By: Alice Erin

The Apple iPod from Apple Inc. is a portable media player that assures the users of perfect musical entertainment. The iPod was a result of Apple’s research which resulted in the disclosure of the fact that the existing digital music players are “big and clunky or small and useless” with user interfaces that were “unbelievably awful”. Apple developed the product in less than a year and unveiled it on October 23, 2001.

The name iPod was the contribution of Vinnie Chieco, a freelance copywriter, who was called by Apple to figure out how to introduce the new player to the public. The first iPod kiosks were demonstrated to the public in New Jersey in March 1998, and the commercial use of it began in January 2000. The trademark was registered by the USPTO in November 2003, and Grasso assigned it to Apple Computer, Inc. in 2005.

The Apple iPod can play MP3, AAC/M4A, Protected AAC, AIFF, WAV, Audible audio book, and Apple Lossless audio file formats ensuring the perfect musical entertainment. The iPod is generally associated with a host computer. Each time the iPod is connected to the host computer, iTunes are able to synchronise entire music libraries or music playlists either automatically or manually. Song ratings can be set on the iPod and synchronised later to the iTunes library, and vice versa. It is also possible for the user to connect the iPod to a second computer. Apple iPods generally function as mass storage devices to store data files. When the iPod is formatted on a Mac OS X computer, it uses the HFS+ file system format, which allows it to serve as a book disk for a Mac computer. The sound can be enhanced with the iPod’s software equaliser (EQ) which has some EQ settings like R&B, Rock, Acoustic, indie, and Bass Booster which can result in fast bass distortion.