Apple briskly refreshed their iPod lineup a few months ago with the mercurial Steve Jobs introducing the revamped iPod Classic, for $237. The iconic media player has finally been branded with the generic “classic” monicker, which is proudly worn by Coca-Cola. The tinkering engineers at Apple have heard the calls customers to do away with the scratch prone faceplate for a sleek anodized aluminum front cover. Amazon offers an instant $5 off rebate on all iPod Classic and free shipping with price protection for 30 days.

The advances in hard drives have delivered us 80 GB and 160GB  iPod Classic in black and silver. The substantial boost in storage has transformed the iPod into a viable external hard drive to complement lifestyle of laptop users on the move. The iPod Classic is slightly slimmer but still bear the easily blemished chrome back.The iPod Classic receives a sleek software upgrade. The new menus include an impressive split-screen preview function. The click-wheel enables quick navigation and users will find anything in their iPod within three clicks. Apple raises the bar for polished menus and beautiful features, which adds to the experience of browsing your music collection. Cover Flow is pure eye-candy.

Battery life has tested in around the following figures: 30 hours of audio playback and 5 hours for video for the 80GB iPod - 40 hours of audio and 7 hours for video for the 160GB version.The iTunes application remains the most satisfying software to organize music collections. The iTunes store also makes buying music instantly gratifying. Individuals with older computers should avoid Cover Flow.

After long debates, we have come to the conclusion that the iPod Classic remains our favorite iPod. The versatility of using this iPod as a viable external hard drive will, in  the long run, offer more joy to the owner than the other players offered by Apple - iPod touch, iPod nano, and iPod shuffle.