iPod Touches still ship with old firmware
In case you were wondering, an iPod Touch purchased since the 2.0 firmware was released will not, in fact, come with version 2.0 installed. It won’t be an oversight, either, because it will come installed with version 1.1.5 instead, which was released after 2.0.
And, needless to say, Apple will still be willing to charge you $9.99 for the upgrade, finally putting a nail into the coffin of that silly old “we only charge for the upgrade because we have to for accounting purposes” excuse that they’ve been touting.
My annoyance with Apple in this regard (no, I don’t own a Touch) is only outweighed by my disappointment with Microsoft’s Windows Mobile platform, which has been thoroughly put to shame by the iPhone OS. As much as I dislike Apple’s resistance to removable batteries and external storage cards, the lack of Bluetooth/speaker/microphone on the Touch, and Steve Jobs’ draconian control over what applications can be marketed and installed to devices that Apple sells, the usability of an iPhone or iPod Touch vs. a technically superior (with regard to hardware) Windows Mobile device is just so much better that my qualms more or less become irrelevant.
There are a lot of things Apple does wrong, and many things that they do worse than their competitors, but their final package is often simply unmatched in the end. In a way, it’s kind of disappointing.
