Do Apple tech support know iPod touch lacks a camera?

Jonny Evans
|
October 14, 2009
|
Share

So, anyone who doesn’t yet believe Apple intends shoving a camera inside a future iteration of the iPod touch really should chase across to Apple’s tech support pages, where a recently modified document seems to suggest Mac OS X thinks it does.

The document, “iPhone and iPod touch: Disabling digital camera notification in Mac OS X”, seems an anomaly. After all, we all know the iPhone hosts a camera, but the iPod touch doesn’t, does it? That’s certainly set us thinking and conjecturing and speculating.

“When the iPhone or iPod touch is connected to Mac OS X, a dialog is presented with choices for connecting as a digital camera and working with the digital pictures stored on the iPhone or iPod touch,” the document informs.

“This is the default behavior under Mac OS X for digital imaging devices. Mac OS X provides a way to disable this notification,” it adds, moving on to tell you how to disable that there notification those Apple’s is tellin’ us about.

So, just why is the iPod touch showing up as an imaging device when it doesn’t have a camera? Well, it didn’t last time we looked, so we checked and it still doesn’t. Sure, it can carry images, but why then does it show as a camera? Perhaps it's only in order to invoke iPhoto so you can select images to store on it, but we don't think so....

We think it's a pretty solid hint that a camera will be put inside the iPod touch pretty soon.

Comments (10)

9to5Mac Noob (not verified) | October 14, 2009 - 6:14am

Screenshots save to the camera roll, as well as applications that can write to the camera roll (like Safari when you save an image from a website) - this is how you retrieve those. It's nothing new.

9to5Mac Noob (not verified) | October 14, 2009 - 6:21am

My iPod touch has always activated iPhoto and allowed me to import the pictures from the iPod touch when I connect the iPod to a Mac for syncing.

Brrr (not verified) | October 14, 2009 - 6:26am

My son's iPod touch automatically opens iPhoto along with iTunes when it is plugged into the computer. That's a pretty good indication to me that the OS thinks there's a camera in it.

Jonny Evans | October 14, 2009 - 6:31am

To quote Muttley:

"Shwazzle, Wazzle, Gruzzle"

9to5Mac Noob (not verified) | October 14, 2009 - 6:33am

Launching iPhoto when you connect an iPod touch doesn't necessarily mean that is/has a camera or was intended to have a camera, there are other ways to put images on the device like download them for instance. Now I would definitively like to see a camera ASAP in it.

9to5Mac Noob (not verified) | October 14, 2009 - 6:34am

If you connect any generation of iPod Touch with pictures stored on it to your PC, doesn't it do the same thing? For example, if I download a picture from a web site onto my 1G Touch and connect it to my PC, I get a notification that a digital camera has been connected and it asks me what I want to do with the pictures stored in memory. I don;t have a Mac, but this functionality has always been there on the PC.

Jay R (not verified) | October 14, 2009 - 6:35am

Whenever I hook my iPod Touch up to my PC post OS 3.0 it always comes up as a Digital Camera. I was wondering the same thing and was holding off on buying a new one until the camera was implemented. I currently still have my generation 1 iPod Touch.

AppleExpert (not verified) | October 14, 2009 - 6:36am

I've had an iPod Touch for about 2 years now and it has always done this with screenshots. It's not anything new. My iPod always showed up as a camera on Windows XP and in iPhoto.

9to5Mac Noob (not verified) | October 14, 2009 - 6:37am

good morning from Ger to US.
The message that there are photos on my 1st-gen-iPod that are ready to be imported in iPhoto is going on my nerves since >2 years. If you don't store pic from apps or do screenshots iPhoto is calm when connected to the mac.

Jonny Evans | October 14, 2009 - 6:45am

Ho hum,

I've taken this off the front page. Still wonder why it shows as an 'imaging device' though, as it isn't, strictly speaking...now understand it's to do with iphoto/itunes integration.