swing and a miss

I ran across an Apple store in the mall that at least had new iPods out on display. I had been trying to find one and was all set to buy one now that I'd found it.

And then I tried one.

My biggest complaint is that the scroll wheel sucks. It's jerky and not very sensitive and I don't like how the center button is now an 'innie' and bottom line the wheel experience put me off on the whole thing. That was hardly the end of it though. The shape is less rounded than my 4G and I didn't like that. The new anodized aluminum fron panel was also somehow annoying to the touch. On the software side of things, the operating system is so busy making fancy flying graphics that there is a lag when you switch menus rapidly. I also discovered that if you are listening to a song while scrolling through cover art, the song gets drowned out in static. Apple has obviously spent so much time making this a fashion accessory that they forgot that first and foremost it's a damn music player.

I was immensely disappointed. Here I was, one of millions of iPod fans, and I ended up walking out of the Apple store in disgust and into a Best Buy (despite yesterday's bad experience) to check out the competition.

But frankly, there isn't much. It pretty much boiled down to Microsoft's brown brick, the Zune. I played with one for a minute and liked how widescreen videos play sideways, so you can actually see it, but I couldn't actually work out how to get back to the menu. There were seven buttons and none of them did anything remotely menu-ey. So the controls are unfathomable. And that is before the host of other issues such as the crippled WiFi. At the very least I'm going to wait for the next generation so Microsoft can fix what it knows it screwed up. The Zune is a first generation product so I will give them the benefit of the doubt while they hammer things out. In the meantime I am going to have to make do with my iffy battery, floor-dropper 4G iPod.

I also picked up a Consumer Reports new vehicle guide, although it doesn't have any info on the G8. I am kind of cooling on the G6 again. Unless I really like the new G8 I may be holding out for the long term, most likely for a Camaro. So long as the Malibu keeps running.