iPod Photo disappointment
I have been quite disappointed when I read the excellent review of the iPod Photo on Playlist. When Apple released the iPod Photo, capable of displaying full screen pictures and thumbnails as well as playing slide shows on a TV screen, I thought that it would be the ideal companion for my digital camera. Paired with the Belkin Media Reader, it would allow me to unload my Compact Flash cards on the iPod, check that they have been transferred correctly (which is important because the purpose of unloading the card is to erase it to take more pictures) and when I get home, dock the iPod and play them in a slide show on the television.
Unfortunately, this is not how the iPod Photo works. When iTunes is used to transfer pictures to the iPod, it converts them to a format compatible with the iPod, with a lower resolution, and these are the only pictures the iPod can display.
Update: The iPod Photo (now iPod tout court) can display pictures imported from a camera on it's own screen but not on the television.
Therefore, when I see all the fuss that has been made of the lack of support for video in the newspapers and on some big news web sites, I can't refrain from thinking that all those journalists took the easy path, as usual, meaning they compared the iPod Photo announcement with the latest rumours and complained about the first missing feature they found. Had they made a tiny bit of an analysis instead, they could still have made some criticisms but they would have actually given some useful information about the limits of the product. Then again, maybe I am an idealist for expecting analysis and information from a journalist.
A nice alternative to the iPod Photo (as a digital camera companion, there is no alternative to the iPod for music) would be the Nikon CoolWalker. It features a 30 GB hard disk, a 2.5" colour display, a Compact Flash reader (optional adapters for SmartMedia, SD Card, MultiMediaCard and Memory Stick), USB 2.0, PictBridge support (to output directly to a compatible printer) a video output for viewing photos on a television and a remote control. It looks like a nifty little device.