Apple snubbing PortalPlayer for next-gen iPods

Chip vendor PortalPlayer has been dealt a severe blow by Apple, as the computer company has apparently decided not to use PortalPlayer's media processor in some next-generation iPod models. PortalPlayer has been working on a successor to its PP5021 chip, but the company says Apple will not be using it in new high-end and midrange flash models. However, PortalPlayer expects (or is that hopes?) that Apple will continue using the PP5021 in other models. There's no word yet on whose chips Apple will be using in the next iPods, though we expect rumors to start flying furiously very soon. Meanwhile, in an indication of the power of the iPod ecosystem, PortalPlayer's stock plummeted over 40% in about 10 minutes of trading today -- not a major surprise, perhaps, given that the iPod accounts for a whopping 90% of the company's revenues. But, hey it's not all bad news: PortalPlayer has plans to provide chips for auxiliary displays on Windows Vista-based computers. Which should provide some relief in about two or three years, once such computers actually start shipping.

[Drew @ Apr 20th 2006 10:24AM]

Ouch!

[yuppicide @ Apr 20th 2006 10:28AM]

I think it's a setup. I think Apple said that to make their stock drop, then they can buy stock, then they will say we're going to use their chips afterall and stock rises.

[Traid @ Apr 20th 2006 10:29AM]

The company is developing and selling chips for non-MP3 applications, but it has yet to make a dent in the arena.

[Soft @ Apr 20th 2006 10:31AM]

Hey, hope this will make new iPods better ;)

[JJ @ Apr 20th 2006 10:42AM]

any idea who else sells this type of chip?

[putte @ Apr 20th 2006 10:45AM]

Hopefully, they'll use the Sigmatel 3600 chipset, which would bring us gapless and Vorbis: http://www.dapreview.net/comment.php?comment.news.2458

[Tomas @ Apr 20th 2006 11:02AM]

Thank the dear Lord that I did not get involved in this stock when it piqued my interest back in January.

[David @ Apr 20th 2006 11:04AM]

a Sigmatel chip would be great.

[Joe Smith @ Apr 20th 2006 11:10AM]

That Sigmatel chip looks so nice it makes my heart ache with joy.

[kaizr @ Apr 20th 2006 11:24AM]

down from 22$ to 12,77 and still dropping. that's gotta hurt.

[David @ Apr 20th 2006 11:25AM]

When does one expect the next-gen iPods to be released? I'm a newbie to this fabulous gadget, and purposely got a "smaller" (in my opinion) 30 GB iPod so I'd have more motivation to upgrade when the new ones come out.

[Jacob @ Apr 20th 2006 11:29AM]

2: I think it's a setup. I think Apple said that to make their stock drop, then they can buy stock, then they will say we're going to use their chips afterall and stock rises.

Not a chance. That's MASSIVELY illegal.


Honestly, I think Apple's been working on some new chipset internally... with a little help from Intel.

(Yes. The PortalPlayer chipset had to go. There's no excuse for it not having gapless playback after this long.)

[Mike @ Apr 20th 2006 11:41AM]

I'm betting they use a new chipset from Intel.

[Apple Hater @ Apr 20th 2006 11:58AM]

what is gapless playback?

[bob @ Apr 20th 2006 12:02PM]

i think anyone manufacturing for apple needs to keep at the top of theire game, if we have learned anything its that apple is NOT afraid to go through big changes to get the best, like IBM was better than pentium 4 but times change and now intel is making gains apple changed ship.

[Justin @ Apr 20th 2006 12:03PM]

Who needs gapless playback!? Hell, here in West Virginia we don't even have gapless teeth.

[tommer12 @ Apr 20th 2006 12:07PM]

Surprise! It's bono on the ipod aaaaaaggain........ ugg... at least can you put spongebob on it or something?

[Nick the Greek DJ @ Apr 20th 2006 12:09PM]

Gapless playback is not about removing silence that should be there (although some poor attempts at implementing gapless will do that *cough*iRiver*cough*). If a CD has a 10 second pause between two tracks then that pause should stay there and does when played in properly gapless players. Gapless playback is simply about not inserting any extra gap that shouldn't be there, so that tracks which flow together on a CD still do so, without any pause or click, when played on a computer or DAP. Some players add more silence than others and it depends on the music you listen to, and your personal tolerance levels, whether "near-gapless" is good enough. Many, many people can even put up with the half-second gap which the iPod adds; this page is not for those people and will just agitate them, just like gaps agitate the rest of us.

If you tend to listen to albums from start to finish, and albums where someone spent time crafting a complete hour of music rather than a compilation of disconnected songs; if you're into live albums, mix albums, classical, opera, hip-hop with all its interludes and segues, flowing dance music or rock that isn't made for idiots who hang out at the mall, then maybe it will annoy you that between each track, where one piece of music should flow into the next, the whole experience is interrupted by silence or a click. If the album sounded better that way the artist would've made it like that in the first place.

