#ipod classic

Like father like son tbh

woah tsu writes an actual blog post? not art? I apologize in advance for how long this is

The last few weeks, I’ve been going throughthe joys of having a dedicated music service, no ads, reasonably priced, and full of songs from my childhood. Now, which of these things could this thing be? A. Youtube Music B. Spotify C. Amazon Music D. Apple Music If your answer was any of the above,BZZT BZZT YOU'RE WRONG WHOOPS Streaming services keep getting more and more expensive, and so many of my favorite songs get removed without question. Not to mention the algorithmic portions of the apps pushing music videos, audiobooks, and podcasts when you’ve never even listened to those on the platform before (looking at you, Spotify. No, I do not want to watch Police Bodycam Videos on SPOTIFY. THAT IS FOR REGULAR VIDEO SERVICES-)

I’ve been going through a huge retro-tech phase lately. Mostly due to the nostalgia most of these devices bring me, or specific experiences I missed out on while owning these devices that many my age got to do. The biggest example I can think of off the top of my head is never getting to experience any of the classic Pokemon DS games. My very first Pokemon Game was bought in the New York City Nintendo Store…. And it was Pokemon Y being put on clearance to make way for Sun and Moon releasing later that year (Yes, my introduction to Pokemon was the Kalos region. Despite how many call it boring and easy compared to the prior Pokemon games, it was a great introduction for me).  

{{Somewhat off topic, but also related. I’d been on a DS and 3DS fix since around the time I returned from my study abroad. I bought a few 100 yen DS games that I found at the BOOK OFF a few minutes away from my dorm, but couldn’t find a normally priced Japanese DS, DSi, or 3DS in time (And the times I DID find them, people on Mercari snatched them up before I could buy them, or I’d tell myself I’d buy it after I got a good grade on my Japanese language tests…. only for it to be sold out in the Book-Off the next day). Well, tsu, “why don’t you just mod your 3DS”? Weirdly enough, I’m finally getting around to doing so, now that Pokemon Bank is set to shut down in February of next year. However, I had to try and get a 32 GB SD card. I have a lot of 64 GB SD cards, but trying to reformat those to work with my 3DS, on a Macbook nonetheless, did not like working with me. I’ll likely have a separate blog post for when I eventually DO mod the 3DS.}} Rather than focus on modding my 3DS, I decided to try to get my old childhood iPods working again. Yes, iPods. PLURAL. I had both a 3rd generation Nano from 2007 (to keep me still during travel. Like cocomelon for you people now) and a 7th generation nano that I got for Christmas in 2012 from my late grandparents. I hadn’t used the 3rd gen one since 2014 at the latest, and the 7th gen was one I used into late 2016.  There was actually very little music on the 7th gen nano. It was primarily albums my mother added that she thought I’d like, various Christmas songs, and then two singles that I requested to be added at the time (Ariana Grande’s “Side to Side” and Rihanna’s “Work”… My music taste for a good few years was formed by whatever was on repeat on the radio.) I ended up removing the Christmas music (as it drives me crazy now), but I kept everything else on there to preserve that era.

