Disqus - Latest Comments for Wayne Schulz

Re: GearDeal: Unlocked Nokia N82 - $359.99 at Amazon.com

Wayne Schulz — Sat, 24 May 2008 18:14:18 -0000

Amazon runs some type of demand pricing on their items. I've seen other online retailers do it too -- but it's most pronounced at Amazon. The price will rise if the system detects a sudden increase in demand.

That also means that it could fall.

I didn't realize this was a deal until Mitchell Khouryt remarked on it. Then I figured maybe it was worth making a note of.

I think Dell runs these Nokia unlocked deals quite a bit as well.

I still want to get a Nokia and run Qik video over it. That service seems so cool. Problem is I don't need another $80 /month cell phone plan...

Re: First Impressions of the New BlackBerry App Store

Wayne Schulz — Wed, 01 Apr 2009 14:55:07 -0000

I was hoping to see a common "check for updates" button.

However in my limited testing I see no such global option -- and I couldn't even see it from the individual apps that I downloaded.

The App World also neglects to scan your BlackBerry for items that you already own.

Hopefully it's checking for version compatibility before you download an item because I also did not see any system requirements listed on the apps for sale.

Re: Sage cutting jobs, outlook weak

Wayne Schulz — Thu, 19 Mar 2009 07:01:27 -0000

When Sage first spotlighted Billing Boss in the US at the Sleeter Group conference I was in the audience and everyone (including Sage) was surprised to see it unveiled.

What pre-packaged software companies need is a way to tie license renewal to continued use of the software. The Sage MAS 90 product doesn't do this and I think part of the annual maintenance has to be a renewal key that unlocks the software for another year.

Worth noting that Intuit does this in a small manner with their QuickBooks product. They discontinue support every few years (I'm not certain of the exact number but 3 yrs seems about right) and if you're using Payroll you have to either upgrade or compute the taxes manually as the table functionality shuts off.

You're going to see more vendors adopt that "shut the software down" methodology in some fashion. The market is largely now driven by installed base sales and maintenance renewals. No reason to pretend (or measure it) like its not.

Re: Freshbooks and Shoeboxed: accounting mashup

Wayne Schulz — Wed, 04 Mar 2009 08:22:03 -0000

Dennis,

I looked at Freshbooks. Then looked again. And went back again.

I just couldn't make their billing work for me (consulting firm that bills hourly and annual maintenance).

While they have a pretty neat iPhone application that integrates real time with their billing software - what really scared me away was:

1. There wasn't any easy way to bill ALL of my clients in one run. My conclusion was that billing clients one by one is a nifty feature that just doesn't scale. I can't imagine my administrator having to go through and bill each client one by one - and Freshbooks (at the time I reviewed it) had NO easy way to view unbilled work in process. It had a decidedly mom and pop kitchen table feel to it the more you tried it.

2. At the time that I reviewed the application, Freshbooks had no ability (without using what seemed like obtuse workarounds) to accept retainer bills. Sure, they offer up all sorts of bizarre ways to get around this. See my comment #1 -- workarounds are cute for mom and pop but don't scale to firms with multiple billers.

3. For some odd reason there was a requirement that each of my clients have their own project. For example I couldn't make one master project called "annual support agreement" and assign it to multiple clients.

Now admittedly a lot of the above issues also exist with competitors. As I looked around at other billing solutions there were applications that were far worse.

Unfortunately in the billing area it started to become apparent that when most people begin an online invoicing application they look around and borrow the "good ideas" from what's out there rather than what makes sense and scales.

Freshbooks = Cool application for mom and pop but doesn't scale beyond 3 or 4 timekeepers (and if they're doing any volume that's probably pushing it).

Just my .02

Re: Sage’s odd interim statement

Wayne Schulz — Sat, 07 Feb 2009 08:52:51 -0000

From my perspective I'm not seeing a lot of interest from prospects in switching accounting systems unless it is a move to a niche accounting package.

There has to be a tangible benefit to get a prospect interested in making a migration. The old "grass is always greener" theory is not working for more and more prospects - some of who are on their fourth and fifth accounting system and are much wiser.

Re: Sage’s odd interim statement

Wayne Schulz — Fri, 06 Feb 2009 07:10:22 -0000

First I think Sage USA has a lot of room with the margins they pay their channel for maintenance. I don't expect those to stay at the same rate forever. Manage the margins and you'll have instant improved US results. The trick is how to do this without alienation.

Second, interesting mention of CA..

From my perspective Sage has an excellent marketing engine. My installed base clients are extremely interested in many of the products Sage spotlights in their web casts.

I think this is a huge plus for Sage.

With some fine tuning of pricing (there are too many flavors of the same product which make it confusing to the customer) they could be poised to drastically increase their sell through to the installed base.

For the win -- here's what needs to happen with Sage. Make all their individual acquisitions act like one company and not separate P&Ls -- that's the only way to streamline pricing and offerings.

Just before there was executive turnover about a year ago Sage underwent a big restructuring. I'm not sold managing each each piece of the company as a standalone is long term beneficial.

I have no inside information on this whatsoever. Sage is the only product we've carried for the last 22 years so they ARE doing many things right.

Re: Sage’s odd interim statement

Wayne Schulz — Fri, 06 Feb 2009 05:52:07 -0000

Full Disclosure: As a Sage VAR in the USA - I am not independent with respect to these comments.

Dennis - I noticed this release and had similar thoughts. For the moment I've written the release off to just awful market conditions. I think the ERP marketplace as a whole is coming to the realization that the future game may be installed base sales and maintenance and upgrades. Acquisitions are both a blessing and a curse. During the time companies are making lots of acquisitions their financial results are difficult to evaluate because of rapid growth and changing structure of the company (added divisions and products).

I watch with the same curiosity and do not think that the US operations will be allowed to languish indefinitely.

Re: How could you do this to me Mr. Scoble?

Wayne Schulz — Sun, 30 Mar 2008 08:31:55 -0000

Wow - is this what blogging evolves to - bloggers blogging about other bloggers?

Can I call "market top" on Blogging or has someone else already done it?

(Braces self for the next 25 friendfeed wannabees and the plaintive testimonials of 50 bloggers who swear by it)

We now return you to our regularly scheduled program titled "time to find a day job" already in progress.

Re: Recording Industry Calls for "Monetization Without Representation"

Wayne Schulz — Fri, 14 Mar 2008 07:40:35 -0000

When will we be forced to supplement the newspaper industry? The movie industry? Real Estate Agent industry (they haven't died yet but they're next in line imho).

Point being that there is no end to the number of industries who could "benefit" from such a tax.

Instead of a tax, get out there and figure out a better business model like every other industry periodically has to do.

Re: 2.2 And Eight Things That Are Still Wrong With The iPhone

Wayne Schulz — Sat, 13 Dec 2008 22:20:55 -0000

How about allowing me to selectively set a wi-fi connection to prompt before connecting. I know that I can do this globally however whenever I'm connected to a public access point with a SSID like "linksys" -- I should be able to tag that connection to NOT automatically connect.

My home and work access points are uniquely named. I want them to allows connect.

If Apple isn't sure how to implement this - look at how BlackBerry does it.

Re: 2008/03/10/zuckerberg-open-qa/

Wayne Schulz — Mon, 10 Mar 2008 15:32:37 -0000

MySpace last year.
Facebook this year.

Who will be the hot site next year.

That's all I could think about while watching the extreme over-hype of this event.

Re: Sage Software say’s “not so fast” to free MAS90 Credit Card Processing By Sage offer

Wayne Schulz — Mon, 20 Oct 2008 09:43:53 -0000

I'm still getting conflicting emails from other Sage Resellers on this promotion. This should be an easy promo.

The intent is for the module (built into MAS) to be free.

How they (Sage) do it is the current mystery.

In any event -- if you're thinking about Credit Card processing you definitely should go this way instead of PC Charge. It's tons easier to setup and frankly PC Charge is a gigantic pain in the ass to deal with.

FYI

Re: Sage Software say’s “not so fast” to free MAS90 Credit Card Processing By Sage offer

Wayne Schulz — Mon, 20 Oct 2008 12:11:34 -0000

Thanks Merilyn - I hadn't worked with SO-1032 before so I looked up the description:

Multiple Customer Deposits on a Sales Order
Allows for an unlimited number of deposits to be applied to a Sales Order and allows deposits from A/R Cash Receipts to be applied to a customer’s Sales Orders. Additionally, terms codes may be associated with payment type to provide defaulting logic.

The whole deposit area tends to be confusing. Anyone who is doing much work with credit cards and deposits should look at SO-1032!

Thanks - great observation.

Re: QuickBooks vs MAS 90 comparison guide now available

Wayne Schulz — Tue, 04 Nov 2008 20:38:41 -0000

Greg - The link for the guide is at the end of the article titled "QuickBooks Conversion Guide" -- this is the PDF that compares MAS90 to QuickBooks.

Any questions let me know

Wayne

Re: Crystal Reports scheduler for Sage MAS 90 and 200

Wayne Schulz — Fri, 05 Dec 2008 15:53:47 -0000

This is a sample comment submitted via Facebook Connect

Re: Intuit’s Turbotax imposes $9.95 additional return fee for 2008

Wayne Schulz — Mon, 08 Dec 2008 13:53:11 -0000

I'm not disputing Intuit's right to charge whatever amount they see fit and for whatever terms they like.

What I have a concern about is the people who are rushing through the store and pick up a box with Turbotax and don't realize the pricing model has changed.

Ultimately with these people (and I very well could have been one) they are stuck at the 11th hour ponying up an additional fee for processing their parent's or children's tax return.

Re: Intuit changes mind regarding Turbotax 2008 fees - now allows unlimited federal filing and up to 5 e-files

Wayne Schulz — Mon, 15 Dec 2008 14:24:33 -0000

I agree that including at least one state would be a nice bonus. Worth noting that in all prior years that I can remember the states have always been extra charge.

My concern initially was that people buy their upgrade without reading that the terms (# of returns) have changed.

Then when you're ready to print your federal return for anything but the one free(included) federal return you're stuck ponying up.

Hopefully next year Intuit will brand the boxes as singe return, 5 return and perhaps unlimited return.

Re: Signs that a MAS90 deal is going to be a dud

Wayne Schulz — Mon, 15 Dec 2008 16:33:44 -0000

I agree Jon. I've also been seeing more and more "self diagnosis" where people don't want any advice. They're primarily concerned with the cost.

On more than one occasion I have seen a user buy the wrong product. We usually see this as the second (or third) consultant in the door.

Self Diagnosis is the biggest issue that I'm dealing with now.

Re: Sage MAS 90 and 200 Year End Closing Tips

Wayne Schulz — Wed, 17 Dec 2008 15:15:37 -0000

Erika - I'll send you the info privately.

Wayne

Re: Taylor Macdonald leaves Deltek

Wayne Schulz — Wed, 31 Dec 2008 03:06:21 -0000

See as this was under a years' worth of effort and expense by the VARS who were recruited, I'll be interested to see what the fallout is. And even more interested to see where Taylor lands.

I'm of the belief that his departure from Sage was a huge loss.

Re: Taylor Macdonald leaves Deltek

Wayne Schulz — Wed, 31 Dec 2008 05:39:06 -0000

I haven't heard anything. This sounds like it was an amicable thing. I wouldn't be surprised if Peyton (was allowed to) followed Taylor.

Payton joined about a month after Taylor and so far as I know reported to him.

Still remains to be seen what educational software company Taylor lands at. I'm pretty sure it won't be Video Professor.

Re: Accpac Software consultants offer up YouTube video to explain benefits of their product

Wayne Schulz — Thu, 08 Jan 2009 22:22:26 -0000

How cool is it to be known as "the guy who was wearing the funny wig in that video". This is a great idea. I don't think it would work if there was a new video each month (there's such as thing as overdoing it) but for client relations (and even prospects) it's an awesome idea.

Re: Avalara explains January 21 slowdowns and data outage

Wayne Schulz — Fri, 23 Jan 2009 12:42:41 -0000

I am a big believer that ANY provider should have an instant notification system for these types of outages. That includes cell phone carriers, ISPS and all software service providers.

I realize that during an outage it's "all hands on deck" but I actually had one reseller tell me that he was pitched by Avalara DURING the outage and the salesman denied that anyone complained...

Re: Former Best Software COO Dave Butler named president of Ticketmaster North America

Wayne Schulz — Tue, 03 Feb 2009 15:24:55 -0000

Good Times. Noodle Salad! Have not heard a single bad story or comment about Dave Butler - ever. Very rare in this industry.

Re: Find add-ons for Sage MAS 90 and 200 [How To]

Wayne Schulz — Tue, 03 Feb 2009 20:25:10 -0000

Good point - I made an assumption that everyone would check the Extended Solutions first -- and I forgot not everyone knows that Sage markets their own Extended Solutions.

http://www.sagesoftware.com/mas90/extendedsoluton...

Here's my hierarchy of where I got to find solutions:

1. Sage Extended Solutions
2. If niche, then I go to the biggest/most popular provider - ie Job Ops for MFG
3. If custom programming I use DSD - http://www.dsdinc.com

Re: Sage Insights 2009 Registration - My 10 Reasons Consultants Should Attend

Wayne Schulz — Wed, 25 Feb 2009 19:15:38 -0000

Hmm - I use Firefox so I'm not sure what may be happening. I'll have to look tomorrow in the office.

