Review: Apple iPod Nano music player

By far the best known of all portable music players, the Nano is the newest and smallest of the iPod family. Apple has now came out with a completely new, thinner version of the iPod Nano.

This one comes with 4GB of storage space and the top half of the player is taken up with the screen, which is a little on the small side compared with some of the players we're looking at. That said, the screen is clear and fairly bright, and has been slightly improved in the new edition.

Unlike most modern music players, this one doesn't come in black – that's reserved for the high-end 8GB edition, which costs an extra £40. The case is made from aluminium rather than plastic, which makes it more durable but gives it a slightly retrograde feel compared with its predecessor.

In pictures it looks like the iPod Mini, but once out of the box, the differences become clear.

Apart from its size, the best thing about the iPod Nano is its navigation system, which remains the same as before. All the players here use playlists, artists, albums and song titles to find music, but Apple is the only company to use a truly intuitive method to navigate it – the famous scroll wheel.

No other player comes close (apart from the Sandisk Sansa e260 - our review will be online from Monday), as far as ease of use goes. There's also the ability, lacking in some players, to add tunes to a playlist while listening.

The Nano comes with a slightly redesigned pair of Apple's standard earbud headphones, which are not particularly good. It's worth replacing these at the first opportunity, particularly as they indicate to others that the user has an iPod.

The iTunes software is the only way to put music on the player, and the iPod can't play downloaded music that's protected with the Microsoft DRM, only music bought from Apple's iTunes store.

Annoyingly, the iPod Nano still can't play video. That makes sense, in a way, given the small screen - it's still smaller than that of most similar music players. There are still those who'd like to see video playback as a feature on the Nano, we think.

There's no sound recorder or radio, but it can show images, and has an organiser, a few games and a stopwatch. No case is supplied, but plenty of third-party accessories are available.

Apple supplied our test device with three of its own gadgets, all of which cost £19 - firstly a dock, the adapter for which comes with the Nano itself. This simply provides a place to put the iPod while it's charging.

There's a USB power adapter which connects the iPod (all models) to the mains, so it doesn't have to be charged using the computer. Finally, there's an armband, for those who like to look slightly silly while jogging around with a Nano strapped to their arm.

We don't think any of these represents particularly good value for money - particularly the power adapter, since it would have been nice to see this in the box itself.

Accessories aside, the iPod Nano remains an excellent buy. No other music player of its size has such an excellent way to scroll through menus and track lists. The screen remains small, but it's bright, and the overall size of the player means it will fit into any pocket.

Also consider:
Creative Zen V music player
A very good pocket-sized player
4/5
£120

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