The solution to iPod Touch problems: Reboot

I’m the proud owner of a 16GB Apple iPod Touch, given to me as a Christmas present by a good friend. I’ve been taking many notes about the device – which is an incredible technological marvel – but I can summarize my experiences over the past three weeks as follows:

What it’s great at: Being a WiFi Web browser and movie/video player

What it’s not great at: Being a plain old music player

My biggest beef with the iPod Touch (as a music player) is the lack of tactile response caused by the shift from a control wheel to the large touchscreen:

• With my “regular” iPods, I can change songs, start/stop the music and change volume without looking at the device. That’s great when I’m using it on an airplane or in my car. In my car, for example, my “regular” iPod sits in a cupholder. If I want to change songs or pause the music, I just reach over and push the button without looking.

• With the iPod Touch, you have to be looking at the device in order to manipulate the controls. That’s fine when you’re watching videos or surfing the Web, but it’s really a nuisance when you want to skip to the next song while you’re driving.

I am surprised that the flash storage is so slow. Updating its files (to load music playlists or new videos) is painful. It seems at least 3x slower than a conventional disk-based iPod. I’m also disappointed that the “Enable Disk Use” option is not available. (There are third-party hacks that claim to provide that functionality.)

When using the iPod Touch as a Web browser, the hardest part is typing. My hands and fingers aren’t especially large, but gosh, it’s difficult to work the virtual keyboard. The iPod Touch needs a stylus.

The software on the iPod Touch (I’m running version 1.1.2) is buggy. There seems to be a memory leak that causes album cover displays to occasionally get out of sync with the songs that are being played, and sometimes, the device stops plays songs right after you start playing.

For that issue, the solution seems to be to reboot the iPod Touch. You do so by holding down the Sleep/Wake button (that’s the one on the edge) and the Home button (that’s the one on the front) for at least 10 seconds, until the Apple logo appears. After I do that, the unit seems good for about a week until it needs to be rebooted again.

Overall: The iPod Touch is an incredible device, and I’m delighted with it. But it’s clearly a “version 1.0” product.