Fresh iPods Just As Expected

They've arrived. The new iPods are shiny, touchy-feely, and pretty much just what everyone was expecting; as usual. Crazy how that works out, doesn't it?

The nano now has video playback capabilities, and a brighter display. Although, I don't think a brighter screen will help heal the severe eye strain caused my watching a movie on the thing.

What came as a surprise to me is that they didn't completely scrap the full-size click wheel iPod. They slapped a classic label on it and bumped the HD capacities to 80 and 120 GB.

Now, the star of the show, the iPod Touch. Looking exactly like the iPhone, only smaller, the Touch is everything but the phone. It's got wi-fi, built-in iTunes Music Store, and the same cool interface as its bigger cousin. The only drawback is the paltry 8 and 16 GB drives. The cool factor may cancel that out for some people, though.

In other announcements, the iPhone will cost $399 by the holidays, so get your credit cards ready to spoil the kiddos! iTunes now has ringtone support, and Apple has partnered with Starbucks to offer an interesting service.

Imagine, your in your local Starbucks, and your connected to the internet with your iPod Touch or iPhone. You say, "Gee, what is that song that's playing?" Well, finding out is as simple as pushing the Starbucks button in the Music Store, and listed before your very eyes are the last five songs that have played at the Starbucks your currently in. The problem? Well, I don't know of many people who actually want to know what songs are playing.

Hmm... what was the name of that indecipherable new age song that just played? Could it have been John Tesh?