iPod Touch

The face of the Touch is clean. There's a button at the bottom that takes you back to the main screen, and a button on top to lock or switch off the player. For the benefit of those who came in late on the iPhone hype, get a load of this: navigation is entirely onscreen. The touchscreen system is one of the best I have seen so far; it takes the comfort in interaction to another level.

In the touchscreen mechanism the capacitors are arranged in such a way that it can sense changes at each point along the grid. So each point generates its own response, allowing the machine to recognize multiple touches. I also noticed that you cannot make the player respond to anything but your fingertip. I tried stylus, blue tack and a great many objects, but to no avail.

This is quite brilliant, because unlike other touchscreen phones, if you leave the Touch (or the iPhone) unlocked in your pocket, rubbing against other objects will not cause it to fire up.

It offers not only basic media playing capabilities, but a complete entertainment solution. You can rely on it to keep you occupied for a long time. But I’ll get to that later; first let’s talk about music.