yusakugo's Full Review: Apple iPod shuffle 1st Generation (512 MB) MP3 Pla...
Before you go on and read this epinion, know that I wrote and own the 1GB iPod Shuffle and wrote an epinion on it already that you can read for a full and heavily detailed review of the iPod Shuffle. There is no differences in performance that I can tell (when playing with my friends' 512MB iPod Shuffles) but I wanted to go into a change of direction using the 512MB iPod Shuffle as an example since I think it represents an extremely attractive price point with the specs that inexperienced MP3 player purchasers think are important but may not be.
The quick and important numbers most people with notice on the iPod Shuffle 512MB version is the price and amount of memory on it. $99 and 512MB of memory are the likely numbers that will catch your eye. For an MP3 player with the Apple iPod brand... heck for any decent brand MP3 player, $99 is a steal. For example, Sandisk sells their 256MB player for $89.99 and their 512MB player for $149.99! iRiver sells their 256MB flash players (there are several models) at starting prices of $129.99. Creative sells their MuVo Micro N200 256MB player for $99.99 and the 512MB version for $129.99. Note that all the prices are MRSP and may be discounted if you shop around. Regardless, at this era of electronics, the price of $99 with a half GB of memory are powerful numbers and numbers don't lie... but they can be misleading.
The iPod Shuffle in a Nutcase
If you can keep a pack of Trident gum on your body, you can easily keep an iPod Shuffle on you. Whether it is in a pocket, on a lanyard, on an armband, in a pocketbook, and heck who knows where else (in your athletic knee high sock, maybe iPod Shuffle earrings especially for anyone who still wears those huge '80s hoop earrings). The size of the main iPod Shuffle unit is pretty small. There aren't alot of buttons and options to muck around with either. You can play music, fast forward or rewind through a song, skip ahead or fall back on the songlist, shuffle the songs, and change the volume. The iPod Shuffle was meant for the user to veg out and relax... enjoy the tunes and get surprised on long forgotten songs in your collection. No thought... you don't have to think... in many ways, that's a beautiful thing. That's how some people want their music... heck, I enjoy music in this way every now and then too. The player is pretty much pure white... what some people termed iPod White. The batteries are rated at 12 hours... and I've gotten anywhere from 10 to 14 hours of play time on my 1GB iPod Shuffle which is similar to several friends with 512MB and 1GB iPod Shuffles. Accessories in the box is pretty sparse... the USB connector cap and the Lanyard.
The Shuffle integrates well with the iTunes program and ability to AutoFill your Shuffle in various variations make it very user friendly (especially if you use iTunes for listening and organizing your music on your PC/Mac). The Shuffle's shuffle capacity was actually quite good... rarely did I have songs repeat within a short time frame (1 hour continuous play). Battery life is good... I average 10 hours on a full charge over a 48 hour period. The other feature of the Shuffle is that it can act as a USB flash drive as well.
What you don't get is a way of charging the Shuffle away from a computer without buying the $29 AC adapter. You don't get an LCD for more flexibility. You don't get equalizer settigns. You don't get many settings you can change on the fly away from your computer with iTunes on it. You don't get the fancy extras like FM tuner, voice recording, FM recording, playlist creation and editing, etc. Sound quality did seem slightly worse than the iPod mini or regular iPod models. I had a slight hiss on my 1GB iPod... and it seemed to be present on other iPod Shuffled I listened to (although to lesser and greater degrees (and all using the standard iPod earbuds). Note that after upgrading the firmware, the hiss disappeared by my iPod Shuffle 1GB unit... so upgrade to the latest firmware to get the best possible sound from your iPod Shuffle! Some may be disappointed that the battery is not user replacible... but in the end, with how fast the market is changing, who knows how the MP3 player market will look like in 2-3 years.
If you want the itty-bitty details and almost all the nook and cranny information read my 1GB iPod Shuffle epinion. I written more details on the accessories that came with Shuffle and details about some of the nuances of the Shuffle. What I'm going to go into next is what the main numbers mean to you and features of MP3 players on the market competing with the iPod Shuffle.
