I-Pods.

[Tom]

After spending much of today oogleing the Ipod Minis in town, and coming damn close to buying one, I want an opinion on them from someone who isnt being paid to sell or demote them. Does anyone here own one? Thoughts or comments welome from all.

Tom

[tufty]

I can't vouch for the iPod mini, but having used one of the originals, I can say that they rock, and mightily. The interface of the originals is simplicity itself, I believe the minis are closer to the originals than anything else. As with most things Apple, you pay a bit extra for the fact that it not only does what it says on the box, but doesn't require an OS reinstall every 3 days. You turn it on. It works. Period.

Although not actually paid by Apple, I am an unashamed Apple fan (I had to bite my tongue _very_ hard at the recent 'PC breakdown' thread), so take this comment with as much salt as you like.

Overall, I'd say 'buy one'

Simon

[paul skinner]

Only complaint I've heard is the battery is proprietary. Once it dies, the IPod is toast. Kind of a draw back for me.

[Tom]

yeah, i've heard no end of battery issues, as as it's half the cost of a new pod to replace, i might hold out to the 5th gen pods, and see how they are doing with battery.

Tom

[Bruno Ogorelec]

Although not actually paid by Apple, I am an unashamed Apple fan (I had to bite my tongue _very_ hard at the recent 'PC breakdown' thread)

I just want to say that I learned working with a computer on a Mac. It was Mac for my first full year at the keyboard.

Switched to a PC after that and moaned for maybe a week. Once I got the hang of it, I never looked back. It's a personal thing. I just never got to like the logic of the commands, the software or anything else.

[Viv]

After spending much of today oogleing the Ipod Minis in town, and coming damn close to buying one, I want an opinion on them from someone who isnt being paid to sell or demote them. Does anyone here own one? Thoughts or comments welome from all.

Tom

Ok save all your pennies and buy the big IPod! the current 40Gb one, I have a 2g 30Gb one and I take it every were.

My ITunes music library is currently 35.17Gb so i cant take it all with me:-(

Don't be fooled in to thinking the small one is ok as you will just take what you want out with you, I thought that and I find now that I listen to more of my music than I ever did before, having it all with me means what ever I am doing I have the right music:-)

Get the big one!!!!! you wont regret it ever!

Viv
Another Mac fan:-)

[Viv]

yeah, i've heard no end of battery issues, as as it's half the cost of a new pod to replace, i might hold out to the 5th gen pods, and see how they are doing with battery.

Tom

The battery issue was on the early ones and then only some of them, I got a battery replacement cover when i got mine so no problem if it does fail.

There are no a number of companys doing replacement after market batterys that are better than the original so its a none isssue now.

Viv

[Tom]

I can see where you are coming from, but i have no need for that much, I have the bus ride into school, maybe an hour a day in terms of lessons or after school lessons where i can listen, and the bus home, with the occasional bus journey to town after school or at the weekends. Its going to be for music and file storage, because i am already getting through 256megs of mp3 a day. I can chance music over at school (friends laptops, school account, my pc setup as a server to let me access all my music at school), and at home, so 4gb sounds about ok for me. Beisdes, the look schweet. Hows the battery holding out on yours Viv?

Tom

[tufty]

yeah, i've heard no end of battery issues, as as it's half the cost of a new pod to replace, i might hold out to the 5th gen pods, and see how they are doing with battery.

Ummm. ipodsdirtysecret.com, I'll bet. That one's been hyped to buggery. The iPod battery is no worse than any other consumer lithium-ion pack in respect of battery life. It's not 'consumer replaceable' as far as apple are concerned, but they can be replaced, and cheaply. The battery is covered under the standard 1 year warranty. You can extend that warranty to 2 years for a small sum. Apple are very, very, good at replacing stuff under warranty. I've been there, I know. I've also been there with Dell, and been kept away from equipment I needed for months at a time. There's a reason I use Apple gear, after all.