Re: 5 assumptions I’ll make when debugging your MAS200 server

Wayne Schulz — Fri, 27 Feb 2009 09:56:54 -0000

I had a client call yesterday. They were receiving an error message -- PRCxxx.SOA is missing.

This message generally indicates one of two problems:

1. The file IS missing
2. The file is corrupt

Thankfully this client was honest and confessed to "deleting some files" in MAS 90 that perhaps he should not have.

Which leads me to wonder exactly how many computer related problems (not necessarily MAS90 or MAS200 even) are brought upon by end users doing something to cause the error condition?

Re: Kindle for iPhone released

Wayne Schulz — Wed, 04 Mar 2009 08:28:08 -0000

It's a convenience issue. The Kindle for iPhone is free as is the integration to Kindle content you already own.

So if I'm stuck at my daughter's baseball game and want to read a book - assuming I have a signal - I can download the books I already own.

There's no pinch zoom and admittedly there aren't as many features (you can't buy books from within Kindle for iPhone) -- but I still think it's a great add on for those of us who own Kindle's.

Re: Netsuite vs Sage: Big discounts are the “greatest hits” albums of the ERP industry

Wayne Schulz — Thu, 05 Mar 2009 11:41:28 -0000

I'm not quite sure why this 50% offer got so much attention because it's been done before (Netsuite made a similar offer against Salesforce and SAP).

As I said above, I'd be surprised if anyone off the street couldn't get 50% off on the initial sign up.

Re: Don’t let Intuit sucker you with a 20% discount

Wayne Schulz — Thu, 05 Mar 2009 21:46:02 -0000

Debra- I don't have an email for you -- can you email me directly (please don't post it here) --- at wayne@s-consult.com

Thanks

Re: Sage Insights 2009 Registration - My 10 Reasons Consultants Should Attend

Wayne Schulz — Wed, 11 Mar 2009 09:35:05 -0000

I am looking for walking partners at 5:30am each morning of Insights -- meet in the hotel lobby for 45 minute walk and discussion of prior days' sessions.

Re: Welcome Jodi Uecker-Rust to Sage - why the Interim Leader title?

Wayne Schulz — Mon, 16 Mar 2009 16:09:51 -0000

I've heard nothing but positives about Jodi. What struck me as odd is that she needs an interim job like she needs a hole in the head.

My speculation is there's a different position eventually -- but that's as far as my mind can think..

Re: Sage Insights 2009 Registration - My 10 Reasons Consultants Should Attend

Wayne Schulz — Fri, 20 Mar 2009 14:16:47 -0000

Excellent -- I go every morning at 5:30am (open invitation to anyone who wants to join us) -- meet in the main lobby of the hotel (you'll know us because there will be two groups -- Rob Johnson usually is there running and we gather to walk).

Great time to hash out thoughts, ideas and concepts related to Insights --- also you get a little exercise so you don't worry as much about all the food you've over-eaten..

Re: Sage Abra Procedure Manuals

Wayne Schulz — Thu, 26 Mar 2009 12:45:12 -0000

Update - I was unable to secure a sample page to show you. As a matter of fact the contact person emailed me as if I'd just stepped off a space ship and walked into their office to request such a thing.

Apparently the concept of providing their customers with a sample of what they're selling is foreign.

A few people have contacted me to ask where they can get these guides....

Re: Bloggers wanted - no pay, lousy hours, invaluable experience

Wayne Schulz — Fri, 27 Mar 2009 09:54:12 -0000

I may have stretched my scholastic abilities a little bit -- let's say I survived

Re: QuickBooks vs MAS 90 comparison guide now available

Wayne Schulz — Fri, 27 Mar 2009 13:32:34 -0000

What I tell my clients who are considering moving off MAS 90 or renewing a license is ---

Consider whether you could live without specific functionality that you're getting now in MAS 90.

In some instances the answer is yes -- and the client moves.

In others, once they think, their answer is NO that they can't live without MAS so they license that extra copy.

This is especially true for people with a lot of data who don't want to convert and lost history as well as anyone with custom reporting or inventory needs.

Re: Update for Sage MAS 90 and MAS 200 2009 941 and other tax changes now available

Wayne Schulz — Fri, 27 Mar 2009 13:45:00 -0000

Steve -

I just heard from Sage and there will be an Interim Release disk available to fix the 941 and also NJ tax law issues.

It sounds like they will make two separate fixes available so if a payroll user doesn't need them both they only load what they need.

Sage is presently putting these through quality testing and expects to set them free in the wild shortly.

Re: Welcome to the WayBack Machine

Wayne Schulz — Mon, 03 Mar 2008 05:45:56 -0000

Welcome back. And how appropriate that the first post (underneath this one) is the Sprint Mogul.

I bought that device based on THAT review -- and it was my main brain for many months until the iPhone dislodged it...

Re: Verizon V740 Expresscard - Up To Speed Or Not?

Wayne Schulz — Mon, 03 Mar 2008 18:56:45 -0000

Mitchell drives on the wrong side of the road to pretend he is in Australia. We humor him.

Re: Yay, My MacBook Pro is Back…With a Catch

Wayne Schulz — Tue, 04 Mar 2008 05:14:09 -0000

Mitchell - Curious what your Expresscard Modem clocks in for speed?

On Verizon the highest I've measured at speedtest.net is about 1.5mb. The connection is a pretty reliable 400-500k even when signal strength is weaker.

More typically it's 800k to 1.2mb.

I consider these speeds good -- albeit on the lower end of what I'd dreamed of.

In the US it seems that AT&T; has a bit faster speeds but their 3G is not fully rolled out in my state.

Re: First Drive: Lexus LX 570

Wayne Schulz — Tue, 04 Mar 2008 16:14:03 -0000

Nice. But not $73,000+ nice -- damn..

Re: OMG

Wayne Schulz — Tue, 04 Mar 2008 17:30:28 -0000

Now you need a post that makes fun of excessive use of LOL..

Re: Yay, My MacBook Pro is Back…With a Catch

Wayne Schulz — Tue, 04 Mar 2008 20:53:22 -0000

That's a great speed Mitchell. If you move around a bit with it, let me know what you get in various locations.

The best that I've seen Verizon in Connecticut do is a little over 1.5mb.

I do have to say that Verizon Wireless is pretty reliable though (one reason that I decided to keep it). I've never had a problem connecting up or losing connection. I don't think they're the fastest here in the US , but they make up for it (imho) with reliability.

I use a T-Mobile WIFI Hotspot account as a backup -- and that rings in at a consisten 1.2mb speed which I suspect they somehow have capped to discourage heavy file sharers from nursing a latte all day while leaching files...

Re: Navigon Announces New GPS Unit

Wayne Schulz — Tue, 04 Mar 2008 22:08:34 -0000

I was just looking at the GPS units over at Costco and I'm amazed how quickly these came down in price. It seems almost everyone should be able to afford them now.

Re: The Venturi Mini Review

Wayne Schulz — Wed, 05 Mar 2008 05:59:01 -0000

Hey does this CHARGE your iPhone?

This seems to primarily be a deal for those with phones/devices which do support the special A2DP Bluetooth protocol -- which as you point out the iPhone does NOT (but my Blackberry does - yeah!!).

I LOVE that this device has a USB port (when the heck will cars DUMP the old fashioned ugly cigarette lighter that doesn't light -- in favor of universal USB?)...

I've seen other units that clip to your visor -- which is nice aesthetically -- but then requires either snaking a cable or periodic recharges (translation: another funky charging cable to carry around)...

...when elected President, within the first 30 days in office I intend to pass a law that all cars must have 5 USB charging ports and all devices such as portable phones are required to change their charging port to a universal mini-usb size (such as the Moto Razr has).

Enough of the veering off topic for one morning..

Re: Open Source Podcasters/Show of the Week: The Linux Link Tech Show

Wayne Schulz — Wed, 05 Mar 2008 20:44:55 -0000

Joel - Do you know what we would use to listen to the streams on a Mac? This is probably built in somewhere and I'm just too dense to find it.

Re: Can You Copyright a Publicly Accessible URL?

Wayne Schulz — Thu, 06 Mar 2008 20:23:19 -0000

Hopefully Howard has about 12 lawyer volunteers by now. I love when these places send silly articles -- which basically shines a big spotlight on the entire problem.

Boy I hope they take Howard down and then Mobitv will learn a quick lesson with all the people that they upset.

Re: Can You Copyright a Publicly Accessible URL?

Wayne Schulz — Thu, 06 Mar 2008 20:34:53 -0000

Just tested -- the HOFO thread has the actual URLS in the 2nd message -- I'm not all that impressed with the content -- half the channels seem to be throwaways.

Re: My MacBook Pro is Here

Wayne Schulz — Thu, 06 Mar 2008 20:38:00 -0000

Come on you have to at least charge it..

Re: Can You Copyright a Publicly Accessible URL?

Wayne Schulz — Thu, 06 Mar 2008 20:40:44 -0000

Can't wait to see this land on the top of DIGG and also start bouncing around techmeme -- this is the worst thing that Mobitv could have done -- from what I've seen at the HOFO threads at least another 6 sites were claimed to have posted the info before Howard -- including Fatwallet and Slickdeals. These are all major and heavily trafficed sites.

Wonder what the Mobitv usage rate is tonight....bet they have a few more viewers than normal..

Re: GearChat: The Demise of Print Media and a Possible Reason for the Amazon Kindle

Wayne Schulz — Thu, 06 Mar 2008 20:41:57 -0000

That's it dammit - I'm ordering a Kindle if for no other reason than to see if they're really out of stock....

....and next time Joel's bathroom habits deserve a NSFW label... :lol:

Re: There’s Something in the Air…Unboxing

Wayne Schulz — Thu, 06 Mar 2008 20:44:46 -0000

How about that bottle of Jack Daniels......

Re: Review: I Hate Spam and So Do You!

Wayne Schulz — Thu, 06 Mar 2008 21:22:59 -0000

Only 18 spams throughout your test is pretty impressive. I consider GMAIL's filters one of the best -- and I bet 4 to 5 slip through each day.

Another trick that I've used in situations where I had a device that did not have the ability to use a spam solution -- is to forward my email to a spamcop.net address ($30/yr but worth it) - then out in turn Spamcop.net lets you forward the email to yet another address.

In the early days when I was just starting to use a Blackberry, I would forward email to spamcop.net (they give you an address xxx@spamcop.net) -- which in turn allows you to forward that email out to another address (the trick is that this email is scraped of all spam).

It was quite effective and eliminated nearly all the spam (as good as any) --- as I recall it had a few more false positives than normal.

These days with the spam solutions becoming so effective it's a wonder that these guys still make money (though I think all the money is being made in illegal sales of prescriptions and/or fraudulent stuff).

Re: Is Windows Mobile Still Relevant at JAMM

Wayne Schulz — Sat, 08 Mar 2008 20:00:01 -0000

Mitchell - nice catch -- I especially like the part about the "wet fart" --- was hoping that we'd pick this up

Re: Freedom…from WIRES. Best Buy’s Insignia Pilot 8GB Preview

Wayne Schulz — Sat, 08 Mar 2008 20:05:29 -0000

Joel what did you pay for this? And is this one of the bad boys where you can just drag and drop MP3 and movie files to the player?

Re: Surviving the Nuclear Winter after an Atomic Server Crash, Part One

Wayne Schulz — Sun, 09 Mar 2008 08:22:28 -0000

This whole ordeal (and I read most of the original BB postings) seems like a big CYA for the host.

Sadly, what I've observed over the years is that many of the web hosts with poor customer service can easily close up shop and re-open under another name with nobody the wiser.

And I agree wholeheartedly with Judie about how much it counts for these organizations to keep us posted.

When I first started using Hosted MS Exchange I was with Mailstreet. They were a smallish hosting company specializing in personal attention. Like most of the things I buy, I found them online via a forum posting

Then Mailstreet gets acquired.

Suddenly their focus shifts to selling to bigger companies and offering all sorts of doo-dads to get you to buy in addition to Exchange.

The support techs became increasingly more difficult to reach.

Then they had a server crash.

After two days with no update and no email -- I switched hosts.

I think in some instances, these guys keep quiet because they figure to publicize it looks worse (I secretly suspect that RIM does this with their myriad of Blackberry outages that you only read about when some web site notices).

Re: My MacBook Pro is Here

Wayne Schulz — Sun, 09 Mar 2008 12:45:05 -0000

Ctrl + Click = Right Click

Also I found a lot of options could be set in System Preferences.

This was the first thing I wondered about too.

Re: My MacBook Pro is Here

Wayne Schulz — Sun, 09 Mar 2008 13:21:51 -0000

In VMWARE the Ctrl-Click worked for me on Friday when I was running Windows XP.

Re: iPhone: the New Gateway Drug

Wayne Schulz — Sun, 09 Mar 2008 17:28:23 -0000

My transition was:

iPod Touch (after avoiding iPods for many years due to a poor early experience with failing battery life) --> iPhone (which I believe you were indirectly responsible for --> iMac (after seeing the Gateway One which was going to be the same money but just not as many features) -> MacBook Pro.

I'm currently contemplating a MacBook for my Mom when her Dell fails (which will probably be in another 6 months).

This weekend I worked to configure a Compaq Presario T2330 (which I'm still elbow deep in removing all sorts of bloatware from).

Without the iPhone, I don't think I would have converted to the Mac world (of course the people here played a big role in the conversion as well).

