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TMO at MWSF - Hands On: iPod shuffle

by , 4:20 PM EST, January 11th, 2005

SAN FRANCISCO, CA -- As Apple CEO Steve Jobs finished up his demonstration of the iPod shuffle and announced that "they are shipping from the factory today," he casually mentioned that he had heard they were a few at the Apple Store a few blocks away from the Moscone Center.

It came as little surprise to me to find that just minutes later the Apple Store three blocks away was packed with people, most of whom were in line to buy one (or ten) of the new iPod shuffles. Only the 512MB version was available and while they had ample stock while I waited in line for almost half an hour to purchase one--ample, at least, to not have to limit the quantity you could purchase--employees there, who had only learned of the device minutes ago themselves, expected to run out of shuffles quickly. San Francisco is apparently the only place in the country you can get them at the moment (the online Apple Store estimates shipment at one week for the 512MB model, and 1-2 weeks for the 1GB version).

The iPod shuffle box is about the size of a couple compact discs, and it's about easy as a CD to impulse buy more than you need, especially on the day that they're announced. Apple's typically minimalist iPod packaging is even more minimal with the shuffle: open the top, slide out the plastic holder that contains the iPod shuffle, lanyard, and headphones, and slip out the small square envelope that houses the documentation and install CD. iTunes 4.7.1 -- not yet available from Software Update at the time of this writing -- is needed in order for iTunes to see the shuffle (an iPod Updater 2005-01-11 that recognizes the shuffle is also included on the disc).

After you've plugged the shuffle in and named it, iTunes automatically fills it randomly with tracks using the new iTunes Autofill feature. You can specify whether you want it to replace all songs when it Autofills, chooses higher rated songs more often, and whether to choose songs randomly (as opposed to in the order of a playlist). Through the iPod shuffle's Preferences window you can control further options: whether to open iTunes automatically when the shuffle is plugged in, for example, or whether to use part of the iPod shuffle's capacity as a USB flash drive (you must specify how much, and doing so requires you to manually eject the iPod shuffle from the Finder each time you want to unplug it). You can also tell iTunes to automatically convert higher bit rate songs to 128 kbps AAC when it copies them to the iPod shuffle, enabling you to squeeze more songs onto the device.

First impressions of the device are pretty favorable. I have to say I was skeptical about the lack of a screen, but as Bryan Chaffin put it last night, "Apple wouldn't do it if it didn't make sense." At the end of the keynote, I started to "get" where the iPod shuffle fits in. It's ideally suited for people who already own a full-size iPod and already understand iTunes and basic iPod functionality. You won't be able to easily find that one new song you want to show your friend (unless you put it towards the top of the iPod shuffle's playlist), you won't be able to glance down and figure out what a song is or rate it to figure out later, and you can't scrub forward or backwards (not too great for audio books), but what you can do is affordably and take your favorite songs with you wherever you want and not have to worry about breaking the device. It's especially ideal for the gym.

Around your neck, the iPod shuffle is barely even noticeable. The front has five buttons with six basic controls: play/pause, skip forward one track, skip backwards one track, and volume up/down. On the back are two other buttons: a small one tells you the battery status through one LED (green you're good, orange you're low, red you're very low), another switch allows you to turn the device off, set it to continuous play, or set it to random.

Skipping around tracks is relatively fast, a bit faster than an ordinary iPod (especially when that iPod needs to spin up the hard disk to load more tracks to memory). If you turn the device off in the middle of a track and then turn it back on, it picks up exactly where it left off. The LED on the front of the only illuminates when you press a button (not while it's actually playing), provide visual as well as tactile feedback. There is no specific hold button on the iPod shuffle. Instead, to lock out the buttons you press and hold the play/pause button for a few seconds, after which the LED blinks orange a few times. Pressing any buttons while in hold mode cause the LED to blink orange. To remove the hold, you similarly press and hold the play/pause button.

With the iPod shuffle, Apple has taken the flash-based MP3 market and turned it upside down. There will surely be those who are turned away by the lack of a display, but other the iPod brand will likely be enough to convince everyone to at least take a look at the shuffle and decide for themselves whether Apple's approach meets their needs.

Observer Comments

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View Name:Guest
Subject: It's analogous to radio
Close Name:Mace Posts: 9163 Joined: 07 Aug 2003
Subject:

The primary target of the iPod shuffle is for those potential flash player buyers. Such buyers are not music connoisseur. They are unlikely to have enough songs to fill up the iPod shuffle or not are very particular what songs they are listening to at any point in time. The fact that it can also use as a flash drive suits these guys well.

The finer preference and auto-fill features are targeted at existing iPod users who want a smaller iPod or my case, for my 6 years old son.

