Using the iPod touch 6 in 2021 - Review By 91Tech

By 91Tech
Aug 15, 2021
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Using the iPod touch 6 in 2021 - Review

The iPod touch is a line. Apple has had around for nearly 15 years and one that hasn't received much love since the fifth generation that came out in 2012. This iPod here is that fifth generation from almost a decade ago, yeah hard to believe- and this here was its successor- releasing in 2015 and looking basically the same minus the silver circle that had been there for, like a wrist strap on the 5th gen, the 6th generation iPod would be sold by apple for a very long time. To the point, I really thought it was going to be the last one ever and yet in 2019 the iPod 7 finally replaced it changing practically nothing. And since then, we haven't really heard anything else. Leaving this iPod 6 is kind of the forgotten brother that didn't really change anything from the five but is also technically worse than the seven.

However, it's also the iPod touch that was sold for the longest stretch of time out of any iPod touch ever hey how's it going I'm josh from 91 tech, and this is my old iPod 6. , the one I actually bought a couple of weeks after launch in 2015 and used for a solid year or so until upgrading to the iPhone 6. It did me quite well- and I was excited to have a brand-new Apple device, but there was a reason I upgraded so quickly with the lackluster battery life and under clocked CPU, really making it not much better than the iPhone 5c I had beforehand. So today, let's ask: no one seems to be asking anymore: how does the iPod touch six hold up over six years later? It's probably clear. I do have some attachment to this device, but in a sense it was actually more my brother's than my own, as I gave it to him to use for a couple of years after upgrading myself, and it worked fine for him, assuming he kept a charger nearby.

As that battery life was and is just truly awful and an unfortunate aspect. That's carried over to the iPod touch 7. And the reason for that is due to probably the best thing about these old iPods, the mind-bendingly thin and light size how they manage to stuff the internals as powerful as they are in an iPod. This compact is truly astounding, but the small size does mean a very small battery which causes issues down the line, if not from the get-go and lithium-ion batteries, of course, do degrade as they age trust me. The battery is bad enough here to die much quicker than I'd like even in just filming the darn thing your first instinct might be to go and get a replacement battery, but as implied the truth is this.

iPod is a device, that's kind of too old to be too useful at this point beyond some basics of basics and, of course, as an iPod, it can't even be a simple phone, although it can use iMessage on Wi-Fi. When I got the iPod six, I was around 15 years old, and I didn't have a cell phone plan. My parents weren't paying for one, and I didn't really see the point as I couldn't get my driver's license yet, so I wasn't going out by myself very much, but then I turned 16 and got my license and so going to the iPhone 6 made a lot of sense for me for both the phone aspect, and the better battery life that wasn't too great on the iPhone 6 either, but was definitely miles better. It might seem strange that I upgraded to the iPhone 6 from the iPod 6 as on paper. They seem to actually have about the same specs, a single gigabyte of ram and the Apple A8 chipset, but the iPod touch 6, actually under clocked, that chipset likely, due to the smallest size, to 1.1 gigahertz from 1.4 a significant enough difference for the iPod to feel a little slower. Although now on iOS 12 truthfully, I don't notice a huge difference going to this from the iPhone 6.

, but ultimately the performance is going to be worse and yeah. Io's 12, perhaps one of the best iOS updates we've ever gotten. It's the final main iteration. The iPod 6 can run, and we do still actually get some minor updates here and there for basic patches and security fixes and all in all, this iPod runs pretty darn, okay, fine at best and mediocre at worst, which is really the beauty of iOS 12, as it was a refinement, update, focused on fixing the bugs of iOS 11 and speeding up devices across the board by a significant margin. The iPod 6 can still download surprisingly recent versions of apps, if not the latest versions, depending on what the app requires in terms of iOS and if I had a gun to my head and hopefully a portable battery.

I honestly could use this device day to day. If I had to at least if it weren't for the lack of sim tray, it's basically a small iPad, maybe a mini iPad Mini and while the use cases are slim, there definitely are some reasons to keep your old iPod around if you're really looking for one, the biggest is probably the most obvious and that's for music. This is an iPod after all, and if you still use downloaded music as opposed to streaming off, Spotify or whatever, then having it all stored on a single separate device from your phone can be quite handy as you maybe leave it plugged into your car or take only your iPod with you when you go for a run and if anything happens to it, whether it be stolen or broken or anything, it wouldn't be the end of the world as it's relatively cheap and hopefully not your main device with all your pictures and everything important. The other big use case I can think of is using this device for a child or someone who really doesn't need to do much basic games will run fine on here. In fact, that's actually something apple marketed pretty heavily when the iPod initially came out, albeit in 2015.

, it also has iMessage and can run TikTok or Instagram or any social media. Your kid's overstimulated brain could possibly desire beyond those two uses. It pains me to say that the iPod 6 is really not much more than a paperweight and a pretty crappy paperweight at that. Given how small and light it is darn apple and their brilliant engineering design? Jokes aside, of course, we will be looking somewhat in depth at the device itself, but I wanted to start this. Video off really pushing the iPod touch.6 is fast approaching. Obsolescence.

