iSkin eXo2 in the Flesh: First Impressions

I just received my iSkin eXo2 in the mail today (Thanks, Andrew!), and all I have to say is coolness. I like this thing. As you can see, I already have it fully assembled with belt clip, dangling wrist strap, and my sony headphones wrapped around the clip for easy storage when not listening to tunes. I was expecting not to like this product, because from the pictures on the web, I was expecting it to be a very rubbery feeling case that smelled rubbery, like those little rubber 'rags' you buy to help open jars. However, it doesn't smell at all that I can tell and it has a nice soft comfortable feeling in your hand. It comes in a little zippered case and with easy set-up instructions for attaching the belt-clip (which you can attach either vertically or horizontally to the back of the eXo2, depending upon your preference), a handstrap, and a little hard plastic protector for your iPod's screen, which you can use or not. I'm using mine for now. In any case, I'll be using this thing extensively this weekend and report back with a more detailed review after several days of use.

Feel free to hop on over to my other blog to see what I have to say about the iSkin ProTouch PB.

40 Hour iPod

Good post on BoingBoing about this:

Run your iPod for 40 hours
This external iPod battery provides 40 hours of playtime and includes a USB port for plugging in USB-charged devices like PDAs and cellphones. It's $100, and no indication of what it weighs.
Link (via iPodHacks) [Boing Boing Blog]

Also, if you have one of the voice recorders for the iPod, this means that you could potentially now record 40 hours of everything you hear without a recharge. I recorded a whole hour one time just to see how it handled longer bits of audio (and I could hear every bit of dialogue from that episode of the O.C.; still have it on my iPod actually. The O.C. is a good show.)

Pod2Go Update

Pod2Go has been updated. Get it.

MacMerc headline...

The following news title to a bit from MacMerc this morning made me almost spew coffee all over my laptop:
MacUpdate offers the iPod Mini at a smarter price--FREE

HA!

iPodMiniWalker

Click here for a chance to waste $10 on an iPod screensaver: iPodMiniWalker.

You know, modern screens don't suffer from the burn-in effect that made screensavers necessary back in the day. There is nothing to be saved. Should be called "ugly processor hogs" rather than screensavers. //rant off

iPod Troubleshooting...

Jason's been trying to fix the iPod that I sold him over Christmas, which has stopped mounting in the Finder or iTunes (!!!), for the better part of the day. He's managed to get it to mount in the Finder now, and is waiting till it fully recharges from a full discharge before attempting more of the tips to be found in this KB article. If he successfully revives the beast, he's going to post the journey of his troubleshooting efforts here. If not, he's going to bounce his new paperweight against my forehead the next time we see each other. Here's to a successful revival!

Pod2Go

Pod2Go is the free swiss-army knife of software for your iPod. You can read news on your iPod due to it, use it rather than iSync, use it to eject your iPod, use it to launch specific programs when your iPod is plugged in, and many other things, all with a nice little icon that remains in your menu bar. Get it.

How to Reset Your iPod

KB article on how to reset your iPod.

iPod mini Origami and the Bait & Switch magics of CDW

I've seen this origami piece mentioned before and wasn't going to bother posting about it here until I saw the following from Cory Doctorow of BoingBoing:

Origami mini-iPod from rip-off artists CDW


From CDW comes an origami mini-iPod. A lot lamer than the other origami iPod, which is unsurprising, given that CDW are a bunch of rip-off artists (I once ordered an iPod from them, got a confirmation, and then got a phone-call telling me they were sold out the iPod at the price they'd confirmed, but could sell me one for $200 more).

760K PDF Link


[Boing Boing Blog]

I have to agree that CDW doesn't always work on the up and up. Several years ago I tried to order an iBook from them and after I placed the order and all was set, I received a call telling me they were out of stock (why couldn't their database online note this) of the iBook at that price, but then giving me a sales-pitch for a more expensive unit. This is called a bait and switch and it is a scam. In short, don't buy from CDW.

Atom feed...

Well, Blogger now has Atom feeds and I put one for this site up in the sidebar, and right here if you are feeling lazy. I'm keeping the other feed up, though, as this new-fangled Atom feed doesn't want to work in NetNewsWire Lite, my RSS reader of choice (although according to this page NNW support is coming soon).

Wishlist for next iPod Software Update

Harold Martin at O'Reilly has a wishlist for the next iPod Software Update.

MacTracker for iPod

I just downloaded Mactracker for iPod:

Mactracker for iPod brings Mactracker's database to Apple's iPod through the Notes feature. Mactracker for iPod requires Mac OS X v10.1.5 or later and an iPod (Dock Connector) withiPod Software 2.0 or later or any iPod mini.

