Video comes to the Nano (Apple iPod nano (5G) 8 GB)

Member Name: davomrmac

Product:	Apple iPod nano (5G) 8 GB
Date:	12/10/09 (83 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Great sound, awesome screen

Disadvantages: Bad video capture in low light, does not take photos

I have had so many iPods over the years that I have lost count. However, with the iPod Nano I never really enjoyed it. This was mainly due to it being really aimed at those who exercise or maybe the younger audience.

With this latest version I decided to give it another try. The design is so so slim and this latest 5th generation has a really shiny glossy finish, instead of the matte finish on the 4th gen. The screen has also gone up in size a little. 2.2-inches instead of the previous 2-inches. At first glance it looks kinda weird, almost like the screen is too big for the front of this tiny device.

I want to cover the biggest change first. Take a look at the back of this Nano and you find a camera. Wow, this is amazing, now everywhere I take my iPod Nano I can take pictures! WRONG! You cannot take photos with the new Nano. Apple deemed the camera insufficient to take still images. Oh well, at least you can take video footage at 640x480 resolution. It actually performs very well. If you pan the camera quickly, it does give a wobbly image. If you hold still though and action is moving around you it does a really good job, nice colours and a good amount of detail. The sound is pretty good too, with the microphone (situated right next to the tiny lens) picking up clear sound from quite a distance. Low light performance is pretty poor. Where my mobile phone camera manages to pick out some detail, the Nano scores badly. Sometimes you cannot see a thing in low light. Apple also built in some fun effects that can be applied to video whilst recording. One for the younger audience here, but nice all the same.

Music is still delivered very well. Nice tones, good warmth to the sound. Video is also good, the 2.2-inch screen just big enough for watching the odd video clip, music video or video podcast. The user interface has not changed really apart from the addition of a Pedometer and the Video Camera to the menus.

All in all, this is a fully featured wonderful device. It does everything pretty well and certainly means that if you have this iPod, there would be no need to buy the likes of a Flip video cam for movies on the move.

Summary: What more an this all singing all dancing Nano do?

Processing/Quality:
Reliability:
Ease of use:
Features:
Sound quality:
Download speed: