Our first iPod arrived yesterday. This is my first few hours experience in detail. These are my genuine thoughts both good and bad.

Information
Operating System: Windows XP
iPod Model: 20GB 3rd generation
iPod Connection Used: Firewire
iPod From: Apple Store UK online

Now onwards with the first few hours...

I've been reading these forums many times a day for the previous two weeks so expectations were incredibly high but at the same time I was as cautious as I could manage.

The first thing was the box, I just love it. Good packaging and presentation like that is a good start to a users first experience with a product. Every little part individually wrapped and packed into a space, all opening and unfolding from a small cube.

Then there is holding the iPod itself for the first ever time. I'd looked at hundreds of photos, read the dimensions and checked them against a ruler and even had a Speck iSkin here before the iPod, yet still I managed to be in awe of just how small this thing really is. I'd seen plenty of 3.5" hard drives over the years but no smaller ones, so imagining that the electronics, a 20GB HD and the battery were all packed into that tiny frame was just amazing. Even the weight felt good in my hand - the fact it isn't really light just makes it feel all the more solid.

The iPod first turned on while I was looking at the back. Through two layers of clear plastic film the buttons obviously have no problem responding - wow I thought, those suckers really are sensitive! So quickly off with the plastic it was and onto squinting at the unlit screen (it is quite dark in here). What a nice screen though, higher resolution that I expected. Having a quick play with the touch-sensitive buttons was fun, especially the scroll wheel with the satisfying "click" sound made each time you move up or down or press a button. This didn't last long though as the battery indicator dropped to the lowest setting so it was time for a full charge.

Then we get to the first bad point - the patented easymark? material the iPod is covered in. OK so that is a joke but it could easily be reality - never before have I seen an electronic device that sucks the oils out of skin so effectively as the iPod. The shiny reverse is obviously the worst, you can't even look at it without smudgy marks appearing. The front isn't much better, the screen and buttons being the worst culprits there. On this point I would have to say "why?". Seem crazy to make something look so good yet have it easily spoiled by even the mildest use.

The included case might help with the above point but I doubt it. I actually really like the case but it wouldn't stop the iPod getting filthy every time you take it out to use/charge/dock which is going to be often if you actually want to use the iPod at all.

So now I've got it all unpacked. The little plastic wrappers spread everywhere, the nicely packed box looking like it was packed by, well, me! Time to plug the dock into the PC and the iPod into the dock. I do so and it comes back to life with a flashing no entry sign and "Do not disconnect" written accross the bottom. As this and the animated battery meter were going to be my only iPod experience for the next few hours I decided to take a few photos. You can see them in their original form here (http://pabuk.hopto.org/stuff/iPod/) (be warned, they are ~900KB each).

Lots of waiting later (3 or 4 hours) and Mr. Battery Meter stopped doing his little dance. Finally the chance to start actually using the iPod! After all that I wasn't really sure what to do. I was not going to use MediaMatch Jukebox or iTunes because I dislike them both greatly so I chose EphPod as it seemed to be the best rated free 3rd party software. It told me to go away and come back when I had an iPod that was actually formatted. So I did just that and formatted the iPod in Windows Explorer before running EphPod again. This time it wanted to create the directory and file structure as the iPod was completely wiped, so sure go ahead I told it. That done, the iPod was now ready for use in EphPod. Time to put some music on the thing. "Add Directory" looked like a good place to start, so I pressed it and selected the directory that held my recently re-ripped to MP3 (using EAC and LAME --preset standard) ~50 albums. The 5.2GB of music took just 15 minutes to run across the firewire cable from PC to iPod (via the dock of course). An impressive speed in my opinion. I cringed imagining how long it would have taken on a USB 1.1 connection.

Though no fault of the iPod, something happened now. EphPod crashed as it was closing and because I thought it was in the middle of writing something (I don't think it was now) I decided to format the iPod and start again. I decided to update the firmware to 2.1 while I was at it as well so I did. Then I used EphPod to transfer the albums again. It still crashes for me every time I exit the program but it doesn't affect the iPod in any way so I think it is just the program crashing as it closes.

