Try to avoid frequent full discharges because this can cause strain on your iPod battery. There is no harm in charging a battery even if is not totally drained. Unless you are watching videos on your iPod, I usually reduce the brightness to about 40 percent when listening to mp3. The iPod Nano is very tiny. In fact, it's about the size of a portable flash drive (those little memory sticks that people walk around with and plug into their laptops). The iPod Nano has all of the features of the iPod mini, with the real differences being size, storage capacity, and technical scalability (we'll look at this in a second). Similar to the mini, the nano also has a color screen, and the beloved grey wheel that must be depressed in order to work (which, as noted, is a feature that Apple added based on feedback from early iPod consumers). The iPod Nano weighs - get this - an ounce, which MacWorld equates to the heaviness of 6 credit cards. Since most of us carry about a dozen cards in our wallet or purse - everything from library cards to gas cards to a driver's license and more - it's really quite amazing that something so technologically advanced could be so light! Other remarkable features of the iPod nano include the fact that it has a stop watch, which can record lap times (which is great for those who listen to their iPod nano as they jog!).

Before you even get to the surface of the iPod, you encounter what could be called its aura. The commercial version of an aura is a brand, and while Apple may be a niche player in the computer market, the fanatical brand loyalty of its customers is legendary. A journalist, Leander Kahney, has even written a book about it, ''The Cult of Mac,'' to be published in the spring. As he points out, that base has supported the company with a faith in its will to innovate -- even during stretches when it hasn't. Apple is also a giant in the world of industrial design. The candy-colored look of the iMac has been so widely copied that it's now a visual cliché. But the iPod is making an even bigger impression. Bruce Claxton, who is the current president of the Industrial Designers Society of America and a senior designer at Motorola, calls the device emblematic of a shift toward products that are ''an antidote to the hyper lifestyle,'' which might be symbolized by hand-held devices that bristle with buttons and controls that seem to promise a million functions if you only had time to figure them all out. ''People are seeking out products that are not just simple to use but a joy to use.'' Moby, the recording artist, has been a high-profile iPod booster since the product's debut. ''The kind of insidious revolutionary quality of the iPod,'' he says, ''is that it's so elegant and logical, it becomes part of your life so quickly that you can't remember what it was like beforehand.'' Tuesday nights, Andrew Andrew's iParty happens at a club called APT on the spooky, far western end of 13th Street. They show up at about 10 in matching sweat jackets and sneakers, matching eyeglasses, matching haircuts.

They connect their matching iPods to a modest Gemini mixer that they've fitted with a white front panel to make it look more iPodish. The iPods sit on either side of the mixer, on their backs, so they look like tiny turntables. Andrew Andrew changes into matching lab coats and ties. They hand out long song lists to patrons, who take a number and, when called, are invited up to program a seven-minute set. At around midnight, the actor Elijah Wood (Frodo) has turned up and is permitted to plug his own iPod into Andrew Andrew's system. His set includes a Squarepusher song. Between songs at APT, each Andrew analyzed the iPod. In talking about how hard it was, at first, to believe that so much music could be stuffed into such a tiny object, they came back to the scroll wheel as the key to the product's initial seductiveness. ''It really bridged the gap,'' Andrew observed, ''between fantasy and reality.''  The iPod nano also has a world clock, which is perfect for travelers, and has 22 preset listening modes. We noted the iPod nano's technical scalability, and this is something that many people are quite pleased with. To enhance the functionality of this tiny little creation - and, of course, to boost sales! - Apple has enabled the iPod nano to play songs wirelessly through any home theater, via Bluetooth technology.

This is a very significant feature that many iPod nano users are extremely happy about. In seconds (even less!), they can listen to their tunes through a state-of-the-art home entertainment system: no wires, no fuss, just sitting back and hearing their favorite songs sound as good as a live concert; in some cases, even better. While most of the publicity about the iPod Nano has been overwhelmingly positive, there is some negative feedback also. The color screen is prone to scratching, which can make reading the menus difficult.