Can someone educate me on ipods?
 

My wife is dropping hints that an ipod would be nice for her upcoming birthday. What's the best bang for the buck?

iPod Minis are great form factor and style, but only 4GB, about 800 songs. $249. If that's not enough, step up to the 20GB model. Rumors have it that Apple will be giving the color treatment to the main iPod line in a couple months, so you might want to hold out. My son and I each have one. Mine does duty on the motorcyle and the living room, hooked to the stereo. They are great!

I like the form factor and the user interface much better on the Mini. For most people, 800-1000 songs is plenty (and if you have more, you can shift around playlists to change things up). I use my mini all the time, and my full size less so. If they come out with a revised full size (using the same buttons as the mini), I'll get a new full size.

The cool thing about the full size is that it works great as a firewire harddrive. The mini does too, but there isn't much room.

And yes, they really are that good and that cool...

Lee,

Get her the mini. You can have it laser-engraved at the factory with a nice message.

I fiddled with the software for a few hours and couldn't make head nor tail of it. My wife sat down and in three minutes was able to upoad music. Go figure.

My 2nd gen 20 GB is still crankin'....in fact just loaded a bunch more Beethoven on it. Best music purchase I've ever made.

Nostatic is right about the interface on the Mini vs. the interface on the full-size. However 4GB simply wouldn't cut it for me.

What makes the iPod the killer appliance vs. the other mp3 players on the market? Seriously, is it just the hardware/user interface? I would like to pick up something that can double as a portable hard drive for my XP systems to shuttle stuff between work and home. I'm totally clueless on these gadgets and since I've lost my 256mb thumb drive would like to replace with something more useful. I use iTunes on my XP system if that makes a difference.

Thanks!

iPod user interface is superior. I went to Best Buy and played with 15 other music players, couldn't figure them out. The iPod is quite intuitive.

Size and battery life are okay. Could be smaller and longer, but fine for me. And I have the older iPod, the current ones are even smaller (thinner).

iTunes is superior. I've used a few other PC music jukeboxes and they're okay, but iTunes is just simpler.

I have the "classic" iPod. The "mini" is cool but hard to get and I don't want to think about which 4GB of songs to carry - I just want to have my entire music library with me at all times, which means the "classic".

It's not just the interface. There are quite a few advantages -- supporting playlists, for instance. There are plenty of reviews that delineate the advantages.

Because there are more iPods sold than all other MP3 players put together, there are more accessories and hacks for them than any other player, too.

I 'hardwired' mine into the Aux input of my Boxster, using he headphone out, and the quality of sound is excellent.

the integration between iTunes and iPod is flawless. That cannot be said for other solutions. Hardware design is elegant and intuitive. Software is too. In short, Apple "gets it."

OK... the 4GB holds around 800 songs... and that's not enough? Am I missing something? I guess if you're loading complete CDs then that's going to be 80 or so. Still seems like 800 songs would be a lot to try and manage.

With the larger iPods, you don't have to "manage" the music on your iPod, it can automatically mirrors whatever is on your PC/Mac. With the mini 4GB, now you have to "manage" things, e.g. decide which songs go on the iPod and which don't.

This assumes you have more than 4GB of music on your computer. I have 10GB and my music library is not particularly large. I put "books on CD" on the iPod too.

My entire CD collection is on my iPod.

Where's the best place (i.e. cheap & reliable) to buy an ipod?

If you have an Apple store in Phoenix, go there. Otherwise, Best Buy, CompUSA have them.

Don

Asked the same question to this board last winter, and I haven't been so pleased with a techno-purchase in......well, ever.

Got the 20GB 2nd generation. Has all my CD's in it (3000+ songs), a few downloaded songs, old time radio dramas, Sam Shepard short stories, my kids' favorite Disney/radio tunes - to quote the Eagles - everything, all the time. Really is great to have all your music at your fingertips.

Only drawback is running. It usually skips a bit, so I've stopped using it except indoors on a treadmill where you can set it down on something. Fine on an outdoor or indoor bike though.

Wired it into the home stereo & use a iTrip radio transmitter for the cars (great reception in the 911 and Volvo V70XC, a little less great in the Acura MDX and old Honda Civic). Have an old neoprene Palm case that I velcro it into so it is pretty tossable & waterproof.

iTrip also doesn't work well where serious power lines line the road (like the Florida Keys).

Looks like the new full size iPods on the Apple site have the mini's controls......

Here's a hot tip for saving money on an iPod:

Macy's and some other department stores carry iPods. these stores almost always give you a blanket 15% discount with your brand new department store credit card. Do a little research and save a bunch.

Also, like RickC said, look at Apple.com today. The new iPod has bigger capacities and lower price.

You're lucky...your wife drops hints. Mine expects me to read her mind.

Two Ipod threads at once....I'll cross post:

I am considerng an iPod - the big one. If I burn in all my albums, will they still be in "album" format? Like will the running order and stuff all be the same? I have a different mp3 player and the order gets all jungled up when I put them on the device.

Also, do I need to burn all my CDs to my PC, or can I got straight to the iPod through the PC? Note I said PC!

VaSteve:

You can set up any kind of playlist you want, including serial playback of any album.

I'm just lucky that she didn't run out and buy the thing herself. Usually what happens is that she talks about what she wants months in advance and then methodically buys each and every thing she's mentioned purchasing the last item a week before her birthday.

Of course her birthday is on the 30th so there's still time.