Make sure you have your iPod mounted when you run the installer and that you install on the iPod (the installer comes with no instructions whatsoever and on my first attempt I tried installing to my main hard drive thinking that the info would sync with the Notes folder on my iPod during a normal iSync session. I thought wrong.) So, now to "Get info on any Mac" all I have to do is navigate to Extras/Notes/MackTracker/ and browse through a complete database of Apple-related hardware, software, and peripherals. Pretty cool.

For you Entourage Users out there: iPod It 2.3.1

If you use Entourage and have missed the ability to use iSync to synchronize all your PIM data to your iPod, you should check out iPod It 2.3.1. $14.95.

Me? I use my iPod to listen to music, to play Brick, and to carry around large files . . . I've got a 3650 for everything else.

TuneBelt for iPod

Check this out: The Tune Belt iPod Armband Carrier. Pretty nifty little case for the iPod. I usually just shove mine in a pocket and go, but at $20, this would seem to be a nice little possibility. The one thing about the iPod mini announcement that made me lust after one was the optional armband holder that the regular iPods, like my 15GB, lacked. This is a good solution.

Samurai iPod

Check out this editorial, which claims:

The iPod is the modern-day equivalent of the Samurai sword.

If this is true, I want to be the first iPod Shogun.

How the iPod mini can be cost-effective...

As an mp3 player, I don't think the iPod mini can be considered cost-effective, especially when compared to the regular iPods. However as noted on iPoding ripping the iPod mini open for its Hitachi 4GB Microdrive would be cheaper than buying the drive alone retail.

The 11GB Divide

This entire editorial rant on my part is in response to this post over at MobileWhack, and is cross-posted in the comments there. Here it goes:

The iPod mini:
I just think it was a poorly thought out product launch. I mean, just before announcing the iPod mini for $249, they announced that they were bumping up their $299 model of the regular iPod to 15GB. That makes for an 11GB gap and only a $50 gap in price. Bad math and marketing on Apple's part. I mean, yes, it is smaller and cuter than its big brothers, but the regular iPods are still small and cute themselves.

I think everybody who I've read as being anti- the new mini iPod have focused on this discrepancy. Strangely, all those who are pro-iPod mini have used this "rumor site rhetoric" as I like to call it, trying to overlook this 11GB for $50 gap and how it cripples the iPod mini's marketability, and instead focus on how everybody is slamming "the miniPod because its pricing didn't match what the rumor sites had predicted". I don't care what the rumor sites said. As a conscientious consumer, the math for the iPod mini just doesn't add up for me. I disregard 99% of what the rumor sites say, but I have to tell you, they are an interesting place to examine speculation about what Apple customers would like to see. Apple would have been better served with the iPod mini, had they kept the 10GB iPod (making the $50 divide only 6GB) and introduced a set of iPod mini's starting at 1GB heading up to 4GB and with a nice variant in price. That would have made more commercial sense. Will people buy the mini iPod? Sure. But not nearly as many as would have had Apple produced their usual combination of style and technology. The iPod mini misses the mark for the technologically savvy who are forced to work with a budget, and it misses it because of an 11GB divide that Apple created the day of their announcement of the product.

Verdict is in: NO WMA for iPod

I thought that all sounded really fishy:

Hewlett-Packard: No WMA for IPod
Contrary to reports, HP's version of the iPod music player won't support Microsoft's Windows Media Audio format for downloadable music. By Leander Kahney. [Wired News]

Tuner Tricks

Saw this mentioned over at MobileWhack. Pretty interesting pictures. I cannot tell whether it is just an iPod holder or whether there is some actual wiring that connects the iPod to the stereo. Either way, pretty cool.

HP iPod deal to bring WMA support to the iPod?

Check this out:

HP's blockbuster deal with Apple will have one exciting side effect. The company will be working with Apple to add support for Microsoft's superior Windows Media Audio (WMA) format to the iPod by mid-year. You heard it here first.

/. mentions this here. Needful things: support for all audio formats on the iPod. Ogg Vorbis support would be nice...

Barrett eyeing iPod mini

More words in favor of the iPod mini; this time from the respectable Mr. Barrett.

iPod as Red Box HACK

Saw iBox mentioned over at iPodHACKS. Basically, it's instructions for creating sound files that replicate the sounds generated when coins are dropped to pay for calls in payphones. Kind of retro-cool, but not really a hack (what you could do with it illegally is more of a phreak) and it would only appear to be geared towards Canadian payphones. It all seems a bit of a hassle in the days of the cellphone though. Even if it did work in the USA and I was into doing illegal things, I don't know where my closest payphone is located, and I would imagine it is in some inhospitable locale with absolutely no heat or means of blocking the freezing wind.