Orb is already there, depending on how you look at it, with iOS 12 being fairly recent, it's hard for me to call it a dead device, because it's really not, but it's also not something that most are going to want to use. At this point anymore and honestly, that's okay! You wouldn't expect a 6-year-old phone to be too usable anymore, and even though the iPhone 6s defies those expectations, it would be asking a lot of a 200 iPod from 2015 to do the same. So, let's back up here a bit and kick things off by looking at what, since the iPod 5 has been the most standout feature of the iPod touch, the colorful and compact design, the iPod touch hasn't changed its look for the better part of 10 years and for better or for worse there's a reason. The form factor is at least in theory, perfect for a device of this nature. The iPod touch 6 is super thin light and pretty darn nice.

Looking with a rectangular aluminum body reminiscent almost of the iPhone 5, which makes sense, given that the iPod 5 that introduced this design came out the same year, we have a lightning port on the bottom, as well as the headphone jack, which was pretty typical for the time, but is, of course, now a bit of a rarity in apple's lineup. Although the iPod touch 7 is actually one of the last iOS devices to still retain it, but like the iPod, 7 you're, not getting a lot of modern commodities here, with no water resistance, wireless charging, thanks to the aluminum and, of course, no touch ID with that old classic home button. If you're wanting security on your iPod touch, you better get used to putting in your passcode, since the 5th gen revamp in 2012 apple has been extremely lazy with the iPod touch, and while it's hard to fully blame them with what I would expect are very low sales. It must still be selling well enough to keep around, so I do wish apple would finally show it some love. This iPod could have been so much more in 2015.

It came in the perfect time to, in the very least, bring touch ID. But, alas, what you see here is what you get the colors on. This iPod are of a different variety than that of the iPod 5 going from the colors you see on the top here to the newer ones you see on the bottom, which look you prefer is completely subjective, and I think changing up the colors in the very least, was a half decent addition, as it was really one of the few changes from the iPod 6's predecessor, you have red space, gray gold, silver, pink and blue, giving something here for everyone and back when this iPod came out. I was especially hyped for that gold that I have here it's funny, because in hindsight I'm actually not really a fan of the gold color, at least on iPhones. I think the glass gold phones have been nice, but the aluminum ones at least, but because it was still a relatively new thing in 2015, my younger self was very hyped for it.

One really nice touch, I do like is coloring the square on the home button to the color of the iPod and yeah just kind of nice attention to detail. And what is there really to say about the overall design? There's again a reason, it hasn't been changed. It's almost perfect for what this device is supposed to be almost the thin body makes it easy to throw in your pocket or purse or car or backpack, and bring it along almost anywhere, giving you likely the most portable and condensed iOS experience that exists today on the small 4-inch display. Ah, yes, the display it's retina with a resolution of 36 by 640 same as the iPod 5 and any 4 inch iPhone, and thanks to the strong pixel density of 326 pixels per inch that we get with the retina. While content shows up clear and crisp with accurate coloring, the screen isn't the brightest, but all in all, it's good enough.

Just a bit small. You can see pretty clearly by the lack of dark mode and older music app icon, I'm running iOS 12, which is the final version of iOS. This iPod can run as mentioned earlier, meaning beyond technical and security updates. Occasionally dropping you shouldn't expect anything new coming to your six-year-old iPod as the hardware it holds just isn't capable of running any better iOS version. I'm happy apple stopped updates here, as the iPod 6 was one of the slowest devices running iOS 12 by nature of the under clocked CPU and iOS 12 actually gives pretty decent performance, definitely not the best, but it's not terrible with leg existing for sure, but the basics are still very much usable.

Of course, performance could be and probably will be impacted by a bad battery, but assuming you're plugged in or have your iPod fully charged. It should be able to do most things. You would want it to do from messaging to social media, to lightweight games, even playing music of all things. On an iPod I know crazy, the Apple A8 chipset inside might be under clocked, but it's enough to get this device by and by all accounts and purposes. The iPod 6 has aged better than one might have expected of a 200 device back in 2015, and that price point should really be kept in mind when talking about all this, because it's really quite astounding, that's such a budget oriented machine is even remotely usable anymore with how far tech has come in such a short amount of time.

It's aged exponentially better than the 5th generation iPod touch to be sure, as that iPod died, a painful death on iOS, 9 and probably shouldn't have gotten past iOS 7. I think when critiquing the current iPod touch or an older one like the 6th generation, people tend to forget, including myself, that this was a very cheap device when it came out, and yet it survived a very long time in terms of updates. However, while that value is great within a couple of years around when the iPod initially comes out, the problem arises when these iPods are being sold for so long and had you bought the iPod touch 6 in early 2019 before the seventh generation came out, you would have already lost full iOS support by the end of the year. If Apple was just giving the iPod minor upgrades every couple years, just a better chipset, this wouldn't be an issue, but they don't, which is quite frankly, disappointing and a bit unfair for anyone who unknowingly buys or has bought an iPod touch so late into its life cycle. I mean you can't sell the same device for four years or almost four years, without an upgrade and barely really reduce the price.

