Apple iPod shuffle 2nd Generation Blue (1 GB)

Right well here goes.
I bought the product as I have lengthy travels to work and i used to get depressingly bored so i wanted a cheap solution for that i had tried a few various mp3 players but the one thing i found with most of them was the headphone lead was loose so if you stepped up/down or did anything it came out and you ended up costly adjusting yourself i can honestly say this has NEVER happened with this.
The next point i would mention is that i always found other mp3 players just werent loud enough you could buy various headphones, etc but nothing was enough any wind and you couldnt hear any music.
One of the most impressive things on this is the quality of the sound for me i had a song on today and when the bass kicked in my ears nearly exploded it really was a booooooom.
Now i could go on all day about how much i like this product it does everything i want it too for a cheap price i paid £18 factory refurbished but the new ones arent much more expensive around 30-40 however i would like to do this in a balanced way so ill give a point that im not so impressed with.
The one thing i would say to transfer music onto the shuffle it can be a absolute pain in the rear....firstly you need the chargin dock, download itunes, get itunes up, synch it with your ipod, download some itunes or other media you may have ie windows media player songs, etc its just a basic drag and drop onto itunes, then transfer your songs onto your ipod and wait for it to finish. To be honest it sounds so much hard work but its alot easier when you get used to it and can be done very quickly.
If my friend said should i buy one i would definetly say yes and just stick with it.

There are many good things about this product and some bad things about this product. overalll i would say this product is better than the 3gen shuffle (I have both and have used them for quite long).

The bad parts which i have found is that it has low capacity (1 GB isnt that much because I use it for storing other files but you use it just for music then it should be alright) and you can only have a single playlist (you can edit the order of the tracks). but i wouldnt really call that bad points though and this still makes it WAY better than the 3gen shuffle. The good points about the 2geb is that it has BUTTONS!!.

I swear the 3gen headphone buttons were disabled, mine are nearly broken and I have had it for less 6 months (I keep my stuff in good condition). ok the 3gen does have other neet stuff aswell (voiceover and the ability to have more than one playlist) but is there a need to have a half disabled robot tell you the name of the artist and the song track when you can obviously tell who it is by listening to the first 4 seconds of the intro. the 2gen also has an extra 4 hours of battery life.


other things which you may need to know.

you can only use the 2gen dock on the 2gen shuffle (i tried the 3gen cable doesnt work, dont know if 3rd party cables work but i dont see why not)

only able to store around 100 tracks

has a 'HOLD' function (hold play button for more than 3 seconds to toggle on and off)

battery indicator is a bit disabled (100% to 30% is shown as 'GOOD')

if you dont normally use the auto fill function make sure you turn it off (its a bitch)

you can reserve the space for tracks and other files on the ipod

you can go to the previous track if more than 3 seconds of the track is skipped (in the 'GET INFO -> 'OPTION' tab and if the 'START TIME' box is checked) the 3gen does not allow this and I had to make multiple playlists to get around this. Its a bitch

buttons do not wear out easily (unless you get a second hand one or your just simply over powered)

you can go to the beginning of the playlist by pressing play 3 times quickly

there is a slight delay when playing the FIRST (and only the first) track. Its not very long but its long enough to make you think 'why isn't it playing??)

Functionally, the second-generation (2G) iPod shuffle differs little from the original. Like the first, stick-of-gum shuffle, the 2G model bears a central Play/Pause button and four controls arrayed around a rocking click wheel—Previous, Next, Volume Up, and Volume Down. Instead of a three-way switch on the back to switch the device on and select Shuffle or Repeat play modes, this version has two small switches on the bottom—one for powering the iPod on and off and the other that selects Shuffle or Repeat. The headphone jack is found on the top of the iPod.

Whereas the original shuffle sported a male USB connector, the 2G shuffle requires the included dock for syncing and powering the player. The dock is small, bearing a single miniplug jack that sticks up from a plastic base. While it’s no more trouble to carry the dock than the special cable required to sync and power larger iPods, I miss the all-in-one convenience of having the USB connector on the iPod.

After touting the superiority of the earbuds bundled with the latest iPod nanos and full-sized iPods, Apple chose to include the original Apple earbuds with the 2G shuffle. Given that I’ve replaced my headphones with better-sounding alternatives, this doesn’t bother me, but some may be disappointed that they’re not getting Apple’s latest and supposedly greatest ’buds.

