iPhone's multi-touch interface, with the iPod touch carrying it to buyers who skip the phone.