iPod nano 5G with camera first hands-on!

Update: Quick walkthrough video is now after the break!

A look back on popular stories from today in a specific year.

Now that we've thrown 'em off the trail, use the form below to get in touch with the people at Engadget. Please fill in all of the required fields because they're required.
HD radio? Didn't that fail along with HD-DVD?
http://www.apple.com/ipodnano/features/includes/overlay_camera.html#overlay-camera
NO Camera, only video recording! FAIL... EPIC FAIL....
Looks like Apple can't get it done anymore.
The still camera will be a revolutionary enhancement in the next firmware release! Got to love apple!
Gimmicky.
Wow, the M$ fanbois sound off. Hilarious. I mean what the fuck else were you expecting, an implantable iPod? Holograms? 3D? Almost anything they do is going to be incremental and minor as there is nothing new to do with this kind of tech (at this point). And to the one idiot who mentioned the Zune, LMAO!
I dunno, they could get rid of the scroll wheel and put in an optical trackpad , give the damn thing a mini-web browser.
And it would make all those 'fantastic' games so much easier to play. Innovation is when you do something that's not incremental.
Nah, he's worried about his Windoze 7 release.
All I wanted was a 32 GB Nano Apple, was that too much to ask? Instead you went and stuck a useless camera in it, because apparently my cellphone cam and my Canon SD were not adequate. Thanks a lot. Looks like I'm not buying a new iPod for another year.
So is this regular FM or HD Radio? It took Apple how long to put a radio in their devices? I think the only interesting thing about today's announcements was Steve Jobs is back (although I agree with someone in an earlier thread about Big Steve's return... he does need to grab some more protein and carbs... break that vegetarian living for a bit and have a burger).
Oh shut up will you please. It's not like they didn't try. And even though the new features don't fit all of your NEEDS and WANTS, it's still a pretty cool little device. You should all be goddamn grateful that Steve took o"time off" from battling cancer for God's sake to build you all a new iPod. Grow up will you?
Sarah, will you listen to yourself. You sound like a bad parody of a Steve Jobs worshiper, except I guess you're for real. I'm sorry for you and especially for your idol.
We should be grateful for HE has graces us with HIS presence.
Big Apple fan here and even I think that was a very poor update....I was hoping for a one more thing after the one more thing :(...lets just hope that Apple has more up its sleeve before christmas. A very dull year for Apple updates unfortunately, really feels looking back that SJ's health is tied in with Apples health.
How many megapixels does the Nano camera have? (Why is no one reporting this spec?)
Does it do single images. I'm thinking that a single snap from that camera would be just as bad as the junk from my elcheapo LG cellphone.
That's because it's not a still camera. It only does vga video.
Could you find a WORSE camera operator to film this piece?
He shouldn't be worried: my next PMP is an HD, and Win7 is amazing. Microsoft is doing, shall we say, really well lately.
Years on my 3G nano is starting to wear out, and Apple *still* can't seem to actually improve on it. The things that would actually make a difference:
- better battery life
- waterproofing
- smaller/lighter
- 32GB
Instead there's a long list of mostly useless tackons (cameras, accelerometers, video playback, ...). Are they just there to justify the price? Can they not concentrate on just making a better portable music player? Or at least if I have to carry around all this crap, can I have some real improvements too?
edit: my *2G* nano, released 3 years ago.
Wow Apple copies the Zune with FM radio almost exactly. Tag the song to purchase later oooo my Zune can do that. Oooo know what song the iPod is playing ooo the first Zune 3 years ago could do that. What can this thing do that a Zune can't do umm a camera oh sorry a video camera that can't take stills. This update was very weak and I hope that the Zune HD that launches next week will show people in need of a media player how it should be.
One thing it can't do which made the Zune so great was tagging, and then purchasing it right over the air. Also, anyone who used that system knows that the song identification is pretty hit or miss depending on station. With HD however all the stations broadcast song titles. Again, win Zune.
