Ever since I was a little kid I've had an iPod of some sort. I've always thought it was the coolest thing, being able to curate a collection of music wherever you go, though I didn't really use it to its full potential. My first iPod I can remember was a 4th gen iPod nano in black. All the music I put on there was things like Parry Gripp, the soundtrack from the Cartoon Network show Incredible Crew and Minecraft song parodies which I somehow convinced my parents to buy for me. I mostly used it for watching episodes of TV shows and playing the built in games, the idea of this one tiny device replacing my DS and a portable DVD player was absolutely incredible.
I still remember the exact day I got my iPod touch, march 3rd 2012. I remember it so well because I believe it was being pushed by Disney Channel as 'platypus day' to advertise the show Phineas and Ferb. I used to have a Perry the Platypus shirt and blue shorts that I would wear together, like the cool 9 year old I was. I saved up Christmas money to buy the Touch and when I purchased it at my towns Apple Store, the employee working there let me install one paid app, I chose temple run. He showed me the glitch in the tutorial that let me run forever, it was pretty rad. I mostly used this iPod to play games like Angry Birds and Bloons Tower Defense before I got a Nexus 7 tablet and quickly forgot about the touch. It doesn't help that I got it just before the 5th generation came out which could run iOS 7 while I was stuck on 6…
It goes without saying that the YouTube Channel DankPods has been a huge source of inspiration for me getting back into iPods as an adult, but there's always been some interest. Fiddling around with old Nanos and the Touch years after they went out of commission. Unfortunately my 4th gen Nano got the dreaded black spot on the screen, a sign of a swelling battery, and didn't work anymore. I still have a 3rd gen nano that was my father's. I've owned and used practically every iPod ever made. I had a Mini that I bought a few years ago with the intention of modding with an SD card and new battery, but while taking it apart I broke off one of the capacitors, thus bricking it.
Currently I own 4 iPods, with intention of getting a few more. I still have my childhood 4th gen touch, my mothers 2nd gen shuffle, a 3rd gen Nano, and a 5th gen Classic thats been modded out. I don't have the touch on hand, it's back at my childhood home, but the rest I have with me currently. I thought I'd talk about each of them and compare them a bit.
2ND GEN iPOD SHUFFLE
Theres the least to say about this one. I got it from my mother when I started showing interest in iPods, it was laying around gathering dust. The battery is sadly very tired, hardly lasting an hour of playback. Design wise theres no screen, just buttons to change tracks and adjust volume. Theres a switch on the top that allows you to change between the devices 3 modes: continuous play, where it goes through the songs imported onto it in order, shuffle, where it plays the songs in a random order, and off, for when you don't really feel like shuffling. My model only has 1gb of storage, which translates to about 200 songs if I compress them down to 128KB/S or 100 standard CD quality songs. For charging and syncing it uses connectors inside its headphone jack, and slots into a very snazzy dock.
3RD GEN iPOD NANO
Ah, the classic nano. This one has the same user interface as my childhood 4th gen, but with a different orientation. It was the first nano that has a screen big enough to watch movies, which I did a lot. It uses the same ui as the 6th and 7th gen classics, so it really feels like a full featured iPod. The games are especially lovely, I spent countless hours playing solitaire on this device, along with a music quiz and a brick-breaker type game but in 3D! On my childhood 4th gen I also remember having Yahtzee installed, though I can't say how much I played it. iPods could be loaded with extra games at a cost, but these games are almost impossible to load onto an iPod now as they've been taken off the iTunes Store and no reliable means of loading them exists. I'd use this one far more, but the battery is a little worn and with only 4gb of storage I can only store about 1000 songs compressed to 128KB/S. It's still a lovely little device, though, and 1000 songs in my pocket is no small feat.
