The Apple iPod gave us so much, now it taketh away. Gone from the top of the 5th Generation iPod is the remote control port that few probably used anyway. The real travesty is that this port also provided power for accessories like the Griffin iTrip FM modulator and iTalk voice recorder. Watch for replacements to these in "sled" form factor that connect to the bottom port to derrive power and line-level audio. This should not have the distortion problems that the headphone jack was prone to in the past.

The real interesting feature deletion from this iPod though, is its lack of Firewire. Yes Apple, who helped to create this standard has orphaned the technology on thier latest incarnation of the Nano and iPod with Video. That's right, the entire iPod line for fall 2005 only supports USB 1.1 and 2.0. Was this a way to save a few precious cents at manufacturing or is this a testament that there are much more PC than Apple users now? I say the latter as most iMac and iBook users do not have the opportunity to put PCI 2.0 cards in their computers. Perhaps this is just a creative way for Apple to force computer upgrades rather than their throwing in the towel on the technology. Expect slightly longer charge times and slower speeds in syncing with USB 2.0 over Firewire also called IEEE 1394.