1SRC Podcast TwentyFour

[Jeff Kirvin]

The LifeDrive is real, but less impressive than it should have been. Also, Textware Solutions releases Instant Text for Palm OS. [details (http://www.1src.com/?m=show&id=1053)]

[STBXXL]

Hi Jeff,

I mostly agree with your 1st thoughts on the LifeDrive. Having the T5 (and the Wi-Fi card) I'm not very impressed. Why should I change? I'm probably not the target customer for the LifeDrive.

However, I wonder what the later versions of Blazer (v4.1 vs. 4.0 with the T5) and VersaMail (v3.1 vs. 2.7.1) offer? If palmOne will make them available to the existing T5 customer base at some point? I appreciate that the development of those two programs costs money. So I'd be even pay an upgrade fee - provided it's attractive.

Cheers.

[rpayne]

Did you record differently this week? I can't get my NX60 to play the podcast...I did get to listen to to it on my computer.

[Alan G]

Did you record differently this week?

In the podcast, Jeff did say he was on vacation this week, so I suspect he was using a different computer to record the podcast.

Jeff,

Thanks for your summary review of the LifeDrive. I was ready to drop the $600 on the LifeDrive today. Alas, I wasn't able to find a local store that had them in stock. After listening this latest podcast, I will probably upgrade to the T5 without any further reservation. So my quest for a Zodiac appears like it will end with a T5.

Alan G

[JAmerican]

I hope that PalmSource might release a ROM update for the LifeDrive when they are ready for Cobalt.

JAmerican

[Cyker]

*Moved from LiveDrive RAM thread*
One thing, did anyone else have any trouble listening to the Podcast? It kept clicking and going quiet and loud and quiet.
I'm re-downloading it right now just in case, but...

As for the LD, I wasn't really disappointed because everything about it is more or less in-line with what I suspected it would be.
I was surprised by the revelation that accessing VFS stuff causes it to be written to the HD first before it's run - This is bad bad bad... again I feel compelled to slate Palm's implementation of NVFS (Bad Palm! Get better software designers! :p)

I look forward to your review 'tho - The performance shouldn't be as bad as people seem to be making out. I'm expecting it to be slow and unresponsive (Like old Palms or PPCs), but not to the point of taking 4-5 seconds to switch between programs!! :eek:

InstantText - Nifty! I can only imagine what it's be like combined with Fitali or a keyboard :D
My only annoyance is that on my TH55 it seems a little slow, and I feel ~1MB is quite a lot of space for me to give up. It would be neat if the datafiles could be held on VFS with only the core stub staying in RAM... although that might make it even slower...!

Anyway, enjoy your vacation (with the insane dog(s?)) :D


Edit: As well as the dodgy encoding, it's encoded at 24kHz which is why we can't play it in AudioPlayer. TCPMP eats it up 'tho ;)

[JAmerican]

Yea Cyker. I noticed that. The audio file is also Mono and 40kbps. The audioplayer can play that bitrate but the sample rate has to be 44.1 or 48kHz according to the manual.

JAmerican

[depret]

Listen every week but just like Tech Nation (earlier this month) I get the following error. They have a new under writer (sponsor).

"This track is unavailable for one of the following reasons:
The card is write-protected or does not support copyright control, or the track file is corrupted."

Never had this problem with 1src podcast only other podcasters. BTW, I download both via WiFi while in the cradle. I guess the commute will be a 20 minute moment of silence. Hey, LD forum to catch up on after 24 hours.

Keep us the good work but if you change how you record then Thursdays will continue to be very quiet.

[Cyker]

dpret: As me and JA said above, it's because the file is encoded to 24kHz instead of 44.1kHz.
Clies can ONLY play 44.1kHz* MP3s using the built-in AudioPlayer.
You can listen to it with any software MP3 player 'tho like PocketTunes, AeroPlayer or TCPMP.


*JA - Can your UX playback 48kHz MP3s?? My TH can't :(

[strider_mt2k]

Just ran into the same trouble on my TH55. (Glad it's not ME!)

NP, will listen on my PC at work.

I can't fault Jeff.
I'm sure he's wrapped up with other things at the moment. (Star Wars)
(Well, not THIS moment. At THIS moment he could be still sleeping, courting a hangover, or possibly both.)

