“Though it”s almost as small and light (about an ounce-and-a-half) as the Shuffle, the tiniest iPod, the Nano is even thinner and can hold 500 to 1,000 songs, about four times the Shuffle”s capacity. Like the Shuffle, it stores music in flash memory. That”s a more durable technology than the hard drives used on the iPod Mini and most other more-capacious players, which are more easily damaged if the player is dropped.
You select music by using a scaled-down version of the easy-to-use clickwheel on larger iPods. Though little bigger than a postage stamp, the Nano”s color display is easy to see under most lighting conditions. You can easily create slide shows with music (though you can”t play them on a TV, as with more expensive iPods). The Nano is also the first iPod with an address book that works with Microsoft Outlook on your computer.
Quibbles: A 2-gigabyte (500-song) Nano costs $200 ($A299 which bought you a 4-GB iPod Mini before it was discontinued. (There”s a 4-GB Nano for $250 ($A359 which used to buy you a 6-GB iPod Mini.) The Nano”s claimed music-playback time of 14 hours, while more than the Shuffle”s, is about half that of some other flash-memory players.
The bottom line: The Nano is the top choice among MP3 players, with what may be the best-yet combination of size, storage, and ergonomic ease. That said, consider a flash-memory player from another brand if you want additional functions such as recording capability or an FM radio. Such players typically cost less than the Nano but hold only a quarter to a half as many songs.”
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