Still something c00l to show your 31337 script-kiddie friends, prefaced with "Look what I have set up for if I ever have to go to Canada..."

iPodEject 0.2

Jason pointed me to iPodEject 0.2, which places an iPod eject icon in the menu bar. Click on it to unmount your iPod. Nice.

Griffin iTalk

So, yesterday, I went ahead and pre-ordered the Griffin iTalk along with the SightLight for my iSight. I'll compare it to the Belkin Voice Recorder when it arrives, post a review, and either sell the losing device on ebay, give it away to a friend, or raffle it off on my iPod blog.

iPodRip 3

iPodRip 3 is now available for $9 from the Little App Factory. Makes pulling music off of your iPod a breeze.

Although there used to be a bunch of free alternatives to this out there... Whatayaknow? They are still there.

Xpod rules. It's free. Get it now!

Steve Jobs is a Billionaire...

And because Steve Jobs is a Billionaire, he thinks with a billionaire's wallet. See this:

Steve Jobs suggests a compromise: “I think that one of the biggest customers for the mini is going to be current owners buying a second iPod. They’re going to have both—when I go on a trip I take my whole library with my iPod and when I go to the gym I take the mini.” How’s that for a low-price strategy?

I think that somebody who actually has a concept of an average consumer's budget needs to be Steve's Jester, poking fun at comments like the one quoted above.

I mean, granted, if the iPod mini were $100, I, the current owner of an iPod, would buy a second one for my non-technically minded fiance who would find it cute. But $250 for something less than a 3rd as powerful as the entry level iPod (which also happens to qualify as cute)? No dice...

ICELink for iPod

The ICELink could be another possibility for getting my iPod to play nicely with my car.

A Positive Response to the iPod mini...

Check this out. I disagree with him, but it is a smart analysis of the way things could play out if consumers in general are in fact even dumber than I think they are...

HP iPod in the works...

I was shocked to hear that the new G5 Xserves were certified to run other server software besides OS X Server, and today I was even more surprised to learn that Mac is teaming up with HP to make an HP branded iPod. Check it:

HP to make iPod-based players
Apple's desire to see the iPod remain the leader in the digital music player market got a big push on Thursday when Apple and HP announced that they have formed a strategic alliance to put HP-branded digital music players based on the iPod. The news came at the Consumer Electronics Show (CES) in Las Vegas, Nevada. [MacCentral]

Now, the Server thing makes sense, but it seems like this H-pod move will undercut regular iPod for Windoze sales, no?

Belkin Voice Recorder Broken... Buggy

Well, that's what I get for praising a product too highly. The wonderful Belkin Voice Recorder that I have been loving in the 22 hours that I have owned it just stopped working properly. The speaker will still play back music, but every time I try to record a voice note, it won't play back through the Belkin Voice Recorder. If I plug my iPod in to my computer, the notes play fine. What the heck gives?

Looks like I'll be returning this soon and getting the Griffin one instead...

Update: Performing a soft reset fixed the problem. But it shouldn't have this problem to begin with...

iPod mini too expensive...

This from the Washington Post:

You Call That a Discount?--But many observers were put off by the "low" price of the iPod mini -- $249 verses $299 for the current low-end iPod model. "Apple's price on the iPod Mini wasn't as low as some had anticipated, and it remains unclear whether the markdown will be enough to allow the device to breakthrough to a more mainstream audience," The Wall Street Journal said. "The price puts it between cheaper MP3 players that use flash memory but store far fewer songs and the entry-level model of the iPod itself, which now offers roughly 15GB of storage for $299," The Washington Post explained. (A $100 price tag for the mini was bandied about on some rumor sites, the S.F. Chronicle noted in its coverage.)

I think the pricing of the iPod mini is a huge mistake. Anyone who is all tech savvy will realize that for $50 more you can have an iPod with 3 times as much space for music or data. What they should have done is made a 1GB iPod mini for $100, a 2GB for $150, and a 4GB for $200. Those prices would get much more purchases. I would've bought the 1GB model for my fiance, b/c she thinks they are cute. I don't think cute sells at $249, though.

