Tim Cook, executive vice president, annonuced that Apple plans to introduce new iPods until the end of the year.

“Over a year ago, we set out to create revolutionary updates to our core iPod lineup,” Cook said. “Last quarter was the final quarter for the older products. We think we did rather well with the prior lineup and believe that we will do even better with the new lineup that we have for the holiday season, including the new iPod Nano and some very innovative new products that we have yet to introduce.”

There were speculations about Apple adding video capabilities to its iPods but Steve Jobs, Apple’s CEO, put them down, motivating there are many difficulties associated with making the kinds of commercial video that would make such a device popular.

Devices in the iPod family offer a simple user interface designed around a central scroll wheel. Most iPod models store media on a built-in hard drive, while the smaller iPod nano and iPod shuffle use flash memory. Like most digital audio players, an iPod can serve as an external data storage device when connected to a computer.

iPod sales had grown lately, although it has slowed from the boom of several months ago. Apple sold 6.45 million iPods in the fourth quarter of this year, three times the number it sold a year ago, but only with 5 % more the first quarter.