:)

[ptmin]

Hi All
I just found the real specs of ram here very comforting from P1 knowledge base:
Quote From P1:
# "LifeDrive" logo, centered above screen. This is the first mobile manager to bear this name.
# Silver metal exterior, rounded edges.
# 4GB hard drive in addition to 64MB Program Memory. Do not confuse it with the Tungsten T5, whose hard drive is 256MB.
# Bluetooth and Wi-Fi wireless capabilities built in. This is the first palmOne device to include both

4GB Hard Drive (3.85GB available to user) for documents, music, photos, movies and more
64MB Program Memory (55.1MB available to user) for Palm OS applications and data
Non-volatile memory means the information is saved even if the power runs down. You don't need to worry when you're on the move and unable to recharge or synchronize.

See it here:
http://kb.palmone.com/SRVS/CGI-BIN/WEBCGI.EXE?New,Kb=PalmSupportKB,ts=Palm_External2001,case=obj(39318)

[rpayne]

Earlier I posted having trouble listening to the Podcast on my NX60. Today I downloaded the trial for Pocket Tunes Basic and it works fine. I was having the same problems with EarthCore - the free podcast novel...and it too plays fine on Pocket Tunes. I'll be purchasing P-Tunes soon!

I figured that as I downloaded more podcast, having them fall within the Clie's 44.1 kHz spec would become more and more of a problem.

[MrNako]

It sounds terrible even in my computer.

[Cyker]

Yeah, the file seems to be a bit corrupt or something...
Downloaded it three times but they all have this quietLOUDquietLOUD weirdness :/


Strider - If you have TCPMP installed, that can decode the MP3 (As can PTunes, Aero, mmplayer etc.:))

[JAmerican]

dpret: As me and JA said above, it's because the file is encoded to 24kHz instead of 44.1kHz.
Clies can ONLY play 44.1kHz* MP3s using the built-in AudioPlayer.
You can listen to it with any software MP3 player 'tho like PocketTunes, AeroPlayer or TCPMP.


*JA - Can your UX playback 48kHz MP3s?? My TH can't :(

Yea it can :p ... LOL. Sorry. I thought it could because some of my songs are and when converted with dBpowerAMP Music Converter, I make it copy the source sample rate. Guess all my songs were 44.1kHz or it did it by itself.

My songs are 44.1kHz as well.

JAmerican

[strider_mt2k]

I beg to differ on the music in the backround thing, Jeff.
Even OS4 Clies could do that.

Bummer about the particulars on the LD.
(sorry about your streaming too, Jeff. I know that was something you wanted out of the box.)
I think I'm going to wait for LD II, however, and simply get a 2GB MS when the price drops to get by with.

That being said, I sure hope my TH55 is good for the long haul, because i'm back to nothing as an alternative. :(

[Jeff Kirvin]

In the podcast, Jeff did say he was on vacation this week, so I suspect he was using a different computer to record the podcast.

Jeff,

Thanks for your summary review of the LifeDrive. I was ready to drop the $600 on the LifeDrive today. Alas, I wasn't able to find a local store that had them in stock. After listening this latest podcast, I will probably upgrade to the T5 without any further reservation. So my quest for a Zodiac appears like it will end with a T5.

Alan G
The more I read about the LifeDrive, the more I love my T5. That's not to say that the LD isn't cool, and I plan on fondling one in person at the Wichita CompUSA tomorrow (ah, to be back in Denver...) but I think the T5 is a better fit for me personally.

And yes, the recording goofiness is because I was recording on Josh's PC and it's not set the way mine is. Next week's 1SRC will be Clie-friendly, promise. :D

[Jeff Kirvin]

I hope that PalmSource might release a ROM update for the LifeDrive when they are ready for Cobalt.

JAmerican
Not bloody likely.

[jjesusfreak01]

Not bloody likely.
What he means is,

"They dont like us enough, and I dont want to be forced to move to Cobalt"

[Jeff Kirvin]

What I mean, Brad, is that there's no financial incentive for them to do it. It's a tech support nightmare waiting to happen.

[jjesusfreak01]

What I mean, Brad, is that there's no financial incentive for them to do it. It's a tech support nightmare waiting to happen.
No, releasing the T5 with a buggy OS is a tech support nightmare waiting to happen. The idea is to do things that make it run better while still allowing app support.

