Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #48082 in Consumer Electronics
• Brand: Apple
• Model: New40gbipod
• Released on: 2004-07-21
• Dimensions: .39 pounds

Manufacturer's Description
Incorporating the fabulous Apple Click Wheel that was first introduced on iPod mini and offering up to 12 hours of battery life, the iPod continues to define the perfect digital music player for Mac and Windows. Weighing in at just 176 g (6.2 ounces) and getting slightly thinner with each new generation, this fourth-generation iPod offers huge capacity, letting you easily slip up to 10,000 (1) songs into your pocket.

In fact, the new fourth-generation iPod includes features that make it even easier to access -- and have fun with -- your music. Take, for example, the Apple Click Wheel. With the Click Wheel, you can select playlists, scroll through a long list of albums or artists and choose just the song you want to hear without ever lifting your thumb from the wheel. Feel like mixing things up? Now you can choose "Shuffle Songs" right from the main iPod menu. We think you'll also enjoy iPod's long battery life -- up to 12 hours. And with the 25 minutes of skip protection iPod provides, you can jump for joy and the music will keep playing.

A Click in the Right Direction Though ease of use has always been the hallmark of iPod, we believe in constantly moving perfection forward. So iPod now incorporates the same touch-sensitive Apple Click Wheel that debuted on iPod mini. Without lifting that trusty thumb of yours from the wheel, you can easily select playlists, scroll through thousands of songs, and start the music playing. Want that song to play from the beginning again? A single click will do the trick. Do the iPod Shuffle You can put the Apple Click Wheel to use the next time you want to set your music to shuffle. Right there on the main menu - where it's very easy to find - you'll find a new option - Shuffle Songs. Everyone's favourite option for mixing things up, Shuffle Songs randomly plays songs in a selected playlist or your entire music collection. You'll never guess what's coming up next, so you're always surprised by startling juxtapositions - like a melodic Coldplay song setting up an aria by Caballé. Play Your Music for Hours... and Hours And you can shuffle your way through a lot of songs now that iPod lets you play your music for up to 12 hours on a single battery charge (2). Just imagine: you could fly from New York to Paris and still have hours of listening time left over as you stroll the Champs Elysées. While you're on the move, iPod keeps you aware of its charge level, and when it's time, iPod's quick to recharge. Plug it into your computer or a handy wall socket (via the included power adaptor), and you can fast-charge iPod in as little as 2 hours.

Music and More
But, guess what -- iPod lets you do more than listen to music. Much more. iPod provides you with up to 40 GB of storage. True, you're likely to use a good portion of that storage capacity for your music and audio books, but you're bound to have a little space left over. You can use the FireWire or USB 2.0 cable that comes with iPod to connect the iPod to your computer and copy files. Word documents. Keynote presentations. Excel spreadsheets. Photoshop files. You name it.

Apple's fourth-generation iPod features song shuffling from the main menu, as well as Calendar, Games, and Alarm functionality.

Where am I at 2 p.m. Tuesday? If you've ever forgotten a dental appointment, you'll be pleased to hear that iPod also lets you take your calendar with you. Many applications -- iCal, Microsoft Entourage and Palm Desktop, to name a few -- export calendar files in vCalendar or iCalender formats, both of which iPod supports. Sorry, Wrong Number Little black address books are so last millennium. Thanks to its support for industry-standard vCard files, iPod lets you store and access all your important contact information -- names, addresses, phone numbers, email addresses -- with the spin of a Click Wheel. Play Games You know what they say about all work and no play. Navigate to Extras and you'll find Games: Music Quiz, Solitaire, Brick and Parachute, four popular games you can play anywhere (like when you're waiting for the movie to start at the multiplex). Store Text Notes You've got playlists. You've got To-do Lists. And you can carry both with you on iPod. iPod's Notes Reader lets you take text-based information such as news downloaded off the web, stock tips, your workout regimen, restaurant reviews, directions, your shopping list with you on your travels. Just transfer it via FireWire or USB 2.0 to iPod from your computer (Mac or PC).

A Music Store at Your Fingertips
The perfect companion to iPod, iTunes lets you easily build and manage your digital music collection. Since the iTunes Music Store is built right in, you can browse through hundreds of thousands of songs and audiobooks until you find just what you're looking for. Jazz, Reggae, Pop, Electronica, Hip Hop - the iTunes Music Store has it all. And it's open 24/7. All year long. In the US, UK, France and Germany. On both the Mac and Windows PCs.

As for all of those CDs you already own, iTunes makes it easy to quickly transfer your favourite songs and albums. Just pop a CD into your Mac or PC, and click the Import button. You can import music in a variety of formats (such as MP3 or AAC) and at whatever quality level you'd prefer. You can even choose the new Apple Lossless encoder. Music encoded with that option offers sound quality indistinguishable from the original CDs at about half the file size of the original. And with FireWire and USB 2.0 support, you can transfer the music from an entire CD to iPod in just 5 seconds or less.

