My Latest Object Of Desire

[editor]

I wandered into the Apple Store today and what did I see....

The iPod Nano. The iPod Shuffle is history. This thing is smaller, thinner, holds about the same number of songs. It's solid-state and sports a color screen and many more functions than my other iPods.

I hate when I can't justify blowing cash on electronics.

[pineda]

My daughter has a Dell DJ, and loves it!

[editor]

I was never much of a music fan until portable MP3 players came along.

As a kid I had a few Walkmen, and had one of the first portable CD players when I was in elementary school. It took 12 AA batteries! After that I kind of drifted away and didn't care about it.

Then I got my wife one of the first iPods because she is a HUGE music fan. That got me hooked. I love the idea of having so many songs in such a neat little package.

Whether you have an iPod, or a Dell DJ or a Rio or something else, I think they're all great and really have revolutionized music.

[RedScare]

I have never been that big on the portable tunes. From Walkmans to Discmans to iPods, I just never wanted to lug that stuff around for my music. I like it in my car and in front of my couch.

I wish I could ditch my cellphone, too. I am WAY too connected to my office. No way to escape with that damn thing on my belt. *sighs*

But, since I gotta have it, what I really like is the Treo 650. Price is down to $299 with a commitment. Since I've been with Verizon for 8 years, a commitment doesn't bother me much. And it will download my entire calendar into its PDA, as well as my 1600 contacts. Sweet!

http://www.palm.com/us/products/smartphones/treo650/

[Subdude]

I lug around an ipod and a phone, so my latest object of desire is the new Motorola ipod phone. Even though it only carries 50 songs or so, that can be plenty for a plane flight. The problem is that Cingular will be carrying it, and I have Verizon.

[Jeebus]

  The problem is that Cingular will be carrying it, and I have Verizon.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Thats been my complaint from day one. I was with cingular when they had crappy phones, so I switched to sprint. Now cingular has all the good phones.

When will the day come when you can have any cell phone with any provider? Also, do any of the Palm phones play mp3s?

[editor]

All of the Palm phones should be able to play MP3's. My Palm Pilot from five years ago was able to do it, and they've only gotten better since then.

As for being able to use any phone with any provider, that's slightly possible.

My phone and my wife's phone are both unlocked GSM phones. That means we can use any GSM provider. Right now she's with T-Mobile and I'm with Vodaphone Austria and roaming on AT&T Wireless. If either of us want to switch to another company it's as easy as buying a new SIM chip for $25 and sticking it in the phone. When we travel overseas (except Japan) we frequently buy pre-paid SIM cards and jam them in our phones. That gives us local rates and a local number pre-paid that we don't have to worry about. When we get back to the states we just slip in our regular SIM cards.

If my wife ever decided she didn't like T-Mobile she could switch to Cingular just by sliding in a Cingular SIM card. We have no contracts or obligations on either of the phones or phone lines, so we're free to do what we want with them.

But freedom has its price. We paid full-price up front for the phones, instead of getting them free with a contract. Her phone was $99 and mine was about $300. But I think I've saved at least that much by being able to use a lower-priced rate plan than the one that comes with a "free" phone. If I think I'm going to use more minutes, I call and change to a higher plan. If my wife has extra minutes left over at the end of the month I call T-Mobile and switch her to a lower rate plan. Since I own the phones and am not tied to a particular carrier I can do whatever I want. I generally don't change much with my phone because my German is dreadful, but I've made six or seven changes a month to my wife's T-Mobile USA service without any problems.

I guess the carriers are offering phones that are "free" as in beer.

I'd rather have one that's "free" as in speech.

[Jeebus]

How sad am I? I just had to ask a co-worker about sim cards Now that I'm up to speed, I have some questions:

1. unlocked GSM is the type of phone to buy?

2. where do you get SIM cards for different carriers?

3. I thought you HAD to have a contract with the phone companies?

4. Do US carriers sell pre-paid sim cards?

[kjb434]

Unlocked phones are all over the internet. Many are in Europe, but some are here in the US.

I had Moto MPX200 under AT&T. Cingular was trying to get me to buy a new phone, but I loved that little phone. It had windows on it, played MP3 off an SD memory card (1Gb of storage). It had all my contacts and calendar items straight from Outlook.

