Customer Reviews

Apple iPod nano 16 GB Pink (4th Generation) [Previous Model]

5 star:		(853)
4 star:		(275)
3 star:		(94)
2 star:		(77)
1 star:		(126)

 

 

this is my 6th portable digital music device so far, and i tried to avoid ipods because they always got bad reviews for malfunctioning and lacking features. this on is a different story. not only is this ipod the thinnest ipod ever made (you can stop here, apple, any further and it will vanish), its made smart, and so far its a pretty good buy for me. unlike everyone thinks cover flow cant be turned off, it can. instantly after i connected my ipod for the first time to itunes a new firmware update popped up, and one of the updates was an option to turn off cover flow, among other things.

+ pros
-incredibly thin. i cant even tell its in my pocket
-aluminum casing and glass screen offer excellent scratch resistence
-very light
-very competitive pricing - 16 gb for what the nano offers is the most affordble nano ever. the apple reputation has never been so attainable.
- accelerometer - this adds a few fun touches to operate without pressing buttons, is very useful for rotation on the screen when viewing pictures or watching videos. games are now actually very interesting
- screen clarity
-simplicity of use
-lots of colours to choose from

- cons
ITUNES - although itunes is the gold standard in today's media players, it has a tendency to use a massive amount of resources on any pc, and runs without question parallel to quicktime. if any quirks manage to occur, renstallation is required
- battery life - other than uninterrupted music playback very disappointing, especially while playing games
-everything is automated - this pertains to 1, the fact the ipod will turn on when i put in headphones, and the rest to itunes, which tries to sync entire libraries worth of music onto foreign ipods, like friends' and family
-Apple decided to require either their brand or certification to all ipod accessories, so to anyone that has bose or othere expensive docks and such, this might be a deal breaker

er, then i suppose theres a "both" category
-genius- theres something i havent noticed people mention, or if they do, its complaints. Genius is an absolutely worthless feature when used on the ipod. It works with only about 25% of PURCHASES. And it doesn't make a very satisfying playlist even when it does work. But honestly who should expect that? When you use genius on, itunes, yeah it still sucks at making playlists, and it is frustrating, but it's an excellent tool for finding new music, because it reccomends a huge list of new songs and different artists that usually appeal to your taste.

overall a big improvement compared to other ipods ive seen. the pricing and compactness, features and ease of use stand out, though the battery life and new accesory restrictions leave something to be desired. (get the 16 gb if you really want movies, or go for the classic or touch, which are both equally appealing) i give the nano ****.

Just purchased the 8G 4th generation Nano for my 14yr old. He loves it but has expressed concern about the battery life. Not a serious issue but be advised it does not last as long as previous Nano's. Also, the traditional USB based charging accessories do not charge this device. Only a standard computer based USB port seems to work. We tried to use various older ac-usb,battery pwr USB, DC-usb nothing charged it. Seems Apple decided to wire the pwr to the USB pins and not the firewire. Has caused another "Apple" generated situation where you have to go out and purchase product specific accessories.

Having 16GB of storage is a huge plus for the new version of the Nano.

The control wheel seems a bit "stiff" and it is not as responsive as past versions but it works fine.

The menus and setup choices have been improved. These are nice but don't make a major difference. "Shake" shuffle is a bit silly (in my opinion it is just as easy to push the advance on the control wheel) but it can easily be turned off.

BIG MINUS - Apple un-necessarily changed the plug on this version of the Nano. The unit will not charge using my older iPod chargers. The bigger issue is that my Bose and other expensive speaker units will play this Nano but they won't charge it.

Apple is beginning to act more and more like Microsoft - forcing its customers to make un-necessary software upgrades and expensive hardware changes in order to use their latest product versions.

Anyway - the Nano is a great product. If you already have a Nano the only justification I can find to upgrade would be the need for more storage or the desire to play video on a very small screen.

If you don't need the video or more music storage you should stick with your older Nano.

