Tue Feb 28, 2006 5:06 pm

Bleargh. It looks uglier than our Klipsch iGroove, and somehow I'd expect the Klipsch to sound better.

At about $70 cheaper, no less ...

Tue Feb 28, 2006 6:35 pm

Agree with stuartes. The only big omission here is the lack of Wi-Fi in the Hi-Fi. I'll wait until I hear one to pass judgement, but with Wi-Fi I could have seen myself getting a couple of these for my home office.

Wireless speakers on the shelves behind my desk would have been great. But not if I have to either cable across the room or buy an Airport Express for each of them. It's just not an elegant solution.

Wed Mar 01, 2006 2:35 am

[rant]

Would (most of) you people PUHLEASE quit yer' ceaseless whining about how Apple didn't do what you wanted or expected them to do?! You sound like a bunch of primadona rich kids that aren't happy about what your parents got you for christmas, or your doing some serious armchair quarterbacking. If you don't like it, just say that, but STFU about how Apple let you down, what they really 'should' have done if they were as smart as you, or how Apple overhyped this event.

1) Apple sent out a subtle invite to some press, just saying 'check out some fun, new gear we have', not 'OMG, everybody has to wait on baited breath, to see what AWESOME, new stuff we made, that will blow everybodies socks off!!!' So, it was neither over-hyped, nor does anybody have the right to say they were let down. So many weenies take rumor sites at face value and build up massive expectations around Apple's every move, that when Apple fails to come out with something like the world's first human teleporter (or whatever the public and the moronic analysts unjustly expect), it actually negatively affects Apple's stock price. That's not a good thing.

2) Simply put, if you think you can do better than Apple, go ahead and do it. YOU may think that the iPod Hi-Fi is ugly, but I (and plenty of others, I can assure you) think a small, spartan but sleek looking, yet high quality speaker system, that can connect to iPod, is a good thing. Aesthetics is totally subjective.

As far as the suggestion of 'why not build an Airport Express into it'... Lets see... Maybe, some people already HAVE an Airport Express and just want better speakers. Or, maybe the cost of building it in, would have made the unit unmarketable for all the people who just want to use it with an iPod and don't want to pay for wireless. Also, what happens when Apple comes out with an 802.11n-based Airport Express? What if the speakers blow out, due to some unfortunate occurance? Wouldn't it be better to keep the components seperate? The same goes for the CD player and whatever other gizmos. This thing is simply a good, compact, fairly portable set of speakers, with an iPod dock. THAT'S IT. It isn't meant to be an iPod Boom-Box, as some people seem to think. You want components or an Aux input? Then get yourself a tuner and pre-amp, and hook the Hi-Fi into them.

[/rant]

Wed Mar 01, 2006 5:52 am

	MOSiX Man wrote:
	[rant] As far as the suggestion of 'why not build an Airport Express into it'... Lets see... Maybe, some people already HAVE an Airport Express and just want better speakers. Or, maybe the cost of building it in, would have made the unit unmarketable for all the people who just want to use it with an iPod and don't want to pay for wireless. [/rant]

OK, but why not put an internal slot in the unit to fit an Airport card as an optional extra? What do Airport cards take up these days spacewise? This is a major omission as far as I'm concerned, and as a result Apple have lost two sales.

It would also have made a lot of sense when using these with the new Mac mini "media centre" abilities. It's a lost opportunity to increase how many of these units they ship.

Wed Mar 01, 2006 12:08 pm

Anyone find the "iPod software update that adds a "Speaker" menu to the MP3 player's interface"? I've looked at the ipod software download page at Apple and checked software update and still only see the iPod Updater 2006-01-10.

Wed Mar 01, 2006 1:31 pm

	Guest wrote:
	Nice thought, but a working Airport card expansion slot would necessitate enough built-in hardware and software that you would end up with the equivalent of an Airport Express in there, anyhow. An Airport card has to connect to a logic board of some sort. Remember?

The Hi-Fi already does have a logic board of some sort, otherwise the iPod connector wouldn't do anything other than charge the iPod's battery. To control the optional card would probably mean extending the logic board by enough to accomodate a single controller/converter chip, and running an Airport antenna inside the case. The plug-in card would then identify itself to the streaming computer by means of it's MAC address (ha ha). The controller chips only function would be to convert incoming streamed audio and pass it to the speaker.

That's way simpler than an Airport Express, which has to act as router, wireless switch and signal converter. Even if you encrypt the streamed signal with a WEP/WPA key, you have a front-end program on your Mac/PC that takes it from your network settings, then sends the key once. The chances of someone war-driving at that moment are extremely low, and from that point on, the speaker is just another host on your encrypted network and your stream is secure. The program could even be written to configure multiple speakers at once to further lessen the risk.

This would probably add about $3 to the basic production cost of each speaker unit, and certainly wouldn't mean it had to increase in size. Optional cards would retail for $50. It's so obvious I'm truly amazed that it's not been included.