1. Based on using 128Kbps AAC format.
2. Rechargeable batteries have a limited number of charge cycles and may eventually need to be replaced. Battery life and the number of charge cycles vary by use and settings.

Box Contents

Customer Reviews

pretty much a perfect music player
There's a lot of hype about the iPod, and whilst this attracts a lot of people to a product it also puts a certain percentage off. Its battery life is too short, they say, it is all style and no substance, it doesn't play Ogg Vorbis, WMA... It is easy to overlook the obvious, and the obvious is that despite one or two shortcomings this device is genuinely fantastic.

I already use iTunes on my computer (a Mac) to store all my music in AAC format and so starting to use the iPod was a breeze - double click the installer to install the iPod software, plug the iPod cable into the computer and iTunes will transfer all your songs onto the iPod automatically. On my collection of about 100 albums it took about 5-10 minutes or so. I later wanted to add another album - simply insert the CD into the computer, it appears in iTunes appopriately named (using the Gracenote internet site), and just just be drag and dropped into your library, Next time you connect your iPod the new music just gets transferred across. Easy.

I bought the 40GB model because I wanted to also use my iPod as a backup hard drive. To initiate this feature I simply clicked on the 'Use as Hard Drive' option and it appeared on my desktop ready to use. Now I have a way of transferring large quantities of data around without the tedium of burning DVDs.

So whilst the computer based software is very straightforward using the iPod itself is also very easy. The click wheel makes finding a given song the work of moments, and the main menu can be customised to an extent depending on how you best like to navigate through your music.

Playlists are a central feature of the iPod/iTunes experience and in addition to creating these on the computer with iTunes (drag and drop again) you can now also create them 'on-the-go' on the iPod. This is actually a lot more useful than I thought it might be - I can;t usually be bothered to create Playlists but creating them on the iPod gives me something to do if, say, I was on a train or car journey. Pressing and holding the select button adds a song to the current play list, which can then be saved as 'playlist 1', 2, etc. You can give these better names when you get back to your computer.

Sound quality is very good indeed, although the supplied headphones aren't all that great. I used a £150 set of Sennheiser 'phones which were awesome but the apple ones sound a bit muddy by comparison. I'd definitely recommend upgrading to a decent set of headphones or buds depending on your preference. I have to add though that most devices come with pretty crappy 'phones.

Battery life... Supposedly the weakness of the iPod with a mere 12 hours. Well, on its first charge my iPod was still going strong the next evening despite my thrashing it all day. Of course I didn't use it all that time but you have to ask the question: how much battery life do you actually need?! What is the minimum requirement to make such a device usable? To my mind 12 hours is perfectly adequate most of the time so it doesn't bother me unduly, although I am sure that there will be the odd occassion when I do run out of juice.

All in all I am very happy with my purchase and wouldn't heistate to recommend an iPod to anyone. In terms of usability it is simply awesome, I'm no mug when it comes to computers and gadgets but I appreciate an intuitive and well designed interface that saves me time and is enjoyable to use. Literally anyone could work one of these things. So what are you waiting for? Just buy one...

Best player for looks and sound but not enough goodies
The first item you should buy after getting the Ipod 4g is a decent pair of headphones that can handle a punch of bass. Because these headphones can distort making this player a fashionable Iriver.

Another fault with the Ipod is that it is flimsy - so invest in a hard case like the Contour Isee. Otherwise this little gadget is the best around for high quality sound. It works on Apple's Lossless technology which compresses CDs to the ratio of 2:1, Mp3 is considerably less. The closest rival to the Ipod is Sony's NW-HD3 20 MB which is good looking and works on the bespoke ATRAC but it's software, Sonic Stage crashes a lot unlike Itunes.

Apple also povides excellent technical support. If your Ipod breaks down they repair and return it you within' 7-10 days.

Overall a great player but not enough gadgets. 4 stars instead of 5.

A fabulous musical toy
...this must best be the best musical toy I have ever laid my hands on. The Song Shuffler is just genius: if you like your CD collection, the song shuffler acts as a nice surprise: like listening to a radio station where you'll enjoy all the songs. The Ipod is also very easy to use and the sound quality is excellent. It's worth investing in slightly better headphones, as the Apple ones slip out. The Musician's Sound Isolating earphones do the Ipod the justice it deserves: as the Ipod itself will to your favourite songs. I'd invest in the InStation as well, so you can listen to your fave songs without having to be plugged in to the headphones all the time.
It's totally magic: nice one, Apple !