Misleading Numbers? Where's the LCD?
For some, the lack of a LCD will kill the deal. I can understand that... my preference is to see the title of the song, the length, and even change some settings on the MP3 player like the equalizer settings. The Shuffle cannot do this things... as you can see from photos, there is no LCD... there is no wired remote with an LCD (an iRiver trademark on their CD-MP3 players and many Creative MP3 players). However, if you like to sit back and listen or have something pleasing playing in the background while you work out or jog, I think you'll be happy with the iPod Shuffle. Whether you miss having the LCD depends on your listening habits... if you like to pick and choose the song you're listening to most of the time and making playlists on the fly, you are going to hate the Shuffle.
Misleading numbers? What am I talking about? Well, people will see iPod, $99, and 512MB. iPod will mean decent feature set with ease of use... $99 means affordable iPod... 512MB means plenty of music. What misleading then? Well, it might make most buyers gloss over the other details that you might want to take into account. Battery life is rated at 12 hours... which is decent for people who can recharge the player on a daily basis with frequent use. I'm getting a little more than 10 hours personally with 48 hours between charges. To bulk up battery life for long trips (like intercontinental plane flights) or perhaps a backup battery solution, you need to purchase the $29 dollar AA battery adapter. Notice you have no way of charging the Shuffle without a computer with a high powered USB port (older computers and some notebooks may not have this). You need to spend another... yup, another $29 for a power adapter for direct charging. Each accessory adds an additional 1/3 the cost of the 512MB iPod Shuffle MRSP! Get three accessories and you're paying almost $200! Things like the AC adapter are standard in other companies MP3 players. Costs can be deceiving!
The 512MB of memory allow up to 120 songs encoded to 128MHz AAC files at 4 minutes a song. Note that the iPod Shuffle doesn't allow you to use every nook and cranny of that 512MB of memory... a few kb are used for other functions. On top of that, the AutoFill function tends to leave a few MBs empty (on average 4-6 MB are unfilled). And really, if your music collection is like mine, you have songs shorter than fours minutes and songs longer than four minutes (like classical music and some classic 80's songs lasting closer or beyond the 10 minute mark!) I have on average 100 songs that download to the Shuffle on AutoFill (allowing only 512MB of the 1GB on my Shuffle). During continuous 1 hours play sessions, I rarely got a repeated song which is better than I can say for other MP3 players I've used with a shuffle function. In relation the the battery life, the 512MB of memory is perfect. You should be able to go through the entire playlist on a full charge... heck, even go through the playlist 1 1/4 times as per Apple's numbers. In reality, how much memory do you really need... if you have 1 to 2 hour workouts (you should get through on 10 to 15 songs an hour), you can survive on 128MB player if you have specific songs you like to listen to during your workout. Any multiple of 128MB will increase your songlist flexibility and variety. So although bigger numbers are technically better, don't shun players with smaller memory amounts if they fit your tasks better.
Compatible Formats?
Yes... the iPod Shuffle supports a handful of formats including MP3, MP3 VBR, AAC, AAC Protected, WAV, and Audible format (for audio books). No... it doesn't support WMA but anybody whining that WMA isn't supported is in the same boat as people with Creative, iRiver, Archos, etc. players who complain that their MP3 players don't support AAC. If you're comfortable with a particular format, you should find a player that supports it and NOT buy a MP3 player and hope/complain that it should support the format. All the major companies that make MP3 player spell out pretty clearly what formats that they support (just check their websites).
Competition Can Be Brutal!
When you consider everything, the iPod Shuffle may not be the best flash memory MP3 player for everyone. The $99 price tag looks great but considering that will likely need at least one more accessory... the 512MB iPod Shuffle bumps up in price very, very quickly.
When you think about it, the other MP3 competing with the Shuffle aren't that much more expensive... heck, the prices come more on par actually!