[JAmerican]

What I mean, Brad, is that there's no financial incentive for them to do it. It's a tech support nightmare waiting to happen.
Looks like Palm OS doesn't want to move on. They are even sticking with Palm OS 5.4. They just increase 5.4.x everytime something new comes out. T|T5, E2, now LifeDrive. I'm really loving the HTC universal. PalmSource has got to make a move. Just like you said before about Graffiti, you just have to move on. Well, PalmSource has just got to move on as well. Like everything we all interact with in our daily lives, we learn to accustom ourselves to change. Some people did it with Graffiti 2 from Graffiti now we all can do the same for Cobalt. Why are we all afraid of change?

JAmerican

[Jeff Kirvin]

Like everything we all interact with in our daily lives, we learn to accustom ourselves to change. Some people did it with Graffiti 2 from Graffiti now we all can do the same for Cobalt. Why are we all afraid of change?
If it ain't broke, don't fix it.

And Brad, the T5 isn't that buggy. The defaults for NVFS may not be optimal, but anything that doesn't run well on the T5 definitely wouldn't run well on Cobalt, so be careful what you wish for. The problem with the T5 isn't that the OS itself is buggy, it's that it's much less tolerant of poorly-written applications than previous versions of Palm OS. If you run applications that actually adhere to the PalmSource coding guidelines, they run beautifully. It's wacky crap apps that break things, and Cobalt will be even less tolerant of such application bugs than Garnet 5.4.

[applejosh]

I think a nice financial incentive would be to keep people from jumping ship to the other PDA platform. But no sense in beating a dead horse. I'm growing more and more skeptical that I'll see a Cobalt device here in the states.

[applejosh]

If it ain't broke, don't fix it.

And Brad, the T5 isn't that buggy. The defaults for NVFS may not be optimal, but anything that doesn't run well on the T5 definitely wouldn't run well on Cobalt, so be careful what you wish for. The problem with the T5 isn't that the OS itself is buggy, it's that it's much less tolerant of poorly-written applications than previous versions of Palm OS. If you run applications that actually adhere to the PalmSource coding guidelines, they run beautifully. It's wacky crap apps that break things, and Cobalt will be even less tolerant of such application bugs than Garnet 5.4.
I don't have a problem with apps crashing all over the place. I have a problem with the darn thing taking so long to load apps, etc. If they were to release a ROM update that helped speed things up a little, then I'd be happier. It's just sad. My old Handera is faster at my main apps (DateBk mainly) than the T5. I know part of it is because of the DM, but even loading the default Calendar app takes a few seconds. And I don't have that many appointments (I purge them to a history file quite often). The concept of a non-volatile device is great. I'm less than thrilled with the implementation.

[JAmerican]

I think a nice financial incentive would be to keep people from jumping ship to the other PDA platform. But no sense in beating a dead horse. I'm growing more and more skeptical that I'll see a Cobalt device here in the states.

I agree. With Sony abandoning ship, that leaves me with two options, wait for Palm to get their acts together and release cool devices or go to Windows Mobile where I can code in VB.net for my device, talk on the phone and stream WMVs as well as everything else my UX can go. Can't wait for the HTC universal to be released then the price to go down. My next best handheld :) .

JAmerican

[Surur]

So Mr Kervin, you were so full of bravado (or was it sugar) last week in your podcast. You must be feeling rather let down and depressed now that the saviour of the P1 PDA business turned out to be a damp squib. At least you did not preorder the device.

Last week you said this would be a good seller. What do you think now? Is it acceptable to have a soft reset last from 67 seconds to 4 minutes? Is it acceptable that a released unit crashes a number of times during a single day of just playing around with it? I hope the crash does not cause a softreset loop, meaning you have to hard reset, because all the photos you have stored in your "image bank" while on vacation to be summarily deleted. Good luck with that.

I am glad you now finally realise, despite your previous statements to the contrary, that POS 5.4 is well past its last legs. Do you realise now that you have just been an apologist for P1 management, and their reluctance to embrace the POS future? Maybe you should join the voices clamouring for its release. Or maybe you should encourage P1 to change over the WM 05. Apparently it can do everything POS can do (according to you) and its actually a modern OS, not requiring a Heath Robinson like memory arrangement like the life drive does. So much for the "Zen of Palm".

Instead of investing all your time getting used to the idiosyncrasies of POS and graffiti 2, why not spend a week dedicating yourself to mastering WM. At least it has G1 built-in already.

I hope you stop making excuses for a dying company (excuses about find bug, excuses about NVFS bug, excuses about lack of updates for recent hardware, excuses about the absence of G1 etc etc) and embrace a vibrant living community you will find in the WM world.

