Articles tagged with: ipod touch

As you probably all know by know, there wasn’t much in the way of excitement at last night’s Apple “Let’s Rock” event. There’s a new iPod Nano with a bigger screen and more storage; a new iPod Touch with the same curvy design as the iPhone 3G and built-in support for Nike+; and a new version of iTunes with a clever automatic playlist function (which we like) and a Genre list that can no longer be disabled (which we don’t’). Oh and the iPod Classic 160Gb has been discontinued. No one has that much music, apparently.

From today, users of Apple’s UK iTunes Store can rent or buy movies from a catalogue of over 700 titles.

The company has signed agreements with several big-name studios, including 20th Century Fox, Paramount and Warner Bros. At the time of writing, the top-ten downloads included Batman Begins, I Am Legend and, inevitably, The Matrix.

Pricing starts at £2.49 for a 30-day rental of ‘library’ titles (ie, back-catalogue flicks), rising to £10.99 for purchases of new releases. Rentals for new releases are charged at £3.49. High-definition (HD) versions of some movies are also available, but are charged at another £1.00. To purchase library titles costs £6.99.

Apple has just refreshed its iPhone and iPod range with the launch of a 16Gb iPhone and 32Gb iPod Touch. Both new models cost £329 and are available immediately. The old 8Gb iPhone and 8Gb/16Gb iPod Touch models are still available, with no price change. It's unclear why Apple is charging twice as much for the iPhone upgrade as on the iPod Touch - its extra 8Gb of storage costs £60, which is the same as the iPod's extra 16Gb. 

[Apple]

The latest version of Apple’s 1.1.3 firmware for the iPhone has been hacked – and how. While previous versions of the ‘Jailbreak’ software required a Mac or PC and had owners jump through various hoops before they could install third-party applications on their iPhone, the latest release runs straight from the handset itself.

The catch is that you already need a jailbroken 1.1.1 or 1.1.2 iPhone before you can upgrade to 1.1.3 without losing access to third-party apps, so UK owners with a virgin handset will still need to go through the rigmarole of downgrading the firmware to 1.1.1 before they can run the Jailbreak application and finally upgrade to 1.1.3.

If Santa left an iPhone in your Xmas stocking (or an iPod Touch, for that matter), you may still be wrestling with its syncing capabilities. Both the iPhone and the iPod Touch use iTunes to synchronise both music and 'info' - iTunes' term for appointments, contacts, and so on.

The problem is that if you use your home PC for music synchronisation, but your work PC for your calendar and contacts (probably with Outlook), it's difficult to avoid wiping one or the other types of content whenever you sync with either PC. Difficult, but not impossible -- here's how.

One quick snippet from the currently ongoing Steve Jobs keynote at Mac World in San Francisco -- the latest update for the iPod Touch adds the same Mail application as on the iPhone. In other words, iPod owners can now access their email when they're within range of a Wi-Fi hotspot.

Available now through iTunes, the iPod Touch update costs £12.99 for existing iPod Touch owners (it's free with all brand new models from now on) also includes the Maps (now with location tracking), Stocks, Notes and Weather applications. So, the iPod Touch is now an phone-less iPhone in every respect, which is great news.

[Apple]