I am known for getting off on a tangent, or perhaps it's the onset of AAADD. This all started this past Christmas when I was trying to come up with gift ideas...
I'd decided to try to be cool for my age and get an MP3 player for my older girl. While it was wrapped and under the tree, I set about finding an MP3 ripper so that after she'd opened her present, her Mommy could reclaim her "borrowed" CDs and we could quickly load it up for her. There were some minor glitches, but it went pretty much as planned and was very well received.
During the process I found that some of these disks were not well cared for while being borrowed. To circumvent any future issues, and because I was beginning to discover playing music on my PC, I just kept going. And going, and going -- like the energizer bunny -- until I'd ripped all the CDs we own (about 250 or so, I think).
More Background
Years ago we had gotten a digital camera. I love it and when the younger girl was born I took quite a lot of pictures. These were readily available to me on the computer, but Mommy was more of a technophobe and I'd have to print them out if she wanted to see them.
For some time Mommy had been pestering me for a notebook computer, perhaps in part because of the pictures, but also email had become an interest to her. I had also been making DVDs of 8mm home video. Options existed to output in formats other than DVD such as MP3. And the older girl was trying to get internet access on her computer.
All of this started spinning around in my head with the intent on getting Mommy a really cool gift for her birthday.
The Search
As I began searching for this "cool gift", iPods and cell phones and PS3 and all sorts of technologies -- that I'd happily ignored for years -- I was suddenly comparing by spec sheet minutia. Some of Mommy's other requests, such as a dual-tuner TiVo, started blurring into the picture as well. Even Those Damn Annoying DVDs.
Along the way a new term was introduced to my vernacular: portable multimedia player. For our general behaviors, I felt that this direction was the one I would take. And I discovered that these critters widely varied across a broad spectrum of capabilities.
My Find
To make a short story long, I eventually settled on the Archos 604 WiFi. I decided to dress it up well with accessories, like its DVR station and car adapter, and I was pleased with its fit for our uses.
- It holds all of our pictures (so I don't have to worry about the issue of them only being available "to me").
- It holds all of our "CDs".
This also led to another tangent regarding album cover art. - With that it is just a bit over half full, so it's got room for movies.
- It can record TV (so it filled the "extra TiVo" category).
- I can record DVDs being played, so it could be used with the car adapter.
(But I haven't quite gotten this far yet.) - It has wireless access to my PC and others I may make available in time.
- It has wireless access to the web for things such as email or NetFlix.
And I also discovered a use for the audio recorder on at least one occasion. Much of this new technology ended up blending and blurring with another of my burgeoning tech tangents: IRC chat.
Given the joys of ownership, even the best toys lose their luster to some degree after they are no longer new. I am still quite pleased with it, but its familiarity of use led to issues with Web Mobile sites.
It gets to be quite the tech web we weave!