who has a iPod touch?

[matg]

Got one today and posting my first message from it on here. I have to say its great, the web browsing is excellent!

[harleyfatboy]

hi matg yes i have one had a classic before but screen to small only downside is lack of music videos and films if you go on the american site its a far greater choice also it would be nice to have an adaptor to fit in the car so we could turn the i pod round for the videos maybe in time

[ADENGUNNER]

Got one with lead fitted. Only disappiontment is it does not transfer to Sat Nav screen, it just says "Extension". Means that you have to disconnect to select on i pod screen. I usually select shuffle for whole of i pod libary and suprise myself with what plays next!

[CivPilot]

I got mine (16gb) when they first launched in the shops which was about 3 weeks before the website started selling them. Fantastic device and it's pretty much always with me as it is so good at finding free Wifi slots .

I've now "jail broken" mine and have installed google maps, weather & notes from the iphone and several other great third party programs (games, iphysics etc). I've also got full customisation control over the look of the menu's etc with full theme activation and the ability to have wallpaper on all the time. I even have a second page on the main screen that I access by just paging left (The second page has some games on it as I can reorder the icon shortcuts manually).

I will take a couple of photo's when I get home and post them here. In my opinion it's the way apple should have shipped the device.

[harleyfatboy]

hi civpilot you seem to have it happening with adapting your i pod is it possible to download dvds through your computer to play on the i pod if no then fine if yes how out there do you have to be to make it happen *****

[CivPilot]

Originally Posted by harleyfatboy

hi civpilot you seem to have it happening with adapting your i pod is it possible to download dvds through your computer to play on the i pod if no then fine if yes how out there do you have to be to make it happen *****

Simple answer to your question.... yes you can put DVD movies on your ipod touch, however this is just the movie itself and does not include menu's etc.

You need a program called 'Magic DVD Ripper' if your on a PC. This will enable you to take the film in ipod format direct from the disc with loads of options available to you (language track, subtitles etc).

Once this is done (takes about 40mins to rip one film) you simply drop the file into your itunes video library.

I'm just about to have some food but will post a couple of pictures later, including the video library I currently have on my unit.

[ADENGUNNER]

Civpilot
Where did you get the ripper program from and how do you do all that other cool stuff like the extra page etc?

[CivPilot]

The extra page is done with a program called customise. The DVD Ripper software was found on the internet, do a google seartch, it should be found easy enough.

Here's some quick photos of my touch as it looks now (along with the movies loaded I also have about 1500 songs, which is more than enough I think). anyway, one with the piccies...

How it now looks with Summerboard themes activated...

Second front page thanks to customise (you just sweep the page to the left to get here, and back to the right to show the first page)...

My movies folder...


Great picture obviously...

And I can change the theme in seconds in Summerboard...

Google Maps from the iphone...

And the live weather application also from the iphone...


For me this is how the touch should have shipped and I wouldnt put it back to standard if you paid me. I was extremely happy when I bought it, I'm over the moon with it now.

As far as hacking your own touch, have a search around the internet, there are very clear step by step instructions out there but you do need a bit of tech savvy to do it. And if you have upgraded to 1.1.2 firmware you will need to backstep (1.1.2 only added calender entry function anyway, something that is added with the opened unit).



Ps. Google maps actually seemlessly intergrates with your contacts, so if you go to one of your loaded contacts and press on their address the touch instantly opens maps and finds them. Very clever indeed.

[Fedorov]

Nice one CivPilot! I've had my 16gb Touch since they were released also, love it!!! Athough I'm a tech person I've not dared to jailbreak my precious device and I'm running the latest firmware on it.

Converting DVDs/Xvids etc... yes I agree there are plenty of FREE programs around but I still swear by DVD Catalyst 3.0 DVD to iPod,PSP,AppleTV,XBOX,Zune and more - very small cost for outstanding customer support. The best thing about this software is it can convert for pretty much any device. I use it to convert to my iPod Nano 3g, AppleTV and Touch, as well as PocketPC, Archos etc.... not many apps can convert to so many devices/formats without trying to charge you for a product for EACH device.

The 7-day trial is great if anyone fancies trying it, no cripples, you can convert as many movies with it as you wish during those 7 days. I'm simply a very happy customer

[CivPilot]

I looked into the latest firmware and the only changes a user would notice are the nifty battery charging logo in itunes and the enabling of calender entries on the fly.
By simply not bothering with this upgrade I've opened the unit up fully to be capable of being a proper PDA capable WiFi device. Well worth the (little) effort. It even automatically tells me if there are upgrades available for the programs I have installed.

