By AppleInsider Staff

Published: 08:30 AM EST

Apple on Tuesday slashed the price of its 1GB clip-on iPod shuffle music player from $79 to $49 and introduced a new 2GB model for just $69.

The diminutive device is just half a cubic inch in volume, weighs just half an ounce, features an aluminum design with a built-in clip and comes in five colors-silver, blue, green, purple and a (PRODUCT) RED special edition.

"At just $49, the iPod shuffle is the most affordable iPod ever," said Greg Joswiak, Apple's vice president of Worldwide iPod Product Marketing. "The new 2GB model lets music lovers bring even more songs everywhere they go in the impossibly small iPod shuffle."

Apple's refresh of the shuffle comes amid analyst reports which place a large part of the blame for recent iPod demand softness on the aging shuffle line, which hadn't received a material update in nearly 18 months.

"While virtually 100 percent of the unit shortfall was in the low-end iPod Shuffle, allowing Apple to beat consensus iPod revenue despite the unit shortfall," Citigroup analyst Rich Gardner recently wrote in a research report covering Apple's fiscal first quarter results. "We believe the unit shortfall reflected the lack of a compelling update to the Shuffle product last Fall; the Shuffle simply was not the compelling 'stocking stuffer' this year that it was last year."



Pricing & Availability

The new 1GB iPod shuffle is available immediately for a suggested retail price of $49 through the Apple Store Apple's retail stores and Apple Authorized Resellers. The 2GB iPod shuffle will be available later this month for a suggested retail price of $69 through the Apple Store, Apple's retail stores and Apple Authorized Resellers. iPod shuffle requires a Mac with a USB 2.0 port, Mac OS X 10.4.8 or later and iTunes 7.4; or a Windows PC with a USB 2.0 port and Windows Vista or Windows XP Home or Professional (Service Pack 2) or later and iTunes 7.4 or later.