Aug 17, 2007 02:34 PM
6807 Views
How I Bought The Shuffle*
Last August, I Saw that Apple Was releasing a 1 Gb iPod at the cost of the 512 Mb iPod at that time....I waited desperately for it to come to India as I was not gng to the US in a while.While roaming in Forum with friends, I decided to check out the Imagine showroom and to my surprise, a consignment of iPods had just arrived from the USA...I thought I might be the first person in Bangalore to have an iPod but someone already beat me to it.
*Pros*
The Functionality is pretty good and it withstood the rough use I put it through for seven months.Then, one day I donno what went wrong but it stopped functioning.I had to replace it and they gave me a new iPod Shuffle with a brand new 1 year warranty again.Now, the replacement is worth mentioning.
I was in Pilani at the time the iPod stopped working and I mailed it to my friend in Bangalore.The guys In Imagine, Forum couriered me a new iPod in just 1 week.I never expected this kind of a prompt replacement at least from an Indian store who try to postpone the replacement indefinitely....
The ability to clip it onto clothes is a very good feature.
The Bass is especially good and you also have the option of adding an equaliser preset for every song, something which other mp3 players dont have.
For those of you froma n engineering background, the iPod is a very gud example of an embedded system.The way the battery amount indicator has been integrated in the system is a marvel for which the Apple guys need a bow.
If you are a parent and dont want your son to listen to songs at high volume, there is a volume limiter in iTunes.
The earphones which are bundled are also very good, but the white color fades with time.Make Sure you keep them clean.
Bug fixes are automatically downloaded by iTunes.
*Cons*
Price is a bit high for a 1 Gb mp3 Player.The other players have 1 Gb mp3 players at very low prices, which are almost half the cost of the Shuffle.
The Indian Shuffle is priced 1k more than the same Shuffle sold in the USA.
The colors in which the Shuffle is sold are too glossy and generally dont suit men.They may look good on girls.Silver is very good and is the one I am using currently.
There is neither display nor the option of playlists which are available on Nano and iPod.
It can sync with only one iTunes(read one PC or a Mac). However, a very clever guy wrote a Python script to use it on multiple PCs.Google it and you can find the script and its usage isntructions.
*Final Verdict*
To sum it up, the Shuffle is a no-nonsense mp3 player which offers good
value for money.If you want to for the high-end ones, go for the iPod nano or the
iPod, but only for the disk space they offer.If u r an audiophile and if
dont mind the low disk space, then the Shuffle is for you.
At 4.7k, it is a good bargain(in fact very good) for the quality of the product and the service.
