Dell not even a worm in Apple’s iPod

In an effort to break Apple's 60%-and-growing hold on the digital music player biz, analysts are expecting Dell to refresh its Dell DJ player in time for holiday sales. When the Dell DJ was launched last year, critics had generally good things to say about it and it cost less than the Apple iPod, but instead of being an "iPod killer," it didn't even inflict as much as a superficial wound.

Dell remains silent about what plans, if any, they have to jazz up their DJ line, but the experts seem to agree that if Dell wants to be a player in this market at all, they will have to do something soon so that the DJ shows up on someone's Christmas list.

Check out BusinessWeek for an in-depth analysis.

Since Michael Dell and Steve Jobs are known to harbor personal grudges as well as professional contempt for each other,
it's unlikely we'd see an iPod-based Dell Digital Music player along the lines of the
Apple iPod + HP that was announced in January and started shipping earlier this fall.