Surur

[Cyker]

<Rant, +2 Informative>

I don't want a Cobolt PDA. Cobolt is not PalmOS.
Everything I've read about it suggests it will be more similar to PPC than PalmOS.

On these big-number monsters like the T|5 and LiveDrive, I think Cobolt would be able to better take advantage of the Flash architecture than PalmOS, because PalmOS just isn't designed to do what they're trying to crowbar into it in the form of NVFS, among other things.

As Scotty said, "The more you try to overtake the plumbing, the easier it is to clog up the drain."

Palm's ever-more complex workarounds and kludges that try to make PalmOS something it's not are just going to make their devices worse and worse. They are currently trying to compete with PPC on PPC's turf, and they will *never* win that. PPC's are *DESIGNED* to take advantage of masses of RAM and CPU power - They will always be able to bloat it out much better than any PalmOS device.

If they wish to go down that route, Cobolt would be a lot better, but then they'll be saying goodbye to the huge PalmOS software base. Again, I repeat: Cobolt is NOT PalmOS!
They say Cobolt can run PalmOS programs, but this will likely be in the manner that PPC's can run PalmOS programs - i.e. Emulation. Now look at the problems NVFS alone caused - Almost *every* major program I can think of has had to have it's code modifed in order to make it less likely to blow up on an NFVS device. I don't even want to think about the compatibility nightmare that Cobolt will bring because too many people will NOT realise that Cobolt ISN'T PalmOS and that it should run it's own apps, not PalmOS apps! (Which'd be like running DOS programs in XP! :p).

Even worse will be when developers PATCH THEIR PalmOS PROGRAMS to run better under Cobolt's PalmOS Emulation because they don't want to write two versions of the code for PalmOS and Cobolt! The program code will become so convoluted that it'd make Windows look stable!
In fact, a big reason Windows *is* so unstable is because it actually implements all the idiosyncrasies of previous Windows versions to maintain compatibility! Do we really want that on our PDA's?!)

Palm's have always been about clean interfaces, simple hardware and elegant program design, and as JK says, "If it ain't broke, don't fix it.". The sooner Palm realise this and go back to grass roots, the better. All I want is a good PDA, not some MHz monster with gobs of RAM!
Either way, Palm really need to pick their path: To challenge the PPC's directly or go back to their grass roots, because trying to straddle the line like this is just hurting them...

[Cyker]

Yea it can :p ... LOL. Sorry. I thought it could because some of my songs are and when converted with dBpowerAMP Music Converter, I make it copy the source sample rate. Guess all my songs were 44.1kHz or it did it by itself.

My songs are 44.1kHz as well.

JAmerican

Darn.... that would have been soooo cooooool! :p :D
(And would have opened up the possibility of hacking the DSP on the TH55 for 48kHZ too! :D)

[Jeff Kirvin]

So Mr Kervin, you were so full of bravado (or was it sugar) last week in your podcast. You must be feeling rather let down and depressed now that the saviour of the P1 PDA business turned out to be a damp squib. At least you did not preorder the device.
First off, the name is Kirvin.

Actually, no I'm not let down, but neither did I expect the LD to launch flawlessly. I have realistic expectations when I have them, and I work at having no expectations at all (I'm a buddhist).
Last week you said this would be a good seller. What do you think now? Is it acceptable to have a soft reset last from 67 seconds to 4 minutes? Is it acceptable that a released unit crashes a number of times during a single day of just playing around with it? I hope the crash does not cause a softreset loop, meaning you have to hard reset, because all the photos you have stored in your "image bank" while on vacation to be summarily deleted. Good luck with that.
I'm still waiting to see something definitive on both the soft reset time and whether a hard reset does or does not erase the entire hard drive. PalmOne has indicated that a hard reset both does and does not format the entire drive, so until this is resolved, I'm withholding judgement.

But to your point, it wouldn't be a problem if you actually knew how to use a Palm OS device. Soft and hard aren't the only reset options. I've occasionally over the years hit a reset loop. In fact, I hit one last night while testing the latest build of Dmitry Grinberg's skinUI. I'm on vacation right now, hundreds of miles away from my PC. A hard reset would have been devastating. But I had looping soft resets.

