RIP iPod Classic: 5 Ways the Original iPod Is Still the Best
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It's a sad, sad time for everyone who grew up in the 2000s. The iPod Classic, the most highly coveted MP3 player amongst your classmates, is no more. Apple quietly discontinued the click-wheel-scrolling iPod (it's come a long way) this Fall, the same season the iPod was first introduced 13 years ago. Now, the device is currently the most expensive iPod and are being sold for up to $1,000 on eBay in the UK. In the US, you can get one for $490 on Amazon, which is double the original $249 asking price. The Which iPod Are You? page only shows the Shuffle, Nano, and iPod Touch. Sad. The original white iPod brings back so many memories of swapping our Walkmen for a little stainless-steel-backed, music-playing brick. Read on for all the things we'll miss about the iPod classic. Source: Getty / Justin Sullivan
It was the first MP3 that could be used with just one hand.
The iPod was the size of a deck of cards! Its 3/4-inch hardware seems gargantuan today, but, in 2001, being able to play, pause, and browse through your music with just your thumb was incredible. Nothing will ever replace the feeling of the first time you held an iPod.
It could fit a LOT of stuff. Not just music.
The iPod Classic used a hard disk drive, just like your old laptops, which is why you could hear whirring from the inside of the device. There were actual moving mechanical parts inside of the iPod Classic, unlike the fancier iPod Touch of today. The main advantage of this was a ton of storage. Sure, back then it could only fit 1,000 songs. But the iPod Classic of 2013 was available in a 160 GB size, which could hold 40,000 songs. The new generation of iPods only offer up to 64 GBs.
And the original iPod wasn't just portable storage for music, you could use it as an external hard drive by dragging and dropping any type of file over the iPod icon on your desktop. Sigh, the good ol' days.
The silhouette ads were cool then and are still cool now.
There were over 20 dancing silhouette ads featuring songs from your childhood like "Hey Mama" by the Black Eyed Peas and celebrities like Mary J. Blige, Eminem, Coldplay, and U2 (who, apparently, still exist!). It was an iconic campaign, solidifying the white MP3's place in product-design history.
The clickwheel was so satisfying.
Click . . . click . . . click . . . never has scrolling through playlists or playing Pong ever been so fun.
It had fitness features way before fitness features went mainstream.
Apple's has been partnering with Nike for a long time. The iPod has included activity tracking and running data collection that could be synced with your Mac long before wearable gadgets took over tech.
Watch Steve Jobs's original iPod announcement!
Ah, so much nostalgia.