Behind The Development Of The iPod nano

bonch writes "A Time Magazine article on the behind-the-scenes development of the iPod nano reveals that development work began just nine months ago, when the iPod mini was still a top-seller. Every internal component was redesigned and packed into every millimeter of the space inside. Famed Apple designer Jonathan Ives spent months on the tiniest of details, like the laser-etching of the logo and the roughness of the clickwheel compared to the smoothness of the rest of the exterior. 'I know you're not going to consciously find these details particularly appealing," says Ives, 'but I think it's the fact that we've worried about all of them that makes the product so precious.'"

Danger, Slashdot, Danger!

[Knight Thrasher]

Incoming "My Preciousss!" jokes!

At any rate, my bet is that Apple didn't run their prototypes over with cars. Or did they??

Engineers @ work

[ackthpt]

WHAM! WHAM! WHAM!

"It's still not slim enough, give me the BFH.

Re:Danger, Slashdot, Danger!

[Praedon]

No... but Creative and Microsoft seem to be stealing them out of trucks and running them over with the big rigs to ensure the sales don't get out.... they just can't quite reproduce the same results of throwing it up in the air a good 40 feet and letting gravity have its chance for distruction...

fingerprints!

[Anonymous Coward]

I know you're not going to consciously find these details particularly appealing," says Ives, 'but I think it's the fact that we've worried about all of them that makes the product so precious.'

"At which point in the interview, Ives, began sandpapering his own fingerprints from his fingers in order to leave no smudges on The Precious."

Well,

[Hawthorne01]

they certainly had some crappy ideas on design [gizmodo.com]. :-)

New Units of Measurement

[Comatose51]

The Nano is thinner than a pencil and lighter than two bucks in quarters.

In addition to Libraries of Congress and football fields, today we add two need units of measurement: "pencil width" and "bucks in quarters". Alas, Google has yet to enter the new units into the search engine as this search [google.com] produced no useful results. But just you wait! Apple has always been a trendsetter. Soon all the models will be listing their measurements in terms of pencils and weight in terms of bucks in quarters!

Re:Canada?

[MightyMartian]

It's being reported that Canadian customs is stopping shipments because they believe that Robert Redford may be trying to hide inside a Nano.

Re:I like the nano but...

[MightyMartian]

What is the next BIG thing?

Music worth listening to? Live organ donor transplants? Politicians that tell the truth? Apple users who aren't demented little toads?

Re:Danger, Slashdot, Danger!

[ackthpt]

Incoming "My Preciousss!" jokes!

What? You think we'd stoop to the level of must ... ree ... zist .... mere punsters? We can't the power ... strong .. too strong ... write something interesting, insightful or even can't hold out ... must hold out informative? You really think that? aaaaarrrggghhh You might have a point.

one iRing to rule them all

ahhh...

4GB

[Gorimek]

Does your 256MB flash card hold 4 GB of data?

If not, it's hardly a replacement, is it?

Dual Personality

[EdwinBoyd]

He's already calling the Nano his precious. Obviously the dual personality displayed by Gollum/Smeagol is beginning as well. "Tricksy little Ballmerses stoles our interfaces!!"

Re:New Units of Measurement

[Belgand]

Football fields is a terrible unit of measure as I have no damn idea how big the stupid things are (yes, I'm an American, but I just don't give a shit about sports). I know the stadiums tend to be huge, but the field itself is a few hundred yards or so isn't it? Considering it's already a measured entity, why not just refer to the actual (or rounded) measurement.

Re:New Units of Measurement

[cowscows]

Yeah LoC's are really just thrown out there to impress us, not to actually convey any meaningful information. Perhaps they should tell us how many atoms thick ipod nano is. Since I don't have an innate understanding of the size of an atom, that number will just bewilder me. Although since atoms are quite tiny, the number would seem rather large. So instead of the actual number of atoms, they should give a percentage compared to the number of atoms thick that a Toyota 4 runner is. Throw in some scientific notation, and I'll be so impressed that I'll go buy four of them. I have no idea what I'm talking about right now.

Re:It's IVE, not IVES

[richdun]

Courier would be happy.

Re:New Units of Measurement

[Humorously_Inept]

I assume that the quarters in question are American, but I'm Canadian. How many Canadian quarters does the new iPod weigh? Google doesn't have this useful conversion measure either!

I'm not going out of my way to sift through and collect eight American quarters out of my Canadian change!

Re:nano WARNING - No case available.

[ultramk]

I can't tell if this is a troll or what...