Fortunately, I know how to do a "firm" reset, also known as a Safe Mode reset. You press the reset pin while holding "up" on the d-pad and Palm OS loads without automatically loading any non-OS libraries. This effectively removed skinUI from the startup sequence and allowed me to delete it without doing a hard reset. A simple soft reset later to re-init my other software plugins and I was right back in business. Most of the time you have a problem with a Palm that a soft reset does not fix, a firm reset will do the trick. In eight years and 12 Palm OS devices (7 of my 19 PDAs have been WM), I've only been forced to hard reset a device ONCE. All other hard resets have been voluntary.

But unlike some people, I know what I'm doing.
I am glad you now finally realise, despite your previous statements to the contrary, that POS 5.4 is well past its last legs. Do you realise now that you have just been an apologist for P1 management, and their reluctance to embrace the POS future? Maybe you should join the voices clamouring for its release. Or maybe you should encourage P1 to change over the WM 05. Apparently it can do everything POS can do (according to you) and its actually a modern OS, not requiring a Heath Robinson like memory arrangement like the life drive does. So much for the "Zen of Palm".
Surur, have you ever heard the adage, "the right tool for the right job?" I pointed out that in this case, Cobalt may have worked better than Garnet. But this is only because the LD has a hard drive and dual wireless, which Cobalt supports better than P1's modified version of Garnet. Cobalt may also work better for the Treo line. Garnet, however, remains the best fit for the Tungstens and Zires. It's lighter than Cobalt, and more forgiving of improperly written software (although the newer revs of Garnet are stricter than they used to be, something often misunderstood as the OS itself being unstable).

As far as WM goes, see below.
Instead of investing all your time getting used to the idiosyncrasies of POS and graffiti 2, why not spend a week dedicating yourself to mastering WM. At least it has G1 built-in already.
I mastered WM long ago. Ask Jason Dunn. Not only did I use a Pocket PC exclusively for three years, but I'm a former team member on Pocket PC Thoughts and a three-time Mobius attendee.
I hope you stop making excuses for a dying company (excuses about find bug, excuses about NVFS bug, excuses about lack of updates for recent hardware, excuses about the absence of G1 etc etc) and embrace a vibrant living community you will find in the WM world.
I'll grant you the find bug, but what NVFS bug? As for G1, the people clamoring for this don't understand the business realities. The Xerox lawsuit is still under appeal. P1 could no more include G1 as they could include WM without a license or paint their devices white and call them iPalms. If you don't understand this, there's nothing more I can say. People asking for P1 to include G1, even as an option, are asking P1 to commit legal suicide.

As for WM, I thought seriously recently about investing in a Dell x50V. Certain things about my new relationship with Fictionwise make Palm OS inconvenient. I need better web form support with good file upload capability, something I know Pocket IE has always done well. I also need to be able to edit RTF files natively, something Pocket Word (now Word Mobile) has also always supported. Most Palm OS word processors edit Word files natively, but none do RTF.

So I did some research, and discovered that while WM would solve those two particular problems, it would introduce others. I'd no longer be able to use Life Balance. ActiveSync is still unreliable and the new 4.0 is less capable than it used to be as they've removed WiFi syncing. I'd have to use Outlook on my desktop, which introduces new wrinkles.

In the end, I determined that both platforms are ill-suited to what I need. Actually, I need a device that doesn't yet exist. I need a Longhorn-based microtablet. Even current Tablet PCs don't work for me because they don't work well as portable media players, and I listen to a LOT of podcasts and audiobooks while I'm on the go.

Since I'm waiting anyway, I'll stick with Palm OS, which in the long run is a little better suited to the way I work than Windows Mobile. But thanks for the suggestion.

[timepilot84]

When the T5 came out, I read the forums. The forums talked about NVFS problems, the so-called "find bug", programs crashing left and right, etc, etc.

I held off, until I found one on eBay a few months ago for $278. Everything I'd read negative about the T5 was a load of BS.

This time around, I wasn't going to listen to the peanut gallery, and ran out and bought a LifeDrive as soon as it came available, and guess what? All of the criticisms from the 1SRC Curmudgeon Crew(tm) turned out to be a load of BS, as well.

1) The longest load time: 3 seconds, and that's only the first time you run the app. If you switch back to it, zero load time.

2) skipping while listening to music: No skipping at all during normal operation. If you switch to an app that you had already opened, there's no skipping at all. If you open an app for the first time, there's a pause while it loads,, when you go back to it, no skip.