My partner got the new Razor, I borrowed his sim card and paid about $35 online to someone in the UK for the special code for my particular phone to unlock it. When you put a foreign SIM card in a locked phone, it'll ask for a code to unlock it. I put that code in and it unlocked. Then i went to Cingular and told them I unlocked it and they gave me a new SIM card. Great! The only problem is I can't Text Message now (didn't before) or go online from my phone (didn't do it that much before).

There are a lot of places online that better describe the process. The thing is you need to have a foreign SIM card for your phone from another carrier to unlock it along with the code.

I'm now going to use this phone until motorola unleashes the Q, there next generation of Window Mobile phones. It should be out in January 2006.

I was thinking of going with the Palm Treo, but I'm used to the Smartphone interface. The only problem is that the new phone going to hit me for about $500. The Treo is a cool phone though and has a loyal following.

[editor]

You don't have to buy from the internet to get an unlocked GSM phone. I got an unlocked Ericsson T68mc from a place on the Southwest Freeway between Westpark and KPRC. I think it was called The Phone Warehouse. It's on the inbound side. They have a large selection of unlocked GSM phonews.

The key is to go to a mom and pop phone shop, and not to one of the carrier stores (the ones that only sell one carrier's phones.) Go to a store that sells phones from a bunch of carriers. They are more likely to give you better choices because they aren't obligated to sell one particular phone company's phones. These stores usually also sell unlocked phones.

You do not have to have a contract with phone companies. That's a myth they would like you to believe. My wife's T-Mobile is without a contract. I had my old phone with T-Mobile with no contact. The company I'm with now is contractless, too. The contracts only exist so the phone companies can recoup the money they spent giving you a free phone. If you're bringing your own phone, you don't owe them anything, so why should you have a contract.

Essentially, here's how phone stores make money

1. Line activations

2. Selling phones

3. Selling accessories

1 - Every time they sign someone up for a contract or for a new phone number they get money from the carrier (Cingular, Verizon, whomever). It used to be $300/line, but that may have changed over the years.

2 - If they throw in a free phone, they're counting on the contract to make money. If there's no contract (mom and pop shop) then they make money off the phone.

3 - Self-explanatory.

You can get SIM cards from carrier stores or from the mom-and-pop shops. When my wife moved to Houston from Minnesota she had an unlocked Voicestream phone (this was before Voicestream and T-Mobile merged). We went to the T-Mobile store on West Gray and bought a new SIM card tied to a Houston phone number for $30. BTW: I don't recommend going to that store. The salespeople are very unfriendly, unhelpful, and are more interested in sitting around listening to their ghetto blasters than actually helping customers.

There are several U.S. companies that sell pre-paid SIMs. I'm pretty sure T-Mobile does it. I'm not sure who else, but I've seen plenty of ads for them, so it's just a matter of finding the companies.

[editor]

Boo! Hiss! I'm less in love with the iPod Nano now:

Think Secret shows that it's USB only. No Firewire! So it only transfers song as slow-ass USB speed, not the full speed its capable of. That's the thing that annoys me most about my Shuffle -- it takes so long to put songs on there. All of my other iPods are Firewire, this one should be, too.

[Talbot]

I really like cingulars new Razor phone, but I am also with Verizon.

Editor, how much is that iPod Nano? And I am thinking about buying an iPod for christmas, will it work on windows or will I need another manufacturers product?

[Jeebus]

Think Secret shows that it's USB only.  No Firewire!  So it only transfers song as slow-ass USB speed, not the full speed its capable of.  That's the thing that annoys me most about my Shuffle -- it takes so long to put songs on there.  All of my other iPods are Firewire, this one should be, too.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Is it not USB2?

[YakuzaIce]

Editor, how much is that iPod Nano? And I am thinking about buying an iPod for christmas, will it work on windows or will I need another manufacturers product?

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

It is $200 for the 2GB and $250 for the 4GB. Personally unless you need something small I would just spend the extra $50 and get the 20GB photo iPod.

[Talbot]

ok, thanks for the advice.

[editor]

Is it not USB2?

It is USB2, but all flavors of USB are slow when transferring large amounts of data because of the overhead.

Since iTunes has the ability to write songs to more than one 'Pod at a time, I'll have to hook both up and do a little speed test.

