Movie Rentals Will Significantly Increase iPod and iPhone Storage
It can be speculated why Apple hasn’t introduced a subscription based music service and the yet-to-be movie rental system. Whatever the reason, I believe it will force Apple to increase the storage of their iPods drastically, something that won’t be easy to do anytime soon.
But there seems to be a bump in the road which can be partially solved by something like the Apple TV. Apple is adapting Flash storage at a significant rate, 4 out of 5 of their media players (including the iPhone) rely on Flash memory with only one, the iPod Classic, making use of a hard drive.
Anyway, it seems Apple wants to abandon hard drives in the iPod line, something that is vaguely signaled by the iPod Classic’s name and, more so, the advantages Flash carries. During this transition Apple will want to keep something with a massive storage option that still appeals to consumers. This is where the iPod Classic comes in, and if that name doesn’t bring up thoughts of an already antiquated device then allow me to make the bold claim that a touch interface will greatly expand on functionality in an iPod and will eventually kill the scroll wheel we’ve become accustomed to.
Back to movie rentals: Apple is in a unique position when it comes to music content in that they are one of the biggest online retailers, but video is an entirely different beast. Only a few movie studios have made a commitment to Apple and iTunes, and alongside NBC’s childish tantrum it doesn’t look like a resolution will be reached any time soon.
Apple may have been able to give the record labels a valuable outlet to sell music, but online video sales are still a sensitive matter; nothing has been established as the de facto standard to sell video content and DRM is still restrictive. It makes sense to tap into different venues and even multiple retailers to maintain price and quality consistency, but once video rentals can fight then they’ll reach a rock and a hard place. Apple will need to jack up the amount of storage in the iPods and iPhones, but this won’t happen in the near future.
But this allows Apple to experiment and play with what they can offer on a mobile device and how it can improve the iTunes experience for the consumer. I am sure by the time Apple has every movie studio on board, iPods and iPhones alike will be able to surpass portable (the 1.8” and possibly 2.5” variety) hard drives in storage capacity through Flash Memory alone.
Even if you can get storage to a practical level, you run into one massive problem: High Definition. But you must be wondering, “why would I want HD content on such a small screen?” You have every reason to ponder this statement considering that you would notice little to no quality improvements. However, we are steadily approaching the age where things just need to work on every device, even video content.
So this conflict will mean yet another bump in storage and repeat this cycle: the early generation of iPods/iPhones around the time when Apple finally offers HD rentals won’t be sufficient to store everything but will be able to as time goes on. Then this cycle repeats and repeats.
The only reason music rentals haven’t cannibalized the smaller music players is that not many people can fill them up; even the most spacious iPod Nano is overkill for some people when it comes to storing songs.
Video storage, on the other hand, needs to be in the double digits and outside of the teens to be considered minimum or sufficient.
del.icio.us
Digg
Facebook
Slashdot
StumbleUpon
Comments
I would have thought that movie rentals would allow us to have less disk space…. but perhaps that’s only on the computer.
ie: If I’m buying a movie, I’ll want to keep it somewhere once i’ve watched it. If I’m renting, I’ll let it delete.
From a purely iPod perspective, I agree as we build a selection of shows we’ll watch ‘soon’, we’ll need more space. And I agree that eventually we’ll just have one HD version for whatever device, though for now the iPod needs a smaller version both to enable decoding and for space reasons (I suspect the recently discovered iTunes error “wrong movie version” relates to that.
Would it have been so hard to have an iPod touch with an HD and then transition it to flash storage later as prices come down? I don’t really think so. I think the product matrix is just a bit of a mess. Why would rentals affect storage space, if I have 16gb, I would just toss on a movie every so often and watch it, I hardly need to carry every single rental with me.
Would it have been so hard to have an iPod touch with an HD and then transition it to flash storage later as prices come down? I don’t really think so.
I wholeheartedly agree. I think capacity (and usability) should trump size. It’s not like it would require a 3” thick iPod. Just look at the Classic. It’s even thinner now at 160GB than my old 60GB. They are plenty thin.
And as for battery life, the 160GB gets about twice the battery life of my 60GB and the EXACT same battery life as the 16GB Touch. No advantage to the Touch at all. Maybe if you added the Touch screen AND the HDD together it would go down some but it would still be an improvement over my 60GB iPod.
On the subject of movie rentals, the rumored models sound very promising. $3 per title for 30 days. Very reasonable. Which means it probably won’t happen that way.
though for now the iPod needs a smaller version both to enable decoding and for space reasons
How wonderful it would be to have some kind of amazing codec that could enable decoding a single stream at a variable resolution with linearly scaling processor intensiveness.
Would it have been so hard to have an iPod touch with an HD and then transition it to flash storage later as prices come down? I don’t really think so.—akatsuki
I wholeheartedly agree…
And as for battery life, the 160GB gets about twice the battery life of my 60GB and the EXACT same battery life as the 16GB Touch. No advantage to the Touch at all. Maybe if you added the Touch screen AND the HDD together it would go down some but it would still be an improvement over my 60GB iPod.—beeblebrox
Your knowledge of this subject is woefully inadequate compared to the loudness of your cries telling everyone how things should be done.
First of all the difference in the size of flash memory and 1.8” hard drives is enormous. Second of all the difference in the sizes of the batteries between the iPod touch and classic is just as large.*
My fact-based approach to rationality, eschewed by you I realise, shows that including a hard drive in the iPod touch would not only increase the size very, very considerably, but keeping the current battery would provide lamentable battery
life that would be extremely sub-par for a video enabled device. To overcome this would mean that an EVEN larger battery would be required to give decent life. The size increase would be on the order of 100%.
I can only too easily hear you denouncing it for either of those flaws.
Think rationally for a minute. I promise it only hurts briefly.
[*] ifixit.com is good for component sizes
On the subject of movie rentals, the rumored models sound very promising. $3 per title for 30 days. Very reasonable.
It’s probably the same deal that everyone else is negotiating with the studios, which actually sucks. You have the video for 30 days, but as soon as you watch even 10 seconds of it, you will only have 24 hours to finish. From personal experience, it feels way too limiting.
You have the video for 30 days, but as soon as you watch even 10 seconds of it, you will only have 24 hours to finish. From personal experience, it feels way too limiting.
Ah, see I figured there was a catch. I didn’t know that. Thanks.
To overcome this would mean that an EVEN larger battery would be required to give decent life. The size increase would be on the order of 100%.
Wow. “EVEN larger.” “Considerably larger.” I marvel at the specifics of your “rationality.” You must be secretly hiding some kind of advanced physics degree that puts me at a disadvantage.
That must explain why the iPod Classic with it’s “considerably larger” 1.8” drive is actually 38 feet wide and 42 feet thick. I can see now that the photos just make it LOOK only slightly larger than the Touch. My mistake.