iLove my iPod

If you remember from a previous entry, I bought one of the new 20GB Apple iPods a few minutes after they announced them early Monday morning. I had it FedEx Express Overnight shipped to me, and it arrived Noon yesterday at my house, so I think it's safe to say I'm one of the first people in the country with one of the new ones :)

I've never owned an iPod before, and have only played with one for like 30 seconds before this, so I wanted to list some of my reactions as a new iPod owner.

First Thoughts

The backlight is awesome. I set it to turn on/off 2 seconds after my last button push, and the way it goes from dark to light is really amazing. It's like a gradient of light, I can't explain it, it's cool.

The earplug/headphones suck. Maybe I have narrow ear canals or something, but the ear plugs just don't work for me. They irritate, and they fall out — two things that I will not put up with. I used to be a DJ so I'm used to headphones that put grapefruit hemispheres on either side of your head, so this was definitely a foreign area for me. So I went to BestBuy and bought some Aiwa HP-X223 headphones (see picture). For about $30, they improved the sound quality tenfold, I highly recommend them.

It actually fits in my pocket! Even though Jobs is always pimping the fact that the iPod can fit in your pocket, I never really believed him until now. Granted, my 20GB version is 1mm thinner than old 20GB versions, and is definitely thinner than the 40GB version, but it's really really tiny.

The packaging it came in is astounding. I know others have recognized Apple's iPod packaging as a superior effort, but I never appreciated it until I opened it the very first time. It comes in a nice little square, that opens up and spreads out in front of you. Each part is packaged individually and perfectly, and unwrapping it all felt like I was unwrapping an expensive Coach purse. If you know what I'm talking about, then you know what I mean :)

Other iPod Uses

Now that I spent close to $300 for this small little toy, I need to make it worth my money. If all the iPod could do was play songs, then I'd kick myself in the ass for paying that much for it. I've always wanted a PDA, but now that PDAs are all crazy fancy with video cameras and internet connections, I'm glad the iPod has the basic PIM functionality built-in. I'm really looking forward to syncing my iPod with my iCal calendar — I'm always looking to find new ways of becoming more organized. I wish it had a calculator though, I guess I'll still have to use my cellphone for that.

I used to do my best thinking when I was driving through Nowhere, Ohio at 4am while hopped up on caffeine pills — I came up with my greatest ideas then, and always would have to pull over to write them down. I think my next purchase may be a Griffin iTalk recorder so I can talk to myself while on long car trips. Also it would be handy to record classes I sleep through :)

Do you use your iPod in any cool or unique ways? Have any suggestions for me? Oh, and know any good music? Now that I have 20GB I might have to fill it on up :)

Comments

[Matthew Oliphant]

I put my iPod on the railroad tracks and it got smashed into the size of an iBook.

Strangely there is now a color screen too and the scroll wheel turned into a keyboard...

[Nicole]

So you've unwrapped quite a few expensive Coach purses have you?

[Mike]

I have rich friends who have multiple Coach purses, so I've seen them do the deed before :)

[Heather]

Apparently silhouette designs are in now - good to know I'm hip. And it's very reassuring to hear you've "seen" others unwrapping their Coach purses. Nice try, Mikey, we all know the truth. ;)

[Honus]

Yeah, I have a use for my work's iPod: Crashing Windows XP. It's inherently frustrating that 1/10 times I plug in a USB/Firewire Mass Storage Device that's under 128 megs, I get a blue screen. It's worse that EVERY time I try to hook up the iPod, same old bluescreen. My only guess is that Microsoft/Dell drivers for this particularl chipset are not well adapted.

I think the backlight you're talking about was on the previous generation's screen too, because I know what you're talking about.

[Dan Macrina]

Oh baby buying a coach purse is the greatest so I can just imagine what unwrapping that bad boy must have been like... I would like to tell you how my ipod works in cool and unusal ways and crazy places but i told my boy i would keep it clean... Good luck with the pod-

[Dave Marks]

I'm so jealous! But then again i'm not on the road like i used to be when i was at uni - don't even comute to work (work from home)

Tell me what exactly is a coach purse? I had a quick look on google, but it just looks like an ordinary handbag...

[David]

I just picked one up and have been relatively happy with it. Unfortunately, they haven't built in any way to make gapless playback so I doubt if I'll keep it.

[Mike]

That was one of the things that bothered me as well, maybe I can find a software hack on the internet for it or something.

[David]

Be sure to contact me if you find out (my email address should go your way, right?). I bought mine on Friday and I only have 2 weeks to decide whether or not to hang onto it. If I can't have gapless playback, then there's no way I'm keeping it.

[shelia]

What is gapless playback?

[fred]

does anyone know how to make the 30G video ipod visible as mass storage on winxp? My station at work sees it fine, and itunes on the pc at home sees it fine, but I can't see the files i put on the ipod at work at home since the ipod does not show up as a drive on xp.... any thoughts?

[Coach Outlet]

ipods are the greatest thing. I have had various mp3 players and nothing compares to them. The video is especially good especially for going to the gym.