Apple iPod MP3 Player
The Apple iPod MP3 player is the heart of the iPod line, with this particular iPod making up at least forty percent of the market share for new MP3 players purchased online or in retail outlets. One of the most important aspects of the iPod MP3 player is the great sound quality and the amazing storage capacity in this streamlined and ultra-modern looking design.
One of the many benefits of the Apple iPod MP3 Player is that there are so many different features, sizes and accessories available for the product. There are the relatively small 1GB MP3 players that hold up to 240 songs or the massive storage space in the 4GB MP3 players that can hold up to 1000 songs. There are also several options in between as well as the true music lover’s delight, the Apple iPod 4th Generation that has 40GB of storage space and holds up to 10,000 songs.
IPod MP3 players come with standard flash memory of various sizes, which means that the memory is non-upgradeable and is internal, allowing the user to program, erase and reprogram songs up to the total storage volume of the memory. Some of the iPod MP3 models may have additional memory and will require higher memory amounts if photo storage, video files or Apple TV are applications that are used in addition to the MP3 player capabilities.
iPods and PCs
One of the first major drawbacks to iPods had nothing to do with the quality of the MP3 player, rather it had to do with the fact that they would only work with Mac computers, not PCs like the vast majority of people have. Today this is no longer a problem, with programs available that make PCs and iPods very compatible for programming and downloads. A company called Mediafour has developed a software program called MacDrive that will allow PCs and iPods to be able to communicate with each other, without needing a separate Mac computer to program the iPod. The software is called Xplay, and now allows users to download and save music from Windows Explorer sites or from Windows Media Player version 7. This increased compatibility and functionality has really helped the iPod become both practical and simple to use for almost anyone.
The new interface on the computer will look like a new drive added to the “My Computer” area. All that is needed is for the user to click on the hard drive folder of the iPod to start adding new music, organising files or developing play lists. The simple drag and drop function that is so easy and convenient in Windows is still a function in the iPod files, making adding MP3 files a simple click and slide away.
Comment by John Q Normal
Um, this article is a little strange. It mentions 4th generation iPods, yet they’re on the 5th generation (5.5, actually, if you count the mid-generation updates to the line).
The article doesn’t mention that the iPod plays AAC (the great sound quality) and MP3, and that there are video models as well. The iPod’s shortcoming is lack of support for Ogg and Vorbis.
The article indicates that there was a problem with iPods being Mac-only, but software for Windows was available from the inception of the device. It’s only recently that Microsoft released the Windows Vista operating system and introduced incompatibilities the interfered with operation of the device (for which they’ve subsequently issued patches that fix most of the issues).
Speaking about Vista, you mention Xplay — which won’t work with Vista. So watch out if you bought a new PC! Xplay is a little awkward in that while it will reencode audio (sometimes with a notable loss in quality), it doesn’t integrate with the non-iTunes services, meaning it’s more complicated to use than iTunes. The main feature of dragging-and-dropping content as opposed to iTunes syncing can be accomplished by turning on the “Manually manage iPod” and “Use iPod as a disk” features in iTunes.
This isn’t a very good article.