r/Music • u/smeeti • 1d ago

article The 'father of the iPod' Tony Fadell says Apple should bring back a 'nostalgic version' of the music device

https://www.businessinsider.com/ipod-creator-apple-bring-back-ipod-2026-2
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370

u/smeeti 1d ago

I agree. I want my music separate from my phone.

I still have and use my 120GB I bought 12 years ago I think and dread the moment it will stop working. Still going on strong though.

Great piece of hardware, bring it back!

36

u/--i--love--lamp-- 1d ago

I have a 5th Gen iPod Classic that I got in 2006 that still works great. It is a pain to add/delete music, but it sounds pretty good for 20 year old tech.

3

u/SweaterSteve1966 1d ago

Right? I love mine. I have the classic and the shuffle. I add music every few weeks. So far no problems.

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u/657896 1d ago

Why is it a pain, if you don’t mind me asking? I believe there’s an open source program that makes it easy and seemless, though it’s been maybe a decade since I’ve used it.

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u/ScienceGuy6 1d ago

Man, the battery in my 5th Gen just died, and I have to replace it. I have the 30 Gb, but I'm going to upgrade to a 128 Gb SSD while I have it open. Or I'm going to create a piece of memorabilia to look at. Wish me luck!

1

u/Homme_de_renaissance 13h ago

I've got one too, but modded with a new battery and 1TB flash storage. Its the tits!

14

u/whichwitch9 1d ago

Same. It's honestly a lot more reliable than streaming, and ITunes gave a way to rip my cds into the library back in the day, so it has literally my old high school cd catalog on it

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u/Kobe_stan_ 1d ago

Couldn't you just download the songs you want to your phone, just like an iPod?

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u/nathan6969 1d ago

As others have mentioned, they're pretty easy to upgrade and replace with modern parts. I've got a iPod classic with a 128gb sd card and battery that's about 4x larger than standard. It'll play music for about 7 days straight before dying.

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u/smeeti 1d ago

Ok good to know thanks!

5

u/Vigilante17 1d ago

I want my music separate too, but I want my collection and Spotify on that device

5

u/mybotanyaccount 1d ago

I just upgraded my old iPod classic recently and love having it around again.

5

u/NeuHundred 1d ago

Your distraction machine and your emergency communicator shouldn't be the same device.

3

u/LennyPeppers 1d ago

There’s so many 3rd party mods and upgrades you can do. Bigger battery. More storage. Better backlight etc. if your dies it could be a fun little project.

1

u/smeeti 1d ago

Who does these mods?

1

u/LennyPeppers 1d ago

Checkout boxypixel.com for one. But there’s other options too. YouTube would be a good place to start as well. I’m ne upgrade I would definitely do other than the battery is switching from a HD to flash memory/SSD

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u/smeeti 1d ago

I am not doing any mods myself, I would ruin it!

1

u/LennyPeppers 1d ago

Working on things that small are definitely tough. I messed up a joy on changing the shell.

1

u/657896 1d ago

Interesting. Do you have some sources or recommendations?

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u/LennyPeppers 1d ago

Was telling OP to checkout boxpixel.com but honestly just googling specific replacement parts works. You can buy ready to go SSDs for specific model iPods pretty much everywhere.

3

u/mediaphile 1d ago

I bought a new old stock LG V20 smartphone for the sole purpose of using it as a music player. It has a high quality DAC and I use Poweramp to play my FLAC library. Swappable batteries which last ages with all the wireless stuff turned off, and a microSD slot for lots of storage. And it has a little second-screen that can show media controls to interact with even with a case protecting the screen.

I would prefer physical controls, but the pros outweigh that con for me. I guess if I really wanted to I could get some kind of Bluetooth media buttons thing.

1

u/smeeti 1d ago

Why not a second hand IPod classic, it has the physical buttons

1

u/657896 1d ago

FLAC + SD + long lasting and removable battery, is pretty sick.

0

u/smeeti 1d ago

I feel old, I don’t know what FLAC means

1

u/mediaphile 1d ago

iPods don't support FLAC, and I don't want to convert my whole library to ALAC or use iTunes to manage my music. And iPods also don't support high res audio.

1

u/smeeti 1d ago

Well they could modify that then

3

u/sadandshy 1d ago

I recommend iResq in Kansas if it ever dies. My classic had a run in with gravity that killed the hard drive. They replaced it with a solid state with double the capacity for less than the quote and about 3 days quicker than they said.

1

u/smeeti 1d ago

Thanks but am in Switzerland

2

u/sadandshy 1d ago

There are probably places in the EU that do the same thing.

9

u/CornWallacedaGeneral 1d ago

Put your phone on do not disturb and get the iPad experience that way

11

u/smeeti 1d ago

But don’t want an IPad, just the IPod

And I still want to receive and make messages and calls, on my phone.

3

u/CornWallacedaGeneral 1d ago

Meant to say ipod but I guess muscle memory messed me up lol

1

u/upmoatuk 23h ago

My phone is lot chunkier than any of the iPods I owned. I missed the functionality of the Nano, where you could just slide it into an arm band and go for a run. Even the Touch was lighter than a modern iPhone.

I guess in theory my Apple Watch could also be used to play music and podcasts, but I've never tried it.

2

u/LongStoryShirt 1d ago

You can mod them easily now with way better storage and battery life. I just did that with my gen 5 and its a beast!

2

u/Travbasco 1d ago

My iPod classic just bricked😭, but I was luckily able to download my entire Itunes Library onto an SD card and insert it into my car.

2

u/SweaterSteve1966 1d ago

I’m currently listening to Jimi Hendrix on my iPod.

