General Apple iPod Description Notes andReview

The iPod minis have been replaced. The closest product currently available are the brilliant 2nd generation iPod nano.

2nd Generation iPod Nanos available are:

The below commentary is on the discontinued iPod mini.

There is a new version of the iPod mini. The updated features are listed and discussed here. What follows below is the description notes and review of the original iPod mini.

It's a few months late and it doesn't cost £65 like Steve Jobs promised it would - no surprise there - but the mini iPod is an important MP3 player. It works, it has distinctive styling, it's light as a feather and small as a lighter.

When we we're getting hate mail from iPod users for daring to suggest that people should spend their hard earned cash on a player that cost less, with more features one of the comments that came up repeatedly was along the lines of

" ...I'm gonna buy my girlfriend an iPod Mini. It's the only MP3 player she's ever expressed a desire for"

" ... and I wonder if you will relent and sell the iPod mini for £65 when it comes along? My wife is looking forward to owning one .."

At first this was troublingly patronising until we realised that women seldom have adequate pocket space, so naturally a smaller player would suit their portable music needs better. Apple seem to have done their market research as the iPod minis come in a choice of pastel colours. If you look closely (it took us a while to realise this) the only colour that is inherently feminine is the pink version. The other colours are in fact fairly neutral, in terms of orientation, and quite stylish. However, we would not be surprised if the iPod mini's all become tarred with the same pink brush and became thought of as a ladies' Jukebox. That would be a shame as it has just as much to offer any one. Lets face it, men use their pockets more than ladies, so anything that takes up less space has to be good news for everyone.

The range has a capacity of approx. 4GB. The original HD jukebox launched by Archos weighed almost 400g (nearly half a kilo); was the size and shape of a deformed brick; and only had 6GB of space for about £100 more - that's not to say that there is anything wrong with an original Archos. They will probably be worth quite a bit as collectors items soon, and lets face it, they did spawn a whole new area of portable music. As far as the iPod mini is concerned we're glad to see that a few scant years later the design has improved so much.

The iPod Mini players weigh-in at 103g. A small cloud (e.g. 20 meters diameter) has more mass. Into this cloud you can stuff 1000 songs and the 1000 songs into your pocket.

Connect your little gem to your computer using the FireWire 400, or USB 2.0 connections. Either way the transfer rate is blindingly fast, so you don't have to wait around for your tracks to transfer. The fact that there is only 4GB to fill probably makes this process seem faster than it really is, but its still pretty dam fast.

Like all 4th gen + iPods the Mini comes with skip protection of up to 25 minutes. Its even smaller in size, and crucially for the jolts that can cause skippage, weight too. Not only is the mini suitable for sports, you can get an armband that allows you to go jogging, or play tennis with your iPod mini strapped to your arm. Having said that there is still an operating mini Hard Disk inside the mini, so we would advise some care and attention. E.g. if you are playing tennis with it strapped to your arm, strap it to your left arm if you're right handed. We would also advise that you strap-on in such a way as to have the mini on the inside (body side) of your arm, in case you should sprawl.

Also like all iPods (barring the shuffle range which does not have some of the below) the iPod mini comes with some very good touches:

• Store data files along with your music - the iPod mini can be used as an external HD quite easily. The Zen micro can also store and move data, but the software necessary to do so is a pain to use. In this respect the iPod mini is easily the Zen's superior.
• Prompt and remind yourself with Text Notes - very handy for people like us
• Play games on the go - heh heh heh - "there ain't nothing like a game..."
• Stay organized with contacts, calendars and to-do lists - again, very handy for people like us.
• Clock alarm and sleep timer - perfect. Set your mini to turn off after an hour so that you can go to sleep to music, or set it to act as your alarm clock so that the first thing you hear in the morning is the sound of your favourite song.

The mini is also skinnier than the Zen micro by 0.6 cm (although it is longer by 0.7cm) and it weighs 5 grams less than the Zen micro. For those of us who cannot reckon in metric, that's how much a teaspoon of sugar weighs - minus the spoon, obviously.

Battery News

This is the section of the ipod mini most changed. Originally this was what we had to say:

The batteries will give about 8 hours playback. This was once Apple's top rate for iPods. No Apple MP3 machine could last longer than 8 hours on one charge. Nowadays the larger - in the sense of non-mini - iPods can get more time from a single charge, but the mini's batteries will recharge up to about 80% of full in one hour. Full charge takes 4 hours.

Note for older O/S users: the iPod mini will not work with versions of Windows earlier than 2000, Service Pack 4; or Mac OS 10.1.5

Apple iPod Mini Silver | Apple iPod Mini Green | Apple iPod Mini Gold | Apple iPod Mini Pink | Apple iPod Mini Blue