Month: September 2006

According to Microsloth inside sources, Redmond has decided to drop the anticipated price of the Zune digital media player to US$230. As you may have already heard, MS was shocked by the recent news from Apple that the new 30GB iPod would be priced at $249. They had plans to roll out the Zune at $290, thinking that would be ten bucks below Apple’s comparable player. Surprise!

So MS will now have to take an even bigger up-front hit to stay on target as being the iPod killer (or so they dream). Gizmodo surmises they’ll likely try to minimized the pricing blow by ditching pre-loads we wouldn’t have given a crap about anyway.

A year or so ago, I was thinking that there should be some way of consolidating all of the different charging adapters for portable devices, rechargeable batteries, tool powerpacks, etc. We have a drawer full of this mess. Right after this “brainstorm,” I saw a piece, in think in ReadyMade, for building a small cabinet to act as an uber-charging station. Gawd, it really DOES take a small cabinet, doesn’t it?

The items linked to here won’t solve all of your problems, but they do consolidate up to three devices (phones, iPods, PDAs) into one streamlined unit. They have a home model and a traveling one. The Traveling Power Station (shown here) is actually a respectable travel bag, with space for other gear, papers, etc. The cigarette lighter-type DC adapter allows you to charge three gadgets at once on your car’s power.

[Via Gear Factor]

iLounge has a piece worth reading called “Ten Must-Read Details on the New iPods.” Here’s an eye-opening sample:

“How much better are the new iPod screens?
Apple says that the “enhanced” 5G iPod is 60% brighter than the original, but the difference wasn’t that much more noticeable during our limited testing time. Apparently the new screens have been quietly trickled into pre-Showtime 5G iPods, and no one has noticed. Resolution of the new iPod’s screen apparently hasn’t changed from before – it still displays 320×240 resolution, despite the fact that Apple’s iTunes videos now display at 640×480 on computers. In other words, if you didn’t like the prior 5G screen, this one isn’t going to win you over, but we liked everything but the small size of the prior screen, and continue to like this new one.

“Apple’s press announcement for the iPod nano suggests that the new nano screen is also brighter than before, without quantification. We’ve seen variability in brightness in older nano screens, so it’s hard to know right now just how much better the new nano’s screen is.”

Daily Tech is reporting that a heap o’ tech complaints have been lodged on Apple’s forums since the release of iTunes 7 for the Windows and Mac platforms. Says the DT:

“Going through the Apple iTunes forum, some of the problems most frequently reported are:

* Being unable to playback podcasts
* Some iPod Nanos not being recognized by the Windows version of iTunes 7
* iTunes 7 not being able to save preferences
* Music often becomes jerky or distorted during playback
* Music becomes distorted when switching to another application in the Mac version
* iTunes 7 quitting unexpectedly
* iTunes 7 freezes during library updates
* Next track is played before current track fully finishes
* Different types of coded error messages”

Here’s a link to the rest of the DT piece.

Personally, I’m happy as a hog in swill with my copy, running on a Mac and talking to a first-gen Nano. Any Street Techies having troubles?