Finally I could (after using "safely remove hardware") take the iPod out of the dock and actually use it properly. Before doing so though I decided to place the iPod in the clear Speck iPod Skin that we had purchased from eBay several weeks ago. I was concerned about the fit as I had read reports around here someplace that said they were a bit loose. I don't know if they changed them or what but ours is a very snug fit - nice and tight. In fact it took some forcing to get it in all the way. I now love this cover as much as the iPod itself. It is so nice to hold, makes accidental button presses extremely difficult, protects the iPod casing and is still quite easy to dock with only the bottom flap to lift up. One last thing - I was worried that the flap would be loose and open up when it was supposed to be closed but that isn't the case, the seal is quite good. Big thumbs up to the Speck iPod Skin from me.

By now it dawned on me that the iPod can play music as well as looking pretty and being fun to play with so perhaps I should try it out! With all my properly-tagged and MP3gained MP3s the iPod is a joy to use. I just love the simple interface where you play whatever you want by artist, album etc. I tried out three different sets of headphones - the Apple earbuds, my Sennheiser MX 500 earbuds and my girlfriend's Philips HP800s headphones. Quite frankly I think the Apple ones are awful. I don't expect great quality from the bundled ones but up against the Sennheisers they just sound like mush. The Philips ones, which are great budget "proper" headphones sound fantastic on the iPod. I should mention at this point though that to get a decent volume using the Philips (which obviously need more power to drive them than tiny earbuds) I had to use euPOD Volumeboost. The default +40 setting was enough for me to find it uncomfortable to listen at full volume on the Philips phones which was my goal. That way there is always a bit of room for more volume if needed. I tried the equalizer and didn't find any problems with it but I would never use it anyway because I like the sound to be as close to "as intended" as possible. Which brings up the only negative point I can think of thus far - lack of gapless playback. Apple have no excuse, they could implement it and yet they haven't. I hope they do in a future firmware release or else it will remain a black speck on an otherwise beautiful painting.

Outside of music I appreciate the inclusion of the few little games. My girlfriend loves Solitaire on the PC so I can imagine her playing a lot of that in the future. I most enjoyed the music quiz, as I don't like Solitaire so much and controlling the other two games is a bit fiddly with the scroll wheel. I used Googleget to test out the Notes feature and what a great idea for software combined with a useful iPod feature that is. I read a lot of news on the internet so being able to stick a bunch of news clips on the iPod really appeals. I like the multitasking nature of the iPod too - how you can be playing music and still access most of the menus and other functions at the same time.

After that lot I decided to try the battery meter hack that replaces the graphical battery remaining indicator with a numerical one. I am a sucker for precision you see. I put it on and it started at 450, so I am assuming at 100% charge it would read 500, as I had been playing around quite a bit by that point since charging. Now while I have been writing this post on and off today I have played exactly two hours of music. What is confusing me is the battery life. I am aware that people say with the 2.1 firmware the batter meter fluctuates a lot, and I have observed this but when left alone it always seems to level out and then steadily drop so I am assuming it is accurate. Anyway, during the two hours of music I played over three albums (so which menu use to select each album as well) the battery level has dropped almost exactly 100. If the meter really does go up to 500, and if it drops to 0 when empty, and finally if it drops at a steady rate on average, then 100 / 500 = 5. Which is 5 x 2 hours music which equals 10 hours. I can only assume I am wrong in some of the assumptions above because I have read so many comments that say the average is 4-6 hours playtime and I haven't even tried to save battery in any way. In fact, quite the opposite because by MP3s all have an average bitrate of ~200kbps, so in theory I should see worse battery life than most users. I guess time will tell if the iPod stops playing at 150 or if it starts dropping a lot more rapidly. In the meantime though, feel free to correct my assumptions so that I might understand all this better. And I'll try my best to add up all the playtime from start to when it dies and report back.

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