Miniscule LEDs that glow green, orange, or red appear on both the top and bottom of the 2G shuffle—so miniscule, in fact, that they’re hard to read, particularly in bright environments. As with the original shuffle, these lights have to convey a variety of messages—charging status while docked, whether the iPod’s hold switch is on or not, and blinks that tell you that the shuffle’s firmware is corrupted. Fortunately, Apple provides a small card that indicates what most LED blinks mean. I’m sorry, however, that the latest shuffle doesn’t include a separate battery indicator light as did the original. With this one you can tell only how much battery charge remains by very quickly turning the iPod off and on—a feat that’s not easy to accomplish with such a tiny switch without interrupting playback.

It's so compact and is absolutely perfect for when you want to go for a run, just clip it on your sleeve and you'll never know it's there. It probably isn't the iPod for the music lover as there is no screen to choose which song to listen to and it can only hold a couple hundred songs, but I have bought it just for running and have an iPod touch for the rest of my music. It is absolutely perfect for this and it it's cheap too! It looks great and is so small and portable and virtually unbreakable! I love how it can clip on to things, a feature recently re -added to the new iPod nano 6th generation so it's obviously popular. 1GB isn't much memory but if you only have a couple hundred songs it does the job great. The charging dock is a lovely design and you can easily get speakers for it, although the would play through the earphone jack and not an iPod dock like the other iPod models. Highly recommended for someone that isn't to fussy about choosing music, goes on walks, runs or even cycles regularly and someone with not too much music! Great product!

Design
L'Apple Ipod Shuffle 1gb è un lettore davvero piccolissimo, considerate le sue dimensioni di 27,3 millimetri di altezza, 41,2 millimetri di larghezza e appena 10,5 millimetri di spessore. Anche il peso è, a dir poco, esiguo, con 15,5 grammi. Non dispone di display esterno, anche perché non ce ne sarebbe lo spazio, ma la superficie è occupata tutta da una comoda ghiera per gestire le canzoni. Il lettore è disponibili nelle colorazioni argento, rosa, verde, azzurro e arancione, per adattarsi a qualunque capo di abbigliamento.

Caratteristiche e funzionalita'
Ancora una volta l'Apple ha creato un prodotto unico nel suo genere, ma questa volta ad un prezzo contenuto. Si tratta dell'Apple Ipod Shuffle 1gb, un lettore musicale piccolissimo, come già anticipato in precedenza, ma dotato di caratteristiche di tutto rispetto. Come dice lo nome, questo lettore dispone di un hard disk interno da 1 GB, che consente di archiviare fino a 240 brani della durata media di 4 minuti e nel formato AAC. Ad alcuni questa capienza può sembrare poca ma, considerando le dimensioni ed il prezzo, si comprende come sia invece molto valida. Il primo passo da fare per utilizzare il lettore è quello di scaricare il software iTunes gratuitamente dal sito internet, che consente di gestire le canzoni presenti sul dispositivo. Quindi, è necessario inserirlo nell'apposito dock incluso nella confezione e collegare quest'ultimo al PC tramite cavo USB. A questo punto, è possibile trasferire sul lettore tutte le canzoni che si desidera, fino a 240, per poterle ascoltare ovunque e in qualunque momento. Grazie all'iTunes, è possibile trasferire in automatico i brani sul lettore, per creare la propria playlist oppure, per avere un maggiore controllo delle canzoni, è possibile impostare la funzionalità in modo che sincronizzi playlist specifiche o aggiunga per primi i brani più alti in classifica. Inoltre, si può disattivare la funzione di riempimento automatico e selezionare manualmente le canzoni da trasferire. Chiaramente, la caratteristica più evidente dell'Apple Ipod Shuffle 1 gb sono le sue dimensioni, che ne fanno molto probabilmente il lettore più piccolo al mondo. Tra l'altro, il lettore si aggancia al taschino, ai jeans, allo zaino o ovunque si voglia tramite una comoda clip. I controlli sono molto semplici e facile da usare, grazie alla piccola ghiera controllabile con un dito. Al centro della ghiera si trova il tasto per avviare e mettere in stand-by una canzone mentre, in torno ad essa, i tasti per avanzare e mandare indietro e quelli per il volume. Il lettore dispone, poi, di un indicatore di batteria molto semplice ed intuitivo, che si illumina di verde quando la batteria è completa, di ambra se è quasi scarica e di rosso quando è necessario ricaricare. Comunque, grazie alla batteria ricaricabile ai polimeri di litio, è possibile riprodurre fino a 12 ore di musica ininterrottamente con una carica completa, ma va considerato che la durata della batteria e il numero di cicli di ricarica supportati variano a seconda dell'utilizzo e delle impostazioni. Per ricaricare il lettore basta collegarlo al PC ed attendere circa 4 ore per una ricarica completa. Nella confezione sono, infine, inclusi gli auricolari, il dock e la guida rapida all'installazione.