Latest iPods: Nano & iPod w/video
Apple
$149-$249; $249/$349
www.apple.com
Apple’s smallest and largest color-screen media players keep on getting better with each new generation.
The little iPod nano’s newly anodized aluminum finish resists scratches and dings better than the previous model, while the largest iPod (which in addition to music plays video) gets a capacity bump up to 80-gigabytes, which translates to 25,000 songs or 100 hours of video.
Both models benefit from brighter screens, and the coolest new feature is the addition of floating alphabet letters that appear when you’re quickly twirling the dial to fly through thousands of songs — no more guessing which letter you’re on to find that particular artist or album or song.
A very nice touch, indeed.
— Joe Hutsko