Contemplation

So by now, everyone on the internet probably knows about Apple's iPod nano and Motorola's ROKR phones. I actually feel good about myself, though, for not being a total Apple Fanboy anymore in spite of the fact that I've owned four macs and an iPod mini over the course of my life.

I don't think the nano is a very good product as a replacement for the iPod Mini. The price point for it, $199 for 2GB and $249 for 4GB is not reasonable as compared to the Mini's 4GB and 6GB, respectively. Don't get me wrong; I'm sure the nano is a fantastic product otherwise, with its support of photos and whatnot, but for a product with two gigs less space and (was it?) four fewer hours of battery life, it seems like the only thing you're paying for is minaturization. That doesn't seem fair to me. But whatever, if it does the job for you, it does the job for you. I can say I'm glad I bought the mini, as my only reason for owning it is to put music on it. I have an iBook for pictures.

And shut up about video.

The other product, the ROKR phone, is so underwhelming I don't care about it. $250 from one carrier with 2 year contract is crap for anything anyway, but more importantly, the interface is not at all up to Apple's specs, and apparently the phone's form factor is that of a brick. As the type of consumer I am, that is more or less completely useless to me.

How's the August 2005 iBook working out for me, you might be wondering? It's nice, I like the improvements over the March 2004 version I had last year. The GPU is sturdy enough to do core image, which means I see the ripply whatsit floating over the screen when I open widgets in dashboard (rare!). More importantly, battery life is similar thus far, wireless coverage seems better, and while I don't yet care about bluetooth, I'm glad it's there.

And I won't have to sell this one in 8 or 9 months! Wink!