The other huge issue is one that I've mentioned a million times, but it still needs to be reinforced and that's battery life. It's laughably bad, and the issue is just how small the iPod is. Anyone bringing this around, I would bet a lot of money. They would prefer. The iPod was bigger and thicker and heavier in return for another few hours of battery life, and that's assuming it can even reach a few hours of life, as is the battery, is barely a thousand William hours, specifically being 1043, which is absolutely horrendous and, as far as I can tell, is smaller than any iPhone, that's ever been released.

Yeah, even the original iPhones had a couple of hundred more William hours in size, and I don't care how chalky those things were. The iPod touch just doesn't need to be this small buying a new or used or refurbished iPod. Today, even with a brand-new battery might give you fine performance for a while, but that battery will degrade. That's the thing to watch out for on any older or even newer iPod touch, not that you'd ever want to be buying an iPod touch 6 nowadays, especially with the 7th generation being as cheap as it is, which we'll get too shortly. But before that, let's look at the camera.

An element that's held up pretty poorly, but is about the same in terms of quality as the 7th gen iPod, which that's not actually good, but hey. It makes the iPod 6 hold up better. I guess, but this here was a decent upgrade in 2015 over the 5 megapixels on the 5th gen touch, giving us 8, megapixels and the rear sensor, and the ability to record video in 1080p. These pictures are pretty bad, even in perfect conditions outdoors with great lighting. While you can get some mediocre at best shots, it's just really not up to par even compared to cameras from around the same time frame.

That being said, given this was a 200 device in 2015. The camera would have been pretty low on the list of concerns, and it would totally do the job in a pinch, which is all it really needed to do and hey through the length of time when it was my main driver. I got some nice photos with it here and there. The selfie camera hosts the same megapixel count as the 5th gen with 1.2 megapixels, and the quality is pretty potato tier, but it works, and it's good enough for FaceTime or whatever you need it for, and it's also the same as the one in the newer iPod touch 7, because of course it is. The camera is something I feel fine with rushing through, because it's not a very important aspect of the iPod.

What this device can still be useful for is predominantly music and actual downloaded media, and we do have a range of storage spaces, but they're originally being 16 gigs and 64 gigs available and eventually only 32, gigs or 128 gigs. I would avoid that 16 gig model like the plague. Actually I'd really avoid this iPod, like the plague in general, but you get the idea.32 gigs, however, is probably more than enough for the average user, even with moderate size, music, libraries or a healthy selection of downloaded games or photos or whatever your heart desires, and this is assuming you're even using the sci pod in the first place. I can't call it fully obsolete because it's not, and if you push it is can still do the vast majority of tasks. Even the newest iPhone can do just on an older software version, but it's not a pleasant experience, not even really due to the mediocre at best performance, but instead that garbage battery life.

It is what it is, but I won't stop whining about how apple has seemingly forgotten about the iPod touch until they finally just make it a bit thicker and actually give it some decent, lasting power. I know they can do it. Their newest iPhones have had great battery life the last couple of years, but unfortunately, it's more likely in my opinion that the iPod touch line gets killed off altogether, as the device really just doesn't have the same appeal or market niche that it used to even in 2015. The iPod touch didn't make sense for most people in the early 2010s. It was great the perfect device for kids or someone who wanted a smartphone without fully dipping their toes into getting an actual smartphone, but by 2015 pretty much.

Everyone had a smartphone, including many of the kids, who would have been buying iPods only five years prior as the smartphone audience expanded. The iPod niche shrunk to the point of now, where it's a very, very specifically tuned device for a very small market, and, while I know the ideal user for something, even as old as the iPod touch 6 exists six years later, it would be dishonest to say that they're, very common and, of course, even the brand new iPod touch 7, doesn't exactly have a huge market. It's too bad, I'm just hoping apple either kills the line completely, so people don't waste their money on a subpar device or even better, just give the iPod the proper upgrade it's deserved. Ever since this iPod 6 came out in 2015. This is the middle child of the modern iPod touch trilogy, but I'll always remember it for giving me a decent experience a half decade ago, and really I don't think I could ask much more from it.

Obviously don't buy one anymore. If you have an old one lying around, that's a different conversation completely again. It works as a music player or for a kid or something, but if you do want an iPod nowadays, don't buy a used one like an iPod 6, it's not worth it when the iPod touch.7 is just so cheap brand, new or even refurbished, if you can find it on Apple's website, but I think that's about all. I have to say today, so if you found this video interesting, maybe hit that like button and consider subscribing for more content. Just like this, you can follow me over on Twitter and Instagram.91 underscore tech, if you'd like to for some reason- and we do have a discord link- is always in the description below. Thank you so much for watching.

I really do appreciate it. I'm josh from 91 tech- and I will see you all next time you.


Source : 91Tech

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