The thoughts of a true technology versatilist
A month and a half ago I told you about Dension’s “Ice>Link:iPod” and now Alpine has announced its own integrated solution for its line of audio head units.
Unlike the Dension solution, Alpine’s solution will only be compatible with Apline head units.
It will be available through Apline resellers in September 2004.
With HP’s launch of the new “Apple iPod by HP” (the result of an Apple HP partnership), it also announced the availability of “HP iPod Tattoos”.
To get to the list of HP iPod Tattoos, you will have to click on the lower left hand image of the center Flash image within the HP Digital Image web page.
At this resulting screen you will see Flash movie animations of each of the available tattoos from HP. The images below are examples of the Vanessa Carlton album cover.
According to HP, there will be clear tattoo sheets available in which you can print your own designs. Of course this is another way to sell HP printers and HP Ink. They also mentioned that they are working with record companies to make available to consumers more album cover art.
For the die hard iPod lovers I think they may choose to stick to the clear tattoo sheet to avoid tampering with their beautifully designed white iPod.
Unfortunately, none of the material I read from HP mentioned the Macintosh. It even fail to mention that the Apple iPod by HP is “Macintosh compatible”. I will presume the required software to print to these clear tattoo sheets will be Windows specific software.
Also of note, at the time of announcement there do not seem to be “tattoo sheets” available for the iPod Mini.
I guess this is another opportunity for 3rd party to come in and fill the holes left by Apple and HP.
For many years, iPod users like myself had been fumbling with various devices that allow us to pipe tunes from our iPods through the car audio system.
These solutions had been a combination of cigarette lighter connector for power and then a separate device for the audio. The latter being either a wireless FM Tuner or a tape cassette adapter. These sort of solutions resulted in cords laid out on our vehicle’s console. Then when you park your car, like me, you will go through the ritual of unplugging everything from your iPod and then packing it way.
Now Dension has come to our rescue. The Budapest, Hungary audio supply manufacture has come out with the product they called “Ice>Link:iPod”.
The Dension products is available with different connectors for various car manufactures’ built-in and after-market audio manufactures’ audio systems.
It will also display the current playing track’s ID3 Tag information on your head unit. The amount of information displayed depends on the head unit being connected.
All in all this Ice>Link:iPod product is a very clean solution for iPod owners who happens to also be drivers.
The product is available now at Dension retailers around the world.