Re: iPhone: the New Gateway Drug

Wayne Schulz — Sun, 09 Mar 2008 17:37:36 -0000

Love the iphone graphic too - do you know something we don't?

Re: iPhone: the New Gateway Drug

Wayne Schulz — Sun, 09 Mar 2008 21:06:54 -0000

Danc - I followed that route exactly - and I ripped the iphone via private emails with my consulting buddies for a good 4 months....prior to that I ridiculed my sister's MAC..

Then I got an iPod Touch and loved it. Still use it to this day and agree with Mitchell's assessment that it's one of the best video players around.

The out of the box setup and usage experience with iMac and MacBook Pro has been unlike anything I've experienced recently...

Re: iPhone: the New Gateway Drug

Wayne Schulz — Mon, 10 Mar 2008 06:14:03 -0000

@Chris - there may be more than a reset required if you want to also transfer your music.

I've never migrated an iPod from Windows and MAC - but found a few resources.

First, from a quick reading it sounds as if the only solidly supported way to do this is to backup your iTunes library from Windows to CD/DVD and restore it to MAC.

This appears to preserve all your playlists and ratings - as well as music.

There is a slightly more complex way of doing this documented over at LifeHacker - which does not require a bunch of CD/DVDs for copying large iTunes libraries:

http://lifehacker.com/software/itunes/geek-to-l...

There's a thread in the Apple Support forums dealing with a similar question. In it there are links to 3rd party software which may allow you to copy the files directly off your iPod.

There is a lot more discussion on the Apple forums about this topic.

Here's a pretty good thread on the overall process:

http://discussions.apple.com/thread.jspa?thread...

Remember to de-authorize your Windows machine (as per the above thread) when this is all done.

Also, iTunes is funny about copying stuff that you did not buy (license) through iTunes - and you may need to use third party software (sadly) to copy your own non-purchased mp3s off the iPod.

Re: Sprint Makes It Official: Mogul Is The First EVDO-Rev A Windows Mobile Phone

Wayne Schulz — Tue, 11 Mar 2008 10:01:50 -0000

Doug - here's a good link to a mobile speed test that can be used via the phone browser to check out download speeds (I think it does uploads too).

http://www.dslreports.com/mspeed

Re: Lenovo Outlet Laptop Blowout Sale

Wayne Schulz — Tue, 11 Mar 2008 16:10:53 -0000

Yeah, we pointed out too that when the MacBook Pros got a refresh - that was the perfect time to get in and pick up a steeply discounted older model. Some of them were as high as 40% off regular price.

If you miss a day of GearDiary - you miss a lot....(RSS Reader is your friend)...

Re: Lenovo Outlet Laptop Blowout Sale

Wayne Schulz — Tue, 11 Mar 2008 16:12:42 -0000

ps - keep checking the site -- I swear I just saw a T61 sail by at $476...

Re: 40% Off MacBook and MacBook Pro Refurbs - Newly Re-stocked

Wayne Schulz — Wed, 12 Mar 2008 09:16:00 -0000

I enjoy both of my Macs -- and I NEVER thought I would buy one or recommend than another human do so.

Last night I loaded up .MAC which I bought from Amazon for $69.

It allows all your MACS to synch contacts, calendars, widgets.

Very similar to Microsoft's Foldershare =--- only you have to pay something for the MAC version. Setup is a snap.

I'll play around with it a little more through the week and if we haven't done a review yet - then I'll write up my thoughts.

Re: Batter Blaster: Pancakes in a Can

Wayne Schulz — Wed, 12 Mar 2008 12:15:16 -0000

I wonder how frequently the nozzle clogs.

Re: Batter Blaster: Pancakes in a Can

Wayne Schulz — Wed, 12 Mar 2008 12:25:30 -0000

I love how they start the product name with "Organic"....

Re: Lenovo Outlet Laptop Blowout Sale

Wayne Schulz — Wed, 12 Mar 2008 16:39:04 -0000

Looks like Crunch, Slash and JK just picked this up as well. Too bad the best deals are gonzo.

Re: Evernote Beta: So Much More Than Note Taking

Wayne Schulz — Thu, 13 Mar 2008 09:02:26 -0000

I am pretty sure there is (or will be) a WM version. There of course may be some limitations on what you can do with it.

You do NOT need a PC or MAC to access the notes. You could live a perfectly happy existence just using the web access. Some of the features may not be available in the web only version though. Since this is beta still - we won't know for a little bit what features make it to the final release.

Still, this is simply an awesome way to keep notes and throw out all those redundant notepads kicking around your office. I know that I always have the problem of scratching out a note and then misplacing it.

With Evernote, no matter where you enter this -- it shows up on all your versions - Web, MAC, Windows.

Very cool.

Re: My Favorite Game in the World…

Wayne Schulz — Thu, 13 Mar 2008 09:04:26 -0000

Boy do I wish all the fun iphone stuff didn't require a jailbreak.

Re: Invisible Shield: 50% Off - If You Know The Secret Link

Wayne Schulz — Thu, 13 Mar 2008 13:24:12 -0000

You must log in via the special URL - http://www.zagg.com/showspecial

It just worked for me -- shows a $7 price for one of them which is 1/2 off...

Re: I Win!

Wayne Schulz — Thu, 13 Mar 2008 21:17:01 -0000

very cool story.....what does she admit to her friends that you do? Does she tell them you're a famous writer or does she make up another profession?

Re: Range Rover Sport Supercharged

Wayne Schulz — Thu, 13 Mar 2008 21:19:04 -0000

First, I love each of these reviews - especially the pictures. Second, is the Range Rover getting better in reliability? Weren't they known for having more than their share of problems at some point in the past?

Re: Evernote Beta: So Much More Than Note Taking

Wayne Schulz — Thu, 13 Mar 2008 21:23:31 -0000

Last I noticed the Webware link at the end of the article had a special beta sign up page. That's how I got into the beta -- it took about an hour for them to respond with my invitation.

Re: Do you Hulu..?

Wayne Schulz — Fri, 14 Mar 2008 06:58:32 -0000

Definitely the wave of the future. I looked at this for a while under beta - it would be nice if they'd offer a way to take the shows mobile.

In the meantime my MOM emailed me a few months ago that I just had to "WATCH MOVIES" online. That she and the family had newly discovered the link through Google (Google the words in quotes). Too bad it's not legal.

Re: Why Walmart isn’t the place for Linux

Wayne Schulz — Fri, 14 Mar 2008 07:25:07 -0000

This is one reason why I think ultimately most of the apps we use will move to the web. So long as Linux lets you run a web browser (and the apps within it) - you'll totally remove this type of questioning.

We're 2 to 3 years away (maybe more) from mainstream users discovering how much it makes sense to use applications via their browser.

Before "browserware" becomes widespread, developers will have to figure out a compensation model because I doubt most users will be open to monthly recurring fees for every app that they use.

More than one person has remarked that eventually all software will be free. I wonder if that is true.

Re: I Wish I Was Joking - Lullaby Renditions of AC/DC

Wayne Schulz — Fri, 14 Mar 2008 07:26:44 -0000

I didn't realize that this was a whole series of CDs. I don't know if i would have bought these for my kids. Certainly unique!

Re: Microsoft Technet: Only $ 99 For Students Who Know The Secret Code

Wayne Schulz — Fri, 14 Mar 2008 07:28:20 -0000

This is a hot deal for those with kids in school. I have no idea how Microsoft justifies their "evaluation use only" moniker when offering this to students (presumably college).

Re: Dell Vostro: 2GB RAM, 20″ Monitor, $359 w/Free Shipping

Wayne Schulz — Sat, 15 Mar 2008 05:59:57 -0000

This was a bona fide hot deal. If you didn't get in on it, sorry to say but the deal is no longer valid.

What Dell sometimes will do is limit the numbers of computers available at the sale price.

Once they reach that limit, the deal goes away and the price goes up. Which is what has happened here.

Better luck next time.

Re: Maybe I Should Become a Paparazzi

Wayne Schulz — Sat, 15 Mar 2008 21:01:12 -0000

When I saw Paris Hilton come out of David Letterman in NYC she stopped and posed for probably 3 minutes- striking different poses and angles.

While I think that the highly public Britany stuff leads us to think that all celebrities are stalked -- truth is I think celebrities and photographers have an odd relationship and need each other equally as much.

Re: I’m Adding a New Phone To My Deck

Wayne Schulz — Mon, 17 Mar 2008 16:59:00 -0000

Funny how "helpful" Judie is when spending other people's money... :lol:

Re: Refurb 8GB iPhone $249 via AT&T Web Site - No Store Trip Required

Wayne Schulz — Tue, 18 Mar 2008 11:29:23 -0000

The only refurbs I shy away from are those with a lot of moving parts. I bought a Roomba off Woot! once that was a refurb and about 10 minutes out of the box it started doing the "circle of death" on the office floor. After that I swore off refurbs that had a lot of moving parts.

Apple has a really good reputation with their refurbs.

Re: Refurb 8GB iPhone $249 via AT&T Web Site - No Store Trip Required

Wayne Schulz — Wed, 19 Mar 2008 06:09:14 -0000

I'd be cautious on Dealdigs.com -- important to note that their site indicates that you must wait 90 days for your rebate.

Re: Do I Dare Delete Windows?

Wayne Schulz — Wed, 19 Mar 2008 18:00:50 -0000

I'd keep it if for no other reason than most of the stuff Microsoft pushes out requires Internet Explorer (so much for open internet standards).

Plus for $99 as a student - you can grab most of the relevant Microsoft software for it....

http://www.geardiary.com/2008/03/13/microsoft-t...

My vote is keep it -- as soon as you delete, you know you'll need.

Just my .02

Re: And Now, I Present the Shift…

Wayne Schulz — Thu, 20 Mar 2008 17:51:16 -0000

Ok, I read one of the reviews linked to above and boy are they hedging all over...they touch on various features that others have raised as weaknesses and launch into the "more on that later" ... but I'm not sure I ever got a good "more" explanation. I walked away from one review thinking they wrote it to keep HTC happy for letting them review the unit. Yuk.

Re: Amazon Apologizes for Kindle Shipment Delays

Wayne Schulz — Thu, 20 Mar 2008 17:53:29 -0000

I'm taking one for the team .. I put in an order about a week ago because I wanted to know whether Amazon was truly out of stock - and if so how long it took them to fill the order.

It seems VERY odd to me that a H-U-G-E retailer like Amazon does not have the executive talent to forecast demand for this device. I think there's a good chance that the letter was a publicity gimmick (it certainly gained them wide coverage).

And I remain convinced Kindle is more proof of concept than profit generator.

I'll be interested to see how it works when mine arrives..

Re: The Litter-Robot Review

Wayne Schulz — Fri, 21 Mar 2008 05:26:45 -0000

I love that cats come back to check their business, just like humans. Wait, you all don't do that too. No, I was just joking. Really.

This is super cool and it's nice to see one of these cat gizmos that really works. My ex-wife has two cats - I'll have to forward this on to her. She always asks me to clean the litterbox when they go away -- heck maybe I'll get her one for her birthday...

Re: And Now, I Present the Shift…

Wayne Schulz — Fri, 21 Mar 2008 05:47:32 -0000

James - Good job - please follow-up with a "How much WOULD you pay for this" = I'd love to see the response.....

I'd probably be in at $ 299. For the $1,499 that HTC is asking (and I have a hard time keeping a straight face as I type that thinking about the 2 hour battery life which we both know is only going to get worse with use).....I think the MacBook Air kicks the Shift to the curb.Heck, I think it already did so.

I'm thankful for products like the MacBook Air -- which I don't own and have no current plans to own --- for creating a category where the bar (both pricing and functionality) has been lifted ever higher.

Two hour battery life for a portable device that only sorta sluggishly runs Vista and comes with a case bolted to it's bottom....bawwwwhahahahha -- sorry..

Re: Amazon Apologizes for Kindle Shipment Delays

Wayne Schulz — Fri, 21 Mar 2008 05:51:39 -0000

@doogald - I agree with you 1000% percent - imho you are right on track with your thoughts. This is a marketing ploy. Either that or Amazon after years in the business suddenly became incompetent about supply chain management. Either that or we're to believe they totally outsourced their development of the Kindle and are at the mercy of a third party supplier.

I'm not buying the excuses.

I am buying a Kindle though (on order)...so as soon as it get's here I'll report back.

Why would I buy one? I'm tired of filling my house up with books that waste paper and resources. If I could get this all electronically and have Amazon store my books for me -- I would gladly pay for the device plus a smallish storage fee. That's my hope anyhow.

Re: Palm Reports Tumbling Revenues - What I Think Could Turn Them Around

Wayne Schulz — Fri, 21 Mar 2008 14:16:46 -0000

the part that is missing in the "does the world need another mini pc" is the synch and seamless web capabilities....when I say seamless capabilities I mean full boat -- JAVA, Flash, etc -- and the power under the hood to make it all happen.

Synching documents to a web ala Evernote would be hot.

Re: My Blunder of the Day

Wayne Schulz — Sat, 22 Mar 2008 07:27:52 -0000

I have this type of think happen usually once or twice per year. The last time it was with a prospective client and I was doing the same thing you did - attempting to forward some off-the-cuff remark and instead of forward I hit reply.

I've seen a few of the "talking about the person" situations -- which are embarrassing when the subject is right around the corner.

