my personal version of the iPod shuffle

[cmdr_zoom]

Just days after I decided I needed an iPod (so that I could listen to music at my new job), Apple decided to completely shake up the product line. Again.

I'd been looking at an 80G classic, though it was almost certainly way too much capacity for me, because the other choices only offered a tenth of the storage at most. Now that model's been discontinued and replaced with a 120G at the same price point. Great, but I need that even less. That's the same size as the HD in my desktop.

On the other hand, the doubling of the capacity of the top-end nano to 16G puts it within range of my mp3 library (currently at 18G on HD, but some of that is midis and mods and other formats the iPod won't play, and I could probably trim a few less-listened-to songs if I could get the rest on there). I dunno if I need all of the Kewl Features of the nano, though. And people who've used both types tend to swear by the old-style click wheel of the classic if you Just Want Music, which I do.

There are, of course, options besides buying new from the Apple store (online or local). There's older models of the classic, 20 or 30G, which are both cheaper and possibly better suited to my needs - but I'd be buying used and/or refurbished, from third-party vendors, and who knows?

I would greatly appreciate the advice of my friends list, particularly those who currently own an iPod of any model.

EDIT: It's been suggested that I've limited my options by only considering iPods. A large part of it is that the last time I thought about portable media devices, years ago, the market pretty much consisted of Apple and a few crappy knockoffs. Is this no longer the case? Would anyone care to recommend other brands and models of mp3 players? Like I said above, I don't really care about video - I Just Want Music.

Comments

[irielle.livejournal.com]

I love my iPod Nano. I didn't get the top-end version, and that works out fine for me because I don't need all of my music with me all of the time. It's very easy and quick to change what you've got on the iPod through the use of playlists.

I wouldn't rush into buying one though if I were you. With the introduction of the new models and the holiday retail season coming up (earlier every year), there ought to be better deals in the future especially if you don't need the newest model with the most gigs.

[cmdr-zoom.livejournal.com]

My desire to have All My Music (if possible) stems from my time working for the University, when I had only a single DVD's worth (4G). I'd burned that DVD a while back and there were things that weren't on it, either because they were new or just not part of that burn. I started planning out a new DVD and quickly ran into the snag that I couldn't fit everything into 4G. I was still trying to cull the list down when that job ended months later.

For the last few years, I've gotten accustomed to listening to my entire home audio library on random shuffle. I used to have other playlists (and still do), but haven't touched them lately. To change my habits again at this point - say, to swapping flash memory as I once swapped CDs - would be difficult.

[cmdr-zoom.livejournal.com]

Addendum: also, just the task of going through my collection and trying to pick out the best songs was such a colossal chore, which ended up not amounting to anything, that the temptation now is to just get a big enough bucket to dump it all in.

[irielle.livejournal.com]

Ah, okay.

[cmdr-zoom.livejournal.com]

It might be worth it, though, in the long run. I do do a lot of skipping over the not-so-liked tracks at home to get to the more favored. Hard to sit down and make those decisions, though.

Forgive my semi stream of consciousness ramble.

[twoflower.livejournal.com]

Even with others on the market, I'd still recommend an iPod. Most are cashgrab me-too devices and sorting out the crap from the quality is more trouble than it's worth, when with iPod, you know what you're getting.

I've got a 60gb iPod, video enabled. I'm 12 gigs away from filling it, but granted I have a lot of video (it's about half my content).

I'd say which one you get depends on whether you're willing to sit down and selectively load your library or if you want the whole kaboodle in. That's up to you, really.

[miladycarol.livejournal.com]

There are oodles of options, and I can't speak for any of them. I tried to buy a bargain basement Mp3 player years ago and it was horrible. It simply rarely worked. I gave in and bought the top of the line iPod, well, the only iPod at that time. I've only bought iPod classic since then -- they do wear out. I use mine daily. Netcasts keep me company while doing the dishes and laundry. My playlists amuse me in the car and while doing chores and work. It's just never far. I have speakers that I bought so I don't have to listen through ear buds all the time. For me, it works really well.

I currently have the 80gb. For me, it's worth it. I have about 43gb of music on my computer. When I moved to Australia, I had spent weeks and weeks ripping all my music onto my computer so I wouldn't have to move boxes of cds. For me, it makes great sense to keep it all together and I rip each new cd I buy. I'll likely never fill the 80gb, and certainly never fill the 120, if that's still around when I need a new one, yet it's the easiest thing to use, it's dependable and I am quite used to it.

I'd go to cnet.com and see if they've done any reviews for Mp3 players. They often do video reviews and written reviews of all the new stuff. Also, I've heard Leo LaPorte reviewing different players on his Daily Giz Wiz netcast. See if you can find any at twit.tv.

Good luck!

And... how's the job? Report please!!!

[caluche.livejournal.com]

I wouldn't buy a refurbished model unless you are certain that the battery has been replaced, My older ipods have gotten down to about 1 or 1.5 hours battery life after a full charge, and the very oldest one was recently thrown out with a completely non-working battery.

The advantage of a high capacity iPod is that you'll never have to think about what to sync to it, you always sync the whole thing. The advantage of the flash memory based ipods is you'll never have an annoying hard drive-spin-up pause when skipping around tracks. I've personally got a 16 GB iphone and find that to be enough storage, even though I sometimes have to shuffle things around, 16 GB is big enough for most of the good stuff.

Battery life on the hard disk based ipods is also higher, 36 hours claimed vs 24 hours on the new ipod Nano. That's probably highly optimistic, but correct in relative terms.

Even though you Just Want Music, don't throw out options because they happen to be able to do more. Just ignore them, pretend the Nano just plays music. Pretty much all of the ipods have all of the features that all the others have now.