More About Apple's Bigger iPods and Smaller Nanos

I met with Apple today to see what the big fuss was over the new iPod-Mini-like Nano, the minuscule new Shuffle, movies on iTunes, and the video streaming version of Airport Express, also known as iTV. Gina wrote her impressions last week in this post, but I wanted to add my two cents.

8.5 hour battery life for video is significant: The original video iPods were great for short-haul flights. I watched the entire second season of Battlestar Galactica on my 30GB iPod, one one-hour-episode-and-flight at a time because I was terrified of not having the option to listen to music (I couldn't get through two whole episodes without running down the battery). The 8.5 battery life is enough to watch two feature-length movies and listen to two or three albums on a transatlantic flight from, say, New York to Berlin. And more than enough for a coast-to-coast flight.

That said, I'm still fond of the 30GB because it's slim and light enough to hold in my hand, which is the best way to watch TV on the iPod (the now defunct 60GB and the new 80GB, by contrast, are almost twice as thick and a third heavier).

Thanks for the smaller Shuffle, but give me wireless headphones already: The old Nano was already plenty small for me—it's the dang cord that's obtrusive. In fact, it's a rare treadmill run when I don't get my arm entangled in the earbud cable, which usually sends my iPod flying across the gym floor. Bluetooth seems to fit and function smoothly in most big and small cell phones, so why can't it be in my new mint-sized Shuffle, much less iPod?

iTV sounds cool, but let's see what it looks like: Streaming media around the home is certainly a hot topic in consumer electronics today but so far most attempts with Windows Media-based solutions—D-Link media streamers, Xbox 360—are glitchy. And Windows Media with its HD offerings actually does video pretty well. Which brings me to the next point:Apple has improved its resolution from 320 x 240 to 640 x 480 (technically DVD quality), but just how good will these videos look on a big 50-inch or greater TV? To make sure you get decent quality video on your TV screen—should you decide to stream—Windows Media based solutions such as Movielink, CinemaNow, Amazon's Unbox, and Vongo actually make you download two separate files (one smaller for portables, one larger for desktops). Will Apple's one file solution make the translation to the big screen? All I know is this: The flesh fest of Laguna Beach in 320 x 240 looks fine on my iPod, but it's a faded and pixel-heavy disappointment on my iMac. I'll get back to you after I've watched Season 2 in the higher resolution.

I'd like one Nano in brown, please: Pink, lime green, and flourescent blue are cool for girls, but we've seen them before. Guys like more than gray and black (the other two colors available for the Nano). This is one case where Microsoft's Zune actually got it right with the brown player it showed last week. Brown's plenty masculine, and happening, as evidenced by the many brown kicks I've been seeing in stores lately. For now, I'll keep browsing the virtual aisles of ColorWarePC for wacky colored iPods.