Apple iPod Touch 8 GB 2nd Generation

Apple like to advertise their ‘new generation’ iPods, but I’d like to point out that a 2nd Gen. iPod touch is just as good. Granted, it doesn’t have a camera or the newest processors, but having compared it to the 4th Gen. iPods some of my friends own, I can safely say that the difference is minimal.

Apple’s touch screens are (without a doubt) top-of-the-range. They respond to the lightest touch, and there is no lag time between sensing the touch, and displaying it on the screen (i.e. if a button lights up in green when pressed, it the screen responds instantly and lights it up as soon as you touch the screen).

The screen display itself is bright and composed of vivid colours. Whilst it lacks the powerful ‘retina’ screen of 4th Gen. iPods, I think that the screen is excellent. Everything appears in high definition, and videos/games look stunning.

There is an absolutely massive range of apps available for the iPod touch, from free-to-download apps about popping bubble wrap, to £50 satellite navigation apps. Categories span games, utilities, information/news, and social media. The apps are easy to download, install, and organise into folders on the iPod.

As for the quality of the music – superb. Of course, sound quality ultimately depends on the headphones or speakers used to listen, but the iPod is able to store complex tracks and play them back beautifully.

Music is ordered into several categories, including albums, artists, and a list of all the songs stored (alphabetically sorted). The artwork from the album the song comes from is displayed on screen, and a variety of quick animations makes it feel much more like you’re playing a real album, rather than a digital one – such as the ability to flip over the back of the album and read the list of songs on the back.

You can easily create, rename, and edit (i.e. add/delete/change the order of songs) playlists, which in my view is a great improvement over previous iPods. It means that when you take your iPod on holiday, you don’t need to plug it into a computer and go through the lengthy ‘sync’ process when all you want to do is switch a couple of songs round in your favourite playlist.

Battery life is very important for me, as I don’t want to be carrying a charger round with me all day. The iPod Touch claims to have a battery life of up to 36 hours whilst playing music – albeit with the volume turned right down and the screen on standby. Even so, I can listen to a couple of hours of music during a journey, and the battery indicator won’t change at all. Playing games drains the battery at a much faster rate, although you can still get a decent amount of power from it.

The only irritant about this iPod is its memory space. Although it is packaged and advertised as an 8GB iPod (1 song = 6.5MB approx, 8GB = 8000MB), the iPod only allows you to put 6.83GB worth of data on it. The rest is retained for system updates – revised versions of the operating system, driver updates, and general software updates. I don’t find this a major issue (I just had to delete a few apps), but those who like to put thousands of songs on their iPods may want to look into 16GB or even 32GB iPods.

My original point was that this is not that much different from the newest iPods. The software updates allow you to run all of the apps that the 4th Gens can run, and if you can find one cheaper (4th Gen. currently stands at £150), I would definitely go for the 2nd Gen. The only significant difference is a camera – and if you want a camera, you might as well get an iPhone.