The teardown reveals few surprises, but offers a good look at how Apple has been able to pack all of the components into a body that has 20% less volume than the iPhone 5. With a lack of cellular communications technology, the iPod touch carries fewer components and consolidates them into just a handful of parts. Most notably the logic board and battery are smaller than seen in the iPhone 5 and carry a top-and-bottom layout as opposed to the side-by-side layout seen in the iPhone.
One aspect of the teardown that did catch our eye is the Lightning connector and headphone jack assembly, which contains a long ribbon cable extending from those ports at the bottom of the device up to the logic board at the top. This part was seen several times back in August and was at the time claimed to be for the "iPad mini".
Those claims led to confusion over whether the iPad mini's headphone jack would be located at the bottom as on the iPhone 5 and the iPod touch or on the top as in the full-size iPad and as seen in mockups and cases reportedly based on leaked iPad mini design specs. With the appearance of this part in the iPod touch, the discrepancy has now been resolved and signs are pointing to the iPad mini's headphone jack being along the top edge of the device.
Other aspects of the device are fairly standard, with the logic board revealing Apple's A5 system-on-a-chip, flash storage from Toshiba, and the usual assortment of chips for handling Wi-Fi, touchscreen functions, gyroscope, and more.
Overall, iFixit found the new iPod touch to be difficult to repair, with many components soldered together and the device held together with adhesives and clips that make it difficult to open. The revelation is not a surprise, as Apple does not intend its mobile products to be user-serviceable and the company's efforts to push the limits of design and size reduction have led it to sacrifice accessibility.
We've been focusing on deals on physical products over the past few weeks, but Black Friday is also a great time of year to purchase a streaming membership. Some of the biggest services have great discounts for new and select returning members this week, including Disney+, Hulu, Paramount+, Peacock, and more.
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Tuesday November 25, 2025 7:09 am PST by Tim Hardwick
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We're only a few days away from Black Friday, which will take place on Friday, November 28 in 2025. As always, this will be the best time of the year to shop for great deals, including popular Apple products like AirPods, iPad, Apple Watch, and more. In this article, the majority of the discounts will be found on Amazon.
Note: MacRumors is an affiliate partner with some of these vendors. When...
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iOS 26.2 is currently in beta testing. The upcoming update includes a handful of new features and changes on the iPhone, including a new Liquid Glass slider for the Lock Screen's clock, offline lyrics for Apple Music, and more.
In a recent press release, Apple confirmed that iOS 26.2 will be released to all users in December, but it did not provide a specific release date.
Keep reading...
On this week's episode of The MacRumors Show, we talk through all of the new features and improvements expected to come to next year's iPhone 18 Pro and iPhone 18 Pro Max models.
Subscribe to The MacRumors Show YouTube channel for more videos
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In his Power On newsletter today, Bloomberg's Mark Gurman said that iOS 27 will be similar to Mac OS X Snow Leopard, in the sense that Apple is focused on improving "quality and underlying performance" over adding new features.
Gurman said there is one exception to this rule, though, as he expects...
American multinational news company CNN has abruptly pulled its content from Apple News, Semafor reports.
CNN quietly removed its stories from Apple News over the weekend and there is no longer a feed from the network to subscribe to in the app. This effectively ends its distribution agreement with Apple while the two sides negotiate new terms. Discussions are apparently ongoing and CNN's...
Monday November 24, 2025 10:25 am PST by Juli Clover
Apple is making progress on the development of the book-style foldable iPhone expected in 2026, according to a report from Chinese site UDN. The device has reportedly entered the engineering validation stage, and Apple is gearing up for mass production.
Citing supply chain sources, UDN says that Apple has solved "the crease problem" that has plagued most foldable smartphones, and the...
Right, because that's what people really want to do with their Ipods: repair them.
Right now there are people tearing open the package containing their brand new iPod Touch, putting a screw driver to it, finding it diffucult to repair and howling to the heavens:
"Oh Noooo! It's not repairable!!! I can't believe I paid $300 for this thing! Damn you Apple! Damn you to hell!"
Seriously, the market has spoken. People value small size and improved battery life over repairability. If Apple made it larger or made the battery smaller in order to make it more repairable, people would be less willing to pay $300.
iPod Touch for at least the first 3 generations were at least as fast or slightly faster than their iPhone counterparts cause it was "tweaked" as a gaming device.
Now iPod Touch is the step sister to the iPhone. Never getting the lastest gen specs.
For $299. I can find a very good condition or mint iPhone 4S 16GB. Some of which still have 4-6 months of warranty left on craigslist.
What isee said. Seriously guys, about .0001% of users would trade thinness for the ability to tear open their iPod and fiddle with things. If you're in that small group... Well, sorry. The market isn't on your side.
Precisely.
People who are into tech often forget how not normal they are. And I say this as someone who loves techies. I really do. But if you're here, talking about this, then you are not normal. Even those of us who are casual techies are still way outside of the bellcurve. We are outliers and we shouldn't forget that - these design choices aren't made with us in mind.
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I posted the same thing other day but I'll repeat it again because I think it is a valid point. The way Apple treats the Touch really annoys me. First off they hamper it with a previous generation cpu and half the ram vs the iphone. Second they use a cheaper screen. Third a weaker previous generation camera. Fourth no gps. And to top it off they charge the same price as an iphone. So by all outward appearances you are getting an iphone minus the cell chipset but in reality they cut corners almost everywhere and give you a cheaper built product. They can of course choose to do that, but then cut the price. And yes I realize an unlocked iphone is more expensive but then again I can buy an iphone from any carrier for those cheaper "subsidized" prices right now, so the comparison holds.
I've owned a few Touch's and think they are cool devices. But lower the darn price already.
The iPhone 5 with 32GB of internal storage is £599 here in the UK. The entry price new iPod touch has the same internal memory and costs £249. I don't know how you make that the same price. For £249 this is one hell of a good device. Brilliant screen, screaming fast processor, HD video recording, facetime, Siri. This is a great little device for that money and not nearly as expensive as the iPhone 5.
What isee said. Seriously guys, about .0001% of users would trade thinness for the ability to tear open their iPod and fiddle with things. If you're in that small group... Well, sorry. The market isn't on your side.