I was really looking forward to the built in mic and ear piece in the iTouch for SKype. If it had that, I'm in. Looks like I'll have to wait for 4th gen.
Haven't you heard early this week that Apple manufacturer had tremendous problems with the IPod Touch camera manufacturing? This is why there were no new IPod Touch announcement today, they were obliged to delay , they're not ready, but you can count on it as soon as possible when they will have fix the problem.
I'd say pretty soon
Say, like, roughly 35 days after all the early adopters have finished buying this verson. Sorry guys, the amnesty period is over, enjoy your cameraless iTouch!
All the Camera means is that Apple has lost my future business when I next go for a portable media player.
I work in an industry that does not allow cameras, camera phones, or recording devices. That eliminates 90% of the phone market and now even more of the MP3 player market.
My prime use for my existing 3rd gen Nano is PODCASTS and AUDIO BOOKS - both things that are useless when taken out of sequence.
These new devices are absolutely bloody useless.
the new ipod can take photos?????
No actually.
FM radio?
Well, so much for that 90 dollars I spent on a radio remote
Why the video sample in Flash? No can see on an iPhone or Touch.
NO still picture.... WTF?
KIRF or not, they're all made in China!
W...T...F!!? I wanted something new damn it, Apple you fail epic. Shitty new iPhone, crappy nano upgrade, you didn't axe classic, and worst of freaking all, your oh so glorious amazingly well selling flag ship ipod touch HAS NO UPGRADE WHAT SO EVER? I wanted to waste more money on a new Touch, but guess what!? NOW I WONT!
Wonder ful, although i still don't see why it doesn't just draw stils out of the video.
people... you are all missing something. If you want to put a still camera in Nano then APPLE needs to add atleast 3.2 mega pixal camera in it to compete with the market. I think they failed to find a solution with Nano's price tag. so APPLE might have decided to stick with a very basic cam and amature video capability. Adding cam to touch will affect their iphone sales.... dudes wake up this is APPLE afterall.
Here is the answer to some of your questions, from Steve Jobs himself in today David Pogue's N.Y Times interview:
" I asked him, first of all, what the blogosphere’s been buzzing about: why Apple put a video camera into the tiny iPod Nano—and not the iPod Touch.
Mr. Jobs reiterated what Phil Schiller, the marketing vice president, had said earlier in the onstage presentation: that Apple is really pitching the iPod Touch as a game machine these days. And to do that, you have to make it as inexpensive as possible.
“Originally, we weren’t exactly sure how to market the Touch. Was it an iPhone without the phone? Was it a pocket computer? What happened was, what customers told us was, they started to see it as a game machine,” he said. “We started to market it that way, and it just took off. And now what we really see is it’s the lowest-cost way to the App Store, and that’s the big draw. So what we were focused on is just reducing the price to $199. We don’t need to add new stuff. We need to get the price down where everyone can afford it.”
I also asked him why the Nano can record video, but can’t snap still photos. That reason, he said, is technical: the sensors you need to record video are extremely thin these days—thin enough to fit into the wafer-thin Nano. But the ones with enough resolution for stills, especially with autofocus (like the sensor in the iPhone), are much too thick to cram into a player that’s only .02 inches thick."
for those who were hoping for a camera in the iPod Touch:
sorry guys the video function is reserved for the iPhone 3GS in this year's offering
Epic fail and can take videos but no still pictures wtf!!!!!
yeah that'd be a fail. it only does video? what is the point of that?
I saw it today and I really like it.. but I'm not familiar with iPods that much, so I wanna ask if its possible to sort my music the way I want, like creating folders like the psp for example. Thanx
That zombie video on the orange nano scared the crap out of me.
People, they didnt put a camera because putting a flash for the cam would have made the nano fatter.
it looks cool to me. but i already have a nano but its the regular one w/ 8gb.
and why is everybody hating on apple anyway?
soo confused right now!
I so need a smart phone