In case you haven’t heard, Apple has released its next generation of iPod Nano, named iPod “Nano Chromatic”. It’s actually about the right time, because I’m planning to “upgrade” my iPod Shuffle to an iPod Nano.
NOTE: This post is about the iPod Nano 4th Gen Chromatic release. If you’re interested in my personal review on the iPod Nano Chromatic (4G), please go to my review post on the iPod here.
New Design. New Features. Now in 8 GB and 16 GB
The new IPod Nano looks quite similar with its second hand generation as can be seen below (screenshot taken from Wikipedia):
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 2nd Gen |
 4th Gen |
It’s slimmer, it can hold more songs (with 8 GB and 16 GB capacity), and it also has a new “shaking” feature.
iPod Nano Chromatic “Shake” feature
It’s quite useless, in my opinion. The idea is that if you shake the iPod Nano, it will shuffle to a different song in your playlist library. How hard is it to just turn on the shuffle mode and press the next button? O_o I’m not too sure either how sensitive the shake sensor is. You wouldn’t want the iPod to shuffle itself when you are riding on a bumpy road now, would you? Not to mention that some kids might throw the iPod accidentally during the shake 
iPod Nano Genius mode
This is also a new feature on the 4th generation of iPod Nano and a new feature on iTunes 8. When you listen to a song on your iPod, the Genius mode can automatically create a new playlist of your songs in the library that resembles the same mood/tones. I’m not too sure how smart it is to detect similarity between songs. What is it based on? Beats per Minute? The Bass frequencies? I know my own songs; therefore I usually know what songs go well to which songs.
However, I guess it’d be interesting to use this if you have thousands of music files on your iPod!
It comes with a variety of colors too, so it will satisfy everyone’s taste. I just wish probably if they didn’t put the Genius and Shake features in, it may come cheaper than the RRP of UD$149 (AUD $199) for the 8 GB.
I’d have to think more on whether I should upgrade my iPod Shuffle to this. The reason I wanted to upgrade is because iPod Shuffle:
- Doesn’t have a playlist (you can only go to next or previous track)
- Doesn’t have a track progress bar (so you have to do the old fast-forward and rewind way by press+hold the button). It’s kinda annoying when I listen to a music/audio halfway and I mistakenly press the “Prev track” button when I actually wanted to press the volume button
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true. am not a huge fan of the shaking bit as well. i’m perfectly content to move from track to track the old fashioned way. then again, i guess that since they have this feature then that means the device’s pretty much shakeproof… guess that’s a good thing.
Wow, I’ve never had an ipod before, but I’ll definitely buy one sometime. It looks cool and it’ sure better than my old MP4 player ( I don’t use the video mode at all), and it’s pretty cheap in my opinion, I’m gonna check how much does it cost in HUF. (Is it even here?)
It looks nice and all, but it doesn’t have enough space for all my music! I’d need at least a 30GB and for now, my 5th gen iPod classic is still working. =P
I wonder why it’s called chromatic, and Google loves this word as well.
@kouji: I hope so. I’m sure it can be turned off somewhere *fingers crossed*
@rjani: I’ll probably wait for the refurbished item
@Maria: Wow 30 GB! and here I am, very happy with my 1 GB iPod Shuffle lol. I think I need to ramp up my music collection!
@QuickPWN: Hm never thought of that. Might want to google the meaning of “Chromatic” just for curiosity sake
I really like the style of Apple, but I never owned a iPod, because of all the talk about the durability. Nevertheless the new iPod Nano is a beauty that’s for sure and maybe this will be the first iPod for me!
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probably. would make sense. i hope so. :O
I like the new style, really posh! ~_~
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i just ordered my nano the other day and it came in today. i am so excited. i just hope u can turn off the shake to shuffle feature
What? You can’t turn it off? That’s a shame.. I hope the feature doesn’t drain the battery and not too sensitive.. you don’t want it to shuffle when you are on a bumpy road O_o
the shake feature is not sensitive. in fact u have to violently shake it for the ipod to shuffle. but it wont harm the ipod unless u accedently throw it while ya shaking it.
Ah..thanks for that info Jennifer.
lol about your comment about throwing the iPod away accidentally. It reminded me of the broken LCD pictures that people are having when Nintendo Wii was released
Jennifer…
I dun think you have to shake it violently…lol…
what you have to do is just shake it gently 3 times then it would shuffle the songs. Try to shake it 3 times consecutively with straight position to the left or right.^^
3 times to shuffle the songs? Man I’ll just use the next track button, thanks very much lol
Chromatic means color
as in their are alot of colors to choose from
Ah, thanks for the explanation, shakeNbake
Actually, musically speaking, and id imagine being an music player it is, chromatic basically means one note after the other.
As in the chromatic scale being every note one after the other
eg, A A# B C C# etc/
Well it may be named from that, I guess.
and it’s supposed to be written as Bb instead of A# lol (I remember writing A# on my music sheet and someone told me that there’s no A#, although they are meant for the same thing)
@michael A# and Bb are enharmonics. yes, normally you’d write the Bb although A# is still used in some cases when writing music.
and the chromatics are so pretty T_T i really want an upgrade from my 2nd gen nano, video playback and everything…
Thanks, Kate
I honestly still write A# and D# on my “cheating sheet music” - I’m playing for the bass in my church
Back to topic, yeah I’d love to get mine. I’ll wait till the price goes down a bit
my best friend got one and we found out pretty quickly that the shake feature isn’t too sensitive.
it actually takes quite a pound before it will switch songs..
but then my other male friend got one and his was pretty easy to flip songs on….
so im guessing that it just depends from machine to machine.
my zune just broke and they are total asswholes about replacing it.
so on black friday im going to buy a yellow chromatic,
dont trust ZUNE!
Hmm..funny. Well it doesn’t really matter since I’m not going to use that feature anyway.
There was a good deal on the web last week (AUD$99 for the 4 GB one). The site was getting hammered until they were all out of stock
I was planning on getting one.