APPLE's 30GB IPod Video: The Almost Perfect Portable Media Player

As far as portable media/MP3 players go, Apple's iPod Video is almost perfect. It's honestly the only Apple product I can say I love, and I'm really not sure how I ever got along without it.

I bought the 30GB Ipod Video, also known as the 5Th Generation iPod, back in February. As a blind person, I was sort of skeptical, because I'd always found Apple's products to be pretty inaccessible, and had heard that this was particularly true of the iPod. However, once I replaced Apple's firmware with Rockbox, I found this to be the furthest thing from the truth. The iPod Video is very user-friendly, and boasts great sound quality, especially when I replaced the standard earbuds with my own cheap headphones from Wal-Mart.

The unit comes in either black or white; I chose the black one. It is barely larger than the palm of my hand, and fits easily in a pocket or in the slot on my car's dash below the stereo. The unit contains a slot for the included USB cable or a power cord, the scroll wheel for performing all functions on the iPod, a "Select" button for executing menu commands, a "lock" switch, and a headphone jack which can also be used with an RCA plug to connect the iPod to my home or car stereo system.

As I mentioned, all functions are controlled via the scroll wheel. The wheel is very sensitive, so the slightest touch will move you to your next option in the menu if no audio is playing, or alter the volume when audio is playing. If you press the top of the scroll wheel, this will take you to the iPod's menu. Pressing the bottom of the weel acts as a play/pause/stop button. The left side will take you up a level in the menu or to the previous track during audio playback, and the right side will select the highlighted menu option or move you to your next audio or video file.

With my 30GB iPod, I can hold well over 7,000 MP3 files, ripped at 128KBPS. The number of files that can be held will, of course, vary by bitrate at which the file was created and the size of the file. The average listed for this unit at Apple's website is 7,500 songs, each being an average of 4MB in size.

The user interface via Rockbox is very easy to navigate and customize. I can find my files easily, adjust my settings, and access my bookmarks much more easily than I could with my old MP3-CD player. I'll admit, I've not used it with the default firmware from Apple, as that's not accessible to blind users, but according to my wife, that's very easy to use as well. I'll admit, I only use my iPod for audio, so can't tell you how clear the video display is, but I've been told it's very good.

The iPod will support audio and video content purchased from the iTunes music store, MP3 format files, AAC file format, and several other audio and video formats. WMA (Windows Media) files are not supported, but most of what's available at the online retailers who sell WMA files is also available from iTunes. Who knows; if Steve Jobs gets his wish and DRM (Digital Rights Management) becomes a thing of the past, maybe you will someday be able to play music purchased from other online retailers on the iPod.

My only complaint with the iPod is that, with anything Apple sells, they make sure they get as much money as they can off you. I purchased my unit at Best Buy, and upon reading the package contents, I was led to believe that a charging unit, as in a standard AC adapter, would be contained in the package. No; the unit charges by connecting to the USB port on my computer. Of course, if I want to spend some extra money, anywhere from $25 to $250 from what I've seen, I can get anything from a simple AC power cord all the way up to a Bose docking station, which will charge my iPod and allow me to listen to it on Bose speakers. Come on Apple...Throw the consumer a bone and include a simple AC adapter so we can plug the unit into the wall to charge if we're not near our computers. Considering what we pay for the units themselves, it's the least you can do.

Other than that, I have absolutely no complaints about the 30GB iPod Video. Having researched several MP3 players before making my final purchase, I found the iPod family of products, in particular the iPod Video, to be the best value for what you get. For the price, Apple offers you a more compact unit, more memory, and ease of operation. I would recommend this particular iPod model to anyone looking for a high-capacity MP3 player. It's nice to be able to fit 7500 songs in the plam of my hand, and have access to them any time I want without having to search through the CD cabinets to decide what to take on a trip, or what to put into the CD changer. The iPod is the way to go.