The Creative MuVo N200 512MB version is $129.99. You lose the built-in rechargeable battery, ability to play AAC files, and a little ease of use but gain the ability to use a AAA battery that gives you at least 10 hours of battery life (Creative states up to 15 hours) and you gain FM tuning, recording options through the line-in port, voice recording through the built-in microphone, a bit cleaner sound (to my ears), and the ability to play WMA files. In reality, the MuVo N200 is more feature rich for the money. The only other loss from the Shuffle is the integration with PC jukebox software... iTune far crushes their competition here. Oh... the size, well it is about the size of a pack of Trident gum. You also have an LCD and equalizer settings as well.
Note that Creative has only flash memory MP3 players around the same price including the MuVo TX FM 256MB and Muvo Slim 512MB.
Rio is another company that many had associated with MP3 in the past, but has taken a bit of beating in recent years. The smallest flash based MP3 player is the Rio Chiba which is expensive compared to other options and less feature rich. The Chiba has an FM tuner and can be expanded via a MMC/SD card slot. The Chiba has a stopwatch built-in but it is also much larger than the Shuffle. A possible plus is the use of 1 AAA battery to power the unit. Rio's Nitrus, Carbon, and ce2100 models are more expensive but are tiny and carry a ton more music... like 1.5GB up to 5GB depending on the model you purchase. However, these are Hard Drive based players and may not be a good choice for the active person. Rio players support WMA but not AAC.
iRiver is another company I associate with quality MP3 players. The entire iFP series (and there are 6 models with several subdivisions) covers several areas. The basic model is the iFP-100 series with FM tuner and recorder, voice recorder, and uses AA batteries for power. The iFP-190 has 256MB and retails for $129.99. The 700 series has models with higher memory capacities but adds OGG music file support, a line in port, and keeps the AA battery power source. The 800 series is a more rugged 700 series player. A 256MB 700 or 800 series player has a MRSP of $149.99. The N10 is a ultra thin player with a high quality OLED display and a hefty price tag. The N10 also adds a rechargeable battery (and an AC adapter and "3D sound" over the 700/800 series players. However, a 256MB N10 costs a painful $179.99. The 900 series adds a color screen and picture viewing abilities over the N10 player. The 256MB 900 series player costs $199.99. The 1000 series adds a 0.3 megapixel camera to the mix over the N10. Unfortunately, the 512MB model costs a costly $249.99!
SanDisk also makes flash memory MP3 players with FM tuner and recorder, voice recording, and flash drive capabilities. It is powered by a single AAA battery. I haven't had experience at all with this but I've heard that SanDisk made decent players although the units felt a bit cheap. The 256MB unit costs $89.99 and the 512MB unit costs $149.
There are still a ton of other manufacturers like Phillips, Samsung, and Sony are other big name manufacturers. Archos is another well known name in portable audio video players although the flash memory player line was extremely weak. There are a tons of lesser known manufacturers like MPIO and others.
What is Special About the iPod Shuffle?
In reality, the strongest point of the Shuffle is the seamless integration with iTunes. This is the one major advantage the Shuffle has over the other flash based MP3 player even though the other players have stronger feature sets and more flexibility. Accordingly, if you use iTunes to mangae and play back your music collection, your enjoyment of the iPod Shuffle will be higher. This single attribute may be enough to be Apple's Ace in the Hole.
By the way, the Shuffle feature doesn't make the iPod Shuffle special... all the players listed above have a shuffle option. The iPod Shuffle just implemented it better than most.
Does That Mean I Should Buy an iPod?
No... absolutely NOT! If you want more than a music player there are a ton of options. Your choice should be based on the music program(s) you use to organize and play back your music on your PC/Mac. All the above players (except some Sony MP3 players) can play back MP3 files. If you use AAC files, you will probably lean towards an iPod. If you use WMA music files, you will lean more towards other players. If you happen to use the OGG music file format, you're definitely looking at a higher end iRiver branded MP3 player. You don't need a ton of memory in an MP3 player to enjoy it... but if you need FM stereo or voice recording, don't feel trapped that you have to buy an iPod Shuffle. Note that I only used the iRiver and Creative branded players which I thought had clearer sound than the iPod Shuffle.
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Epinions.com periodically updates pricing and product information from third-party sources, so some information may be slightly out-of-date. You should confirm all information before relying on it.
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