Wednesday, October 12, 2005

SWEET JESUS

Video ipod.


Daring Fireball weighs in on the product announcements. No firewire on the iPod is kind of a bummer, but frontrow does definitely make it look like we're in for some kind of TV connectivity, not from the ipod, which will only play 320x240, but from the computer itself. By all accounts, the small video looks awesome on the ipod- and that's the screen it's intended for once it's been formatted, the tv connectivity is more for photos. The ipod is the delivery device in this case, and video podcasting seems to be the big use for it... downloading daily shows and watching them on the subway. I've already noticed that the Cinema Minema podcasts I'm subscribed to in iTunes have already farmed out some video clips to my library. I expect HD connectivity from Macs to televisions to be coming next. The Front Row interface they've got in the new iMac begs it. And the airport express is too good a precedent not to expect some wireless video in the future.

10 comments:

Wiley said...

Man, they just refuse to say what that remote uses.. It looks like IR with that black tip, but it seems weird that they'd go back to IR. plus it doesn't say ir anywhere on the tech specs for the new imac.

I'm going to start encoding all my movies to H.264 now.

Will S. said...

I'm going to start encoding all my movies to H.264 now.

You haven't already?

The one problem I have is that I believe I will have to re-encode all the movies I have already encoded to fit the iPod specifications.

Wiley said...

yeah, looks like they need to be 320x240 at 7hundred sumpthin kbps. At first I was a little bummed about the 320x240 restriction (at least for the svideo out) but then I thought about the fact that that little thing is processing the video all by itself... no small feat really.

Wiley said...

I guess I just support the primacy of this particular video codec more than anything else. I think we should all reserve judgement until we see it working. I'm going to get one in a week or two.

Wiley said...

This is nothing new, but somebody already posted a handy walkthrough on ripping dvd's to the ipod:
http://diveintomark.org/howto/ipod-dvd-ripping-guide/

Wiley said...

Here's Apple's tutorial on encoding non copy protected content to the ipod with QuickTime pro. I would probably use Compressor 2 instead.

http://www.apple.com/quicktime/tutorials/creatingvideo.html

Will S. said...

I don't have compressor 2 yet sadly. It would make reconverting all my videos so much easier.

Wiley said...

This is kind of cool, you can subscribe to rss of video tags in del.icio.us or of individual users on medicinefilms.com in iTunes.

Anonymous said...

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Wiley said...

Mike over at HD for indies says that somebody has already hacked front row to work on more macs and also work with Saling Clicker (lets you use a bluetooth cellphone as a remote).