iPod 4th Generation: Generation seXy

I actually find it hard to believe there was a time before my iPod. As sad as that sounds, it is actually a fact that it now seems alien to me to have to take a bus, car or even solo-walk without Apple’s little white music machine. Is this a dreadful sign of how technology is taking over the world? I don’t think so, its just too awesome having my entire record collection at my disposal, any time, any where, in a little gadget smaller than a packet of cigarettes.

It’s been almost exactly a year since I received my iPod as a late Christmas present last year, and I figured I should give it some time before I reviewed it, you know, to make sure it wasn’t one of those purchases that seem awesome for a month and then I hardly touch afterwards. Thankfully, the iPod, a 4th Generation 20 Gigabyte model, has become anything but, and other than my wallet, keys and mobile phone, is the one accessory you are almost always likely to find on me.

Originally, my plans had been to buy an iPod mini, a nice little blue one, however, upon inspection of my music files in Mp3 format, the 5 Gig storage space was gonna require a lot of trimming of my collection to get it all in, and upon spotting that a 20 Gig only cost £40 more, I figured £40 for 4 times the space wasn’t bad at all, and my pearly white iPod wasn’t long through my door before it was in my pocket and an essential part of my life.

What You Get

Upon opening the large cube of a box, you will find yourself presented with your iPod itself, a pair of white earbud headphones, an iTunes CD, a mains adapter and USB and Firewire cables - in other words, everything you need to have your iPod up and running. The iPod itself is around the size of a playing card, and about the thickness of a DVD case, so it fits comfortably in the palm of one hand, where the thumb can be used to operate it’s click-wheel control. This wheel is marked by 4 buttons, the Back on the Left, Forward on the Right, Menu on top and Play/Pause on the bottom. These controls are fairly self explanatory, and are for use when the iPod is playing a song. In the center of the click wheel is a white button, which is used to select things from the menus. Negotiating the menus, as well as altering the volume of songs, is performed by rolling your thumb along the click wheel. Rolling clockwise will turn the volume up and scroll down in menus, while rolling counter clockwise will turn the volume down and scroll up. Pressing the select button when a song is playing also enables the wheel to be used to skip to a certain point of a song, or change the ‘Rating’(more on this in the iTunes section), and is also used to control the games.

Initially I was quite daunted by this system, however, within a week or so using the iPod was second nature, and now I can negotiate it while it’s in my pocket. Also of note on the iPod itself are the Hold button, located on the top of the machine, a slide switch used to disable all the face buttons, so they don’t get hit in your pocket, and next to it the headphone jack, partnered by the Remote Control jack, which is only of interest if you shell out extra cash for a remote control, and on the bottom is the connector used to recharge the iPod or plug it into your computer.

The iPod’s screen is 2 inches diagonally, which means it’s large enough to see clearly, yet still not taking up all that much room on the front of the machine. The text shown on it is all very clear, and the neon-blue backlight, which can have it’s timer altered, is a real nice touch, and looks so much more snazzy than the garish green I expected it to light up.

The iPod also has the ability to shuffle it’s tracks, meaning you are played all of your songs in a random order. I know a lot of people use them for this function exclusively, but while I am a fan of it, I tend to stick to playlists, which are something else I’ll get back to later.

Much maligned with the original iPods was the 8 hour battery life, but the claim for this generation was that it would last 12 hours. While I can’t claim to have ever tested this thoroughly, I will testify that it has went for longer than 8 hours for me, although I have noticed that if you just stick to playing music on the iPod, the battery lasts longer. Games and Shuffling seem to drain the batteries quicker. It takes around 4 hours to charge the battery, and music can still be played while charging.



Speaking of the games, what are they you may ask? Well uh, it’s hardly a PSP when it comes to games, but they are kinda neat if you are bored. You’ve got parachute, where your goal is to gun down parachuters, Brick, which is the old Atari game Breakout, a primitive version of Solitaire and Music Quiz, which is a neat little mode where a song starts to play and you are given 5 options and you have to try and say which song it is. Pretty neat, if hardly reason to buy the machine.

To be honest, Apple are guilty of telling some fibs with regards to the storage space the iPod offers. While I own a 20 Gig model, when you plug the machine in, it informs you that you only have just over 18 gig to work with. I was initially outraged by this, until I realised that my entire CD collection, even the ones I had no intention of ever listening to, took up around 10 gig. I really doubt I’ll ever fill the machine, which is cool, because it can be used as a memory stick of sorts, to transfer files from computer to computer. While personally I’ve never taken advantage of this, it is still good to know the feature is there.