3) powering up of the hard drive to play content off of a SD card: pure and utter BS. Doesn't happen. This is FUD at its purest. Playing MP3's from my SD card is identical to playing them on my T5. No delays switching between songs at all.

4) From what I've seen, like the T5, what draws the battery down the most is running the Wi-Fi.

5) Despite it not being as large as people expected, it is large. when put in the slip case that comes with the device, it's about twice as thick as my T5 with its cover. I made the comparison with the slip case on, because that's how I carry it most of the time. The slip case appears to be good quality with lots of stiff protective padding.

6) The case is probably 70% metal, 30% plastic. The plastic is just a ring around the edge, the front and back are metal. The D-pad is frickin' awesome. It's way easier to use than the T5. It's got the sweet old Tungsten collapsable stylus', too.

7) the device doesn't need to be in drive mode in order to use the LifeDrive manager software which allows you to read and write to the hard drive. Drive mode is only for appearing as a USB Drive. USB 2.0 on this thing is great.

8) The only problems I've had with it resetting, which takes only about 30 seconds, not the 67 second to 4 minutes one curmudgeon was claiming, is because of legacy apps. BTW, the Palm OS 5 Graffiti 1 libs that were released on this board work like a charm.

All in all, after listening to Podcast 24 and using the device, I was disappointed to hear that Jeff was buying in to the forum FUD. I read the bargainPDA review, and all I can say is that either their review device was way Beta, or they lied.

Once again, the negative aspects, so far, aren't nearly as pronounced as some would have us believe.

PS I was able to download the 1src Podcast, and listen to it on my LifeDrive with no problems other than those caused by the funky audio quality of the cast itself. The volume issues weren't really that big of a deal using the internal speaker to listen to it.

[Jeff Kirvin]

Interesting, very interesting. I'll be able to fondle a LD myself this afternoon, so I should have a fuller and more objective report soon. When I recorded the podcast, all I had to go on was reviews, and I should know better. Review units are often unfinished and buggy compared to what people actually buy.

There's a seed of an interesting discussion here contrasting being the "first" with news and waiting long enough to get all the facts and be right. My T5 review was six months late, compared to the day-of-release reviews, but I think that helped me see the device objectively, and much more positively than other reviewers.

[Surur]

Some pious deception going on? the Bargianpda review is just one of many to talk about 6 second pauses, skipping, poor battery life and long reset times. Your positive review is in the minority.

Surur

[Cyker]

That it is in the minority does not make it any less valid.

At the end of the day, you have to take all reviews with a grain of salt unless YOU are the one doing it ;)

Why are you hating on everyone that says a good word about the LD anyway?

While I personally think it's crap, I'm sure there are people who will find this a good bit of kit. There's nothing wrong with disagreement! ;)

I'm sure the time delay is exaggerated 'tho - In reality it really shouldn't be more than 2-3 seconds, but human perception being what it is, it will feel like an eternity, espescially if you compare it to a normal PDA, espescially one using 'real' internal RAM.

Jeff - Please stop using words like 'fondle' when talking about PDAs! :eek: (j/k :D)
Ahh, all this zealotry! It's like being back at ClieSource again! :D


Bottom Line: The Life Drive is a good medium-bulk data carrier with good media playback abilities, great wireless capability, average PIM/PDA abilities and average battery life.

[Jeff Kirvin]

Some pious deception going on? the Bargianpda review is just one of many to talk about 6 second pauses, skipping, poor battery life and long reset times. Your positive review is in the minority.
Okay, I'm getting tired of this.

Yes, I'm an optimist, and tend to see things in a positive light. Yes, I want to believe that the LifeDrive is better than the early reviews would lead one to believe.

No, I'm not going to switch to the Pocket PC. For those 1SRCers that don't know Surur, he's a regular on Pocket PC Thoughts and a scourge on Palm Infocenter. He is a troll in the old school definition of the word, a Pocket PC enthusiast that trolls Palm boards so he can tell everyone how much superior his choice of PDA is, and thus, how much smarter he is than them. He's an idiot, ignore him.

He also doesn't understand a simple concept that I'm going to clue everyone in on right now.

Review units are often unfinished and buggy compared to what actually ships.