Some day they may come out with a working "take back" function within all emails...that would be an interesting tool.

Oh, and my favorite blunder - which I think is the worst actually - is when companies in my industry send out an email and instead of bcc: they use cc: which exposes ALL the names of the people on the list. This is bad for the sending company because usually they've just sent out their entire email list....

Re: Rights as a photographer

Wayne Schulz — Sat, 22 Mar 2008 07:42:00 -0000

Too bad not everyone reads the 10 legal commandments. Too often it seems as if they're made up on the fly by anyone who might not want to have their picture taken. Then the rule becomes - if they're bigger than you --- time to put away the camera ...

I didn't get a chance to read the whole 10 as I'm traveling - but I'm thinking one big requirement must be that it's for non-commercial use as I know all film and TV shows are big on getting releases signed.

Re: Microsoft Technet: Only $ 99 For Students Who Know The Secret Code

Wayne Schulz — Mon, 24 Mar 2008 06:36:25 -0000

Looks like the main page is gone -- but Google has a cache here:

http://64.233.169.104/search?q=cache:mKsq80Ur0B...

The code is: TSTNT7

Re: Microsoft Technet: Only $ 99 For Students Who Know The Secret Code

Wayne Schulz — Mon, 24 Mar 2008 06:37:16 -0000

Update: Just tried the code and it has expired.

Re: Microsoft Technet: Only $ 99 For Students Who Know The Secret Code

Wayne Schulz — Mon, 24 Mar 2008 11:56:47 -0000

yes - move quick if you see me post a deal that I've found -- I typically will only chase them if they have:

1. Readily available and verified usable coupon

2. Discount level that is rare or that I've not seen before

3. Of wide enough use to readers to be worth posting

The 8GB iphone refurbs sold out quick as did the refresh of the Apple hardware (some of which was 40% off list).....

Re: iPod Air: Prophetic Or Wishful Thinking? You Decide

Wayne Schulz — Mon, 24 Mar 2008 16:10:47 -0000

Yes - Macrumors.com did this with the macbookair.com (which Apple doesn't own) -- and they publicly stated that they did the same (and admitted ownership).....

Re: iPod Air: Prophetic Or Wishful Thinking? You Decide

Wayne Schulz — Mon, 24 Mar 2008 16:16:32 -0000

Sorry just looked - Apple apparently does own Macbook air -- see this thread for the background on the Macbookair domain:

http://forums.macrumors.com/showthread.php?t=41...

Re: Anyone Buying the MacBook Air Just For the Hardware?

Wayne Schulz — Mon, 24 Mar 2008 16:25:21 -0000

Hey Mitchell - take a look at this link -- X-Bit labs proclaims the Air to be nearly a perfect Vista machine....

http://arstechnica.com/journals/apple.ars/2008/...

Re: iPod Air: Prophetic Or Wishful Thinking? You Decide

Wayne Schulz — Mon, 24 Mar 2008 20:05:16 -0000

I bet that the owner is trying to avoid the wrath of Apple while trying to sell the domain (assuming Apple hasn't already taken control)..

Re: So You Want to Buy a Car on The Internet…

Wayne Schulz — Tue, 25 Mar 2008 05:43:33 -0000

Here's my trick that always works for car shopping:

Completely figure out WHAT you want so when you stop into the dealership you are ready to make a decision.

When you go into the dealership you tell them one thing -- you're on the way to pick up your child, sick relative from the doctor, etc in 30 minutes -- so you cannot stay longer than 30 minutes.

This gives them a deadline by which to cut a deal with you.

Most of the time the sales guys hurry things along quite a bit. And this gives you a timeframe to get the deal done. If they can't meet your price you're out in 30 minutes (not 2 hours).

This works for me every time.

Nice article -- I would love to see if you could follow-up on what Carfax does. I've heard of them but never have used them. Is this just for used card? What level of details do they provide?

Re: My Touch Keys Brings Haptics to the iPhone

Wayne Schulz — Wed, 26 Mar 2008 17:17:15 -0000

I don't get what will be so hard about re-creating this. Is a piece of plastic with holes patent-able????

Re: Blackberry 8830 Plagued By Connection Flaw?

Wayne Schulz — Wed, 26 Mar 2008 21:34:29 -0000

I was close to buying an 8830 under Sprint. Their simply unlimited plan is a great deal because for $99 you also receive a free BIS Blackberry account plus unlimited text messaging.

The stories in the discussion forums where too similar for this just to have been one or two bad devices. Several people reported swapping two or three 8830s and having the same signal dropping experiences.

A lot of my clients are sporting the Verizon 8830s. I'm going to check with one of them tomorrow when I'm on-site with them to see if they've experienced this issue.

For now I'm sticking with my T-Mobile Blackberry 8320.

Re: Amazon Kindle #1 Selling Non-Shipping Amazon Item

Wayne Schulz — Thu, 27 Mar 2008 17:25:45 -0000

@doogald - it is weird that no sales figures have trickled out..

Re: Best Buy Would Prefer That You Keep Your Mouth Shut

Wayne Schulz — Fri, 28 Mar 2008 09:27:13 -0000

Best Buy wins my "Most Expensive Place To Buy Just about Anything" award....

Re: GearChat: Evernote Beta Continues To Impress - We’ve Got Invites - Or Use This Secret Link To Join Directly

Wayne Schulz — Fri, 28 Mar 2008 15:52:45 -0000

I just sent you out an invite to the beta.

Anyone else needing one - leave a message in the comments and I'll send an invite.

Re: GearChat: Evernote Beta Continues To Impress - We’ve Got Invites - Or Use This Secret Link To Join Directly

Wayne Schulz — Fri, 28 Mar 2008 16:30:22 -0000

It was hard for me to tell whether the link allowed you to create an account on your own or whether it really required an invite.

When I downloaded on my MBP it created the Mac client and prompted me to either login to an existing account or create a new one.

Am not sure if the Windows download is different in terms of allowing you to create an account.

@RuiMDuarte - Sent invite

I have 8 left

Re: GearChat: Evernote Beta Continues To Impress - We’ve Got Invites - Or Use This Secret Link To Join Directly

Wayne Schulz — Sat, 29 Mar 2008 07:31:26 -0000

@Victore - sent invitation this AM
@JDTagish - sent invitation this AM
@Chris Magnusson - am not sure on the greying out issue - I sent you a beta invite just in case that was the "missing piece"

I just tried to setup a Windows Vista copy of Evernote and as originally noted in the comments it stops me from creating an account.

It redirects to:

http://www.evernote.com/prereg/

Unfortunately when I initially discovered you could download the beta of Win and Mac -- I did not test whether I was able to create ANOTHER account -- I just saw there was an "add an account" button and I mistakenly assumed it would work. My bad. Looks like if you're not in the beta you have to roll through the application process.

I have 7 more remaining and I think Judie and Doug may have some as well. I've asked Evernote for a block of them but have yet to hear back.

Re: iPhone and the Edge Network - About to Speed up?

Wayne Schulz — Sat, 29 Mar 2008 16:57:48 -0000

"The mystery is whether this will apply to the iPhone given its current hardware. Let’s hope so!"

Hey - you're talking about a device without a replaceable battery. About a company that is the # 1 seller of music - through a proprietary iTunes program - yet provides no easy way to backup your music to anything but a CD/DVD.

It's all about planned obsolescence.

No way the iPhone gets any major speed update as is without the carrier goosing the EDGE rates at the tower.

Just my .02

Re: Handango vs. Everyone Else, Round 10

Wayne Schulz — Sat, 29 Mar 2008 17:49:51 -0000

My only guess is they have to pay phone carriers to get their Handango Download App onto the phones.

I *think* there was also an article somewhere (can't remember now) about Handango pushing into POS.

Alas, I suspect the end of the line may be near for them. If the whole open phone policy takes off like it should -- that means that other companies might have access to the phones and offer a competing service.

Of course maybe that's why Handango needed another $9million too -- because they forsee having to pay more people in order to stay on the phone handsets once they get "deregulated"...

Re: GearChat: Evernote Beta Continues To Impress - We’ve Got Invites - Or Use This Secret Link To Join Directly

Wayne Schulz — Sat, 29 Mar 2008 20:07:29 -0000

@mitch.olson - Invite is on the way

@Chris - the versions are a bit confusing - the older version was more difficult to sync. I always used the Foldershare utility as a quick and easy sync.

Re: The Solio Solar Charger Review: Kermit Was Wrong!

Wayne Schulz — Sun, 30 Mar 2008 08:17:58 -0000

For 50% less than the price of the charger (which seems to draw most of it's productive charge from AC anyhow) -- check out:

http://www.amazon.com/Black-Decker-Laptop-Cordl...

WARNING: In my brief testing I found that the above Power to Go had trouble supplying power to my Ipod Touch. YMMV

Re: The Dark and Seedy Underbelly of Gadget Blogging

Wayne Schulz — Sun, 30 Mar 2008 08:23:20 -0000

I have them in my RSS reader just to make sure I know what topics/stories are already being covered. I had Gizmodo out for a while but had to add them back to RSS so I could see if they were covering something that I contemplated writing.

Otherwise I find myself reading:

1. techmeme
2. Twitter/Friendfeed (which I think is poised to be CB Radio for Bloggers - I'm not sure either have legs beyond use by Bloggers and their groupies)

Re: Keep All Your Microblogs Updated With HelloTxt

Wayne Schulz — Sun, 30 Mar 2008 08:27:30 -0000

Friendfeed seems poised to take this market. Though I have no idea what the business plan for such a service is. Nobody else seems to know either.

For Twitter - I am using Twhirl (twhirl.org) which is VERY cool and runs on Adobe Air -- so you can use this on either Mac or Windows - same interface.

Techcrunch had news that an Adobe Air version of Friendfeed was being worked on.

Brace yourself because my prediction is that for the next three to six months we're going to see tons of these aggregators - if for no other reason that bloggers seem to love writing about them during their many slow moments.

Re: GearChat: Evernote Beta Continues To Impress - We’ve Got Invites - Or Use This Secret Link To Join Directly

Wayne Schulz — Sun, 30 Mar 2008 08:53:26 -0000

@shaneben - sent invite
@MollyB - sent invite

Re: GearChat: All Socialed Out?

Wayne Schulz — Mon, 31 Mar 2008 20:44:43 -0000

Nice job summarizing Judie - I love how you're able to put this all out there - the pros and cons.

I am @mas90guru on twitter - the hardest thing I've found is to locate people who are interesting to follow. Increasingly I'm finding the smaller blog writers are more interesting than the 100 lb gorillas who tend to speed post mostly links to their own stuff or a friend's.

To add people to my list, I looked at people I knew like Judie and assumed she was following smart people (she is) so I added them as well.

One thing that's cool if you're into tech (which I assume most people are) is that there are at least two people out at CTIA live blogging about the show.

@crackberry is Kevin from Crackberry.com - he twittered about the Verizon 8330 last night. I picked up the info and made sure our readers knew about it asap because I'd seen quite a few users on Howardforums and Blackberryforums pining for the Curve on a CDMA carrier.

@CTIA so far has been quiet but I don't think the main show has kicked into high gear. I noticed one message today about a session that they were in regarding mobile phone disappointments (to which I twittered -- "mobile browsing!"..)

The jury is still out on the whole Social scene. To me the more sites that arrive on the scene, the more the total value becomes diluted - and the higher likelihood that people give up in frustration.

Re: Back to Windows Mobile After Using the iPhone

Wayne Schulz — Mon, 31 Mar 2008 20:49:04 -0000

I'll take $20 on Nokia as Jenneth's next phone love...can I win more if I name the month when this affair peters out and the new one starts? :lol:

Re: Back to Windows Mobile After Using the iPhone

Wayne Schulz — Mon, 31 Mar 2008 20:53:38 -0000

@nosmohtac - I have the SERO plan too. I keep it around since it's probably he best deal going.

About 6 months ago I picked up the iPhone.

If you want to see what it's like -- grab an iPod Touch - very nearly the same thing (minus the phone). That's what sold me. Within 30 days of owning a Touch I headed down to Apple and bought the iPhone.

I use the browser on the iPhone all the time -- it's the first truly usable phone browser I've ever seen.

Re: Digital Justice

Wayne Schulz — Mon, 31 Mar 2008 23:19:43 -0000

I love it!

Re: April Fools: Proporta Introduces Advanced Pane Protector

Wayne Schulz — Tue, 01 Apr 2008 05:32:40 -0000

Can I put in for a review ? :-)

Re: April Fools: When Does an Internet Identity Become Overwhelming?

Wayne Schulz — Tue, 01 Apr 2008 05:34:16 -0000

Here's my favorite April Fools:

Man Arrested For Having Sex With a Patio Table
http://digg.com/odd_stuff/Man_Charged_For_Havin...

Oh wait, that's not a joke.

Can you imagine the reception this guy will get at future family reunions?

Re: April Fools: The Linux Link Tech Show is now The New Mac Show

Wayne Schulz — Tue, 01 Apr 2008 22:02:43 -0000

See - Apple is taking over the world slowly. First they start with music. Then phones. Next it is computers...

Re: Our Readers and Their Gadgets - Your Vote Needed!

Wayne Schulz — Wed, 02 Apr 2008 22:09:17 -0000

Wow - these are all so good. I vote Katie though - looks like extra work went into getting all dressed up and posing.

Re: You Can’t Beat that with a Stick…Or Can You??

