Tuesday February 13, 2007

The iPhone sounds like a great consumer device, but as you may know it's not for me (yet). Good thing because the 20GB iPod I have carried around for 2 years died Saturday. The hard disk sounds a bit like nails on a blackboard if you put your ear up to it. Can you believe my birthday (the big 4-0) is next week? What are the odds? Yeah, my wife didn't like the odds either but she bought me an early birthday present anyway since I have to travel this week. I'm the proud owner of an iPod Video Why not try to fit it all on the Treo 700p? Well, a few reasons:

• The iPod Video has 80GB disk space. That's 20 SD cards in my pocket. While it might help my self-esteem, it's a bit much. It's also 10x what the iPhone will have. I have a boatload of podcasts and Video content for my daughter thanks to the Neuros Recorder 2.
• To be rather frank, listening to podcasts on the Treo sucks, and that's its primary role for me. I have yet to find an application that effectively bookmarks the audio and returns to the bookmark. Kinda crucial for listening to podcasts, don't 'ya think? I'm tired of guessing where I left off at. The Treo is fine for listening to music, though. In addition, I can stream audio off the 'Net with my Treo - something I can't do with the iPod. This has come in handy.
• I can listen to audio and browse at the same time. While it takes two devices, I don't get the choppy audio I tend to get combining the two on the Treo. I don't know if it's an need-more-CPU problem or a Palm OS problem, but it doesn't work great. To be honest, I can live with this but the experience is better with both the iPod and Treo
• The iPod video has better resolution - 320x240 versus 240x240. Big enough difference, but not for a 6 year old :)
  

Hey, my 10 year Sun anniversary is a couple of weeks away. I think I hear the hard drive making funny noises. ...
 

Monday February 05, 2007

I sent to John Wayne airport regarding the current state of "power affairs" within the airport. Since my flight is delayed, I seem to have some time and, luckily enough, the power. It's insane that in this day and age an airport is covering up power outlets. I don't want to speculate the reasoning (temporary?), but the side effects are clear. Business customers are not being served properly by the airport. If you are flying to Southern California and feel that access to power outlets is important, I suggest that you consider alternatives to John Wayne airport. To make the point, I snapped a picture of the two power plug expanders plugged in to the wall outlet. Mine is the white horizontal one that I carry around for situations just like this. The other one is from a guy (one of many) sitting on the ground due to lack of chairs near the power outlet.

I'll let you know what the response is if I get one.