As a quick reminder:

"Dell's new DJ portable music player uses an integrated, non-user-replaceable lithium ion battery, just like the iPod. Dell also has no plan or program to replace batteries outside of warranty at this time (verified by calls to both Dell sales and Dell technical support, 12/03/03). Other music players, such as the Gateway DMP Series, Samsung YP-910GS (Napster), iRiver iHP Series, and Rio Karma - all viewed as the only comparisons to iPod that even come close - all use integrated lithium ion batteries sealed inside the enclosure." (http://www.ipodbatteryfaq.com)


As for 'half the cost of a new ipod', I don't know how much you're considering paying for your iPod, but chez apple a replacement battery is $99, and if you fancy changing your own check http://ipodminibattery.com/ - how's $49 for a battery for the iPod mini sound? Or $39 from http://ipodbattery.com

Don't believe the hype.

Simon

[tufty]

Switched to a PC after that and moaned for maybe a week. Once I got the hang of it, I never looked back. It's a personal thing. I just never got to like the logic of the commands, the software or anything else.

Okay Bruno, I'll bite. I don't normally, as these things can get kind of religious, but hey, it's Wednesday and I burned my finger on a hot jamjar tonight, so I'm feeling kinda frisky.

I could care less what the computer looks like, and what badge is on it, as long as it does the job. I could care less what the software looks like, as long as it does the job. And that's why, most of the time, I use, and will recommend others to use, Apple hardware running OSX. I also use and recommend Linux or the various free *nixes, depending on needs. I would only recommend Windows to people who absolutely need a piece of software that is tied to Windows, or whom I don't like. I'm actually guessing you're tied to Windows by software.

So, on with the rant...

With respect, I think you're comparing a 2004 OS (WinXP) to something somewhat older (MacOS 'classic'). While I'll grant you that MacOS < 10 was crashy (no more so than W98, though), OSX is _stable_. It has stuff _now_ that longhorn _might_ have in 2007. It's gone through 3 major releases, and is getting better all the time.

For me, my machines need to be working. 100% of the time. No pissing about with checking for spyware. No worrying about viruses. No semi-annual complete reformat and reinstalls. Unfortunately, I still know all about such pain-in-the-ass stuff, as I have many people who rely on me for (unpaid, of course) tech support. I lose approx 2 days a month to such crap. The people I've sold on macs don't tend to come back for tech support more than once a year or so...

[turboslab:~] simon% uptime
23:29 up 64 days, 13:34, 5 users, load averages: 0.54 0.62 0.49

That is on my laptop, which goes everywhere with me. Over 2 months without being shut down. The last shutdown was an OS upgrade. This machine gets hammered. It's been taken apart, dropped, deliberately gutted to save a friend's job (long story, that, involves a man going for a major sales pitch with his laptop but no charger) and still works 100%. I've had it since 2001, and despite 3 complete OS upgrades (from OSX 10.0 through to 10.3) and countless point upgrades, it has _never_ required a complete reinstall.

My 'server', which is a 9500 from 1997 or so, hauled from a skip for free and given a $45 processor upgrade (I got lucky on eBay), recently got shut down for a disk upgrade. It had been up and running (linux), without a hitch or a single shutdown, for over a year. Once you're over the initial 'hump' of linux installation (software installs can be kind of a pain - x requires y requires z etc) and have a stable system, linux boxes basically run without requiring any attention. Or, if super secure systems are your bag, OpenBSD is generally thought to be rather good.

As a comparison, I have been loaned a PC laptop running XP pro by a client, as I need to be able to connect to a local SQL server instance (dialup access being rather painful). It has crashed twice today. 6 weeks ago, it 'forgot' it had drivers for its video card, and no amount of coaxing can convince it otherwise, so now it runs at 640x40 in 16 colors. SQL server needs stopping and restarting every time the machine starts up, or I can't make connections to it externally, not to mention the fact that it has some semi-standard SQL implementation. The machine crashes hard if I try to send it to sleep, so I have to shut it down regularly It's not even like it's some no-name clone - it's a bloody thinkpad that cost more new than my powerbook. I have had similar experiences with Dell machines, which were locked down by tech support - my machine, from the same batch as the one next to it, would run continuously for a matter of hours before bluescreening, wheras the other would run for days. Identical machines, identically configured, and running nothing other than email clients, as we actually did all our work on the Sun boxes, but basically random behaviour.