If there is one complaint I have with the iPod, it’s the one you were probably expecting; scratches. You see, while the iPod has proven durable for me with regards to nocks, having been dropped a few times and living in my jacket-breast pocket testify it’s strength, but the unit does scratch ridiculously easily, which means you will need to shell out some cash for some form of case for it, which makes it bulkier and therefore less sexy. Boo.

The headphones included fit snugly into your ears, provide good quality sound, and in a unique design note, don’t feature an L-Shaped end, meaning the entire wire, apart from when it splits into the 2 headphone lines, is in a straight line. Personally, I’m actually not so keen on the fact you can only get these in white, and from Apple themselves, because walking about with a white headphone wire showing makes you look like a complete poser, but at the same time for those of us who bought an iPod not as a fashion accessory, but for it’s practical uses, there aren’t any better headphones for the job.

iTunes

Included in the package is a copy of Apple’s music program iTunes, which is not only a useful tool for keeping your music collection in a nice order and creating playlists, but it also doubles, via the iTunes music store, as a means of downloading music legally. Before installing iTunes, which is a simple process, and both Mac and PC versions are included, my Mp3 listening and CD ripping was done on a program called Musicmatch Jukebox, and iTunes takes all that was good about that program and adds to it.

The main part of your iTunes is naturally your Library, where all of your songs are displayed, with sections being available to enter information regarding song title, artist, album, composer, year, track number, genre, artwork, a rating out of 5, even lyrics and more. You may wonder why you would want to go beyond just artist, song title and at a push album? Well, Smart Playlists are your answer.

You see, one of the main selling points of iTunes in terms of music software is it’s Playlist function. With this, you can create your own mix of songs, I’ve always felt The Jam were a band that needed a really good compilation, as none of their albums were really all that great, but they had some cracking tunes. No truly solid compilation of the band’s work exists, but I can hand-pick my favourites from their catalogue and put them in the order I like in a Playlist. Just feel like a general collection of upbeat songs? Playlist. While iTunes may not be the only software to offer this, it’s Smart Playlists are, I’m positive, unique. Using these, you can get the software to create playlists for you, by finding something in common between tracks. Tracks recorded in 1977? Tracks written by Mick Jagger and Keith Richards? Tracks with the lyrics “f*ck it up”? make a smart playlist. In fact, the software and machine come pre-built with one of the most fun smart-playlists possible…the ‘Top 25’. You see, iTunes keeps track of how many times you listen to each track, either on the iPod or your computer, and creates a list of the 25 most listened to. It may seem rather useless, but personally I find it pretty interesting to check out what I’ve been listening to most over the past few days.

With regards to ripping music into iTunes, the process is very simple, insert your CD and upload files, a process which is accomplished very quickly. The process of using iTunes is made a hell of a lot easier if you are connected to the Internet, because it can automatically find all the necessary information for a CD, which saves a lot of time typing in titles and information.

If there is one fault I have with iTunes, and the iPod in general, it’s the fact that music cannot be taken from the iPod into iTunes. I realise this was done in the name of security, but when I got my own laptop and stopped using my parents PC, configuring my iPod for work on it involved ripping all of my CD collection onto the laptop. A long and tedious process that also meant my iPod was stripped to the bare bones of my favourite albums until I got the whole collection onto it.

Accessories

Seeing as how the iPod has went beyond being a simple music player and become a small-scale cultural icon, naturally plenty of companies have wasted no time in bringing out all form of devices for use with it, from car-battery charges to adapters to play the iPod through the car stereo via speakers and remote controls for the speakers(not to mention Apple’s own Remote Control for the headphone wire) and a myriad of cases and protectors, once you’ve spent the money on your iPod, you’ll have no trouble finding accessories to waste your change upon.

When all is said and done, minor scratching and the whole swapping of computers issue aside, I really cannot fault the iPod, and in the year I’ve had it it’s become a fairly essentially part of my morning routine - I use it to wake me up on the way in to college. While the price for a product that has been on the market over a year may still seem quite steep, I would say it’s worth it, I love my iPod, and would recommend anyone willing to listen buying one. It’s fantastic being able to have the entire Clash discography, all 10 Hugh Cornwell era Stranglers albums and enough Billy Idol to make me want to pump my fist, screw up my face and go “AhAhwooo-ah” in a public place all rolled up into one pearly white package. It’s made 10 hour flights, traffic jams and friends showing up late bearable, and for all that, it’s got to be said that the iPod proves that sometimes being trendy is actually practical.I