COMMENTARY--At first, I thought the iPod Mini was a really good idea. Then a really stupid one. Then I started to appreciate where Apple's going with it.

As expected, Apple lifted the veil off the latest in its long running series of portable music players yesterday. Also as expected, the latest iPod is smaller, both in storage capacity and size, than its immediate predecessors. It's also slightly cheaper and available in a variety of colours, which is a first for the iPod range, which have previously only been available in white.

Apple's had the portable audio market in something of a death grip for a number of years now, and with good reason; they've got great brand awareness, a good product that happens to work, and, although I was among those who questioned the exact wisdom of them moving over to the Windows world, they've come good there, seeing off pretty much every challenger.

I was initially somewhat intrigued by the iPod Minis. The existing iPods seemed small enough for most standard uses, but there's significant proof that people will buy a product just because it's marginally smaller -- my colleague Patrick Gray's just written about that very thing, and I'd be willing to bet his mate "Fred" will have an iPod Mini before the ink dries on a credit card slip. I'm sure he won't be alone.

The whole colour issue leaves me a little cold, but I can see people going for it in a big way. Wander into any mobile phone store, and you'll see a dazzling array of mobile phones, most of which are a raw insult to anyone with any colour sensibility, and presumably somebody's buying those ones -- why should the iPod be any different?

The more I thought about it, however, the more hesitant I became. For a start, there's the well documented issue that iPods have had with battery life. As it's some 60% smaller than the existing iPods, I can't imagine that the replacement batteries Apple's offering (at US$99 a pop) will be cross-compatible if you happened to own multiple iPods. I suppose time will tell if this new batch has that particular battery quirk, however.

Then there's the price. Exact Australian pricing is hard to come by, as officially the only thing up on Apple's Australian Web Site notes that the iPod Minis will be available for order in April, in line with the company announcement yesterday stating global availability in that month. The US gets the iPod Mini a touch earlier, and at an RRP of US$249. At current exchange rates, that'd work out at around AU$325. Given the growing strength of the Aussie dollar, it's likely to be closer and closer to the AU$300 mark by April.

I'd be flabbergasted, however, if we got an iPod Mini at an AU$300 price point when April rolls around, leaving aside a cut in the actual RRP. Given the taxes, shipping costs and other 'considerations' that tend to get added onto IT products when they hit Australian shores, I'd be willing to bet it's closer to the AU$350-$400 mark. That still stacks up nicely against the stated aim of taking on solid state players, most of which hover in the AU$300-$400 price point. Where it looks less compelling, however, is against Apple's existing iPod range.

At the same time as it launched the iPod Mini, Apple also upgraded the storage on its 10GB iPod to 15GB, and that's the smallest iPod you can actually buy in Australia right now. One will set you back AU$449 according to Apple's online store. Now, taking my admittedly theoretical price point for the iPod Mini to its worst extreme, that'd be only AU$50 more for an additional 11GB of pure storage space. Who's going to pass up on spending $50 more for that much extra space?

This, however, is what could be Apple's master stroke. All of the above paragraph compares one Apple product against another, and if you're thinking that way, then Apple, and Apple alone, will be getting your purchasing dollar one way or another. The pricing of the iPod Mini is also very well positioned to ensure that Apple should be able to shift all of its iPod stock, and not just specific units. If they sold them out at, say AU$250, they'd sell like hotcakes, but few people would be tempted to go the extra AU$200 for the 15GB model. That equates to 15GB iPods gathering dust on store shelves and in warehouses, ultimately costing Apple and its resellers money. Instead, what you get is the small iPod Mini, factored towards the sporty and fashion-conscious audience, and the larger in size and capacity iPod 'classic' that tech geeks with an appreciation for how quickly you can fill a hard drive without really meaning to will pick up.

There's also an element of future-proofing here too. Apple's well aware of past history that's seen its innovations (or those handily borrowed, from, say, Xerox) utilised by its larger competitors, most notably Microsoft. MS isn't on the verge of announcing the mPod (at least not yet), but it does have its own solution to the portable audio issue in hand, and it's even bolted on video as well. Microsoft's solution is the Portable Media Center, a technology it's selling to OEMs in the same way that it sold Tablet PCs and Smart Displays; MS supplies the back-end smarts and a version of Windows, and OEMs provide the hardware and actually sell the things. Of course, anyone involved in this venture is presumably hoping that it won't end up like the Smart Display, but I digress there.

We're yet to see any Portable Media Center Products -- heck, in Australia we're yet to even see a single Media Center PC -- but if by the time they do start hitting the market, everyone's too busy bopping along to an iPod or iPod Mini, Microsoft could find itself a little too late to market, especially if Apple's got even a vapourware video-capable iPod up its sleeve ready to be leaked to the press.

What do you think? Is the iPod Mini attractive, or a marketing blunder of Smart Display proportions? Let me know at edit@zdnet.com.au

Alex Kidman is the Reviews Editor for ZDNet Australia. He doesn't own an iPod, and unless he suddenly wins Lotto and convinces his wife that he needs one, he's unlikely to be able to do so.