[ssullivan]

I've found my work laptop transfers files to my two-month-old iPod over USB 2.0 extremely fast -- I moved over about 20 new songs I purchased on iTunes to the iPod about a week ago and it took only about four or five seconds. I know it's still a little slower than firewire but in actual use it's probably not a noticeable difference unless you're moving a ton of song files all at once.

Now, for some odd reason my iPod has never been able to work with my home computer, a desktop machine with USB 2.0. At first I thought the iPod was defective when I bought it, but then I tried it on my work computer and it worked immediately, so I've just always used it there.

[Jeebus]

USB2 may not be Firewire - but its comparable.

[editor]

You're right, USB 2.0 is close to Firewire speeds, especially when transferring fewer, larger files.

I have an outboard Firewire 800 drive, though, that no USB can touch. I only wish iPods had THAT kind of connection.

[editor]

I was going to buy a Nano in Europe this week because I like to get things when I'm away so they remind me of my trip later. But get this -- with all of the European taxes and VAT added on, the Nano that costs $249 here is almost $400 over there. No, thanks. I'm not paying that much tax on anything.

[YakuzaIce]

Oh yeah one disadvantage to the nano is that since it is flash memory it will degrade over time. Just something to keep in mind. But then again if you are rough with your electronics a flash drive is probably for you.

[ssullivan]

I was going to buy a Nano in Europe this week because I like to get things when I'm away so they remind me of my trip later.  But get this -- with all of the European taxes and VAT added on, the Nano that costs $249 here is almost $400 over there.  No, thanks.  I'm not paying that much tax on anything.

The VAT is usually refundable (I know it is in the UK) but you have to fill out some paperwork in the store at time of purchase, and then deal with it again when you are at the airport departing. With the exchange rate it's probably still a lot more expensive than here.

[editor]

I've done a lot of VAT refund paperwork already from my wife shopping at Harrod's and Harvey Nick's. I may wait until I leave to get it, though. I've heard that the Dixon's in the duty-free zone at Heathrow has it cheap enough (and tax free) that it's actually less than the American price. Here's hoping!

I went to the Apple Store on Regent street on Saturday and people were four and five deep around the table with the Nanos. There must have been 200 people just looking at those. I didn't get one. I got a

[kjb434]

One thing I just learned, I need a job that travels internationally.

I may start looking for Civil Engineering work that requires travel (other than Iraq).

I may have to look towards an oil company though.

[editor]

Be sure to travel to countries with iTunes Music Stores. Then you can buy the pre-paid cards and download music that you can't get here. (He says as he's listening to GLC's "Your Missus Is a Nutter")

[jmancuso]

the nanos scratch real easy...more so than the big ipods.

[MidtownCoog]

Yea, but even after the VAT refund, Burberry for example (and most others) is much pricier than what you pay at home.

But at least you can say you bought it in Knightsbridge.

And the real kicker? Harrod's is nothing more than a mini-Galleria minus the food hall.

[ssullivan]

Yea, but even after the VAT refund, Burberry for example (and most others) is much pricier than what you pay at home.

No kidding. That exchange rate is ridiculous these days. This weekend when I was reconciling my credit card I got to see how much my purchases in London really cost me. Oh well... the trip was well worth it and I didn't do a lot of shopping for things I could buy in the US.

[MidtownCoog]

I did score a "UK only" Burberry for a measly 350 pounds.

They even called the Galleria for me to triple check that you can't get it here.

Wifey loves it...

[editor]

I did score a "UK only" Burberry for a measly 350 pounds.

They even called the Galleria for me to triple check that you can't get it here.

Wifey loves it...

My wife does that, too -- picks up stuff that you can only get in different countries. Japan is great for that. A lot of comapnies do special lines for them because it's such a large market with such a different culture.

She got a LV purse with a psychadelic panda on it. Now she gets questions about it everywhere she goes.

Fortunately, I don't have to go all the way to Tokyo to get more iTunes Japan cards. There's a company over there called J-List that will ship them to the U.S. for pretty close to face value. I've bought a few things from them and they're very reliable and quick.

the nanos scratch real easy...more so than the big ipods.

I've heard that, too, but haven't been able to puzzle out why. They're made of the same stuff as the big iPods, so it must have something to do with the shape. I wonder if since they're so small people are much more likely to put them in their pockets than they were with the big ones that often ended up in belt clips or in protectors in purses. Hopefully I'll get one by Christmas and be able to see for myself.