Still, when all is said and done, these are tools, not 'lifestyle choices' (as our friends 'over the pond' might say). If Windows works for you, more power to you. But if you have the time, check out a newer mac, just for jollies. You might be surprised how nice they are. Even if they do come with a no-button mouse.

Oh, and for the intel hardware, you could do worse than to check out a copy of knoppix. It's kinda sweet, and it's a nice way to try out a modern linux without touching your existing windows install.

Anyway, this is all rather offtopic. I'll shut up now and concentrate on growing my fingerprints back.

Simon

[Viv]

Hey Coffee I hope you didn't buy one today! new toys just been released

http://www.macrumors.com/

Viv

[Bruno Ogorelec]

Simon,

I have heard plenty of stories like yours over the years.

The onyl thing I can say is that ALL the problems I have had over 14 years of working 12-hour days on PCs, were traceable to (a) poor installation practices and (b) hardware problems.

As for (b) -- please remember that I have only very recently come to buy brand-name equipment. For about a decade, I worked merrily on a network of PCs put together by semi-amateirs out of anonymous Singaporean, Taiwanese etc sources -- generic stuff, often coming in white cardboard boxes with descriptions stencilled on the sides.

The prices were completely silly.

The only thing I never stinted on was installation. I have had a man with religious approach to software install everything on my network.

For years, I never had problems except for viruses, and those were rare and benign and have almost disappeared in the past couple of years. To be clear -- they _have_ disappeared as infection. They only pop up as a system warning these days.

I've had nothing but good service from Microsoft software. I've had horrible problems with Symantec software, but not Microsoft. Even Win98Me worked greatly for me for two years, and that's probably the most bitched-about piece of MS software ever.

Time for time, my Ford Escort (back when I had it) gave me more problems than my cheap generic computers on MS software.

I will allow that I may be a special case. I am not saying Apple-Bad-PC-and-Microsoft-Good. I am saying that I've built my business around low-grade PCs and Microsoft and prospered for a decade, without major problems.

[Tom]

Yeah, i saw the U2 Pod, came onto the UK mac page a few hours after i got in, and quite frankly, i think it looks s**t. another 70 pounds to have some laser etched signatures, an uglier theme and some U2 that i already have isnt that much of an incentive to me. And the photo iPod? the iPod should be kept for music, what it does best. on a 5 cm screen, i wouldnt even look at the photos i have.

Tom

[Bruno Ogorelec]

Ben, I transfered from Mac to PC 14 years ago. From Mac then to PC then. Even back then, once I got used to it (in about a week) I preferred PC.

Yes, I do have a problem at the moment. It happens once in a week or two and lasts twenty seconds -- until the computer reboots. Nothing else happens that's of any consequence, and the system recovers all the files perfectly as far as I can see.

You can't say things like that do not happen on Macs. One of the people workng for me in Canada (yes, I employ a Canadian living in Toronto)works on a Mac (3 years old) and it's broken down five times in the past year. I mean, BROKEN DOWN. My system has not actually broken down so that it couldn't work in... dunno, maybe a couple of years. Not one of the four cheap PCs. The worst hardware problem I've had this year was one Ethernet card going bad. Took twenty minutes to fix and cost about $ 35.

Again, I am not saying this is a rule. Maybe I'm an exception. I certainly don't hear many other people praising PCs and Microsoft. Given my excellent experience with both, however, I suspect that at least some of the bitching is a pose. But, I don't really know that. I know very little about computers.

[Mike Kirney]

It's incredible how far personal technology has come. In 1985, if you had told me that people would be taking pictures with their mobile phones and downloading free music in their homes, I would have laughed my head off. Now Viv is recommending that Tom carry 35 gigs of mp3 with him, which is about 24 solid days of music at 1 meg/minute. When I was Tom's age, I was sh*tting my pants over 90 minute tapes, VHS, and big yellow Walkmans.