ITunes 7

You're either an iPod and iTunes fan or you're not. Certainly the two work seamlessly together with the iTunes store; you can copy your own music to the iPod and there are utilities that let you manage an iPod through Windows Media Player, but for most people using an iPod means using iTunes. There have been some problems with iTunes 7 and it looks like Apple has some bug fixing to do. By the time of this review there was already a software update for the Nano itself and we didn't experience problems with either the device or iTunes on a Mac or a PC, but your mileage may vary.

If you're used to other media players, having iTunes download missing album art for CDs you've ripped rather than bought isn't that impressive, but the images are very high quality. The Cover Flow flip interface for riffling through your albums isn't new either but again, it's nicely done and makes choosing digital music more like looking through your CDs (if you want that retro feel). There are new options for sorting tracks and albums, plus a new view that shows art and track lists for each album. Among the minor interface changes is a Preferences dialog that let you pick and choose what shows up in the navigation. It's not all style over substance though; the major new feature in this release is support for 'gapless' playing; this is hidden under the Get Info dialog with options like Skip when Shuffling.

If you're in the US you can play the movies you buy from the iTunes store. And iTunes now lets you take advantage of the friendly side of DRM; you're allowed to play your music on up to five machines and you can use your iPod to do it. Take an iPod from one computer to another and provided they're both authorised to the same iTunes account, you can synchronise paid-for music between them. Backing up songs to CD and DVD is easier in this version too. Plug in your iPod and if there's a software update available you'll get a link to download it; this ties you down to iTunes but makes life easier too.

Conclusion

Gapless playback is a very welcome feature and worth upgrading iTunes for (assuming the bugs don't bite you) and integrated update is useful, but unless you're buying movies or have a lot of paid-for tracks to back up, iTunes 7 isn't a major upgrade.

Similarly, the new iPod Nano is most interesting for the 8GB model, catching up with other players on the market. Creating multiple playlists, search, scrolling letters, recording support; they're welcome additions for new users and we definitely prefer the new case but if you upgrade from an existing Nano you'll do it for the extra space and the excellent battery life. As before, it's the Nano's sound quality and supreme portability that make it the ultra-portable music player to beat.