Apple likes to extend its famed friendly user interface to their product naming schemes. Go to an Apple Store — physical or digital — and you’ll see three models: the iPod, the iPod nano, and the iPod shuffle. For all their aesthetic similarity, they are three very different machines.

Let’s look into each current model’s unique properties, followed by a section dedicated to older iPods you may come across on eBay. Once you have the right iPod for you, just add a few accessories to make your iPod that much more enjoyable and well-fitted to your unique life.

• iPod with Video

What is now called simply “iPod” come in two storage capacities, 30GB and 60GB, and two color schemes, white/chrome and black/chrome. It has everything ever offered by the various models that preceded it: peerless digital music playback, digital photo display, basic voice recording, rudimentary personal organizer functions, and simple 2D games — all accessible from the finest user interface anyone has ever seen. The latest model also features an exciting, genre-bending new capability: digital video playback. Everything is stored on a tiny, shock-mounted hard disk and synchronizes with the included iTunes software on your Mac or PC. Connection is via the included USB 2.0 cable for both syncing and charging the battery. Earlier iPods could sync and charge using a FireWire cable, but that transport is being phased out in favor of the more common USB port. Current iPods can all charge via FireWire connection to either a Mac or PC but can no longer synchronize your media files.

The 30GB iPod ($299) should be your choice if you want to have the most fun with your personal media and have a moderate library of audio, photo, and video files you want to carry around with you. If you have boatloads of media files, then get the ever-so-slightly thicker 60GB model ($399), the coolest iPod when only the coolest will do.

The iPod is thin, but not impossibly thin. For that you’ll need a...

• iPod nano

The iPod nano is Apple’s replacement for last year’s iPod mini. This “impossibly thin” device loses the mini hard drive and replaces it with solid state flash memory in either 1GB ($149), 2GB ($199) or 4GB ($249) capacity. The nano has a dinky color screen that’s great for navigating songs and displaying album art but not so great for photos — even though it will sync your photo library if you want it to. Videos will not sync nor will they play on the iPod nano, by the way, so if video is your thing, you’ll have to move up to the “big” iPod. The nano also cannot do voice recording, a minor disappointment for folks like me who use this feature to capture random thoughts.

The iPod nano is for those who like to travel as light as possible and who don’t need or don’t want to carry their complete media library around. This is also an excellent choice for very active people, as the nano has no moving parts or spinning hard drive. Which naturally leads us to the…

• iPod shuffle

Apple wanted to shut out the competition at the extreme low end of the digital audio player market, so they created the controversial iPod shuffle. Like the Studebaker Avanti, Hillary Clinton, and Beethoven’s late string quartets, the iPod shuffle polarizes the world into two camps: you either love ‘em or you hate ‘em.

Some love their iPod shuffles for their ultra-small size and low cost ($59-$99), while others can’t get past the lack of a display or the miniscule capacity (512MB-1GB). Most reviewers feel that the shuffle succeeds in offering what Apple intended: a supremely simple, inexpensive music player for active people who like to listen to one big playlist of songs played in random order. Young teens who have yet to accumulate a large music library, who generally lack access to excess disposable income, and who are often very hard on their personal electronic devices are the primary target buyer for an iPod shuffle. Second to them would be the existing iPod owner who wants a second, smaller device for exercising and rugged outdoor use.

• This Old iPod

Even though the original 5GB fat monochrome iPod from 2001 will work fine as an audio-only player today, you’d have to be a bit of a crank to limit yourself to one. Older iPods had relatively primitive battery technology that tended to lose capacity pretty rapidly. For the roughly $50 price of a new replacement battery, combined with the hassle and risk of cracking the casing open and installing it, you are probably wasting your money and time.

A better bet would be a gently used fourth-generation iPod with a clickwheel. The iPod models prior to this were a bit harder to operate and more prone to problems with the navigation wheel. Expect to pay about half the cost of a new model of comparable capacity. You’ll lose photo display capability on all models that lack color displays and video playback on all fourth-gen models.

Our advice: don’t buy anything older than fouth-gen with clickwheel. You’ll probably become dissatisfied with any previous iPod's limitations: increased bulk, shorter runtime per charge, lack of photo/video playback, lack of color, and its complete absence of any coolness.

• CONTENT: Getting It On

Getting the music, photos, and video you want onto your iPod is accomplished by getting the files into your computer, either by purchasing songs or videos from the online iTunes Music Store, or by importing your audio CDs, personal photos, and home movies into iTunes on your computer for transfer to your iPod. Most of us have audio CDs already, so virtually everyone will end up using both methods eventually.

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The iTunes Music Store has become the world’s number one store for digital media. You can select from a staggering array of music in any genre, old or new, either individual songs (99¢), complete albums (usually $9.99), or even multi-album “box sets.” Apple also offers their own reasonably priced “iTunes Essentials” compilations, with subjects ranging from the sublime to the ridiculous.

But audio is not just about music. You can also purchase and download spoken audiobooks and short subjects such as NPR radio programs like Fresh Air. Apple has partnered with audiobook industry leader Audible to provide a vast array of titles from publishers both large and small.

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With the release of the latest video-capable iPods, the iTunes Music Store now offers short video downloads for $1.99 each. You can buy music videos with an embedded recording of the song that’s equal to the music-only version, animated shorts from Pixar, and commercial-free broadcast television shows that are available one day after they are aired. You can also purchase individual episodes or whole seasons of classic TV shows from years past.

Viewing short videos on the iPod’s 2.5-inch screen is surprisingly immersive for anyone with decent eyesight. As you would expect, the audio portion is of excellent quality and helps make up for the diminutive display. With the optional $19 Apple iPod AV Cable, you can send your videos to any TV. Though videos that have been rendered for the iPod are technically lower-resolution (320x240 pixels) than standard television, they look about as good as a decent videotape recording — adequate for ephemeral content.

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For digital photographs stored in iPhoto (Mac), iTunes detects your photo library and offers to render the whole thing on your iPod. On a PC, or you can use the free Adobe Photoshop Album or just folders full of photos you specify to iTunes, and they render and copy to your iPod. There is an option in iTunes that automatically copies all your full-size original photos as well as the smaller ones it renders for the iPod display. If your photo library isn’t too huge and your iPod has the space for them, this is a convenient automatic backup method for your irreplaceable personal photos. Spend an additional $19 on an Apple iPod AV Cable and you can connect your iPod or the optional $39 iPod Universal Dock directly to your television and home theater system or powered speakers. The rendered photos automatically adapt to the resolution and display geometry of your television, and the iPod’s built-in Slideshow feature does a superb job of showing off your albums — with music you select from your library, of course!

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Unless you just woke up from an 18-month coma, you will have heard about podcasting, the free audio and video downloads to which you subscribe from within iTunes on your computer. The range of offerings and the production quality of podcasts defies easy description. The vast majority are embarrassingly amateur affairs from folks who really should not waste their breath creating them, while the very best podcasts are professionally produced and are absolutely wonderful. The iTunes Music Store has a complete directory of available podcasts which includes top ten lists, genre directories, and other organizational aids to help you find what you’re interested in. They’re free, so sample with wild abandon.