iPod Touch!

image courtesy GadgetReview

So work's finally done for the summer, and I decided to treat myself a bit. So, here's a look at the 16 GB iPod Touch.

DESIGN

Oh man, I never thought myself an Apple person, but I was sold from the moment I booted this thing up. The interface really is just as slick as everyone's been saying, and the screen is magnificent (it makes the engineer in me very happy). Seems sturdy, with it's metal back, and it fits nicely in the hand. The power button's easily accessible, though I feel like having the headphone jack next to the dock connector's a bit awkward. I had been using a 30 GB iPod Video until now, and had gotten quite used to having the headphone jack on the top of the unit. Small gripe, but it's a different feel.

FUNCTION

This thing functions exactly the way I expected it to: nearly perfectly. The OS seems to encounter slowdowns every now and then, and it does occassionally hang, requiring a hard reset. This isn't a common occurrance, but it is annoying.

Sound quality is top notch, though as usual, I ditched the standard earbuds the minute I looked at them. No offense to Apple, but while I think the branding and all is great, the functionality of the standard earbuds just isn't that astounding.

The App Store is great. I proceeded to download a few "lite" versions of games, as well as a level (which helped me hang some blinds!) Downloads over WiFi are very quick, and there were only a few times when the downloads hung.

Now to talk about the more fun features: the accelerometer! This thing makes the device pretty interesting. I love hopping into Safari, and flipping the screen sideways to make everything landscaped. I just wish I could do the same thing in the Mail app. The keyboard feels way too tiny when the iPod's in a portrait orientation.

Speaking of keyboards, this thing takes some getting used to, but I can tell that once you get the hang of the capacitive screen, you'd really be able to fly. Annoyances: predictive text can't be shut off quickly, meaning I constantly have to tell the iPod that I am not misspelling "Pen" as "Penn." Overall, very nice.

ACTUAL RESULTS

So Apple claimed I'd get 22 hours of playback from this thing. Granted, I have not exhaustively tested this by solely playing music, but I managed about 12 hours of uptime. Not too bad, but I can see people running into problems on long flights. Also, WiFi utterly destroys the battery. I was discharging at a rate of about 1% every 5 to 10 minutes. It seems the WiFi is more of a value add than a core feature. With screen brightness at the lowest setting, I bumped uptime with normal usage to about 15 hours. Just make sure you're able to charge this thing once every day or three, and you should be fine.

Final Rating: 4.5/5 - A solid media device with all of the Apple upsides, but a few nagging downsides with the OS.

Starters

I've gotten really tired of hearing outlandish claims about battery life, speed, usability, and all those metrics from overzealous manufacturers. It seems every other week, one of my friends gets a new device, and is complaining about how it doesn't actually work the way they wish it did.

So, that's where I come in. I've decided to make this blog, in hopes that I'll be able to keep track of current industry claims and, when I can, actually test a couple of these claims myself. I'm a college student, so I'm not really sure how often I'll be able to get my hands on shiny new toys, but I'll try my best to borrow them from friends whenever the time is on hand.

The posts will likely be few and far apart, as I'm a dual bachelor's/master's degree candidate, but I'll definitely keep everyone boned up on the important stuff.

Here's to keeping 'em honest.

-Sho