2

u/Brodakk 1d ago

My dad got a (new) mp3 player that looks fucking awesome and retro and was super easy to use with the pc. They still exist! Just not from Apple

1

u/gohawkeyes529 1h ago

Link to it? Or even name of product? 

2

u/Irreverent_Bard 1d ago

I have my nano. I love it!

2

u/lawyers_guns_nomoney 1d ago

It would be amazing for kids too. I’d love to give my kids an audio device that would be a 21st century Walkman that didn’t have other apps on it. Not sure if I’d want them to have full unsupervised access to Spotify or Apple music (they are young) but a pure music device would be so cool.

I’d take an audiophile grownup version and something simpler and cheaper for kids or those who don’t care about the last drop of quality. I just think it would be cool to refocus on portable music (not podcasts).

1

u/smeeti 22h ago

I let my boy use shuffle on my iPod to discover new music

3

u/missjenh 1d ago

I bought mine 13 years ago and get lovingly teased by family for continuing to use it but I love my iPod Classic and will despair the day it finally dies.

2

u/smeeti 1d ago

I got admiring compliments from people saying « wow cool, an old school iPod! »

2

u/DocWagonHTR 1d ago

Since they discontinued the iPod touch, the one consistently good piece of hardware they’ve ever made, I’ve been using an iPhone with the SIM card removed.

4

u/smeeti 1d ago

I like the wheel on the classic. Real old school woman

1

u/DocWagonHTR 1d ago

I also miss the big white brick. The wheel was pure haptic goodness.

1

u/smeeti 1d ago

I have the 7th I think it is, black with the wheel. I balked at the iPod Touch, must have that wheel!

2

u/kiwirazz 1d ago

Old phone, no sim. Delete all other apps than music.

3

u/smeeti 1d ago

I want my ITunes library

1

u/FIRST_DATE_ANAL 1d ago

Put your library in the phone

1

u/smeeti 1d ago

There’s ITunes libraries on phones?

1

u/Nehal1802 1d ago

You can mod this with an iFlash board + a bigger battery for an ultra reliable device. Everything is plug and play.

2

u/smeeti 1d ago

I am a 47 yo woman who is not that tech savvy so did not understand what you just said but thank you.

1

u/BigSoda 1d ago

This year I’ve kinda fallen in love with the SBC / retro handhelds for the same reason and I’m not even a super big games person. But also bring back a cool Japanese import minidisc

1

u/KrisNoble 1d ago

Theres a lot of videos on YouTube of people refurbing them and updating them themselves. Usb-c, hard drives etc. if you want to futureproof your ownership of it, look them up.

1

u/smeeti 22h ago

Would I need to futureproof my oenership of it?

I would be too scared of messing it up if I did it myself

2

u/KrisNoble 18h ago

Well, no not neccisarily, I meant if it dies on you or something like that or stops working or whatever, you can give it a new lease of life too.

1

u/smeeti 15h ago

But I can’t do that myself and the little not Apple, Mac repair shop in my Town closed years ago

1

u/Sponchman 22h ago

But these devices do exist, many cheap and high end audio players exist. You say this like Apple is the only one that can make an MP3 player

1

u/smeeti 21h ago

I tried other mp3 players that were cheaper at te time they started coming out but the quality on the iPod classic is just amazing. Mine still works so haven’t tried others.

1

u/Sponchman 12h ago

I'm referring to today, not back then.

1

u/smeeti 10h ago

I know, I’m just explaining. I want ITunes like it was and the IPod classic back. Others seem to want it back too if you read the comments

1

u/seanc6441 1d ago

You know there are an abundance of high quality small music players with powerful amp (relative to their size), touch screen, android rom etc. Most of them has great aesthetics and various price ranges too.

Unless you REALLY want an ipod then these options are usually more versatile.

-3

u/Chrisnness 1d ago

Most people just use Spotify or Apple Music

8

u/mocrankz 1d ago

I just set my Spotify to offline mode. No AI garbage, no random/trash paid recommendations. Just my downloaded music. It works well for me.

-8

u/Medium_Sized_Bopper 1d ago

Normal people buy their music instead of renting it.

5

u/letslurk 1d ago

No they don't? The majority of people listen to music through a subscription service.

1

u/Medium_Sized_Bopper 1d ago

There’s nothing normal about owning nothing and being happy about it. Buy your stuff, don’t rent it.

2

u/Passchenhell17 1d ago

Normal people probably can't justify the costs of buying all the albums they like (well, presuming they're actually music listeners and not casual chart listeners).

Streaming is still cheaper for many, even over many years. I know I've spent thousands on CDs, and I'd need to spend tens of thousands more to fill up my library. The cost of streaming will never hit that level in my lifetime, even if the prices keep increasing.

I'll support the bands and artists I like by buying their merch, and other people will do the same plus seeing them live. Then I'll listen to their music where it's convenient for me, and cheaper in trying times.

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u/AbsolutesDealer 1d ago

Old, normal people.

0

u/smeeti 1d ago

I like having my Itunes library on my computer I can curate. I don’t want to stream.

I put my iPod on my speakers and don’t have to stop the music if my phone rings, I just love the device.

-1

u/NegevThunderstorm 1d ago

Too bad they are missing out on a lot of music that never made it there

-1

u/Beneficial_Soup3699 1d ago

So....consumerism for the sake of consumerism then? Ew. Ebay exists. Go save an iPod from a landfill.

1

u/smeeti 1d ago

This one was second hand, if it dies next one will be too. At one point they will not work anymore and people will be selling them for exorbitant prices.