I’m thinking about buying one soon at Best Buy for around 80 clams.
The sales lady said they hold 240 songs. They shuffle the songs and don’t have a window and are VERY small and, if I dare say, cute.
From what I gather, they sound great and one can rather easily download songs from Itunes. If there’s any draw-back to 'em I would think that it would be that songs are always shuffled and not selected, which I suppose is okay as long as one has a lot of songs on it.
I think it comes down to personal preference. I personally couldn’t do without some way to both see and select what songs I want to listen to, and playlists in particular are important to me because sometimes I’m feeling a little 80s, sometimes a little rock or industrial, sometimes trance, etc. Lacking such choices, I don’t think I’d really enjoy having an MP3 player nearly as much. I have a Video for that reason. (That, and I have a lot more music than a Nano can store.) Of course, the price point is much better than, say, a Nano or Video, and if all you want is a little something to occupy your mind and ears during workouts or jogs or what have you, that you can clip just about anywhere without it weighing you down or requiring pocket storage, then the Shuffle might just fit the bill.
Apple claims 10 hours of continuous play, which is probably pretty accurate since there’s no display to suck life from the battery.
I have a first generation Shuffle, and you have two choices when it comes to playing back songs: Sequence or Shuffle. Meaning it’ll either play them in the way you’ve arranged them in the play list, or in a random manner.
The only complaints I have with it is that when you’re loading songs on to it, there’s no easy way to tell how much space you have left on it while you’re loading the songs and that it seems fairly sensative to “glitches.” (A bad file will lock it up, forcing a reboot, rather than simply skipping the file.)
The battery life is about 10 hours, and the audio quality is excellent.
I think we have a mis-communication here.
An iPod Mini was a model of iPod that was replaced by the Nano. It is no longer available new.
It appears that the shuffle is what the OP is talking about.
I was gong to get a Shuffle but it is so small I worried that I’d lose it.
Also, it has no display, as mentioned. This means that you have to actually identify the song by sound before you can decide whether to skip it. This is a no-brainer for most songs but some songs have a lot of dead air at the start or start slowly and quietly.
You can buy some pretty tough covers for the screens. If you go to twit.tv and check out some of the Daily Giz Wiz podcasts, you can find the names of some good covers.
Daughter has a new Shuffle and loves it. Batteries last ages and charge quickly, it is very small and light but clips to your clothing so not so easy to lose.
It will play sequentially as well as randomised.
Her biggest gripe is the lack of a display.
I have an iRiver T-30, bit bigger and heavier than the Shuffle. It does have a display but I’m damned if I can read it. It is too close to my nose with my glasses on to see anything at all. Has a hell of a lot of configuration possibilities that are never invoked other than by accident.
Yeah, that can be a problem. Moreso on the Video though, because the whole front is made of that stuff. I don’t know how susceptible to scratching the newer G2 Nanos, but they’re small and light and you can get good, lightweight cases with clips on them that will protect the display.
I have a Shuffle and love it. You can still kind of make use of playlists, since you can set up playlists in iTunes. You do need to sync the Shuffle with your computer to switch from pop to rap or whatever. I am the type who doesn’t want to mess with trying to read a display when I’m exercising, so I like the minimalism of the Shuffle’s controls. Plus, less expensive means less bummed out when it eventually dies, gets lost, or gets broken.
There is an option in iTunes to change the start and end times for songs to skip the silence.
Apple claims 12 hour battery life but the folks at iPodlounge got more than 17 hours in their test. If you library is bigger than the shuffle will hold iTunes will automatically add new music to it every time you plug it in. here is a review from ipodLounge –> Review: Apple Computer iPod shuffle (Second-Generation) | iLounge
I went through the same decision making process recently and bought a 1G shuffle for listening to podcasts. It’s great - you just work around and acclimatise to the no screen thing. It’s so small it just effortlessly goes everwhere with me. When syncing there is a bar thing at the bottom of the window that depicts amount of space left so no guesswork required. And in those quiet moments waiting for the bus, It’s great to just appreciate the incredible design!
Not exactly true - for $59 (in the US) Apple will replace the battery of any iPod, but it seems they basically replace the entire thing with a different iPod. But given that the Shuffle only costs $99 new, I imagine few people take them up on it.
It is slightly more than that "How much does it cost to participate in the program?
The program costs $59, plus $6.95 shipping. The program cost is $65.95 per unit. " And you may or may not get your original unit back but “Will the data on my iPod be preserved?
No, your songs and files will not be transferred to your replacement iPod. Please backup important files, and remove all data from your iPod before sending it to Apple.”
But thank you for that correction. I still say that makes you *screwed.