A Review of the 15GB iPod & Belkin Voice Recorder

15GB iPod:
In a word: Nice! iPod Docs are for Windoze users and losers ... The cord only option on the 15GB model works better for my portable Powerbook lifestyle. However, this also highlights my one complaint between my old first generation 10GB iPod and the new 3G models: the move from straight Firewire to an iPod proprietary cord. This is a design mistake, as far as I am concerned. With my old iPod, I could take it anywhere and plug it into any firewire capable computer with a nice little 3-inch long firewire cord that I have. Easy file access anywhere. Now, I have to make sure I have my 2 foot long iPod cord with me, and if it should short out from all the wear and tear I unleash on it while pulling it in and out of bags and rolling it into little tightly wound wreaths, I have to buy a replacement proprietary cord from Apple for $19, when with my old iPod, I could have just grabbed any of the extra firewire cords that I happen to have lying around my junk box in the closet at home. Fortunately, for a dollar less than the cost of a replacement cord, I could simply buy the PocketDock from SendStation, which basically is a small adapter that makes using regular firewire cords possible again. Now I just have to decide whether to go ahead and order that now, or wait until the cord fails...

Other than this one small short-coming (and the lack of a remote on the headphones on the 15GB), this new iPod is nice. Lighter, thinner and more awe-inspiring than my old 10GB. The way the backlighting fades in and out and the red lighting of the keys are very nice touches.

What really makes it excellent is the Belkin Voice Recorder, which isn't compatible with older model iPods and which I have been lusting after since it was first announced. Now I can record notes, or anything, and in abundance whenever I want. Here's a short clip of my pet parrot, Misha, saying "hello", that I recorded with the Belkin Voice Recorder and converted to mp3 in iTunes. And, you can use it as a little speaker for all your songs to boot. The sound is nice and clear, although mono, not too loud, and lacking a good bit of bass, but still pretty cool. Thanks to this tiny little speaker and the built in alarm clock in the iPod, I woke up to the "One Two Three Four..." of "Hey Ya!" by Outkast this morning. Now if that's not the start of a cheerful day, I don't know what is...

Only downside of the BVR is that I am a loud person and if I get my mouth too close to the mic while recording notes there is much distortion and popping. But, that is simply something that habit will fix...

All in all, I have to say that the 15GB iPod is the best buy out there for the price, and the Belkin Voice Recorder is a worthy addition. I wonder how the recently announced Griffin iTalk will compare? The pass through headphone jack and plug for an external mic are definite advantages over the BVR. I might have to buy one of those too, just to alleviate my curiosity...

Famous '1984' ad hacked with an iPod

If you didn't notice during yesterday's keynote, the classic '1984' Macintosh commercial that aired during that year's Super Bowl had been upgraded via CGI with an iPod. Get your downloadable copy of the new iPod-hacked version of the ad here.

Addendum: Weird. For some reason this link is malfunctioning in Safari (there should be the word "here" that is linked to the address, but it isn't showing up above), so I am just going to paste the address here:

http://www.apple.com/hardware/ads/1984/

UPDATE: Ok. It wasn't Safari that caused the link to disappear. It was PithHelmet which was blocking the link to an ad. Sorry for any confusion...

In-Dash iPod Solution for your Automobile...

After dealing with several FM transmitters that work rather intermittently, if at all, I might have to look to upgrading my car's stereo with an Alpine iPod Ready Interface Kit in the not-too-distant future. Check it:

Alpine announces car stereo integration with iPod
In what the company says is a world first, Alpine Electronics will release a car stereo unit that allows you to connect your iPod to your car stereo and control it from there. They're calling it the iPod Ready Interface kit, and they're building it into selected 2004 Alpine in-dash receivers. [MacCentral]

Jason Ball, Contributor...

As my friend, Jason Ball enabled my current purchase of my 15GB iPod by buying my first-gen 10GB iPod from me, I decided to invite him to be a contributer to the site. He's been posting some interesting things over at his site about his 'new' iPod that he will be cross-posting over here.

Welcome to my iPod Blog 3.0...

Welcome to my iPod blog, version 3.0. I started one of these back when I bought my first generation 10GB iPod, then I grew weary of posting all the time, acted as a bad netizen and erased the entire site, then had second thoughts and started it up again for a short time. That 2.0 version of the site is still floating around on Radio Userland's servers, although I have tried to erase it several times.

This is a new incarnation of my iPod blog, focusing on my new 15GB iPod, announced at MacWorld SF yesterday, and purchased yesterday from the Westchester Apple Store. I wanted to name this site oddPod and focus on the odd members of the iPod family, like the 15GB, the iPod mini, and older generation iPods, but somebody already had the name and is doing absolutely nothing with it as of this posting. grrrr....

In any case, I also run a site called 3650 and a 12-inch, if you are interested. More to come...