Wayne Schulz — Thu, 03 Apr 2008 06:05:01 -0000

Interesting topic. I've been giving this some thought recently as well.

After 4 trips to the repair depot, I've almost given up on my Dell Inspiron. Dell just seems to have lost their way - and I am pretty sure they tripped up not only on quality - but by not offering fully configured hardware.

Remember how it used to be to buy a Dell?

It was damn near a "one click" experience. Dell rarely sold anything but beefy hardware.

At some point Dell started pushing this barebones crap. When I'd go to configure a machine advertised as $500 --- it started to exceed $750 with just the bare minimum "upgrades" required to make it usable (memory, processor, disk size).

Fast forward to my recent MacBook Pro purchase (defection).

Upgraded the hard disk (the one area that I'm squeamish about swapping out in a laptop) -- DONE.

No confusing or misleading configuration (and yes I paid about twice what I'd have paid for a Windows machine)....boy do I hate bait and switch stuff that Dell seems to have ridden to (brief) earnings glory for several years ....

When Windows came out with umpteen versions of Vista I just rolled my eyes. It was confusing to say the least. Then I started to get messages from my friends about how slow Vista was. How much the OS relied on very strong hardware.

If I knew that I could connect up effortlessly to my servers at work, I'd probably grab an iMac for my desktop. Heck, I may still do that.

With the Mac I have an OS that automatically backs up my data (Hello Windows - is that such a hard concept to grasp??).

Just like the iPhone came along and knocked every mobile phone on it's ass with their far superior browser -- leopard is waking up the competition.

I think Windows is too bloated and too far removed from anything innovative. We buy it as a commodity now. When the "Microsoft tax" gets too high - we start to look at options. That's what people are doing now --- nobody wants to keep paying taxes without feeling they are getting some service in return. That's the lesson Microsoft needs to learn. I'm curious if they'll learn that before it's too late.

Re: Guitar Hero III for Blackberry

Wayne Schulz — Thu, 03 Apr 2008 11:49:49 -0000

Looks like you get 3 tunes per month? Now I have no idea if that's three that you get to keep or if they expire.

Heck, I'm not even sure how much fun Guitar Hero will be on a Blackberry.

I just downloaded it OTA (over the air) and it's a big 1.2 mb file. I'll try to register it and take a look tonight.

Re: It’s Official: Windows XP Dead 6/30/2008

Wayne Schulz — Thu, 03 Apr 2008 17:04:58 -0000

yeah, I almost included a link to the Mac store page....but thought better....

Re: Happy Birthday Joel!

Wayne Schulz — Fri, 04 Apr 2008 10:27:17 -0000

Happy Birthday Joel!! :mrgreen:

Re: Keep Up On Amazon.com Wii Availability with Twitter

Wayne Schulz — Fri, 04 Apr 2008 11:35:30 -0000

I'm not entirely sold on the concept of Twitter. I love it for following news type feeds. It is interesting to watch some people - especially those with thoughtful periodic updates.

I still think it's primarily CB radio for bloggers.

I've convinced my sister to join as well as one of my friends. I'll be able to judge a lot better whether it's as useful once/if they start updating.

Re: Sometimes it’s about the destination - this time it’s about the JOURNEY

Wayne Schulz — Fri, 04 Apr 2008 12:21:16 -0000

This looks hot.

Question for you -- is "Crossover" the new more politically correct name for station wagon?

I've seen several of these types of vehicles -- I think Ford has one -- and each time they get a little smaller and except for usually having all wheel drive - they're typically a lot like a station wagon.

Re: Walt Says 3G iPhone in Two Months

Wayne Schulz — Sat, 05 Apr 2008 17:48:44 -0000

Judie - do you know a Bill, a William? I see him. You have some unfinished business. Something that should be done. I'm not sure exactly what - but I see water. Does this ring a bell...

His prediction amazes me in the same way I'm amazed by psychics....

Ok, before I'm a wise ass I should watch Walt.

But geez--- the iPhone has been out of stock for (I think 2 weeks). AT&T;/Cingular publicly stated this year (I think even mid-year but I have to do more searching to be sure) -- and at CTIA didn't the head AT&T; dude spell out "a few months"...

If this prediction had come last year before AT&T; proclaiming that one would be here -- I'd be a lot more impressed.

If Walt could say whether the photo of the "next gen" iphone with the black backing was authentic -- I'd be more impressed.

How about predicting RAM, removable battery, whether there will be an iPhone Pro (I'm guessing yes)..

The real story here is not the statement - it's the betting for how long it will be front page techmeme (techmeme.com - an excellent blog compilation site) and for second place the # of sites that will be under the main story. I say the story is front page until Wed with 15 to 20 sites (contest idea? :lol: )

Re: Walt Says 3G iPhone in Two Months

Wayne Schulz — Sat, 05 Apr 2008 18:07:40 -0000

I just watched the video.

I'm just saying that I don't think Walt's "next 60 days" prediction is all thatrisky for him since the phone was already verified by the carrier last year (about December? ) as coming in 3 G, then Apple stores sold out about two weeks ago all over NYC (big hint that 3g must be coming) - then out of CTIA there were multiple stories that AT&T; verified all their phones would be 3G within a few months (I'd have to go back and see the stories but I know the story was out way before Walt).

Re: Walt Says 3G iPhone in Two Months

Wayne Schulz — Sat, 05 Apr 2008 18:09:46 -0000

...Giz is p1 with AT&T; confirming iPhone 3G in months...so Walt isn't really out on a limb....that's all I'm saying.

I'm picnic bound for a little while - catchya on twitter!

Re: Walt Says 3G iPhone in Two Months

Wayne Schulz — Sat, 05 Apr 2008 20:55:02 -0000

No I'm alluding to the way psychics always seem right - because they "know" stuff about things that nobody really could ... except in hindsight they are really getting us to think they know. ok maybe it's a bad analogy...

Here's another Mossberg prediction I'm still waiting for - and it's iPhone related...

http://blogs.zdnet.com/Stewart/?p=445

Re: My Last Bargain Laptop Purchase Back On Sale - Compaq Presario T2330

Wayne Schulz — Sun, 06 Apr 2008 14:23:05 -0000

Just noticed there is a Dell with 2GB RAM and 160 GB on sale at Best Buy for $499 - slightly bigger hard drive and the memory is expandable to 4gb instead of 2gb.

fyi

Re: The Energizer Hard Case Tactical Flashlight Review

Wayne Schulz — Sun, 06 Apr 2008 21:15:51 -0000

Very cool -- good to see that high quality devices are still being made - and the price is affordable.

Re: Keurig Ultra B50 Gourmet Single Cup Home Brewing System

Wayne Schulz — Mon, 07 Apr 2008 06:05:20 -0000

Excellent point.

As you might be able to tell - I'm not a big coffee drinker. I think this is definitely a device for people who aren't heavy coffee drinkers like me. It cuts out the prep, and cleanup.

Re: Track The Olympic Torch via Google Maps

Wayne Schulz — Mon, 07 Apr 2008 07:35:23 -0000

Not sure - I just stumbled on it last night. I was able to get into the site on my iPhone but I'm not a Google Earth user so I didn't test that either.

Re: Review: Sansa Sessions, free music for your new Sansa Fuze

Wayne Schulz — Tue, 08 Apr 2008 19:30:58 -0000

Do you think this is something that the band's record company paid to get them on?

Re: GoodBye HuddleChat, We Hardly Knew Ya

Wayne Schulz — Wed, 09 Apr 2008 05:43:34 -0000

Wow - this is a big deal in my opinion. Not that Google took down a group chat program (I'm underwhelmed that a one page group chat could rip anyone off any more than Ford could rip Toyota for making a "car").

The huge issue is that Google is trying to attract developers to their platform.

Who wants to spend hundreds of hours only to ultimately have Google take down their application?

I waded through the comments over at Techcrunch and most people largely didn't get the bigger issue. Everyone saw it as a strict problem of one developer copying another.

WRONG.

The problem here is that GOOGLE pulled the plug.

Judge. Jury. Executioner.

Expect to read more opinions on this as people start to get the bigger picture at work.

Now to find another group chat to hold our team meeting in....

Re: New! - Your Google Account As Your OpenID

Wayne Schulz — Wed, 09 Apr 2008 07:24:40 -0000

I don't think they have a Mac version though...

At least not the last time I checked.

Still can't believe I haven't touched a WIN machine at home in 6 months...

Re: AMC Theatres Summer Movie Camp - Only $ 1

Wayne Schulz — Wed, 09 Apr 2008 08:51:09 -0000

Two Words:

Air Conditioning

Re: Kindle Logjam About To Ease?

Wayne Schulz — Wed, 09 Apr 2008 21:06:34 -0000

Thanks for the suggestion on the order number, I changed it prior to posting (the screen shot is of a forward of the email - then I went in and changed my order # and account email).

Re: The Problems and Challenges with Software as a Service

Wayne Schulz — Thu, 10 Apr 2008 05:35:40 -0000

A similar argument could have (and probably was) made when things moved from pencil and paper to computer. Heck I still have clients that argue along the lines of "not trusting the computer".

Part of this argument confuses me because you're talking about online web hosts and (I think) making comparisons to Google Apps (et al). Are these really in the same league?

An online host (in their mind) is essentially renting hard disk space and bandwidth.

SAAS like Google Apps, are usually providing the entire package of use and storage - bundled in a do it yourself package. These SAAS usually take some responsibility for data privacy and backup.

I'm really confused how we discuss this issue without discussing SAAS. Isn't that what the entire story is about?

Re: Where Are You Most Productive?

Wayne Schulz — Fri, 11 Apr 2008 05:50:16 -0000

I'm most productive first thing in the morning before my kids get up and before I have to start my day job.

STarbucks is also a good spot for me. I need to find a slightly bigger spot though as the one by me only has a few tables and one large row of window based seats.

I subscribe to the T-Mobile service and connect via WIFI in Starbucks which gives about 1.2 mb.

One of my favorite places to go mobile is in NYC. I can setup my laptop while visiting clients and get work done.

PS - I'm also amazingly productive with my iPhone -- I read a lot of news on that even before I get out of bed.

Re: The Spracht Aura Mobile BT Review

Wayne Schulz — Fri, 11 Apr 2008 05:53:18 -0000

Thanks - I'm looking for something like this. I wonder if we'll start to see more companies making Bluetooth devices that can pair with multiple phones. Especially given that many iPhone users (myself included) us the iPhone plus another phone.

Re: Blackberry OS v4.5 Screen Shots Leaking All Over

Wayne Schulz — Sun, 13 Apr 2008 11:07:57 -0000

I totally agree. In my opinion (and I'm a long time Blackberry user/fanatic) Blackberry has hit what I call their "market top".

From here on in it's all downhill.

Their browser is poor, they still require the archaic extra fee for BIS or BES (watch this go away when the iPhone adds Exchange support).

The whole issue of push email is not really anything new or technically difficult anymore. I think that the idea of Blackberry demanding a premium for their devices is quaint and within about a year I think we're going to see them start to head downhill in terms of market share rather quickly.

Re: Face-Off Frenzy Give Away: Portable Air Hockey!!

Wayne Schulz — Mon, 14 Apr 2008 06:36:00 -0000

Wow this looks really cool.

Re: Irrational Fears Realized: Trapped in an Elevator for Two Days

Wayne Schulz — Mon, 14 Apr 2008 12:50:19 -0000

Who the heck was keeping an eye on the security tape? I guess the guard never looked at it??

Did this guy refrain from going to the bathroom for 41 hours?

Re: Irrational Fears Realized: Trapped in an Elevator for Two Days

Wayne Schulz — Mon, 14 Apr 2008 13:46:13 -0000

Is it considered sexist to ask whether a woman would have made it 41 hours without a bathroom break?

I'm just asking if it's sexist, not if a woman could hold it 41 hours. Well never mind..

Re: Face-Off Frenzy Give Away: Portable Air Hockey!!

Wayne Schulz — Mon, 14 Apr 2008 13:47:27 -0000

I think it was GI Joes.

I also like walkie talkies too.

Re: OHM Cycles Pick Up the Slack

Wayne Schulz — Mon, 14 Apr 2008 15:11:15 -0000

While we were out taking a walk yesterday the subject of mopeds came up and how you never (hardly) see anyone riding them anymore. The electric seems like a good idea.

This would especially be cool in a vacation spot that is really warm and where you don't feel like exerting yourself but want to bike around an island.

Re: Sprint SERO: An Alternative To Verizon’s New $30 Data Plan

Wayne Schulz — Mon, 14 Apr 2008 19:18:34 -0000

I will start the ball rolling....sprint sucks.

They work well in my area and the data plans are speedy (faster than Verizon) so if you're in a good coverage area give them a try.

Also if you sign up, work the system for all it's worth...the first 30 days is your "remorse" period when you can return the phone. You'll have the opportunity to email eCare and beg for free stuff.

I received 6pm NW.

PS - I recommend you purchase their monthly TEP - Total Equipment Protection - because without it if your phone breaks you have to send it out for warranty. Unlike other carriers Sprint does not fix it outside the 30 day initial period....

Re: Post-April 15 Tips to Prevent Identity Theft

Wayne Schulz — Tue, 15 Apr 2008 13:46:44 -0000

Here's another tip - my day job is accounting software and a LOT of smaller companies still print payroll check stubs with your social security number displayed...