View Name:Guest
Subject: I'm in
View Name:Guest
Subject:
View Name:Guest
Subject: Have your scissors ready
Close Name:spxyu02 Posts: 1214 Joined: 04 Aug 2004
Subject:

Quote
Mace wrote:
The finer preference and auto-fill features are targeted at existing iPod users who want a smaller iPod or my case, for my 6 years old son.


Wait..you're gonna get a $100-$150 piece of electronic equipment for you 6 year old? I'm surprised cuz I imagine 6 year olds loosing/breaking things, but I'm also amazed that he may know how to use iTunes (that kinda speaks volumes about OS X in general).

Close Name:someToast Posts: 1447 Joined: 11 Jun 2001
Subject: Scrubbing

Does it allow holding down the FF/RW buttons to do scrubbing?

Close Name:JimWCB Posts: 301 Joined: 29 Aug 2002
Subject:

Quote
someToast wrote:
Does it allow holding down the FF/RW buttons to do scrubbing?


Yes, if you hold down the FF/RW buttons it scan trhough the current song. A quick press and release skips to the next/previous song. Sounds like it plays several seconds and then skips a small segment instead of just speeding up the playback.

I got my hands on one at macWorld today (couldn't get it off the overhead pipe they had about 100 wrapped around, though ).

Close Name:Nom Posts: 58 Joined: 07 Jul 2004
Subject:

IMO, the best way to think of the shuffle is a cross between an iPod and a portable CD player. Once loaded, you basically have identical functionality to a portable CD player (without any extra CDs), but it's solid state. However, _unlike_ a portable CD player, you can load a large, customised CD, and it's a _lot_ smaller.

Close Name:flub Posts: 9 Joined: 11 May 2004
Subject: OS X demo on CD?

I think Apple should have an avi on the installation CD that comes with the shuffle showing OS X and the mac mini..

Brad

View Name:Guest
Subject: Next/Previous Album function ?
View Name:Guest
Subject: battery life
View Name:Guest
Subject: battery life.. usb2?
Close Name:DanMacTR Posts: 2 Joined: 15 Aug 2003
Subject: Re Battery life

They say 10 hours

View Name:Guest
Subject: Musical Moron Steps Up
Close Name:Jyakku Posts: 34 Joined: 10 Oct 2004
Subject: They are going to sell these by the bucketfull

My Mother in Law saw it and said she is going to buy one right away. She already bought a Mini buy my father in Law stole it from her. I explained the whole shuffle/random concept and how you can have your music collection on your computer and set it so it randomly fills each time you connect it with a section of your collection and she got the idea right away. You know you like all the songs in your collection but you also are surprised each time as to what is going to come up so it doesn't get old.

I don't know about you guys but I almost always am selecting a playlist then playing it in shuffle mode on my regular iPod. I will a lot of times like to have my entire collection with me but for a short trip out and about this will be great. I will be buying one for sure.

Close Name:pyxl8 Posts: 171 Joined: 24 Dec 2003
Subject:

Quote
spxyu02 wrote:
Quote
Mace wrote:
The finer preference and auto-fill features are targeted at existing iPod users who want a smaller iPod or my case, for my 6 years old son.


Wait..you're gonna get a $100-$150 piece of electronic equipment for you 6 year old? I'm surprised cuz I imagine 6 year olds loosing/breaking things, but I'm also amazed that he may know how to use iTunes (that kinda speaks volumes about OS X in general).


There aren't a lot of moving parts on the Shuffle, so it shouldn't be a problem for any responsible 6 year old... especially one who already knows the difference between "losing" and "loosing."

-Ken P

Close Name:jpfreeman Posts: 48 Joined: 12 Jan 2005
Subject: no screen, no problem

On one point I agree with Apple: I bought my 1st gen iPod on day one and have almost always used it in shuffle mode.

The screen is most useful for me to see information about the song I'm listening to, but I almost never search out and play a particular song. I leave it on random and if I don't like the song that comes up I skip to the next song. I only have a 5 gig iPod to hold my 30 gigs + of music, so I've rigged iTunes to give me a random selection of songs every time I plug in. Apple apparently did some market research and discovered that I'm not the only one who uses my iPod this way. My question is, will 240 songs be enough to get me through a run or a commute?

I'll get one as a second iPod, particularly for running. I use a USB drive anyway to move small files around. But I don't think the iPod shuffle has the coolness of the origonal iPod or the iPod mini.

Close Name:Small White Car Posts: 1950 Joined: 02 Jul 2004
Subject: Re: no screen, no problem

Quote
jpfreeman wrote:


My question is, will 240 songs be enough to get me through a run or a commute?


God, I HOPE so!

Assuming 3 minutes per song, that's 12 HOURS of music. That's quite a run!

Close Name:jpfreeman Posts: 48 Joined: 12 Jan 2005
Subject: no screen, no problem

You're probably right. But I tend to skip a lot of songs. If a particular song doesn't grab me at the moment, I skip it. Sometimes I skip several in a row util I find one that fits my mood.