Dude... if you can't manage not to scratch something for 4 weeks, I seriously question your ability to succeed in everyday tasks, like tying your shoelaces. Seriously. I use my 60gb iPod every day (and have for almost 10 months) and have nary a single scratch.

m-

Isn't there a Jonathan Ive in Cornwall?

[stendec]

Launcelot: Oh, yes, Jonathan Iiiiiiiiive.

Several: Iiiiiiiiiiiiive.

Bedevere: Oooohooohooooo!

Launcelot: No no, aauuuugggh, at the back of the throat: aauuuugghhh.

Bedevere: No, no, no, oooooooooooh in surprise and alarm.

Launcelot: Oh, you mean a sort of AAAUUUGGHH?

Oooh! OH NO! It's the legendry black beast of AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAUUUUUGH!!

Re:fingerprints!

[nsasch]

My thoughts exactly. I bought a black nano and immediately, started rubbing the iPod clean with my cotton t-shirt. It then had a lot of tiny invisible scratches(except in the sun), on the metal and the black front and screen. Thankfully, the corner of the casing started coming lose after 2 days, so I exchanged it for a white iPod. I'm keeping it with the plastic cover and delicately resting on a tissue until the local Best Buy or Apple store gets Nano tubes (cases) in stock.

The click wheel is worth ruining my ears for though. I can't resist in the middle of a song just to spin around the wheel back and forth every once in a while.

Re:I dunno...

[Anonymous Coward]

English was obviously not required to get through college.

Re:It's IVE, not IVES

[vought]

"Jonathan is not related to Burl"

-Quote from a buddy at Apple.

Re:New Units of Measurement

[dtfarmer]

How many Canadian quarters does the new iPod weigh?

Well, the exchange rate is .847, so 8 american quarters is $2.36 canadian. Now, $2.36 canadian is obviously 9.44 canadian quarters....

now I wish I was joking, but reality is actually pretty close to that number right there. The iPod nano is 1.5 ounces, which is around 42.5g. The weight of the statehood quarters is 5.67g (.20 ounces) so the nano is actually the weight of 7.5 quarters (which jives with the statement 'weighs less than 8 quarters.')

So a quick check of canadian quarters looks like those minted in 1999 and earlier weighed 5.05g and those minted in 2000 and on are 4.4g. So using older pre-y2k quarters it's 8.42 quarters (or less than 9) - and new y2k+ quarters is 9.66 quarters (or less than 10, and pretty close to 9.44, eh?)

Of course, I really just did all this to amuse myself being that I know you weren't expecting anyone to take your joke seriously...

MAKE ONE! (Re:nano WARNING - No case available)

[Anonymous Coward]

I just finished cutting 1/4" closed cell foam to fit inside an Altoids or Penguin mint box. 1/4" actoss the whole bottom, and two 1/4" x 1/4" stripes along the sides. Drill one hole at the appropriate place for the headphone, smooth with Dremel. I used a sharpie to re-blacken the scratched paint around the earphone hole.

I put a couple of felt pads on the inside of the lid to protect the face and provide downward pressure (make sure not to have anyything interacting with the click wheel).

As Emeril would say, "BAM!" iPod Nano case. Looks cool, contains caffeine (when used in a Penguin case). The black and white Pengiun box also works well with my black Pod, and will stand out enough to keep track of it in a room.

Re:Dual Personality

[NanoGator]

"He's already calling the Nano his precious. "

It really is flattering, but...

Re:New Units of Measurement

[jonathanhowell]

The LoC measurement is silly because I have as much reference to what a LoC is in data as I do to what they're comparing it to.

Just for your reference then: The iPod Nano is (approxiamtely) 7.5e-5 football fields thick.

- Jonathan

Re:New Units of Measurement

[Kadin2048]

Yes, well I'm sure Jobs was going to express its weight as a fraction of a typical beaver pelt, but he was afraid that some rabid PETA freak would throw red paint on him and hit the Precious by mistake.

What would you have preferred? Wampum? Gold bullion? Salt?

Comment removed

[account_deleted]

Comment removed based on user account deletion

If only I could write my software the same way...

[jonr]

The Ipod family is a proof that design matters. Now if I only could convince my boss that we should write our software the same way. It isn't like industrial designers are paid less than software developers, right?

Re:worst. mouse. ever.

[Zone-MR]

"get one on ebay for like 10c. Your wrist will love you, ..."

My wrist already loves me... :-/

Packed into every millimeter of the space inside

[noidentity]

"Every internal component was redesigned and packed into every millimeter of the space inside."

Wow, this thing is so small that it's only one-dimensional!

Re:New Units of Measurement

[UseTheSource]

Did you forget about olympic-size swimming pools [wikipedia.org], as a measure of volume? ;)