Apple iPod nano (4th gen)

It's the iPod nano a lot of people have been waiting for: tall and skinny design, but a big fat screen for watching video. I'm Nate Lanxon and today we're looking at Apple's 4th generation nano. Now no-one has ever liked things that are fat: fat celebrities, Windows FAT32, Apple's fat nano. That much is clear, otherwise Apple wouldn't have ditched Dumpy McFat-Nano in favour of this refreshed slim design. It's also the thinnest iPod to date, with this sort of oval curvy chassis going on around the edges. Problem is, it kinda feels like squeezing a kitten -- one squeeze too hard and it might break. It's worth it though -- this new design feels great, and this 320x240-pixel screen, watching video for half an hour or so is a viable option. But this is, after all, a music player. It'll play MP3s of course, AAC files -- both the DRMed versions from the iTunes Store and unprotected ones from elsewhere; WAV and the big Daddy: Apple Lossless. Like the iPhone and iPod touch, the new nano has a built-in accelerometer, so the nano knows which way up it's being held. When you're looking at photos, just tilt the player on its side and the photo rotates to fit the screen. And if you do this when browsing music, you'll get Cover Flow, which is by far the most innovative way of browsing music. Also inside is a new playlist feature called Genius. It builds playlists of songs from your library, and it picks songs that are best suited to whatever song you choose to build a playlist from. So, if you choose a rock song, expect plenty of rock music in your playlist. It works pretty well, and you can build these playlists in iTunes or right on the nano by holding down the centre button and choosing 'Start Genius'. Browsing the nano's more fun than on last years model, too. The menus are longer, and album art appears at the bottom of the music menu, and in full screen during playback, just like on the iPod touch. To get music on here though, you do have to use iTunes, which some people will either love or hate. Sound quality through the earbuds that come with the nano is rubbish. If you value sound quality even slightly, you absolutely should check out a different pair, perhaps Sennheiser's CX 300s or better. They'll cost you only about £25 and should be considered an essential buy. Through better headphones the nano sounds okay, and pretty much on par with the last model. It's nowhere near as good as the iPod classic, or something from Sony or Cowon, but it'll probably please the average listener, particularly if they're happy with the abysmal earphones that come in the box. Other than that, it's a terrific little player, easily an improvement on every model before, and one of our favourite little MP3 players. Just be aware if you've been buying Windows Media music with DRM on it, like that from Napster, it won't play on the iPod. For more details hit up our full review, which is online right now. I'm Nate Lanxon for CNET UK, with the 4th generation iPod nano.