Jim

Quote
Small White Car wrote:
Quote
jpfreeman wrote:


My question is, will 240 songs be enough to get me through a run or a commute?


God, I HOPE so!

Assuming 3 minutes per song, that's 12 HOURS of music. That's quite a run!

View Name:Guest
Subject:
Close Name:DeKU Posts: 536 Joined: 27 Jun 2001
Subject: apple stickers!!!

wow! my first gen ipod and 3rd gen ipod didnt come with them... now that i think about it, the emac i bought for my little brother didnt have them either... i guess stickers are hot again?

View Name:Guest
Subject:
View Name:Guest
Subject: Removable cover?
View Name:Guest
Subject: battery replacement
View Name:Guest
Subject: Sufficient Volume?
View Name:Guest
Subject:
Close Name:AFCdtLoeb Posts: 2533 Joined: 20 Jul 2004
Subject: Re: Sufficient Volume?

Quote
Anonymous wrote:
Does the Shuffle have sufficient volume with portable headphones? Is it equal in volume level to the other Ipods?

Yes, its identical.

Close Name:spxyu02 Posts: 1214 Joined: 04 Aug 2004
Subject:

Quote
pyxl8 wrote:
Quote
spxyu02 wrote:
Quote
Mace wrote:
The finer preference and auto-fill features are targeted at existing iPod users who want a smaller iPod or my case, for my 6 years old son.


Wait..you're gonna get a $100-$150 piece of electronic equipment for you 6 year old? I'm surprised cuz I imagine 6 year olds loosing/breaking things, but I'm also amazed that he may know how to use iTunes (that kinda speaks volumes about OS X in general).


There aren't a lot of moving parts on the Shuffle, so it shouldn't be a problem for any responsible 6 year old... especially one who already knows the difference between "losing" and "loosing."

-Ken P


I'm an engineer that can't spell, leave me alone!



I'm still very surprised at the 6-year old thing, but I guess that kids are smarter than we give them credit for.

View Name:Guest
Subject: Am I missing something here ?!!
View Name:Guest
Subject: Fit in iBook?
Close Name:AFCdtLoeb Posts: 2533 Joined: 20 Jul 2004
Subject: Re: Fit in iBook?

Quote
Anonymous wrote:
Does the iPod shuffle fit in an iBook if you have, lets say the Apple Pro Mouse attached at the other usb port? The PowerBook definitely has a problem with that:
On the Apple-page you can see the exact same picture but with an iBook instead of the PowerBook. And there seems to be a chance, that the second port can still be used even with the iPod attached to the first one:
But I really would like to know it from someone who has tested it. Anyone here?
Well, you may just have to use the track pad for the thirty seconds that it takes to update the 'Pod.

View Name:Guest
Subject:
View Name:Guest
Subject: NON-"Connoisseurs" like the Shuffle?
View Name:Guest
Subject: charger?
Close Name:AFCdtLoeb Posts: 2533 Joined: 20 Jul 2004
Subject:

No. It is only charged through the USB port.

Quote
Apple.com wrote:
Included accessories
Earbud headphones, lanyard, USB cap

View Name:Guest
Subject:
Close Name:Mace Posts: 9163 Joined: 07 Aug 2003
Subject:

Too late. I have ordered an iPod shuffle. In total I have 4 iPods now:

iPod 20 GBytes: Me
iPod 5 GBytes: First son
iPod 5 GBytes: Mother-in-law
iPod shuffle: Second son



My wife? Motorola with iTunes

View Name:Guest
Subject: they may like it, but I still don't get it...
Close Name:AFCdtLoeb Posts: 2533 Joined: 20 Jul 2004
Subject:

As an experiment, tomorrow I am going to load my 20 gig 'Pod with 240 songs and cover the screen with black paper, thereby turning my 'Pod into a prototype of sorts to determine whether I like the idea. Results soon.

Close Name:Mace Posts: 9163 Joined: 07 Aug 2003
Subject: Re: they may like it, but I still don't get it...

Quote
Anonymous wrote:
... All I can come up with is...brand, price, compatibility with iTunes...am I right ?
Right. Is a well recognized brand. Price competitive with even a USB flash drive. Compatible with the number one music download service. What else do you ask for? Still not satisfy?

View Name:Guest
Subject: Re: "I Still Don't Get It?...
View Name:Guest
Subject: That's all I wanted..an answer ! :)
Close Name:Mace Posts: 9163 Joined: 07 Aug 2003
Subject:

Compatibility with iTunes/iTMS is an understatement and does no justice to the smooth integration of iPod/iTunes/iTMS. Is hard to describe the experience, you need to use it to appreciate that. You feel good about the experience.