..many of these stubs land in the trash bin at the bank...where they could easily be harvested for your name and social security number.

We aren't seeing this as much anymore - some states have passed laws to disallow the number from being printed.

Definitely something to watch for.

Re: Starbucks Duetto Cards Down Nationwide

Wayne Schulz — Tue, 15 Apr 2008 13:54:04 -0000

One poster at the Starbucks Gossip Site said when they spoke to customer service that somehow all the balances on the Starbucks portion of the Duetto cards were reset or erased.

NOTE: The Duetto card is the Visa/Starbucks dual card. This issue does NOT appear to affect any of the regular Starbucks prepaid cards.

Hopefully they have a backup of some sort...

Re: EPOQ Unveils the EGP-98B Windows Mobile Wrist Watch Phone

Wayne Schulz — Wed, 16 Apr 2008 21:36:40 -0000

Cool looking .. but for $600 -- no can do. I think the attraction is miniaturization, but for the money I'd jump on a cell phone that ran WM6 and take advantage of the large number of Apps.

Re: MacUpdate Promo: Up To $475 of Mac Software for $64.99 - Expires 4/29/08

Wayne Schulz — Wed, 16 Apr 2008 21:39:01 -0000

I think I'm going to go for this -- I don't need Parallels so I'll gift it to one reader who needs a copy of Parallels (that is assuming they unlock to that level -- I think there need to be 15,000 copies of this deal sold for Parallels to be included).

Re: Go-Kart on steroids

Wayne Schulz — Wed, 16 Apr 2008 21:44:10 -0000

Love these reviews. David - have you ever crashed a car while testing it? If not crashed - maybe scraped it?

Where do you bring the cars to test them - is it always a track? Do the manufacturers have a site? Or do you just wait until night and rip down Main Stree?

Re: Hall & Oates Fans - Free Performances Live From Daryl’s House

Wayne Schulz — Wed, 16 Apr 2008 21:48:48 -0000

I saw Hall and Oates at the CT Chevy Theater in Wallingford (formerly the Oakdale). They were there with Michael McDonald and the Average White Band.

Possibly the greatest show ever.

No stage setup whatsoever. I think they had one electric piano. A folding chair and the drums and guitars.

Unbelievably these guys sounded just like their albums.

And Michael McDonald did a set for about an hour where he just walked on stage, sat behind a piano and asked the audience what to play.

I'd never seen such an informal and great concert before.

When I caught Hall and Oates at the Foxwoods Casino I bought the show on CD. Immediately after the concerts there is a table set up where they sell their shows. You can also go in via their web site and buy CD's for an extremely reasonable price that are live recordings (excellent quality) of the nightly show.

If these guys come to your town, go see them!

Re: I Feel Like I Have Pushed My Baby From the Nest…and He FLEW!

Wayne Schulz — Thu, 17 Apr 2008 05:32:08 -0000

Mitchell this is great!!

His writing is the reason I've got an iMac and MBP sitting here in front of me. He has a great way of framing things he's enthusiastic about without coming off hyping them.

This is only the first step Mitchell- now that you have one of these print things under your belt more and more follow.

Good job mate, throw another shrimp on the barbie -- are whatever it is they say in Australia.. :-)

Re: MacUpdate Promo: Up To $475 of Mac Software for $64.99 - Expires 4/29/08

Wayne Schulz — Thu, 17 Apr 2008 05:36:58 -0000

I am thinking that you can register the software in another name. I have had such good luck with some of the smaller Mac apps that I don't really hesitation to spend money on these bundles.

Re: A Surprise Unboxing

Wayne Schulz — Thu, 17 Apr 2008 08:37:05 -0000

Happy Birthday!!

GearDiary Team Members in the video - in order of their appearance -

Wayne Schulz
Joel McLaughlin
Allen Hong
Chris Gavula
Kerry Woo
Mitchell Oke

Thanks to Jennifer Serra for slaving over the oven to make, decorate and supervise the whole cake thing!!

Great job on piecing everyone together in the video Mitchell!!

Re: HTC Shift First Impressions

Wayne Schulz — Thu, 17 Apr 2008 11:04:47 -0000

Mitchell I'm especially interested in your thoughts of "would I buy this SHIFT or a MacBook Air" - and in which situations might one or the other be appropriate.

Re: Win a Sandisk 8GB microSDHC Card from Pocket Mojo

Wayne Schulz — Thu, 17 Apr 2008 11:19:00 -0000

My favorite camera phone picture. I had to take a photograph of this note that was lying on my pillow. I didn't notice it until I went to bed last night. Turns out each of my kids wrote a note asking for an allowance. Notice how they butter me up in the signature with "#1 Dad". They sure don't use those words when I'm telling them to be quiet and stop hitting each other in the back seat of the car...

http://www.flickr.com/photos/mas90guru/24204301...

Re: Unleashing Your Inner Artist, the Fendi Way

Wayne Schulz — Thu, 17 Apr 2008 14:06:08 -0000

Ok, I was reading thinking Jennifer would love one of these...then I hit the price tag. Ouch..

Re: New iPhone, MacBook, MacBook Pro Images Debated At MacRumors

Wayne Schulz — Thu, 17 Apr 2008 14:36:58 -0000

I'm not sold that these are the real thing. Though people at MacRumors were debating it (most doubted the authenticity), quite a few of them were of the opinion that while the photos probably were not real that they were pretty close to what they thought about the direction of the products.

I was doubtful about the 32GB iPhone pictured on the site.

If Apple is going to do a push into corporate America I'm expecting them to drop the camera and offer an extended battery. Neither of which I've seen in any "spy" photos as of yet.

Re: The Morning After…Receiving the Shift

Wayne Schulz — Fri, 18 Apr 2008 10:32:05 -0000

Yeah Mitchell - when I was in school we used cassette tapes to 8k TRS-80 computers whose most entertaining feature was a text based game of star trek. :-)

Re: Update: My Kindle Arrives Today - 30 Days From Order to Shipment

Wayne Schulz — Fri, 18 Apr 2008 10:33:38 -0000

I'm really curious to try this out. If you ever see me knocking a product in the comments - watch out. It means in about 30 days I'll be getting one...

I plan on having a cross section of people try it too -- just to see how it would translate to use by geeks and non-geeks alike.

Re: Review: Petty Driving Experience Orlando: Drive It Like You Stole It

Wayne Schulz — Fri, 18 Apr 2008 10:36:08 -0000

Alison - definitely go!! I had a blast and if I lived closer I would go again. I think they follow some of the NASCAR races too and may setup a schedule before and/or after the Cup races.

Think about doing the ride along experience too. It's cheaper -- because you don't drive and you are just a passenger with a driver. But it looked like a LOT of fun and the day of the ride they were offering them for a discount. If I wasn't driving I would have done that too.

Re: The Whoomp! Earbud Enhancers Review: Apple’s Dirty Little Secret

Wayne Schulz — Sat, 19 Apr 2008 06:47:32 -0000

As soon as I saw these I thought - what a great idea.

Do they come in different sizes or is it one size fits all?

How are they at staying in your ear. One of my pet peeves with my Bose in-ear buds is that they always feel like they're about to fall out. I just never found a way to keep them securely in place.

Once these are on the end of the earbud, are they tough to get off (I'm worried more about losing them)

Re: Only In Florida: Unlimited Mini Golf Featuring Live Gators

Wayne Schulz — Sat, 19 Apr 2008 10:27:51 -0000

Unfortunately it was dark and we were returning from our indoor skydiving trip, or I definitely would have paid to go in here and take some pictures.

Re: Use Your Phone To Price Check Items to Amazon - You May Be Pleasantly Surprised

Wayne Schulz — Sun, 20 Apr 2008 09:22:39 -0000

I love Costco!

It's only recently that I am starting to see that online sites like Amazon are cheaper for a lot of things. I was really surprised yesterday when I was in Sams Club (a variation of Costco) and price checked the Flip Video, Nikon D40 and Canon Digital Rebel.

Exact same models and configurations (so far as I could tell).

Amazon beat every one of them by a good $10 to $30.

Here's hoping you get some Costco Warehouses soon! If not - Amazon is probably as good a deal - at least on the electronics that I checked.

Re: Dear Gear Diary…

Wayne Schulz — Sun, 20 Apr 2008 19:03:49 -0000

I've been through some variation of all the ones you mention Judie and here's my .02 --- (and remember when the iphone first came out I nearly peed myself laughing to think people were going to pay money for that -- and now it's my main phone, my house has an iMac and MacBook Pro -- so just because I make a negative observation doesn't mean I wouldn't eventually change my mind and try different technology).

Nokia - Cool - I like that streaming video services like Qik seems to be centering a lot of cool stuff around that platform. From what I've seen Qik is a service that allows those with Nokia phones to stream live video from the phone to the web. I've given a really quick thought to getting a Nokia only for that purpose. My last Nokia was an N73 I bought off the Internet. It was cool but ultimately I couldn't find much to hold my interest long term. When it broke and refused to boot up I was kind of happy.

Then Judie made her famous Mogul unboxing video and soon I was using the Sprint Mogul. That was my main phone for several months. I loved the synch to Exchange (just like your Samsung will do) and I thought the phone was pretty steady. Long term I didn't care for the flip and the keyboard was tough to make a lot of progress with. I still have the Mogul on my kitchen shelf.

For day to day I carry two phones:

Blackberry 8320 which is my main emailer. It's a great email phone. Unfortunately the browser stinks.

For everything FUN I LOVE my iPhone. For a rock solid 4 months i made fun of anyone who used one. I didn't see them out in public that much and took that as an opportunity to email my buddie Mark about how dubious I was about their usability.

Then I bought one. The main reason I made the purchase was because I had purchased an iPod Touch on a whim at Costco. The Touch is an iPhone without the Phone. I loved using the Touch on my home WIFI and suddenly I wanted to be able to take it everywhere with me -- so I convinced myself to pick up an iPhone.

Now the phone goes with me everywhere. It is my alarm clock in the morning. For a out an hour while I'm waking up I review the news of the day. All on the fantastic web browser. This web browser blows every other mobile browser out of the water.

For a while the jury was out on how well I could type with the iPhone. I'm still not perfect but I'm getting accurate enough where the last few weeks I've given serious consideration to using the iphone as my ONLY phone and canning my Blackberry.

So far I've resisted going solely iPhone because I find the implementation of Google Mail on the iPhone to be quirky. Some days it can take forever to retrieve an email (via imap -- which is NOT push) and other days it works perfectly. I haven't seen a stable enough email retrieval pattern on my iPhone. If the email was a little more consistent in speed and reliability of retrieval I'd probably throw my Blackberry in the trash.

When you talk "weekend fun" -- in my opinion you are talking iPhone -- and believe me I thought I'd be the last person on earth to ever utter those words...

Re: Hallmark Introduces Recordable Greeting Cards Just In Time for Mothers Day

Wayne Schulz — Mon, 21 Apr 2008 10:31:55 -0000

I'm definitely looking out for the "Whoomp there it is" card....

Re: Have You Made Your Carbon Offset Donation Yet?

Wayne Schulz — Mon, 21 Apr 2008 12:36:10 -0000

I'd be curious about what the "administrative expenses" are of these types of unregulated organizations.

I'm quite sure you are correct, that you get a bigger impact doing a lot of things yourself.

I rode my bike to work today! :-)

Wonder how much carbon credit that gives..

Re: HTC’s New Campaign

Wayne Schulz — Mon, 21 Apr 2008 16:43:36 -0000

Poor actor in the video....

...so , what films have you appeared in.

WELL, I was in a promo for HTC.

... really, what was it about? Were you in the scene long?

Actually, it wasn't me, it was my hand.

Re: The Race for MY Low Cost Machine

Wayne Schulz — Mon, 21 Apr 2008 17:09:44 -0000

Joel,

Full sized laptops are approaching the price point that you're describing.

Here's the one that my GF Jennifer and I picked up a few months back -- it's not a bad deal - I think BB B&B; (Bricks & Mortar) has them for $449 -- hang out in Fatwallet or Slickdeals as these things are starting to go on sale daily.

I think it's a 15" display which I realize is bigger than your requirement.

http://www.geardiary.com/2008/04/06/my-last-bar...

Re: 50% Off Over 800 Chocolate Items at Amazon.com

Wayne Schulz — Mon, 21 Apr 2008 19:35:02 -0000

This deal's not going to last -- snooze you lose. It's being posted and rep'd at both Fatwallet and Slickdeals.

I grabbed 3 dozen Reeses Peanut Butter cups for about $10 with free shipping ( I have Amazon Prime).

Too bad it wasn't closer to Halloween.

Re: Is Your Twitter Feed Down or Incomplete? Here’s The Fix

Wayne Schulz — Mon, 21 Apr 2008 21:15:02 -0000

blech - still having troubles -- doing this fix seems to work temporarily at catching you up with old feeds -- but then it falls right back to sporadic updates.

Re: Ben & Jerry’s Free Scoop Day - April 29, 2008 This Year

Wayne Schulz — Tue, 22 Apr 2008 06:45:11 -0000

I just checked and it looks like this event isn't always on Earth Day -- it seems like they move it around to various days in April and May.

Very cool that you can get one cone for every person in the family.

Re: A Peek Into What Happens Behind the Scenes at Gear Diary

Wayne Schulz — Tue, 22 Apr 2008 12:33:47 -0000

That's a scream!!