With introductions like the accelerometer, genius, redesigned interface, and an even smaller package, who couldn't love Apple's new Ipod nano? While these sound like great additions, they really don't result in a better ipod. While the new interface, genius, and size, don't hurt, the accelerometer really ruins the whole package. The accelerometer might work well in the iphone and ipod touch, in the nano it is just really annoying. It is way to sensitive and causes problems with simple things like volume. The accelerometer often changes the now playing screen to the cover flow which keeps the volume from being changed without the ipod being pulled out and flipped. The shake to shuffle also causes problems, it is to sensitive as well and will activate when it is not intended to. At least the shake to shuffle can be turned off, I just wish the the accelerometer as a whole could be turned off. If it had that capacity this review could have easily turned from a 2 to a 5.

While this nano is pretty to look at and has a few novel features, it does have an extremely irritating draw back: It can only be charged with an approved apple device or with your computer's USB port.

It will not charge with my Altec Lansing In-motion speakers, as did the previous generation, or the iPod cable on my JVC HD car stereo which also worked just fine with my old nano. These were not inexpensive devices that I purchased to make the most of my 2nd generation nano. While my 4th generation will play with these devices it will not charge. I get an error message that says it is not an approved charging device.

As if this were not enough, the new interface and larger screen drain the battery at an alarming rate. If I had not had the newest nano engraved I would have returned it and waited until the folks at Apple had been cured of their proprietary ways. Now I can only hope for a firmware update that will resolve the issue.

The new 4G nanos are NOT compatible with any of the old accessories: speakers, car cables, clock radios, docking stations, etc. If you routinely listen through one of these devices, please be aware that your new nano will not charge through these items. They will also burn through your battery because they prohibit your iPod from going into "power saver" mode- and the only way to charge the new iPod is through the USB cable on your computer. Apple does not tell you this anywhere. When I complained Apple told me "too bad." They told me all accessories that were compatible are listed on their website. WRONG- my products are not on the website at all- but is compatible with 4 other iPods we have in the house (including a new 80GB). The tech also mentioned "currently we have no speaker systems compatible with the 4G nano." Nice of them to make this public knowledge before everyone upgrades.

Besides that, the new wheel feels cheap, is smaller and more difficult to use than the wheel on my old 2nd generation nano. Should have stuck with that- but needed the bigger memory size. Nice look, good screen colors and viewing, but I just can't get past that all my old systems are useless for this new and improved iPod.

Basically my complaint mimics Mark Garvey's. I made sure you could turn off "shake to shuffle" before buying a 4th Gen nano, but had no idea that when the device switched to coverflow, volume control would no longer work.

That means every single time you need to make an adjustment to the volume, you have to take it out (or pick it up in your car, or whatever) and hold it upright for a random period of time, until the interface reorients itself and volume control starts working again.

I'm honestly shocked Apple released this in this state-it makes using the 4th Gen nano a HUGE pain if you make even semi-frequent volume adjustments. Meanwhile, coverflow-in my opinion-adds nothing. Sure, it looks neat the first time you see it, but I would never actually use it to navigate media. And I certainly don't want it replacing volume controls if you hold the device in anything but a straight up and down position!

On top of that, the unit I had on several occasions wouldn't stop fast forwarding or rewinding until it hit the end of a track. I'm not sure if that was a hardware or software bug, but I ended up sending it back.

Beyond that, the other limitations are more obvious. I found the scroll wheel to be far too small to be comfortable to use. The controls on the iPod classic (or from what I can tell, the Zune) are FAR easier to manipulate without looking at them. It was VERY easy to accidentally hit the center button when I was trying to fast forward, etc.

The screen's quality seemed inferior to the classic/5th gen iPods' as well. Even despite the noticeably smaller size, video looked sort of grainy by comparison (though not unusable).

At any rate, this marks the SECOND recent iPod with what I view as a MAJOR interface problem. I dislike the lack of basic hardware media controls on the iPod touch, but it turns out I hate this "coverflow" issue on the 4th gen nano even more.

I'd strongly recommend looking at a classic, or even a 3rd gen nano or Zune over this model, particularly if you listen to audio books and podcasts.

