10 out of 10 people found this review helpful.
UPDATE!This thing does not suck! but rumors of long battery life are greatly exaggerated.
Date of Review: Dec 13, 2005
The Bottom Line: buy it if you love music and like finding what you want to listen to easily, don't think this makes you cool though
This is an update since my original posting of this review two months ago. Since then the Nano has not made it over six hours before running the battery out. This is with all of the battery saving measures prescribed by apple, i.e. turning screen illumination down to two seconds and turning on the sleep option. I use my player mostly in the car through an FM transmitter. If you keep the volume low and use the car stereo volume it will save some battery time however, it will increase the amount of static you hear.
The lower than advertised battery time hasn't been a problem for me since I have been constantly updating playlists. Never the less, others may not like the fact that the units battery time is markedly less than advertised. My original review follows and everything else written is still valid:
I've never had an mp3 player. I previously owned a Sony MiniDisk player, however after finding out about the hidden root kit on my hard drive, I have decided to jump Sony's ship. Boy, am I glad I did.
+ I bought the 2 gig white version. I only have 300 songs on it right now and I still have plenty of room.
+ Cut the bottom half of the clear plastic that comes on the front and you have a perfect screen protector.
+ while the black looks cooler, the white shows almost no fingerprints (except the back).
+ playback is skip free (no moving parts as opposed to hard-drive or MiniDisk based music players). So, jump rope and jog to your hearts content.
+ Sound quality is great, it has plenty of equalizer settings (I use neutral)
- beware of the ear phones, many people find that they hurt your ears. Not me so much, however the sound quality is abysmal. Expect to spend some money on new headphones.
+ the screen while small, is perfect for checking the cd that's playin. You can't see the details, but if you've ever seen the cd cover, a glance and you'll recognize what's playin.
+ I haven't put any pictures on it but, if you don't have a picture of the cd case you can drag any picture you want into the artwork box. I have pictures of my wife, cats and other things I've picked up around the web (pictures that is).
-/+ (see first paragraph for update) I haven't had any battery problems since I have been adding new music almost every other day. So, I guess we'll see. I am worried about the $100 it will cost to change the battery but, by then I'm sure I'll have some new gadget.
- only because it's sooo expensive. I like to take it to the gym; it doesn't come with a case or lanyard so I have to hold it in my hand or put it in the cup holder on the treadmill. When I use free weights, I find myself compulsively checking it. One wrong step and I'm out $200+. I hope that this will be cured when the case I ordered arrives. Expect to pay about $30 for an Apple case. I bought mine off eBay for $10 total.
+itunes is great. I used Sony's Sonic Stage previously (at the time I thought it was great), it sVcks compared to itunes. With Sonic you have to "check songs back in" and you can only take them out a preset # of times. What a joke! With itunes I can burn my entire music collection to dvd and send them to anyone.
-Watch out for that guy eye'n you on the train. These things are the Nike Air Jordan's of 2006 and showing them around the wrong people could just get yer azz kicked.
jay%^)
