French electronic grandmaster, Jean-Michel Jarre started a new venture: Jean-Michel Jarre Technologies manufacture exclusive and expensive hardware products. They have two products at first: AeroSystem is a glass-based active speaker system for mp3 players, having a 2 x 200W performance, plus a 450W sub-bass. USB and iPod docking is performed, and the visual deisgn is wonderful. It has several different skins, you cn select an appropriate one for 449 euros. The other goodie is a digital picture frame, AeroFrame that costs 200 euros. The size of the display is 8", and it has rechargeable battery.

Alesis shows us how to use your 5th generation iPod as a pocket recorder. The small black shoe is ProTrack, the company's new wonder: it features pro-grade XLR inputs accepting microphone or line level signal. It even puts phantom power on them if you use the gadget from the power supply. ProTrack also has a good stereo LED metering, and after the input stage an analogue limiter cares after the proper signal level. It even has a pair of built-in mics to provide a ready-to-fly solution. Price is still a secret but you can browse the product's page already.

iPod accessories are coming strongly: what you see on this picture is not a cashier's machine but an audio interface with iPod docking. Alesis will sell it, its name is Multiport. It is a stereo USB audio interface with mic and line inputs, and it records on iPod, and plays back it, without the computer. It also does simultaneous recording and playback between any sourcer and destinations if you want. The nice big iPod transport buttons are also very useful. We still don't know the price but here is the official web page.

The video tells the story: it's a virtual guitar modeling software, PocketGuitar, running on iPhone or iPod touch. You can play it with touching the surface of the phone on the way very similar to a real guitar. You can track its history on code.google. Download is free.

From Numark, again: the name of the turntable is TTi, a device which provides digitised vynil sound directly on its USB port. A recording software is also included which cleans the signal from the pops and noises that are unwanted. But the biggest news is the iPod docking station - you can directly convert your LPs and SPs to mp3, without the need of a computer - just stick you 5th generation iPod into the hole and let the rock and roll begin. Price is still a mystery, any other questions are answered here.

NAMM looked two new studio device dedicated for iPod use: at first, Alesis has a new mixer, iMultiMix 9R, which is a 9-channel, rack-mountable analog mixer with five microphone inputs. What you see is true - in front it has an iPod docking interface. Anyway, it has no any special feature among it, the price is a very fair 400 USD. Check the product's web page for more detailed info.

Second entry came from a DJ-specialist, Numark. It is a music file player with a rack-mountable docking station, called Fit For Sound. It is the professional solution for concert and event halls, bars and discos that are needed to provide a professional iPod music interface for the projects they are holding. The device is a well-built one with professional XLR outputs, but we still don't know its price. But here is the official webpage.

Numark has revealed their second iPod-DJ product, the iDJ2. It is much superior than its predecessor since it doesn't need two iPods for playing two channels but one instead. Beyond this, you can tempo adjust, scratch and loop both channels with its proprietary controls. It handles external USB hard disks - we hope it can play songs from there directly -, and accepts phono and line level inputs as well as a dedicated microphone. The color display is very nice and the QWERTY keyboard which is optional enhances the mixer's usability even much further. I have to mention the 3-band EQ on the channels, and an also important factor is direct playing all the protected iTunes content downloaded - but without any manipulation. iDj2's price will be 600 USD - here is the official page, enjoy.

A wonderful small toy from Belkin, manufacturer of iPod accessories: the TuneStudio is a four channel mixer for the iPod 5g series. The settings are very basic: two output which can be recorded with the iPod, three EQs, level and pan per channel. Two channels can accept microphone.

The gadget can function as a USB sound solution with computers also which doubles its value at least. Price is a reasonable 180 USD but the availability is not close: we have to wait until the summer.