Expert's Rating
Pros
- Crisp, bright, color screen and photo features for same price as previous monochrome version
- Excellent sound quality
- Works with existing accessories
- Good battery life
Cons
- No bundled AV or FireWire cables
- Requires syncing with iTunes to “project” photos (to a TV) that have been uploaded via camera adapters
Our Verdict
Since their debut, Apple’s iPod photo models have been hard to beat in terms of their functionality: They are exceptionally easy to use, sync effortlessly with your music (and photo) collection, offer good battery life, sound as good as any player I’ve heard, and include bright, crisp, easy-to-read color displays. Plus you get the ability to view your photos on the iPod or on a TV. However, the higher prices of the iPod photo line–originally $499 and $599, most recently $349 and $449–made them too expensive for many shoppers. But now that you can get a 20GB iPod “photo” for $299 (only $50 more than an iPod mini), that price premium has been all but eliminated: If you’ve got a large enough music collection that you need 20GB of storage on your player, or if you’ve been jonesing for photo capabilities, Apple’s new 20GB iPod “with color display” is hard to resist. (And if you need even more space, you can get the monstrous 60GB model for only $100 more.)
–Dan Frakes