Google’s Really Sucking it Up Part 2: Apple’s Really Sucking it Up
I guess I should write an update to my last posting about my crummy experience using Google Checkout to make a purchase.
I purchased my iFM and it was delivered, I signed for it, opened up the package and suffered extreme disappointment that the iFM doesn’t work with my iPod. Apparently, it relies on a little port that Apple used to put next to the headphone jack called the “remote port”. (See this delightfully crazy page to see what it looks like.) As you can see, virtually every iPod in existence, except my 30 GB video iPod, has a remote port right next to the headphone jack.
You’ll also notice that Griffin Technology actually has two versions of the iFM: one that works with my iPod, and one that doesn’t. Brilliant.
Five demerits to Apple, for removing a port that tons of iPod accessories relied on for no reason what-so-ever. Two-and-a-half demerits to Griffin Technology for upgrading a product without renaming it. (You can’t really blame Griffin as much when Apple does the same thing.)
So it’s been a terrible customer experience all around, and I still don’t have a working FM receiver for my iPod. I give up.
Sucks that you ordered the wrong one. But I don’t catch how this becomes Apple’s fault. And I *know* you don’t want Apple to stop innovating and improving products or you wouldn’t even have a VIDEO iPod.
Griffins fault, maybe, if they only made one version and had zero info about which models it was compatible with. But I’m guessing they will swap it out for you if you give them a shout and let them know you ordered the wrong one by mistake.
Am I missing something? Was there not enough info to make the right choice? You seem to have found all the right info after the fact and saved me the trouble of finding it for you. So I’m still not really understanding how this is Apples fault and not yours for picking the wrong item.
Well, the main problem was that Apple arbitrarily decided to remove the remote port from the top of the 30 GB iPod Video I have, even though it was on all previous models. Surely there’s nothing in the “improvement” of the iPod that would require them to break backwards-compatibility with tons and tons of peripherals?
And because there’s no remote port, the iFM I finally got that works can’t record to the iPod either. (Although that might be Griffin’s laziness, since it does use the dock connector– it seems stuff plugged into the dock connector ought to be able to record.)
But oh well.