| 1GB Apple iPod Shuffle
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First Impressions:
As you can see in the pictures below, the Shuffle comes in a small blue box that details the basic features of the iPod Shuffle, as well as giving you a first glimpse of it through the window in front.
 
The box contains the following (as pictured below): the iPod Shuffle, a lanyard, ear bud headphones, (2) sets of ear bud covers, a CD, manual, quick reference card, warranty and other brochures.
 
The overall impression is quite good, the Shuffle feels quite solid and the control ring clicks give good feedback. The only possible concern is with the plastic used; while it looks great and feels stiff it may be a little brittle especially if used in cold climates. The size seems to be just right for me, not so small that the buttons are hard to use yet still fits easily into your jeans pocket. In fact it is a little bigger than a pack of gum. Another great feature is the built in USB connector which is USB 2.0 compliant. But surprisingly there are several warnings in the package to make sure you do not connect the Shuffle to you computer without loading the iTunes software. I am not sure what would happen if you didn't heed their warning and I wasn't willing to find out since they took the trouble of taping the USB cover on.
So obviously I loaded up the included CD and in a few simple steps it requested I insert the iPod, then it formatted it, installed iTunes and QuickTime. A quick reboot and I was ready to start loading music on the iPod. I have to say I was a little concerned about having to load the iTunes software, normally I would prefer a simple drag and drop file management, but I have to say the iTunes software perfectly compliments this player. While the Shuffle can hold 120-240 songs that is nowhere near what traditional iPod users are used to. The iTunes software gives you several options for loading music on your player to make sure your selection is always fresh. You can manually move files to the Shuffle or you can have the software autofill the iPod.
The autofill option allows you to choose what source to load music from, whether it should replace all songs, choose songs randomly and my favorite feature that loads songs based on your rating. Using the autofill option I was able to load 230-235 songs that were all 128kbps MP3's. Even though Apple claims the iPod is USB 2.0 compliant for high-speed transfers it took just over 12 minutes to transfer 986MB (235 songs). That is not very impressive at 1.36MB/s. I guess the long transfer times are a mute point since the device needs to be attached to recharge the lithium ion battery. Apple claims a full charge in 4 hours; my experience was pretty close to that but I suspect the variance is due to the USB bus on my laptop not having as much juice as a desktop.
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