Re: Alltel Blackberry Could Be First US Curve Model With Video Capability

Wayne Schulz — Tue, 22 Apr 2008 15:28:44 -0000

There is no carrier in the USA that is presently (as of 4/22/08) shipping a Curve, with the OS version pre-installed, which allows video capability.

Re: Is it just me…

Wayne Schulz — Tue, 22 Apr 2008 18:18:39 -0000

Today I tried to activate automatically. It asked me to punch in my mother's birthday. Then it said "please wait for customer service" -- thinking that there was something wrong, I opted to stay on the line.

Then I was hit with a lengthy pitch to upgrade to several different programs.

The other thing I have a REALLY good skill at is attracting people in grocery carts to WHATEVER display that I happen to be standing in front of.

If I'm in Sams Club with my cart parked in front of a shelf of Preparation H - guaranteed no fewer than three people will come along and ask me to move so they can get to the shelf.

And it doesn't matter one bit what it is that I'm standing in front of. The mere fact that there is a human blocking a shelf of any kind seems to attract shoppers like crazy...

Re: Fujitsu U1010 First Impressions - In Ink!

Wayne Schulz — Tue, 22 Apr 2008 19:44:18 -0000

Nice penmanship Mitchell..awesome -- where is the picture of this? Is it the device you had in the prior photo?

Re: The Clone Wars - The Real Deal vs. Psystar

Wayne Schulz — Tue, 22 Apr 2008 21:27:24 -0000

Chris I've been following this whole Mac clone story (as has most of the web) and I'm very concerned about whether this is even a legitimate company.

The old saying "if it sounds too good..." is repeatedly ringing in my head.

Until I see photos and a review up at a reputable web site - I'm totally reserving any judgement on this at all..

Re: GasBuddy Holds The Pump Nozzle Freeing You To Buy Snacks

Wayne Schulz — Wed, 23 Apr 2008 17:11:09 -0000

Check out the site's recommendation on this page:

http://www.gaspumpeasy.com/6201.html

They say when you aren't using the ball to prop open gas you can throw it around with the kids and dog....

Let's hope you avoid open flames around the ball --- because if it's been doused in gas it isn't something I'd smoke around or throw to my dog or kids...

Re: WildCharge Is Just About Ready to Roar!

Wayne Schulz — Thu, 24 Apr 2008 16:46:47 -0000

This is really cool -- I can't wait until they incorporate this into the phone itself -- without any need for a case. Of course that is assuming an industry which feels every phone needs its own special charger tip would ever forgo the profit of constantly selling new power cords when the tips randomly change from model to model....

Re: The Crumpler Limited Leather Daily: Special Delivery From England

Wayne Schulz — Fri, 25 Apr 2008 05:18:51 -0000

Wow that bag looks huge next to Emily. And for $400?

Re: Blackberry Meltdown Coming Soon - Five Reasons RIM Popularity Will Peak This Year

Wayne Schulz — Fri, 25 Apr 2008 09:05:09 -0000

I just thought of a 6th reason that the RIM Blackberry ride will slowly end (notice I'm not predicting that it stops or collapses - just that it won't regain this popularity again)

Lack of HTML email....

I mean - please. I know it may be tough to do but for us to rely on third party apps to do basic html email is painful.

My preference is text email -- which is why I didn't think of this missing feature earlier. But I think it's an important and glaring Blackberry omission.

Re: Blackberry Meltdown Coming Soon - Five Reasons RIM Popularity Will Peak This Year

Wayne Schulz — Fri, 25 Apr 2008 09:26:25 -0000

Hey TT - I modified the top of this post based on some great feedback someone gave me via Twitter -- they pointed out that corporate users won't be fast to abandon this.

In the last earnings call (April 4ish) - RIM pointed out that over 1/2 of their growth comes from consumers.

This area of growth, imho, is highly vulnerable to attack by the 3G iPhone.

Hard to tell if any of the iPhone launch delays are true or not since Apple is so secretive.

Seeing the articles surface this morning about the delays set my mind in motion. I've been wanting to write this for about two weeks.

Overall if as an 18 year user of Blackberry I'm seriously thinking of abandoning it for the iphone because of better iPhone browser and equal push mail, calendar, contacts (not there yet) -- then I'm making the assumption that a lot of other users may as well.

We'll have to see -- but I'd be willing to bet that RIM won't see market share this high ever again.

Re: Blackberry Meltdown Coming Soon - Five Reasons RIM Popularity Will Peak This Year

Wayne Schulz — Fri, 25 Apr 2008 09:44:20 -0000

The keyboard is one reason that Blackberry's will stay popular - just never as popular (market share wise) as they are today.

Sprint actually has a really good deal for anyone who buys a Blackberry under their $99 per month unlimited Simply Everything Plan -- their BIS service is included at no additional cost.

Problems that will start to appear once all these apps for iPhone are released is that other platforms will stagnate -- both Palm and Blackberry are sure to lose developers.

Hey Mark I could be wrong -- and you should definitely know because I think for a solid month I messaged you about how awful the iPhone was and would never take off -- and here I am thinking of adopting it as my full time business phone...:-)

Re: Simply Audiobooks: One For the Road

Wayne Schulz — Sat, 26 Apr 2008 07:48:30 -0000

This is nice that they will send out a CD -- however I'm guessing most people are going to need to rip that to listen -- unless there are people still lugging portable CD players (I haven't seen any laterly).

I just can't wait until publishers throw their hands up and eliminate this DRM annoyance. Until then each and every time I see a download service that has to work with DRM I pass it by.

DRM sucks. I've never ever had one DRM experience that has been pleasurable. I've been burned enough times that I just swore off everything DRM but iTunes.

Re: X-Ray Bag: Fun With Carry On

Wayne Schulz — Sat, 26 Apr 2008 17:31:46 -0000

I think my Mom may be getting one of these for Mother's Day...

Re: Gingivitis Is Now Following You - AKA - Why Twitter Needs A Black Hole Spam System

Wayne Schulz — Sun, 27 Apr 2008 08:19:31 -0000

This type of thing is easy to manage when the numbers are small, but I bet within a month this type of spam problem escalates.

Spammers love situations where it is difficult to block their sill messages -- and Twitter is about the easiest to bypass.

Luckily one of the biggest drawbacks of Twitter is that unless people follow you, nobody really hears your message. And that sort of works in our favor with Twitter spammers.

Re: Sprint Blackberry Curve 8330 Appears In Best Buy Circular

Wayne Schulz — Mon, 28 Apr 2008 13:59:22 -0000

Looks like Alltel WILL beat everyone out the door with the first US CDMA Carrier Curve...that is assuming they meet the 5/1/08 ship date that was in their press release.

And I still think that the Sprint Simply Everything is an awesome plan for anyone looking for a Blackberry. They include the $29 BIS fee right in your monthly $99 unlimited voice/text plan.

Re: The 16GB HTC Advantage X7510 Gets Previewed

Wayne Schulz — Mon, 28 Apr 2008 18:53:01 -0000

I'm so spoiled by the iPhone browser that I expect other browsers would leave me disappointed.

Re: AT&T Rolls Out $40 iPhone Text Accessibility Plan

Wayne Schulz — Tue, 29 Apr 2008 13:21:08 -0000

Looks like you have to fill out a qualification form before they grant the plan. I'm not sure how diligent they are on this.

Re: Add 10 calories, 3G Sugar, and 50 Mg Caffeine to Water and What Do You Get? TrimWater??

Wayne Schulz — Tue, 29 Apr 2008 13:53:45 -0000

My mind says to me - what's the matter with filling a bottle with water and adding a slice of lemon for flavor?

Wouldn't that still be zero calories? If not, at least it would be all natural.

Trim Water.....the name is just amusing. As if there was a way to make water healthier...

Re: Fortune Fuels 3G Iphone Pricing Rumors: 8GB - $399 and 16GB $499 plus $200 Rebate For New Customers

Wayne Schulz — Tue, 29 Apr 2008 18:59:59 -0000

I really hope this is NOT true because I would like to see a 32 or even 64 GB iPhone.

I'm not sure how Apple will maneuver a phone with a camera into corporate America either. It's my idle speculation that there should be some type of removable battery on there as well.

During last nights chat at justanotheriphoneblog -- we talked about all this and more and I'm really hoping there will be more to the new model than just 3G (though 3G is welcome).

Re: Add 10 calories, 3G Sugar, and 50 Mg Caffeine to Water and What Do You Get? TrimWater??

Wayne Schulz — Tue, 29 Apr 2008 19:22:52 -0000

My can of Diet Pepsi shows 35 mg caffeine -- 15 mg LESS than what this "water" contains according to the label from their site.

Re: Fortune Fuels 3G Iphone Pricing Rumors: 8GB - $399 and 16GB $499 plus $200 Rebate For New Customers

Wayne Schulz — Tue, 29 Apr 2008 19:51:23 -0000

It's funny because at the Justanotheriphoneblog.com chat last night most of the panelists were WM diehards who've at least partly converted to an iPhone and then MacBook Pros (or other Mac hardware).

For myself I never in a million years would have predicted that I would be using a Mac as my main machine. I even suggested to my hairdresser this morning that she switch to a Mac. She laughed. But I kinda wasn't kidding..

Geez I'm becoming one of those annoying Mac people.

Re: GearChat: Windows Mobile…Yeah, We Went There

Wayne Schulz — Wed, 30 Apr 2008 05:31:21 -0000

Great article and thanks for laying this all out with pictures Judie - I find it a bit interesting to follow who's who when there are photos - Note: Find Doug G chain mail suit picture for next article - that photo is the best! :-)

Microsoft has an overall problem with improving their OS that Apple didn't. And you can sum it up in two words.

"Installed Base"

It would have been almost impossible to make massive changes and also ensure all their prior applications were fully compatible with a new Windows Mobile.

Apple in all fairness didn't have that problem.

Apple's iPhone is also perceived (at least by me) as being more stable (less crashing) largely because there are fewer third party apps currently used that could muck it up.

RIM Blackberry has/had a similar stability aura - there weren't these huge piles of third party apps that people installed that ultimately caused instability.

Windows Mobile and Palm both benefit and are dragged down by the huge third party catalog of softwarethat they must carry on their backs with every operating system upgrade.

Re: Add 10 calories, 3G Sugar, and 50 Mg Caffeine to Water and What Do You Get? TrimWater??

Wayne Schulz — Wed, 30 Apr 2008 07:32:59 -0000

umm, well to start with I think water implies zero calories -- at least it does to me. Maybe I'm odd that way.

Re: Who Wants My Copy of Parallels Desktop 3.0 for Mac?

Wayne Schulz — Wed, 30 Apr 2008 14:55:16 -0000

Keep the entries coming -- I'll have one of my kids pull a number from a hat at 8pm on 5/1 and that person will receive my unused serial number for this copy of Parallels.

You'll have to download the program from the Parallels site.

This is fully licensed and I only have one license to give away. I bought the Macupdate bundle (which expired 4/29) and already use VMWARE on my MBP.

You do not have to leave anything special in the comments - just so long as it registers -- and please no duplicate entries.

Re: AT&T Free iPhone WIFI: Confirmed At Starbucks

Wayne Schulz — Thu, 01 May 2008 14:40:07 -0000

What I can't wait for is when someone figures out how to fool AT&T; into their laptop log in.

I'm curious too if this is timed.

Re: Shark Surfing - New California Craze or Just Plain Crazy?

Wayne Schulz — Thu, 01 May 2008 15:55:16 -0000

I'm pretty sure this guy is being towed behind a wave runner. I'm not sure sharks will stay on the surface that long. It's just too "perfect" a picture of a share.

When I dove in the Bahamas we saw TONS of sharks and except for when our boat was mooring and they thought we were there to feed, none were visible from the surface.

PS - If you ever go to the Bahamas you MUST do the shark dive. If you're not certified you can snorkel at the surface and watch the sharks circle about 40 to 60 feet below you. Very interesting. They'll pull you all out of the water and create a feeding frenzy off the back of the boat -- barely 10 feet away.

Stuart Cove does this.

Re: Dash Express GPS Review: Three Words- Bulky, Buggy, Beta

Wayne Schulz — Fri, 02 May 2008 10:03:54 -0000

It is my opinion that this thing is a lot of hype.

I noticed the routing and the speed that you mention.

Really, the only reason I can think of that the other sites were fawning over this is that they never used a GPS in their car before.

As a beta I think it's ok -- but sheez -- for $399 and a month fee? No thanks.

Anyone want to buy a slightly used Dash Express? :-)

Maybe I'll give it away if I can figure out how to unlock my name form the unit.

Re: YouTube Domain Down? Hacked? Denied?- Entire Site Down

Wayne Schulz — Sat, 03 May 2008 10:23:26 -0000

Yeah, I think this was a site outage -- the domain thing looked odd but as I looked closer it looks like those are just someone elses servers with the youtube name stuck in them.

Who knows -- at least things are back to normal

Re: YouTube Domain Down? Hacked? Denied?- Entire Site Down

Wayne Schulz — Sat, 03 May 2008 13:17:44 -0000

Nice conspiracy theory on my part but as several people have discovered the Domain was not at issue -- because Microsoft has the same junky server records showing up under their iptools.com entry.

Still a weird looking record -- had me going for a while.

