The iPod is a brand of portable media players designed and marketed by Apple. There are many types of iPods such as the iPod classic, iPod touch, iPod nano and iPod shuffle. Among all these iPods, the classic models store media on an internal hard drive. Whereas, all the other models apart from the Micro drive-based 'mini', use flash memory to enable their smaller size.

Apple iTunes software is basically used to transfer music to the devices. It is a jukebox application which stores a music library on the user's computer and it also enables the user to burn, rip and play music from a CD. It also enables the user to transfer photos, videos, games and calendars to the iPod model that supports this software. An iPod is an extremely easy to use and its unique user interface allows the user to use it easily, despite of any technical capabilities.

An can play MP3, Protected ACC, AIFF, WAV, Audible audio book and Apple Lossless audio file formats. The iPod photo feature has an ability to display JPEG, BMP, GIF, TIFF and PNG image file formats. The iPods with colour displays use anti-aliased graphics and text with sliding animations. An iPod is basically associated with one host computer. Each time an iPod connects to its host computer, the iTunes software synchronizes the entire music play lists either automatically or manually. You can also set ratings on your iPod and synchronize them later to the iTunes library.

Apple has also introduced an iPod touch which is 3.5 in display and is as thin as 8mm. The touch has the same user interface as the iPhone, though Apple has rearranged the icons into a more appropriate order for an iPod. All the iPods except for the touch can function in 'disk mode' as mass storage devices to store data files. If an iPod is formatted on a Mac OS X computer and it uses the HFS+ file system format then it is allowed to serve as a 'boot disk' for a MAC computer. And if an iPod is formatted on Windows then it uses the FAT32 format.

These iPods, just like any other digital music player can serve as external data storage devices. An iPod has come from Apple's digital hub strategy, when they were creating software for the growing market of the digital devices. An Apple iPod is basically a Mac-compatible product which is installed with a 5 GB hard drive and which can put 1000 songs in your pocket. This digital product has definitely revolutionized the music world and is must for the music lovers. As with this technology you can enjoy all your favourite tracks anywhere and anytime.