Non-phone

Oct. 18th, 2009 05:01 pm
livingdeb: (Default)
[personal profile] livingdeb
Robin got a new 32GB iPod Touch to test as part of his job. It has everything he likes about the iPhone except the phone plus you don't have to get the expensive phone service contract. (I'm tempted to call it the non-phone, though it also doesn't have a camera or a microphone.) He's decided to get one, inspiring his co-workers to welcome him to the 21st century. He will use it for everything he used is Palm for and more.

I used to have an electronic device, too (a Revo). I used its databases for keeping track of loads of things like restaurants (including what we already tried and did or did not like), grocery store prices, and books and movies I want but don't already have. It was done in by a totally amazing thunderstorm, during which I actually gave up on the umbrella (not so useful with extremely high winds) and decided I would just get soaked, especially after having to cross a creek to get home from work. Meanwhile, water had seeped through the layers of things in my backpack until my Revo was no more.

They stopped making those. I replaced it once anyway with a used one. That also broke, though I no longer remember how. I got disgusted and went back to paper for some things and looking things up on the computer before leaving the house for other things.

Apple's website advertises the Touch as a pocket computer as well as an iPod and a game playing system. Here are the computer uses it touts:
* wi-fi - this didn't work at the hardware store where we were. And when we were looking at a map on the way to the restaurant, it kept covering it up with a message saying that it couldn't tell where we were, saying to press a button to get rid of the message, like 8 times within the last mile.
* Safari - web browsers are great, but they are less thrilling when you can't get on the internet as happened to us today.
* e-mail - again, less exciting without the connection.
* keyboard - they call it fast, but it's not fast like typing. It's two-finger typing all over again. Robin swears it's miraculous, and even with his man fingers, it always guesses the right letter. He admits that he is careful and does have to look at the keyboard while typing. For a device smaller than even my hand, that sounds great.
* maps - again with the networking
* social networking - deja vous

They don't actually mention things like word processors, databases, calendars, to do lists. You know, things where you input the information yourself. Robin has already found a calculator he loves for $2. He assures me that there are other great software programs out there super cheap or free. It may actually already have more available programs than any other sort of computer because of how they reward non-employees to write them.

The iPod Touch might be an excellent device to drag on vacations instead of my computer as something to load my pictures onto when I run out of room on my camera.

On the other hand, it is completely vulnerable to water.

To those of my readers with iPhones or iPod Touches, what are your favorite and least favorite uses?

on 2009-10-18 10:52 pm (UTC)
Posted by [identity profile] p-j-cleary.livejournal.com
The Kindle app and the Sirius/XMradio app are the two things I can't live without on my iPod Touch. I do wish I had an iPhone, but I won't get one until I can get better service than AT&T, because of the wifi issue.

I mostly use my iPod Touch for reading and listening to satellite radio when I'm in bed. I also like it for taking reading material with me to places where I don't want to drag a book (like the doctor's office).

I have to download the 3.0 stuff, because I'd like to try the Rhapsody app. I don't buy a lot of music, but if I could rent the service every month, I'd listen to music at work a lot.

on 2009-10-20 03:42 am (UTC)
Posted by [identity profile] livingdeb.livejournal.com
Wow, thanks.

I don't think these things are for me. I still like libraries for books and don't mind dragging at least the paperbacks with me everywhere. I don't bring music with me, either. It's always playing at home, and mostly when I'm going out, music would just be distracting.

on 2009-10-20 03:44 am (UTC)
Posted by [identity profile] livingdeb.livejournal.com
Oh, and I have a regular DVD player already installed in my car. Music is a little too distracting when I'm driving, but I'm pretty good at prioritizing properly (I do stop singing along when something unexpected happens that requires my full attention).

on 2009-10-20 03:51 am (UTC)
Posted by [identity profile] livingdeb.livejournal.com
Oh, I do listen to music in the car (even though it's borderline too distracting), but I have a CD player built in. And I have a CD with loads of songs on it made for me by Robin, so I'm happy with that solution for now.

on 2009-10-19 12:01 am (UTC)
Posted by [identity profile] llcoolvad.livejournal.com
iPhone here. I second the Kindle app -- I use that every single day. I play games on it (mostly bejeweled and sudoku -- both were on sale -- but I have about 10 games). I use the weather app, calendar, AIM, clock with alarm, text messaging, voice memo, Shazam (identifies songs wherever you are, from movies, tv, radio, whatever), facebook, MLB app (baseball is my life), TweetDeck for twitter, NY Times app, mail for all my email except work, etc. I have a lot more that I rarely use, but I use all of the ones I listed all the time. Honestly, I rarely move around without my iPhone in my pocket, so I use it just about constantly. Oddly I don't use it for music much, as my car stereo doesn't have an Aux In jack and my phone doesn't have a converter like my iPod does. So my music mostly still comes from my iPod.

When I had a Handspring Prism and after that a Treo, I used them a lot more for documents and databases. But with the internet a quick google search away, I rarely bother. I have a few docs (via DocsToGo) on my phone, mostly my coded list of passwords and a couple of lists of things I own (CDs and Books).

on 2009-10-20 03:47 am (UTC)
Posted by [identity profile] livingdeb.livejournal.com
Interesting. So you are able to access Google fairly regularly? I would love to have that capability, especially when I am in a store and want to look up reviews.

I'm realizing I spend a lot of time around desktop computers and maybe don't need an additional computer for when I'm between desktops.

Games! Dangerous! The alarm clock sounds good, though.

on 2009-10-19 12:03 am (UTC)
Posted by [identity profile] llcoolvad.livejournal.com
Oh, and I use the camera a lot, too. It takes crap-tastic pictures, but the camera in your hand is better than the camera at home! So there's that.

on 2009-10-20 03:49 am (UTC)
Posted by [identity profile] livingdeb.livejournal.com
Your pictures look great, online anyway. I'm always surprised when you apologize for how crappy the phone camera is. It's so much better than other phone cameras! I drag my regular camera around with me. It's about the size of an iPod touch, only several times thicker, so that's not as crazy as it sounds.

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