In order for reviews to be ready to post the day the device is announced, units have to be in the hands of reviewers before the ship date. These are almost always late-stage beta units, test-grade devices that still have a few bugs to work out. It would seem that the devices tested by BargainPDA and Pogue over at the NY Times had delays in launching applications, that the RAM-based cache wasn't working properly. Early reports from consumers that actually bought their LifeDrives retail indicate that this late-stage problem was in fact fixed in shipping units, and that the delays in the actual consumer product are minor at worst.

So again, unless you have an ax to grind and an ulterior motive for spreading FUD (Surur), it pays to wait patiently for the truth to reveal itself. It always does.

[Surur]

I'm just having some fun. Anyways, is it still trolling if its true?

Surur

[timepilot84]

Anyways, is it still trolling if its true?

The fact is: it isn't true in my own personal experience. If someone can give me the name of an application that will take 6 seconds to open, I'll try it. It hasn't happened yet. Most apps take a second or two to open the first time.

One annoyance: Bejeweled loads some of its graphics in the background. While you're playing, the first time you get a bonus or one of the warnings there's a pause mid-play. Hopefully they can have it all load in the beginning, then there'd be no pause.

[strider_mt2k]

I'm just having some fun. Anyways, is it still trolling if its true?
Surur

Is calling someone fat telling them the truth or is it being obnoxious?
An interesting philisophical discussion, but not to the point.

The point is we don't play like that here.

[applejosh]

While I am a proponent of both camps (PalmOS and PPC alike), I do try to limit my antagonizing. I don't shout on 1src, "Palm sucks! PPC rules," just like I don't do the converse on pocketpcthoughts. Both platforms do different things better than the other. It's just how one uses their "PDA" that will determine which fits best. I wish people would catch on that just because they don't like something doesn't mean everyone has to hate it also. Variety is the spice of life. That's how competitive markets work. (I just wish Sony was around to further the competition.) If you're really hellbent on declaring how one platform is better than the other, then show me the positives. And do it in the off-topic forum. :)

This isn't a critique of Surur specifically. The same can be said for die-hard Palm enthusiasts. Sometimes when reading either forum I feel like I'm wathcing a presidential debate. Rather than spending time explaining how they do things well, they explain why the other guy sucks.

[Yorker]

While I am a proponent of both camps (PalmOS and PPC alike), I do try to limit my antagonizing. I don't shout on 1src, "Palm sucks! PPC rules," just like I don't do the converse on pocketpcthoughts. Both platforms do different things better than the other. It's just how one uses their "PDA" that will determine which fits best. I wish people would catch on that just because they don't like something doesn't mean everyone has to hate it also. Variety is the spice of life. That's how competitive markets work. (I just wish Sony was around to further the competition.) If you're really hellbent on declaring how one platform is better than the other, then show me the positives. And do it in the off-topic forum. :)

One thing that has occured to me this week is that my e2 feels much more a true palm than the lifedrive. It's small, simple and does the job. I also have a pocket pc, its complicated, sometimes confusing but much more powerful. The lifedrive seems to be trying to be the latter and it just doesn't feel right to me. Hard to explain.

This isn't a critique of Surur specifically. The same can be said for die-hard Palm enthusiasts. Sometimes when reading either forum I feel like I'm wathcing a presidential debate. Rather than spending time explaining how they do things well, they explain why the other guy sucks.

Well I've come across Surur before and he's usually winding somebody up :rolleyes: I have found a few of the palm guys with their "see no evil, speak no evil, say no evil" hats annoying this week though. Just speak the truth - good, bad or indifferent!

[strider_mt2k]

I have found a few of the palm guys with their "see no evil, speak no evil, say no evil" hats annoying this week though. Just speak the truth - good, bad or indifferent!

Well said!

[timepilot84]

One thing that has occured to me this week is that my e2 feels much more a true palm than the lifedrive. It's small, simple and does the job.

I think you're right, partially. I don't think that the LifeDrive is particularly complicated, but the move away from long battery life and instant access to everything does signal a shift away from the traditional Zen of Palm. The battery is probably the biggest issue for me personally, but I figure third party batteries will be available soon to up the amps, and if not, I can mod the battery packs I made for my SL-6000c to work with the LD.

Using the LD, it seems a lot like using the T3 again, as far as battery life goes.