I looked at Catalyst and it is a good program. Tried the trial version before settling on Magic DVD Ripper. Magic can also code for any format in the same way but it also has some great features like being able to Rip region 1 DVD's even if your computer is locked to Region 2. The ability to add subtitles and choose which audio track to code (Dolby, DTS, etc) is also much more seamless.
It's also nice to be able to rip the entire DVD including the menu's in a format that will go straight back onto another 'back up disc'.

[ADENGUNNER]

Thanks Civpilot
Looks like a busy period ahead (me, laptop and i pod touch!)

[harleyfatboy]

civpilot bought dvd ripper much faster than dvd catalyst to convert maybe you can help me with two questions how do you get the film covers on the movie playlist as i have the title but no picture... second is there a way of increasing contrast or color when you download or can you adjust the ipod somehow ... as all the ipod has is brightness ... could do with a bit more .... thank you

[CivPilot]

Originally Posted by harleyfatboy

civpilot bought dvd ripper much faster than dvd catalyst to convert maybe you can help me with two questions how do you get the film covers on the movie playlist as i have the title but no picture... second is there a way of increasing contrast or color when you download or can you adjust the ipod somehow ... as all the ipod has is brightness ... could do with a bit more .... thank you

The movie covers is done in exactly the same way as you would with an Album cover. Download the movie poster (or DVD case image) from the internet and save it to the same directory as the movie file. Then in itunes right click (or apple click) on the movie file and select "get info" in here there will be the option to assign artwork

As for the brightness issue, I'm not sure what your asking? I don't download films and all the movies I have ripped directly from the original DVD show up fine on my ipod without needing to adjust the brightness or contrast.

[harleyfatboy]

Hi no i dont mean download.... i mean using dvd ripper is there a facility to adjust color or contrast as there was one on catalyst 3 before u started the programme but i cant find a programme on ripper as i am not tech savvy and i have been looking .............thanks for your help so far

[Fedorov]

CivPilot, I bit the bullet and jailbreaked my Touch a few days ago - you know, wanted something exciting to do over Xmas!

Really cool, i-Physics is good fun and google maps is worth doing it for just to play with

[Wasser098]

Anyone got the iPhone? Worth £269 and £35 p/m? Most reviews seem to be good but a mate said it was cack...

[matg]

VOIP on the iPodTouch anyone:

touchmods.net Weblog

Install the app, sign up at freecall.com (activate the account) add the details to you iPodTouch ap and you can dial a number and hear the person at the other end (you can't talk back as no mic, but you can pre-order one)

All working for me

[Dinalli]

Originally Posted by Wasser098

Anyone got the iPhone? Worth £269 and £35 p/m? Most reviews seem to be good but a mate said it was cack...

Yeah ive got one, but not paying O2 35 a month. Bought the handset when they first came out in the US, so had it about 5 monhts now. Jailbreaked it and unlocked it using stuff off the web.

I would say if your only after the music and gagety bits then the ipod touch is the way to go, the iphone only really adds phone function to this.

There are a few quirks on it, you cant send picture messages or multiple sms messages.

[Fedorov]

I've got the Touch which is fantastic, especially if you Jailbreak it. I'm waiting for the iPhone v2 next year which I reckon will be the one to get.

[CivPilot]

Originally Posted by Fedorov

I've got the Touch which is fantastic, especially if you Jailbreak it. I'm waiting for the iPhone v2 next year which I reckon will be the one to get.

I agree, having a phone I often send MMS messages and normal messages to multiple recipients (especially this time of year) so not having those very basic features did it for me.
That and the camera really is bad. A mate of mine had one through work and we compared the 2mp picture taken with the iphone camera to one taken with a Nokia 6300 (my current phone, also 2mp) and the Nokia was head and shoulders above the iphone for both colour and contrast. The Nokia picture also had far less 'noise' and was overall clearly taken with a much better camera.

You cannot fault the user interface one bit, but that is available on the Touch. And as far as carrying 2 devices around, well I dont need my MP3 player 70% of the time so I don't have to. Personally I would much rather have a small phone than one that is lacking in very basic features compared to the cheapest phones on the market.

Expect iphone V.2 to be twice the capacity (16GB) and have a much better phone/camera implementation. Also expect it to be much harder to Jailbreak

Ps. All those with iphones/touch's should check out the range of cases made by "PDair" and the screen protectors made by "Invisible shield"


Edited to add:

iphone 1.1.3 firmwhare launches in a week or so and adds (amongst other things) the following:-

Multiple SMS recipients
MMS ability
Ability to re-organise front page icons
Pagination (multiple pages on for the home screen)
Triangulation for google maps
etc

So basically most of the things already available on a Jailbroken phone or touch.

It appears the iphone will be unlocked to 3rd party apps pretty soon (why else have multiple home pages ) now they just need to up the hardware on the camera and memory. Expect those announcments at the next keynote speach maybe?