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Small but perfectly formed
The iPod sleeping in its docking cradle

When Apple launched the original iPod in 2001, it was universally hailed as the ultimate MP3 player. Its hard disk offered huge capacity, it was streets ahead of the competition in terms of style, and unlike its hard disk based rivals it could fit into a jacket pocket.

The latest version is available in three capacities - 10Gb, 15Gb or 30Gb. Looks wise it’s now even more likely to turn heads and at four inches high, less than three quarters of an inch thick and weighing only 158g, it’s significantly slimmer and lighter than the original. The 15Gb version, at £299 with a wired remote and the new docking cradle included, will be the sweet spot for many. For those who want more capacity, the 30Gb version adds 18g to the weight and £100 to the price.

Navigation

The four buttons and the scroll wheel are now touch sensitive, which does away with the wear and tear issues that sometimes afflicted the control system on the old modell. However I found that it was far too easy to accidentally brush against a button and skip or pause the track I’d just selected. To counter this it’s worth sliding the hold switch on the top of the iPod each time you select some music.

Holding down the menu button brings up the backlight which also makes the four buttons glow red. This not only makes the buttons visible in the dark, but looks very, very cool.

Navigating through hundreds of tracks is simple and speedy thanks to the wheel. You can brows by artist, album, song title or even genre. Pressing the select button at its centre enables you to move within the track, while pressing twice gives you the ability to rate the track out of five. However, this feature is relevant only for the Mac-only iTunes software and is superfluous for Windows users. More useful is the ability to create playlists on the fly. Hold down the button on a track or album and it gets added to a playlist. Unfortunately all playlists are lost the next time you sync your iPod with your computer.

The minimalist design does at times hinder ease of use and the device would benefit from more dedicated buttons. For example if you want to apply one of the many EQ settings while playing a track, you may have to move through as many as six menus and make several buttons presses before arriving at your destination

Design

Despite looking fantastic the iPod does have its design flaws. The back can scratch easily and the wires at the base of the remote cable can become exposed after only a few days. The clip on the remote also falls off clothing far too easily—Apple clearly needs to go back to the drawing board on that one.

The docking cradle is also something of a mixed blessing. It does offer the convenience of being able to sync and charge the iPod without having to hunt round for the correct port, and it also sports a line-out connection, so you can play the iPod through a stereo system. Unfortunately it doesn’t have its own power supply so will only charge the iPod when the computer is on. If you want to charge the iPod when your PC is off you have to unplug the dock from the Firewire port and plug it into the supplied AC adaptor.

As Firewire is still relatively uncommon on desktop PCs the iPod now supports USB 2.0 though it can only be used to sync and not to charge the device. A cable isn’t included however, so you’ll have to spend an extra £15 to get one. Disappointingly the connector employed by Apple is now proprietary, which rules out using a spare Firewire or USB cable you may have.

Using a Firewire connection built into a Creative Audigy soundcard, transfer speeds averaged around 4.3Mb/sec with 114Mb of MP3s, or 14 songs transferring across in only 27 seconds.

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