My last iPod was an old, used 4 gig iPod mini. So my purchase of an 8 gig purple has me absolutely delighted. It's thinner, more appealing aesthetically, and I have only a couple of minor criticisms in regards to newer and more recent versions of iTunes.

While both the Coverflow and lack of backwards compatibility on accessories are legitimate criticisms, neither affect me personally. I've never purchased any accessories for my iPod, and I leave my iPod on hold 99% of the time I'm listening to it - which automatically disables the Coverflow.

I'm going to go out on a limb here and say that much of the harsh criticism for the latest gen Nano comes from the high standards that Apple has set. Not in any way meaning to discredit others' criticisms, but Apple handily dominates the market on MP3 players, and so its users, on average, are going to have higher expectations than those that go for other brands.

Personally, I had a bad experience with a Microsoft Zune Player that made me appreciate how superior the iPod is. Primarily in its customization. The fact that you can't disable Coverflow and the ensuing backlash just serves to prove what's traditional in iPod/iTunes expectations - how much of the little details within your individual usage you can adjust to fine-tune to your preferences; and the fact that Coverflow has no off-switch is an oddity. Hopefully, such a function will be improved with future firmware upgrades.

My only criticisms are:
-I've had a hard time getting iTunes to find all the artwork for my albums - and these are not obscure albums.
-iTunes has been having compatibility issues through my last two PCs, including the tendency to stutter when I run any other program simultaneously, and more recently, it divides an individual album up (not acknowledging all of the songs being on one album) if they have different artists; meaning I had to go through a very arduous process involving giving all the songs on a given album the same "album artist"; an example of Apple, perhaps, taking customization too far. It also wouldn't open as long as I had ZoneAlarm installed on my computer. I still greatly prefer iTunes to other music players, but it doesn't always work very smoothly on PCs.
-My "8 gig" iPod doesn't really have 8 gigs; it has 7.5. When I bought my 4 gig iPod, it only had 3.7. I wouldn't be surprised to learn if the 16 gig really has closer to 15. It feels like a bit of a cheat. Half a gig may not seem like much - around 100 songs - but I have a moderately sized library, and 100 songs could make a difference in the long run.

Overall, I give my new iPod Nano 4 1/2 stars. I absolutely love it. And even though I will be a lifelong PC user, Apple has my loyalty when it comes to MP3 players.

EDIT - 11/18/08
Sure enough, Apple released a firmware upgrade, and it's now possible to disable to Coverflow - under General in Settings, you can tell the iPod not to do anything when it's rotated. But the option for Coverflow can be activated manually with its own addition in the main menu.

Works great and PLAYS FINE in older speaker systems, but HEADS UP: NANO 4G WILL NOT CHARGE IN MOST OLDER SPEAKER SYSTEMS. Brought it home from apple store today, and doesn't charge in my ihome, altec lansing IM7, or my car FM transmitter module.

Has to do with the pin configuration, and it now only charges via USB (and not firewire). Scroll to the bottom of this macworld article (3rd or 4th to last paragraph) [...]

If you have a lot invested in ipod speakers/etc, beware that they may not charge it. So you'll have to reinvest. Else a fine ipod.

11/12/2008 UPDATE:
Apple has released a software update (via iTunes) that will allow the user of a 4th generation iPod nano to disable the Coverflow view (which activates upon tilting the nano horizontally). This was a major gripe for many but a big "thumbs-up" to Apple for resolving this issue.

Note: I'd update the 4G nano's rating from my earlier 2 stars to 4 but Amazon does not allow me to modify that part (is this a glaring oversight by Amazon, or a glitch with my Firefox brower?).

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Real world testing was not in Apple's nano 4G design process. Otherwise they would've included an option to disable that idiotic Coverflow so users could make casual adjustments to volume and songs by feel. The nano 4G requires you to orientate it vertically to gain back access to those controls! Not good. Maybe Apple will release a software update to remedy this oversight, but they're notorious for not listening to their customers so I returned my nano 4G to Amazon. Colors are vibrant and beautiful, audio quality is excellent, and it feels great in the hand, but if you want a nano then get the 3G one instead...you'll be much happier.