Photos: Hands-on with the new Apple iPod touch

By Nate Lanxon on 09 September 2008, 9:01pm

4Pages

1
2
3
4

It struck us at the Apple announcement today that the focus of El Jobs was on the new iPod nano. But a fair bit of attention was given to the new iPod touch too. Like the nano, it's hella thin. It's got the same slick aluminium enclosure it always has done, but now it's got a curved back like that on the iPhone. And, most importantly, we were thrilled to see the rocker volume switch.

What we weren't happy to see was the inclusion of built-in speakers. Apparently this was a requested feature. Yes, probably from the same people who brought you such classic requests as later bed-times, having girls stay over, and not going to school today because you've got a sore throat. Children. Only children want crappy speakers in music players. Grown-ups appreciate how utterly infuriating they are.

True, they'll be handy for listening to podcasts in the bathroom, but that's what battery-powered mini speakers are for. We won't be investing.

Having the app store's pretty much a given, and the Genius playlist creation will be useful for exploiting the 36 hours of music battery life. Definitely a great improvement, and with the inclusion of games we agree with Jobs that this will be "the funnest iPod yet". Yup, he said "funnest".

All these new features will be a free update for you guys who paid to update to iPod touch version 2. And if you haven't, it'll cost you an as-yet unknown fee.

It feels pretty much the same as the last model, only slightly glossier around the edges, but it's essentially the same touch. If you touched the last one, you've pretty much touched this one.

Thanks again to our camera exploding, we can't show you our hands-on pics, but we can show you some other pictures. They're over the page. You'll be able to buy the new touch in the next couple of weeks at £169 for the 8GB model, £219 for the 16GB, and £279 for the 32GB. -Nate Lanxon

Update: Read our full Apple iPod touch (2nd gen) review here.