A team of Brooklyn-based tech savvy folks has released a portable dongle capable of transferring content between iPods without using wires or a computer connection

May 14, 2008 07:12 GMT  ·  By
miShare helps iPod owners easily share files and playlists between portable media players developed by Apple Inc.
   miShare helps iPod owners easily share files and playlists between portable media players developed by Apple Inc.

miShare is a nifty gadget for the iPod, developed by a Brooklyn, New York-based team (along with their Chinese partners) that goes by the same name. You use it to connect two iPods and share files between them, eliminating the need to connect your iPod to a computer, as well as the hassle of using cables. miShare costs $99 to buy.

The dongle is the team's first product. Both the image to the left and the video below will reveal that the device sports two dock connectors, which you simply use to connect two iPods. You connect the iPods to the donor and receiver ports, select the song/video you want to transfer on the donor iPod (you do this on the iPod, not the dongle), push a button and it simply copies the content onto the other iPod.

You can also exchange DRM-encrypted files, which will simply sit on your iPods' disk area, but will be unlockable with your iTunes password as soon as you connect your iPod to a computer. miShare says that its gadget can't do more than 500KB/second, which is pretty slow, considering the price. For example, if you have a 5MB song, it will take about 10 seconds to transfer it from the donor iPod to the receiver iPod.

As far as videos go, a short one in .mov (iPod) format can take as much as half a minute to be copied. So, even though USB 2.0 "Full-Speed" is rated at more than one megabyte per second, real-world tests have revealed a maximum transfer speed of 500KB/second, as far as miShare was concerned.

In order to locate your newly received tunes after using miShare, check on the target iPod for a playlist called "miShare Playlist." According to the developers, this playlist will contain songs or videos that do not employ digital rights management (DRM). However, in some cases, files may also end up on the target iPod's main disk area. Also, miShare does not unlock DRM.

Check out miShare's web site for the full scoop.