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For her first Mother’s Day, I got Sarah a 4 GB green iPod Mini, with car charger and Belkin TuneCast II FM transmitter. It’s already been used on a couple of trips back and forth across the state and we’ve been really impressed.

The Belkin TuneCast is a great option for listening to music on the road. There is a little bit of static every now and again, but overall it has been reasonably clear. I had very good luck in simply changing to another station whenever static intruded. One of the reasons I opted for the TuneCast II is because it can be tuned to virtually any FM channel. Other FM transmitters are limited to only 4 or so FM stations. The other reason I like the Belkin is that it is powered by it’s own batteries. Other units are powered by the iPod (thus draining the battery faster). I will say, it does suck the batteries down pretty good — a fresh set of AAA lasted about 4-5 hours. Of course, that was near continuous use.

In addition to traveling, I bought the FM transmitter for the labor and delivery room. Since we can’t plug in any devices (hospital rules) everything needs to be battery operated and I don’t know what radio we’d have with us. With an unknown availability of a line in jack, the TuneCast will make sure that we can rock out while laboring on.

With some 600 songs currently loaded, the shuffle play has been our preferred mode while traveling. It’s the ultimate “radio station” — we get a variety of songs we like without those pesky commercials.

I have to say, I was pretty sneaky in presenting it to Sarah. She has been in the process of ripping CDs in order to create and burn some mix CDs for the hospital. I let her rip away and create play lists, which I then loaded on the Mini for her. When she unwrapped it, presto, it was all set to go. It was really nice to be able to give it to her loaded with music that I knew she wanted to listen to.