[Sharkk717]

here's an idea for a utility that i'll write once i get a LifeDrive. Please tell me what you think. This utility would fix the 2/3-second problem for loading new apps by auto-loading a few of the ones you know you'll use after a soft reset. the benefit to this is that you won't notice any slowdown because of the programmatic way i will load the apps will (read: should) not load the actual interface of the app, just the prc. i'm not sure if this is totally possible until i get the LD, but i will experiment with the loading thing :D

regards, sharky

[PaTx]

Well .. right now I'm a newbie here so I ask you all for being patient with me ;).

I'm a real fan of Jeff's podcasts and glad to post here.

I'm a T3 owner and use AeroPlayer to listen to lots of podcasts (I plan to purchase a 1 GB SD card soon). I don't usually have trouble to listen to Jeff's podcasts and, in fact, these podcasts have ever sounded smoothly and clean without background noise and so on.

However, this last podcast has given me trouble. In Aeroplayer using the menu / track info option it showed that the encoding was "24khzs" this is a frequency my device theorically could not play. In practice: PocketTunes states my device cannot play tracks at 24khzs but tcpmp and Aeroplayer do play them. However, Aeroplayer adds an annoying background noise and although tcpmp sounds a bit better, it keeps sounding worse than at 22khzs.

Summing up:

- A T3 cannot -theorically- play 24 or 48khzs encoded tracks
- PocketTunes sticks to theory
- Aeroplayer lets you play 24 and 48khzs adding a disgusting background noise.
- TCPMP lets you play 24 and 48khzs tracks with a reduced noise comparing to Aeroplayer but still worse than "properly" encoded tracks (22 or 44.1khzs, as ever before).

I'm glad to read Jeff will continue encoding the podcasts as before, just wanted to point out that it will not only be "clie friendly" but also "t3 friendly" ;).

Thanks to Jeff for his wonderful podcasts, I do agree with almost everything you state there and many of the things you have pointed out have made me learn new stuff. Thank you again and please keep this good work.

P.S. If anyone is relatively fluent in Spanish and wants to dig a bit deeper in my comparisons about PocketTunes, TCPMP and Aeroplayer maybe this "tutorial" about podcasting would be interesting for you:
http://www.pdaexpertos.com/foros/viewtopic.php?t=22690

[thenikjones]

Something that Surur has ignored during his anti-Palm *****ing - unsurprisingly - is that the "firm" reset that Palms let you do is damn useful. A few weeks ago my Dell x50v was playing up and, as I'd recently switched from a T|E, I thoughtI'd do a firm reset. Nope, not on a PocketPC you can't. It's a soft reset or "wipe and reinstall everything". Great.

Oh, and I've found that synching my PocketPC and Smartphone (spv C500) to Outlook at home has "wiped" different contacts from all 3 machines, so I can't guarantee which machine (if any) will have any given person's details on it. F*ckin' great!!

So now, even though I like PPC and use Textmaker/Planmaker a lot, I'm giving serious thought to a Treo 650. Yes, PPC is more capable than Palm but, at the end of the day, you need to get the basics correct, and surely synching Contacts on a PDA should be considered basic!!

thenikjones (not yet a member)

[tlaswell]

Once I heard the comment that all you took with you to Wichita was a Palm I kept waiting to say HOW you recorded the podcast. I kept hoping you would explain how you found some special T5 connector that allowed you to put audio into the T5. I know the connector supposedly has audio out on the new universal connector but I haven't seen anything yet to do it.

My dream is to have a cradle I can stick to my car dash, drop the T5 into it, tap a button and listen to my Podcasts on the car radio while the T5 charges during my 1 hour commute. For now I will settle with a Belkin tunecast and my T5 sliding all over the seat.

[Jeff Kirvin]

Once I heard the comment that all you took with you to Wichita was a Palm I kept waiting to say HOW you recorded the podcast. I kept hoping you would explain how you found some special T5 connector that allowed you to put audio into the T5. I know the connector supposedly has audio out on the new universal connector but I haven't seen anything yet to do it.

My dream is to have a cradle I can stick to my car dash, drop the T5 into it, tap a button and listen to my Podcasts on the car radio while the T5 charges during my 1 hour commute. For now I will settle with a Belkin tunecast and my T5 sliding all over the seat.

That's pretty much it. I had all the podcasts loaded on my T5 as MP3s and my T5 was plugged into a Belkin Tunecast FM transmitter.

Actually, I only have one DC port in my Neon, so I had a four-way splitter plugged into that and resting on the passenger seat. Into that I plugged the DC adaptors for my T5, my phone and the Tunecast.

It's amazing my car doesn't just explode.