If you only listen to randomly selected, individual tracks, or albums where the tracks are always independent, then you're not going to care. That's cool. I'm not trying to push my preferences on anyone else. If MP3, iPods and all that stuff does it for you then I'm really happy for you. Just don't push your preferences on me and tell me none of this should matter to me, please. Every time I hear a pause or a click between a track it irritates me a little bit and over time those irritations, combined with the fact that most of the DAP industry is completely ignoring the problem, has annoyed me enough to make this page and warn other people who feel similarly.

If you don't care about the issue of gapless album playback then you won't find anything interesting or useful on this page.

[Nick the Greek DJ @ Apr 20th 2006 12:14PM]

Refuse to buy DRM'd music.

The big record companies only want to sell you music online if they can control what you do with it via Digital Rights Management. In principal, I don't have any problem with them using technology to prevent piracy, but DRM takes away significant rights and choices from consumers and should, in my opinion, be boycotted. There is no one standard format for DRM'd music. The iTunes store will sell you AAC files wrapped in a proprietary FairPlay DRM wrapper. While AAC is a standard format supported by a semi-reasonable number of players, the FairPlay DRM wrapper around it is owned by Apple. Except for HP who are making iPod players to meet demand, Apple have refused to licence FairPlay to anyone, whether they want to sell DRM'd music compatible with iPods or make competing music players which can play music bought from iTunes. Pretty much the only other popular DRM'd music format is WMA. Many more online stores and music players support DRM'd WMA files, but not all of them do...

Do you really want to pay money for some music that starts making choices for you about which hardware and software you play it back on in the future? What if you buy a DRM'd WMA album today and next month a kickass new iPod comes out that can't play it? Do you skip the iPod, or buy a second copy of the album? If you buy music from the iTunes store you'd better be really, really sure that for the rest of your life you're only going to buy Apple music players because it looks likely right now that nothing else will play them, HP's version of the iPod aside.

[Linh @ Apr 20th 2006 12:15PM]

agreed... that is my one major complaint with the ipod... gapped playback.

[PEZ @ Apr 20th 2006 12:35PM]

PortalPlayer should sue apple for putting them out of business.

Hahahaha...

[The Driver @ Apr 20th 2006 4:04PM]

IMPORTANT QUESTION is it even OFFICIAL that pple is making a new video ipod? Ive heard few 5g owners complain about theirs. Other PMP are practically obsolete, regardless of supported formats or screen size. KNOW WHY? iPods have the word "iPod" written on them. And they have a bitten apple on the back. Thats why.

[Eli @ Apr 20th 2006 5:18PM]

This may not be the best move for Apple, since Portalplayer IS the iPod. Apple pretty much just made the case and marketed it.

[The Jeremy @ Apr 20th 2006 6:29PM]

I agree that a setup for a stock drop could be a motivator. Illegal? Pffff. No more so than what Sega did to 3dfx at the behest of Microsoft back in the day. Doubtful the FTC or the SEC would intervene. Most likely a private lawsuit by PortalPlayer shareholders against Apple if it could be proved.

But take this to heart. Apple dumps PortalPlayer chips. Stock drops. Apple buys PortalPlayer, retains the patents but sells off the designs and the company to Intel. Apple contracts with Intel to provide all iPod chipsets. And how does this benefit Apple? Gives them more intellectual property to hammer Creative with as well as Microsoft if they want to rumble. It would also benefit Apple more than some of their competitors (like Creative) since Apple would receive the discounts based upon economies-of-scale.

[Henry @ Apr 20th 2006 7:45PM]

"agreed... that is my one major complaint with the ipod... gapped playback." Are you serious? Weakling battery life, anti-competitive drm and itunes supporting rather than challenging the record label system. booo. And not forgetting a really silly name.. "Ipod"? The Sony NWA1000V is waaaaay catchier...

[zoara @ Apr 21st 2006 10:13AM]

On gapless playback:

http://www.pretentiousname.com/mp3players/ .
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gapless_playback .

I have an iPod, and I love it. But I hate the gapless playback bug.

[DRB @ Apr 21st 2006 7:42PM]

You don't need a Sigmatel chip in order to achieve gapless or vorbis playback. iPod users may download a alternate firmware (OS)called ROCKbox (www.rockbox.org) which will allow the user to dual boot their iPods into either the ROCKbox or original iPod OS.

Rockbox adds way more functionality, codec support and so many odds and ends, that any DAP utilizing it, would put any other DAP without it, to shame. The RB team have been coding alternate firmware for a long time now and have established that they can produce very stable, incredible alternative firmware.

ROCKbox is currently running on L

iRiver H1XX and H3xx series
Some Archos models
iAudio DAP's
Various iPod generations. (including photo) Video on the 5th gen products is not working yet, but shall eventually. But that's why dual booting rules !