5TH GEN iPOD CLASSIC/VIDEO
retrospectively these are referred to as iPod classics, but on release this model was known as the iPod video, notable for being able to play, um, videos! This is the only of these devices I bought, I got this one in November of 2023 with the idea of modding it. I took out the incredibly bloated battery and the still functioning 30GB spinning hard drive and replaced it with a new bigger battery and a 64GB SD card. Unfortunately during reassembly I broke the screen, and on replacing the screen I broke the motherboard. When I ordered a new board I received one for the upgraded 5.5 gen, which has better support for larger drives and a search function! Currently I have all 3,800 of my songs loaded onto it, plus some podcasts photos and videos with half the storage space still available. With an added hard case and a protective sock, this thing is built tough! I've used it every day it's been in working order for listening to music or podcasts on the go. I even used it when the headphone jack started to go out, when I replaced it I got a new backcase too, so now it's shiny gold! The only original parts left on this iPod are the front case, click wheel, and the metal chassis and screws.
Both the front and back of my iPod video, edited together with computer magic!
I'd like to do some comparisons of functions between the iPods with photos, mainly the things I do the most often with them.
music
Being music players these all play music just fine. Sound quality is good, nothing too life changing of course. When a track doesn't have album art on the nano (and, in turn all models that use the new ui) it shows an ugly placeholder image, whereas on the video it just shows the text, no album art. The shuffle, of course, couldn't care less about album art or track names.
The "now playing" screens on both the video and nano. Notice the 3D effect on the nano.
solitare
The video and nano both have solitaire as built-in games. The version on the nano is far more refined, allowing you to switch card backs and playfields. It also does scoring better, plays smoother and is overall far more enjoyable. To be fully honest the only thing I don't like about my video is the poor version of Solitaire! Its clunky and doesn't keep score or have these cute win animations like the nano.
A side-by-side comparison of the video and nano's versions of solitaire
The shuffle doesn't really play solitaire, but theres nothing stopping you from listening to its music while you play!
video
Both the nano and the video have the same resolution display and use the same video codec. To get videos onto the devices you have to use the Apple TV app on Mac, plus have your videos reencoded n HandBrake using special settings. The shuffle doesn't do videos, but I'm sure you can imagine the classic film UHF just fine.
All 3 of the iPods playing triny to play video. The nano didn't want to run the video file, and I didn't feel like trying to get it wokring. :/
dock compatibility
I use a Sony Dream Machine as an alarm clock, radio, and most important iPod dock. The video connects to this dock great, and music can be played and controlled via the dock or a handy remote. The nano connects and charges, but playback isn't possible. Since the shuffle doesn't have a 30-pin connector the only way to use it would be to use the clocks audio in jack. I guess you could do that with the nano, too, but then you won't charge.
All of the iPods connected (in some way) to my dock. Only the video charges and plays, the nano just charges and the shuffle gets in on a technicality
Car compatibility
On most cars sold from the mid 2000s up until the late 2010s have some kind of support for a connected iPod. In my 2015 Ford Focus there are a few USB jacks where one can plug in their iPod via the 30 pin. Not only can you control playback, but you can browse through your library using the cars built in UI. It's very clunky, though, and in a library of thousands of songs it can take a very long time to find the one you want, not to mention having to take your eyes off the road. My model has a voice command feature where after your library has been indexed you can ask the car to play a song, album or artist. Sadly this feature is very bad, even when the car recognizes what you say it'll play something totally different. Of course, the shuffle doesn't have this function, relegated to the aux in jack and manual control
All of the iPods connected (in some way) to my dock. Only the video charges and plays, the nano just charges and the shuffle gets in on a technicality
another fun thing about this, the iPod will show the Ford logo when connected, and on the Nano even says 'Microsoft Auto,' which on such a proprietary apple product is very funny
CONCLUSION
I love my iPods to death. I always have and I think I always will. The motivation for getting back into it for me was getting rid of my smart phone, but even for those still fully connected having a dedicated music player is very nice. Theres no distractions, and since you have to load everything on it's yours to keep forever. There is no subscription or service, you acquire the songs you want (I won't ask how, I mostly do CD rips for my library) and load them on hassle-free, even on Linux theres ways to sync old iPods! If you're interested theres plenty of great articles and YouTube videos you can watch on the subject, retrospectives and mods and repairs and accessories, anything you can think of. Check it out!
and hey, if you'd be interested in a full post about my adventures modding and repairing the iPod video, shoot me an email or something! I took photos of most of it