Filed under: Analysis / Opinion, Hardware, iPod nano
iFixit tears apart the 5th Generation iPod nano...nicely
The pioneers at iFixit are at it again, this time exploring the Loop's newest, coolest gadget -- the iPod nano. According to their measurements, this iPod is as thin as it could possibly be, and more densely packed than any previous Apple device. I work on iPods at my day job, but I'm afraid to start working on this one because there is very little wasted space and LOTS of glue. Here are some facts worth highlighting:
- The iPod nano uses flash memory manufactured by Toshiba.
- Apple would not be able to put a larger camera into it without reducing the footprint of other components.
- It uses the same style speaker as the iPod touch. The sound exits through the dock connector.
- The display has 17.5% more real estate than the 4th Generation iPod nano.
The clickwheel can actually be removed. It's a completely new design unlike the previous generations. All clickwheels in the last three years have been directly reliant on the logic board. If you are unfortunate enough to lose clickwheel functionality on one of these recent iPods, you're out the cost of a new logic board. With this new design, it appears that we could replace the clickwheel just like with the 4th Generation and earlier iPods.
The glass is VERY durable. iFixit says that they haven't seen issues with broken glass on the iPod nano -- I must be the exception. I've seen them break, but I have to agree that it takes an extreme amount of pressure to damage the glass.
The speaker itself is only about a millimeter thick. We're not talking about great quality audio here, but what can we really expect from a device this thin?
The camera is not integrated into the board and could theoretically be removed from the device if it fails. Getting to the point where you can actually remove it is a different story.
Final fun fact - the entire iPod nano is thinner than the iPhone camera assembly.
Thanks to iFixit for such a great take-apart as usual!
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Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
Jash Sayani said 11:29AM on 9-11-2009
That was expected. How can an Apple product be left in one piece.
I might upgrade my 2nd Gen Nano to the 5th Gen / iPod touch.
How much will I get if I sell my Nano (2nd gen). ? (It's brand-new. Still has the scratch-guards on)
Reply
Drew said 12:48PM on 9-11-2009
How about a link to the page your talking about?
Reply
raleedy said 12:51PM on 9-11-2009
You left out a word. Your question should be: "How about a link to the page your talking IS about?"
SCOTT said 1:23PM on 9-11-2009
@raleedy
NO you are wrong...the only problem with his sentence is that he used
"your" instead of "you're"
and please don't GRAMMAR & SPELLING POLICE us on the blog...unless we are the writer of the article and then GAME ON...
Jason Martin said 2:13PM on 9-11-2009
Apple said that the reason the camera can do video but not still shots is that "the tiny teensy CMOS sensor in the nano isn't up to the quality standards needed for stills; it's too thin. 'The sensors for doing a still camera... they are just way too thick to ever fit inside the Nano.'" http://bit.ly/xT9O0
Could someone explain why the sensor for video would be thinner than that of still shots?
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Josh Carr said 2:16PM on 9-11-2009
It's physically capable of taking still shots... one could simply just take a frame of the video and use it as a picture. I believe that Apple is just concerned that the pictures would be too low of a quality to call it a camera. For general internet purposes like youtube, 640 by 480 is fine for video but I would never want a picture at that resolution. Hope that helps!
gib said 2:45PM on 9-11-2009
Josh said it... this is the same reason basic camcorders with video cameras usually take horrible photos (yes, I know many camcorders are capable of high megapixel photos now, but I am talking about basic camcorders). The included 640 x 480 CMOS or CCD video sensor would be approximately a 0.3 megapixel camera. Here's the math -- (640 pixels * 480 pixels)/1,000,000 = 0.3072 megapixels.
If the iPod nano's camera had an incredible glass lens (which it does not), and the nano had a really good photo processor (which it does not), you *could* make prints from it... but photo printing it done at around 300 dpi, so you would have a print that is about 2"x1" before it looks pixelated.
Jason Martin said 2:51PM on 9-11-2009
Thanks for the explanations. I figured it might have been a legit quality issue. That's too bad. I could imagine using a camera like that for crappy, on-the-fly photos to post on social networking sites (not to print). But I know that's not the standard that Apple has for its products. Oh well.
Daniel said 12:45AM on 9-24-2009
I am impressed by the sleek design and the variety of colors. Apple is growing more by the launch of new iPhones, ipods, etc. There is a camera installed at the back but the picture quality is not very satisfying. FM Radio feature is also not great. Now lets come to the main highlights, the excellent mp3 player. The sound quality is awesome. People will surely enjoy music and go crazy. For more details refer http://www.etechreviews.net/
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