Stylish & funky but still a few problems... Read on (Apple iPod mini 4 GB)

Member Name: c013310

Product:	Apple iPod mini 4 GB
Date:	07/07/05 (601 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Lots of cool, handy features , be used as portable hard drive, enough memory ,sleek & stylish design

Disadvantages: Security issues, short battery life and dropping . . . .

I know what your'e thinking from the title, why the hell did you buy it if you knew itunes only works with windows 2000 or higher. Well heres my experience with my own mini ipod....

Well, i was told that there are programs such as Ananpod Explorer,Xplay and Ephopod which enable win 98 users to transfer songs to the mini ipod easily and without upgrading operating systems. I thought brilliant, i can get one without forking out another £60 for windows xp.

Prices:
When i bought my mini ipod the prices were extremely high so i ended buying it off ebay. Even so, i still ended up paying nearly £180 which wasn't far off the shop price at the time anyway. However, the prices have come down considerably and you can pick one up for a good value compared with its price at the start of its life.

Any way on with my tale... I got the mini ipod for Christmas and was really happy with it...... until i tried transferring music onto it. I must admit, it was an uphill struggle trying to get the damn thing to work. I had been ensured that it would work but the music looked like it went on but was nowhere to be seen on the actual Ipod.
I was quite annoyed as it was Christmas Day and i was sat there trying to get it to work. I ended up trying to format it and unfortunately wiped all songs.... but also the entire thing. An icon appeared on the screen and i looked it up in the manual and found that it meant that i had to restore the operating system on it. Oh and it could only be done on win xp machines. I ended up going round my grandads house the next day as he has an xp machine and restored the ipod on his machine. This was an easy enough task and i took it home hoping it would finally work.

well it must have been a miracle because it did. I used the final program that had been suggested ,Anapod Explorer, registered with it and transferred some songs and they worked!!! Ever since the ipod has transferred music perfectly apart from the slightly slow start. If anyone does do the same thing as me, take the advice i have given above and either don't buy one or get xp.

Now thats over i can explain more about the actual ipod itself:

The Mini Ipod is a portable music player like a Cd player, walkman or mini disk player but discards the need for large cd pr tape collections. The music is stored digitally on the ipod and can be transferred by two methods which are via USB 2.0 or firewire. I advise you to use the firewire method as it is a lot faster than the USB 2.0 and is generally more efficent at transferring data at high speeds. There are also two ways of getting music available to be put on your ipod. One way is to extract tracks off your existing cds through your computer and then transfer the songs that way. However, more and more people are downloading music through file sharing programs like emule and kaaza, or Itunes where you have to pay for the songs. However, remember that kaaza and other programs like it are illegal!!

The mini ipod comes in 5 distinct colours: pink, blue, gold, silver and green. The ipod also lives up to its name, mini. You can hardly notice it in your pocket due to it weighing a mere 3.6 ounces. Its dimensions are 3.6"x2.0"x0.5" which makes it extremely small. I didn't truly reliase how small the ipod was before i held it in my hand.

The mini ipod can hold 4gb of data which roughly translates to 1000 average sized mp3 tracks. However, don't take this to literally as i have 766 songs on mine and my ipod is now full. This may be because the songs are longer than the average 4 minutes but don't expect to be able to fill it up with exactly 1000 songs.

The innovative touch sensitive click wheel is also a new and welcomed feature of the mini ipod. The wheel is sensitve so you just have to lay your finger on the wheel and whizz it round to get to your desired songs. I loved doing this for the first week or so but then the novelty wore off but it's still better than clicking for hours to scroll to your favourite song.

The sound quality is often misjudged as this is to do with the fact that mp3s of the internet are always not the best quality themselves. The sound quality of the mini ipod is good though and the volume is able to reach very high volumes!!!

The ipod mini also doesn't just have to be used for songs, it can be used as a mini portable hard drive. You could transfer large movies or photos digitally form computer to computer without the hassle email. There are also many other features of the mini ipod like games, sleep timer and the ability to make and arrange playlists. These features just add to the value for money you are recieving on this product.

There is one problem though. The battery life of the ipod is roughly 8 hours when fully charged and this can be quite a pain. You can charge the ipod either through your computer or through the mains power adaptor. Either way, 8 hours isn't really long enough as i have often not payed attention to the battery life and gone on a car trip to find that the battery becomes dead after 5 minutes of playing. Also, a case for the ipod would also be advisable as if you drop it, the scratches and internal damage will be made for life. This would just ruin the stylish and sleek design that the makers at Apple have designed.
Also, security is a bit of an issue with any ipod due to the distinctive white ear phones that come with it. I normally change my earphones while going out with it because i know people who have been mugged for the ipod.

These are the only problems i can think of and i've had my ipod for nearly 8 months and its still running strong.

I hope this review has been informative and has been a help in your decision of buying a mini ipod if you were before you read this. If you want a relatively cheap, reliable and user friendly Mp3 player, the mini ipod is for you!

Summary: Reliable & cheapish Mp3 player which is good value for money!!

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