Just now, I realized I didn’t talk about my iPod nano yet. I got my iPod as part of that back to school deal that Apple has every summer, allegedly to get rid of old stock so they can introduce the next new thing in iPoddery.

The iPod is my first real MP3 player. Before, I used a Sony NetMD MZ-N510 for my digital music needs and it was quite a hassle getting my music off of my computer and into an MD. It was even more difficult after I’d ditched Windows for Linux and my music transferring dropped almost to nothing. That thing was a bloody pain, even with Windows. You’d have to convert your MP3s into ATRAC which took longer than the actual moving of files.

Anyhow, my iPod came two days after I ordered it. I wouldn’t get my computer until two weeks later, so it was nice to have the iPod to play around with. The packaging is very Apple. That is, even the plastic and the box that it’s in is all in that very clean style. That made me sad when I had to cut the box for the barcode for the rebate.

GtkPod was strange to use, probably because of the way the iPod transfers music. I didn’t discover this until I used it with iTunes though, so GtkPod confused me a lot at first. I managed to figure it out and it started copying stuff to the iPod. At this point I experienced how utterly slow USB 1.1 is and decided never to use that computer again to transfer my music.

Surprisingly, nothing else went wrong, and I was able to enjoy music in a small, slim form factor for the rest of the two weeks.

You all probably know about the interface. It’s quite simple. Touch wheel to move, etc, etc. Pretty easy to find things, switch songs, etc.

How the iPod works with iTunes is that you just connect it and it starts syncing the iPod with whatever’s in your library. In the case that your library is so bloody huge that it doesn’t fit, you can select an alternate playlist where you can choose what to put on. It’s quite convenient to just have it go and start transferring songs when you connect it.

I haven’t gotten any of those nasty scratches yet because I’ve always kept it in its case, but it does seem likely if I were to shove it in my pocket. Speaking of that, sometimes, when I put it in my side pocket, I’m worried that I might forget it’s there and sit on it. Actually, that’s happened a few times now I think, so now I leave it in the pocket with my wallet. Well, if Ars Technica is right, it can survive a car driving over it.

I am quite happy with my iPod and even more happy that I am getting it for free. Actually, if I were actually to buy one, I’d either get a 4 gig nano or a 20 or 30 gig normal one, so that I can actually fit everything.