My 3rd gen Nano was mostly filled with Disney soundtracks from old CDs my parents had, ALL of the Charlie Brown Holiday Specials, the 13th Episode of Winx Club Season 5 (I think I only asked for that one because it was the first 3D animated transformation sequence in the series), and a lot, a LOT of Taylor Swift and Katy Perry. Idk why I liked them so much as a kid. I'm not particularly fond of either of them nowadays, my music taste is EVERYWHERE. To avoid any further battery issues, though, I stopped using the 3rd Gen nano after figuring out what all was on it. That generation of iPod nano is notorious for having the batteries swell behind the screen and explode. It already has a very tiny bulge, so I didn’t want to risk it. That iPod is going to stay as is, a time capsule of my childhood. However, I decided that using the 7th gen nano into this day and age would be a good way to shift myself away from the music streaming service algorithms and heavily repetitive shuffle (Spotify shuffle actually has me stop, realize that the order of the five songs that just played was the same order as the LAST time I pressed shuffle the day before). I renamed the device from “Christmas 2012” to IRL name’s iPod nano. I know that you can name it anything, I could’ve named it “music bomb” or something… but unlike my physical notebook labels, I like keeping my devices in order. I regret not buying a lot of CDs in Japan during my time there. I could have easily sent them back, they’re small enough to fit in my suitcase. However, I already had a lot of stuff to send back… I DID buy ONE cd, though, which was a compilation of 80s singer Akina Nakamori’s greatest hits. This happened by pure chance, as I bought it from a man running a 80s era CD pop up within my usual grocery store. (If you ever go to Japan and are in the sort of suburb/inaka area, go to a Piago grocery store. The one near me had two floors; one with groceries and one with clothes, stationary, and tech stuff!). That day, I only had the budget for one on top of my groceries, but looking back on it, they also had a bunch of stuff by other artists I like, Meiko Nakahara, Junko Ohashi, Minako Honda, and Kiyotaka Sugiyama… I’m making up for it now, at least… the experience of burning a CD into my music library for the first time, truly owning my music on my computer… I can’t really put it into words, but it brings a certain type of joy that simply pressing “add to library” on streaming services doesn’t provide. Now, in terms of “retro”, the iPod nano 7th gen is a touch screen, has a home button, and is very small (as intended). It’s great in my pocket, and has bluetooth also, so I can use modern headphones with it-- but it's not really super retro... I greatly miss the feeling of the click wheel, middle buttons, and overall just the appearance of that old 3rd gen nano. While buying a new, working 3rd gen would lead to the same problems down the line with the battery behind the screen, an iPod classic would not! However, I never actually owned an iPod classic as a kid. 

My parents had quite a few iPods themselves, my biological mother having a 2nd gen shuffle, a 5th gen shuffle, and a 5th gen iPod nano in green (the one with the really tiny and oddly placed camera). My dad’s was a black iPod classic of a generation I can’t recall, and a dark blue iPod nano 4th generation. Although, this week, I also discovered he had an iPod Video (5th gen) from 2006; classic in white. I didn’t want to mess with his music collection, though, so I cleaned it up with some alcohol wipes (it was COVERED in this weird sticky rust-like substance. He says it was in a sticker case, so that’s probably why).  I decided that I was going to try and find an iPod classic on eBay, as they usually sell for a pretty good price if the storage is high and condition is alright. However, before I could buy anything, I forwarded the eBay listing to my CURRENT family members, to which my stepmom offered to let me test all her old apple devices, some iPods included. One of them was hers, which she adamantly requested not to be wiped if it worked. (This one was a 4th gen color, as there was no video option, but the side scrollbar was blue). The other belonged to her EX-HUSBAND. While the battery was dead for quite some time, and took a good hour and a half to get to a charge, I got permission to wipe and reset it. About two hours of troubleshooting, reformatting the drive, and restoring the software, I can say that my desire for a clickwheel, larger size, high storage, and overall feel have all been met— by a 7th generation iPod classic, the last one of its kind to be made. Putting music on it was kind of a hassle, as the hard drive could be heard struggling a few times (particularly freezing and kicking itself out of my computer whenever I tried to sync my DECO*27 albums… why does it hate deco in particular? I don’t even have whatever the new one no one on vocaloid twitter likes on there!), but after another reset and restore, I could sync my whole library without problems. I plan to add more to it when I get my hands on a more sizable CD collection. My dad is more than willing to let me burn some stuff from his OWN CD collection, but I’m not really a fan of a lot of the “power-pop” bands he likes, save for like, four of them.

It has 120 gigabytes! That’s huge for an iPod… I know the highest it can go without mods is 160, and then WITH mods it can go up to a couple terabytes. Realistically, though, I don’t think anyone has enough music locally stored to equal a terabyte. Unless your whole thing is making bootleg CDs and devices and whatnot…

i love old tech soooo much. everything was just cooler like the sidekick phone omg i want one of those so bad or all the different mp3, cassette, and cd players or all the awesome cameras. it looks so original and customizable so everyone could express themselves exactly how they wanted. i want that era of tech to come back so baddd, i literally bought an ipod classic because i cant get the thought of having one out my head.

*not my pic btw*