I was never a big fan of Apple products. I always thought Apple was all about style over substance. Their products look really nice but that's about it. When Apple first introduced the iPod it was an instant hit and won rave reviews for its design, packaging and performance. The only problem was that first iPod only worked on a Mac, which greatly limit its sales.

Somewhere along the way, a brilliant mind at Apple thought "I bet we would sell a lot more iPods if we made it work with Windows based PCs as well as Macs." Whoever this person was deserves a big bonus because iPod sales took off like a rocket. Last quarter Apple sold over 800,000 iPods, making it the best selling Apple product ever. Apple now sells more iPods than computers, which brings up the question; is Apple in the computer business or the music business? Their iTunes online music store is the number 1 legal MP3 download service on the internet, with over 70 million MP3s sold in its first year of operation. Originally intended to just break even, iTunes is now turning a profit.

The iPod comes in two models; the iPod and the iPod Mini. The iPod Mini is only available with 4GB of storage but offers a bunch of different colors. The iPod comes in any color you want as long as it's white. However you can chose between 15GB, 20GB and 40GB models. For this review we're testing the 40GB model because we always like testing top of the line models. :)

Now you might be thinking there is no way I will ever fill this thing up. Last time I checked my MP3 collection I was no where near 10,000 songs. However you can use the iPod for a lot more than just a MP3 player. Besides storing MP3s, the iPod can be used to store pretty much anything. You can back up your applications and all your work onto it. Digital photos and video can also be store on the iPod. If it were not for the iTunes software (more on that later) you can easily use the iPod as a portable hard drive.

At $499.00 from Amazon.com the 40GB iPod is like the most expensive portable MP3 player on Earth. Apple will say if you divide the price by the 40GB of storage or the 10,000 songs the unit can store, the iPod works out cheaper than competing units from other manufacturers. This is because no other companies produce a MP3 player with 40GB of storage so of course their "cost per GB/song" will be higher. However you do the math, $499.00 is a lot of money to pay for a portable music box. Is it worth it? Let's find out.