Well this is certainly a position I never thought I would ever be in, I am now the proud owner of a 2GB iPod Shuffle. My Dad works at the 3M factory nearby as a “Tool Maker” which is a form of engineer. You will probably have heard of 3M before because it is all around you, they seem to have their fingers in all sorts of pies , they are one of the biggest companies out there. So being such a big company it seems that they can give out iPods left right an centre.
My Dad’s workplace was named “2007 HealthCare Division of the Year” so as a token of appreciation everybody got a free iPod Shuffle. The thing I found most interesting was that it wasn’t from last year’s generation, which you often see with free iPods.
So my Dad got a free shuffle, ’sadly’ he has no real use for it because of his relentless devotion to cassettes. His portable musical needs include recording his favourite soul radio show and playing it on his Walkman. So if anybody knows how to record FM radio to a digital file please tell me.
So he has no use for it and I had no problems with giving it a loving home on my desk. You may already know I own and love my iPod Touch, so why would I even want a shuffle? Really the main reason is because it is just nice to have. Listening to music with it I find myself smiling at how small it really is. Other than being cool it does serve a real purpose, with my touch I find myself using Safari and Mail more than I am listening to music. The thing with the shuffle is that it is ONLY music so I find myself listening more and just enjoying my music a lot more. Another use I have for it is its Xbox 360 compatibility, for reasons unknown the 360 does not recognise my touch, but is happy to play music from my shuffle. The final good thing is that it is serves as a backup if for whatever reason my touch is out of batter. It is just really handy.
Its an unbelievably tiny, screenless MP3 player. The buttons are great to press with very nice tactile feedback(I forgot how much I miss buttons from suing my touch for a year), the player itself is a clip so you can attach it to your clothes or anything you would like (I quite like clipping mine to one of my teddies to create some sort of musical animal) It syncs through a little dock, rather than telling itself to sync with your entire library (most peoples wouldn’t fit) it Autofills the player randomly with songs from your library or from a playlist. A nice touch is the ability to choose higher rated songs more often rather than just syncing all the rubbish.
All in all it is a fantastic little player for just listening to music, great for exercise or any high movement activities. Apple supplies a shorter cable (0.4m) with this player which is nicely tailored to the size of the player. I was really surprised with this little player, it really is good. In the past I thought that not having a screen was its biggest flaw, but really it is its greatest feature, it sets it apart nicely from all the other players out there (good idea Apple)
Another thing to praise 3M for is that they had the players engraved with “3M DDS” which I think is the name of the subsection of 3M which my Dad is employed under. Either way it is the nice finishing touch.
So all in all I am one happy bunny, new gadget for free which I have genuine use for, what more can I ask for? So don’t be surprised if when you next see me my collection of Mario badges are joined by my sexy new shuffle.
