I guess there is little point writing this article. Everyone who was going to purchase an Ipod probabaly already has. But for completeness you now have my opinion.
The Good
Smart playlists son, get into them. Apple for whatever reason completely crippled manual sync mode (it doesn’t manually sync playlists even when you tell it to) and I don’t think anyone was ever going to seriously use “Automatic” magic you just got your entire Britney Spears collection mode. Luckily ITunes has another mode that meets you halfway and sync’s selected playlists.
You can combine these with Smart Playlists which are essentially dynamic playlists based on certain criteria. In my case I use a smart playlist which is all songs I have never listened to before and never skipped before in my library, sorted by recently added. This is my daily sampling of all the stuff in my library I’ve never heard before.
Having an mp3 player that you can hand to anyone and they know how to use it is great. My previous mp3 player was an IOAudio product and was awesome to use but required a degree in mp3ology to operate. This may sound stupid but it was a major reason for me to move away from IOAudio.
The Bad
The ITunes software is kind of like your parents. Sometimes it comes through and gives you exactly what you want or helps you out, most of the time you spend trying to find a way to achieve your goals by either working around it or subverting it entirely. Luckily only my desktop at home runs Windows, and linux support for IPod’s is great now. No you still can’t purchase in the ITunes store I don’t think.
The Ugly
My headphones broke four times. Each time they last days and then they start crackling unbearably. I ring up apple and they send me out a new pair. They break. Repeat. Everyone I’ve spoken to has thrown them out and bought proper headphones. Really – I’m not buying my ipod for the headphones but I was really disappointed that apple don’t seem to have acknowledged the problem.
Overall
Overall although ipod’s are overpriced I’m very happy with mine and I think they have survived past their hype. I wish I had understood the best way to use the itunes software sooner.
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