Re: Blackberry Meltdown Coming Soon - Five Reasons RIM Popularity Will Peak This Year

Wayne Schulz — Sat, 03 May 2008 16:06:26 -0000

My first BB was the off-brand Inter@Active Pager:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/mas90guru/2269051938/

I may be off on the years (I could swear that I located info online when this device was first released and used that as my basis for stating when I started using the BB -- I've had one ever since they were available - every model - or variation)

With respect to the required data plans, you're right. You need to use a plan with other PDA phones as well. I see having to buy a RIM specific one which is more expensive and an additional point of failure as a downside.

As for the whole issue of replacing Blackberries with iPhones -- you're right again -- my feel is that this is going to change pretty quickly as the iPhone enters the corporate market with promised Exchange features (I believe one announced feature was to disable phones remotely). I'm making a few leaps of faith (which perhaps I shouldn't) that Apple will execute and build into their next iPhone OS all the tools needed to make the phone corporate friendly.

I'm disappointed by the lack of cool apps like the Slingbox player lak (in beta but as of yet unreleased) as well as the dog slow speed on my T-Mo 8320 browser and the lack of html email (and early reports are that it still may be delayed in future OS releases).

You make a lot of excellent points and present an very good opposing viewpoint to this article.

Thanks for making such a well thought out comment on this topic.

Re: Walmart Has the Garmin c550 for $199

Wayne Schulz — Sun, 04 May 2008 14:29:07 -0000

Wow - this is a HOT deal -- I definitely would look at something like this versus any of the more expensive ones. I do not think there's enough usable feature difference to justify the wide price variations between low/high end models.

I bet that these settle down to a commodity like $125 to $150 within a year.

Re: Walmart Has the Garmin c550 for $199

Wayne Schulz — Sun, 04 May 2008 14:33:01 -0000

PS - I saw a Blackberry 8830 on Verizon at my Rocky Hill CT Walmart for about $190 -- with 2 year contract. I'm not sure if there were any in stock (and I think it would be a better idea for anyone with decent coverage to consider Sprint for their $99/unlimited which includes BIS and unlimited SMS/MMS (when avail) ).

I haven't seen a Blackberry 8830 for under $250 to $300. I think there may also be a $100 carrier rebate though I'm not sure if that rebate would apply to a Walmart purchase - so ymmv.

Re: When Good Opinions Go Bad

Wayne Schulz — Mon, 05 May 2008 06:14:54 -0000

Very timely post. If you look on Techmeme.com - there is no shortage of opinon on what went wrong with the Microsoft vs Yahoo failed merger. It's difficult to get any type of feeling as to whether the failed merger was for the best or whether it spells the end for one or both of the companies.

Re: Wii Fitness

Wayne Schulz — Mon, 05 May 2008 12:57:49 -0000

What a great video! This will be a cool game. I wonder if it will be in short supply or if there will be enough quantity to go around.

Tip for guys: Anything to do with fitness is never a good mother's day gift for your wife as they always question whether you are giving them one "because you think I need it?!" -- stick to spa, flowers and/or candy.

Re: Xobni No Longer Beta

Wayne Schulz — Mon, 05 May 2008 16:23:49 -0000

While I think this is cool, GMAIL does most of this natively and I never have to sit and listen to MY hard drive grind away on a search or worry about a corrupted Outlook mail file.

I haven't missed Outlook since I stopped using the software about 6 months ago in favor of Google Apps for Domains.

Re: HTC London Press Event Live Coverage

Wayne Schulz — Tue, 06 May 2008 07:11:24 -0000

I'm sorry but I just cannot help but wonder what competitors would be adding to their phones if Apple had not literally re-defined the market with the iphone.

Love it or hate it, the Apple iPhone raised the bar and forced these guys to innovate.

Re: HTC London Press Event Live Coverage

Wayne Schulz — Tue, 06 May 2008 07:36:04 -0000

I'm still trying to gather all the facts, but based on my quick read of Vincent's last update, let me be the first to congratulate HTC .... on re-inventing the iPhone....or at least trying to..

Re: HTC Diamond: Reinventing The iPhone?

Wayne Schulz — Tue, 06 May 2008 08:02:33 -0000

Hey HTC - Apple Called - they'd like their iPhone bag.

What do you think ? Am I seriously missing something???

Re: HTC Diamond: Reinventing The iPhone?

Wayne Schulz — Tue, 06 May 2008 08:04:00 -0000

One more thing....if I was HTC I would have been "pedaling" as fast as I could to one up Apple by including Flash support. If it's here -- I missed it.

Re: Review: Smart for Life Weight Loss Cookies

Wayne Schulz — Wed, 07 May 2008 13:20:58 -0000

I love Zone Perfect bars. I've used them quite successfully in the past. Target stores have about the lowest price I've seen on them - usually under $1 per bar.

At most I've eat three bars per day -- but usually only two.

Even at 3 per day -- you're only talking $100-is for 5 weeks versus $ 269 for these cookies.

Re: Free iTunes Hitman Movie

Wayne Schulz — Wed, 07 May 2008 21:33:10 -0000

A few people on Slickdeals were reporting that if they exited iTunes and went back in (sometimes repeatedly) that they were able to ultimately download the movie.

Big YMMV on this one -- but interesting nonetheless because it's openly available.

Re: Happy Birthday Kerry!

Wayne Schulz — Thu, 08 May 2008 05:24:43 -0000

HAPPY BIRTHDAY KERRY...!

If I had known I would have baked a cake.

Re: Two Headed Holstein Calf Mount - Mother’s Day Gift For The Quirky Hard To Shop For Mom

Wayne Schulz — Thu, 08 May 2008 19:35:07 -0000

I'm considering buying one to send in with one of my kids for show and tell day at school.....

Re: ESP Test Site Fails To Impress: Forces Me To Enter My Address Instead of Already Knowing It

Wayne Schulz — Sun, 11 May 2008 15:06:33 -0000

The press release:

http://www.prweb.com/releases/mathematics/paran...

Refers to:

Seaford, NY (PRWEB) May 10, 2008 -- The Anima Project promises to finally end the debate of whether certain paranormal phenomena exist. The site, launched April 10, 2008, is currently gathering data from the internet community in preparation for a definitive mathematical analysis of clairvoyance and precognition, bringing such realms under the lens of rigorous science for the first time in history.

While Wikipedia defines Paranormal:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paranormal

Paranormal is an umbrella term used to describe unusual phenomena or experiences that lack an obvious scientific explanation.[1] In parapsychology, it is used to describe the ostensibly psychic phenomena of telepathy, extra-sensory perception, psychokinesis, ghosts, and hauntings.

I enjoyed the guitar/music on the site though.

Re: iPhone Black = 3G iPhone..?

Wayne Schulz — Tue, 13 May 2008 21:49:18 -0000

Have any sites checked AT&T; stores to see if they have stock?

Re: Mobius Seattle 2008: Day One, Second Half, HTC

Wayne Schulz — Wed, 14 May 2008 22:32:03 -0000

Can't wait - naturally that's going to be a giveaway, right? :-)

Re: Mobius Seattle 2008: Day Two, First Half, Zune

Wayne Schulz — Thu, 15 May 2008 14:35:02 -0000

Love the MacBook Pros in the picture...

Re: WES 2008 - The Blackberry Conference

Wayne Schulz — Fri, 16 May 2008 06:38:59 -0000

Did they have any sessions on the next version of the BB OS? I am having trouble finding the sessions on any of the other sites (if they existed). It's all about the photo-shopped touch screen Blackberry.

Did they show their next generation web browser that will probably be the make or break component of the Bold?

Re: Sprint Losing “Best Data” Crown With Rumored 5GB Monthly Data Cap?

Wayne Schulz — Sat, 17 May 2008 12:00:32 -0000

Thanks for spotting this. I made the correction.

Re: HTC Shift Review Part 3: The Finale

Wayne Schulz — Sun, 18 May 2008 10:19:42 -0000

HTC Shift V MacBook Air

Which do you pick?

(If I recall, aren't they both right around the same price?)

Re: The Forgotten Mission of the OLPC

Wayne Schulz — Sun, 18 May 2008 15:35:56 -0000

I still shake my head to think about making laptop ownership a priority for children in developing countries.

It's not politically correct to say, but I find the whole concept, just plain weird and out of place.

Re: Microsoft Steal’s Page From Seinfeld: Issues Press Release About Nothing

Wayne Schulz — Sun, 18 May 2008 16:52:39 -0000

I'm telling you this is the funniest press release ever. As much for the ridiculousness of it all. Does someone in Redmond sit back and wonder whether they should issues these things just to let the world know they are alive?

Silly.

Come on Microsoft - we know you're going to do it. Just up and overpay for Yahoo! already ....

Re: Weirdest Sam’s Club Free Sample Ever

Wayne Schulz — Sun, 18 May 2008 23:55:57 -0000

You know not only did I compute the per meal cost of this twice - but I computed it wrong each time -- thanks for catching it! I updated for the correct amount.

Re: Mozy-ing Along

Wayne Schulz — Mon, 19 May 2008 15:26:34 -0000

I have been using Carbonite backup on my Windows laptop. My opinion with respect to privacy is the same as yours. Who really wants my stuff?

Re: Vamoose! Tobacco Odor Eliminator Review

Wayne Schulz — Mon, 19 May 2008 22:17:33 -0000

Is "Avoid spraying directly onto teenagers" part of the warning label? :-)

I wonder how this would compare against Febreeze?

Thankfully I have 5 years before mine become teenagers!

Re: Sony Rolly Available Now - A $400 Music Player That Lights Up and Rolls

Wayne Schulz — Tue, 20 May 2008 09:09:44 -0000

Prediction (after watching the YouTube): This is at best a $49 Woot! item ... and they'll probably have to offer it as frequently as the Roomba in order to sell completely out of it.

Re: ‘Drive it like it’s stolen’

Wayne Schulz — Tue, 20 May 2008 16:49:38 -0000

Wow - this is a great idea.

Re: Reviewed: Skullcandy Link Hydro Pack

Wayne Schulz — Wed, 21 May 2008 13:04:35 -0000

Jennifer you used it more than me but I really think the audio quality was nice. The speaker's came across as much more than some type of gimmick that they threw into the pack.

There's plenty of storage room inside as well.

Forgot to mention that they make it in orange color as well.

Re: Who’s Giving Vista a Pass and Waiting for Windows 7?

Wayne Schulz — Thu, 22 May 2008 06:22:56 -0000

My day job is consulting with mid-sized companies (typically 1 to $200 million in size) regarding their accounting systems.

I can't think of a single one that has made a switch to Vista. Most of their IT guys shake at the thought.

Recently rather than buy a PC with VISTA for my Mom, I bought a refurb iMac. I just did not want to deal with the hassle of becoming the support department for an OS which I think will ultimately be a footnote in the history of Microsoft.

At home I made the Mac plunge as well. That was largely provoked by my lack of motivation to analyze the umpteen VISTA versions that Microsoft offered
to see what I'd be missing if I chose one version over another.

Microsoft's biggest problem was they came out with too many "flavors" and didn't offer a compelling reason to upgrade.

Re: Blackberry Meltdown Coming Soon - Five Reasons RIM Popularity Will Peak This Year

Wayne Schulz — Thu, 22 May 2008 15:09:41 -0000

I do not think RIM is going to lose market share overnight, but the writing seems to be on the wall. As the iPhone gets better, more and more employees are going to want to use it as their work phone.

Just for an update, I've since canceled my Blackberry 8320 and now carry my iPhone as my main work phone.

I elaborated a bit more on the reasoning here:

http://www.geardiary.com/2008/05/19/goodbye-bla...

Re: Nothing Says “Happy Father’s Day” Quite Like An Engraved Beer Tub

Wayne Schulz — Thu, 22 May 2008 20:46:10 -0000

Geez - great idea. I wonder if my stepfather would like the brief safe... Maybe your kids could gift one to their dad? :-)

Re: The Beyza Cases MacBook Air Thinvelope Leather Case Review

Wayne Schulz — Fri, 23 May 2008 06:28:21 -0000

My laptop cases cost $115 and I thought that was high.

$215 for a case with no pockets, is well, high.

BTW, I have the Bezcase for my iPhone as my main case and love it. I just slip the iPhone into the sleeve and then can put it into my pocket without worries about scratching. The only thing I don't like is that the top of my iPhone is exposed and, sure enough, when dropped it ALWAYS lands on the exposed side!

http://www.beyzacases.com/cat_slimline_-_apple_...

Re: LifeLock CEO Subject of Repeated Identity Theft According to Lawsuit

Wayne Schulz — Fri, 23 May 2008 09:18:11 -0000

Definitely take a look at the article. There's a lot more there about the underlying value that people are receiving for their monthly fee -- which I think the article stated was $10 per month.

Re: Nokia N82 Review: Coming Soon

Wayne Schulz — Sat, 24 May 2008 06:27:14 -0000

I just saw that Amazon has this unlocked model for $359 which seems to be the cheapest around by about $100 or so.

http://www.amazon.com/Nokia-Unlocked-Smartphone...

Re: Nokia N82 Review: Coming Soon

Wayne Schulz — Sat, 24 May 2008 08:24:08 -0000

I'd love to run a Nokia to test out Qik.com - but there's no way I'm entering into another 2 year cell phone contract.

Dell also seems to have periodic deals on unlocked Nokia's.

Re: Cure Your Commute: The Simply Audiobooks Giveaway

Wayne Schulz — Sun, 25 May 2008 19:36:31 -0000

I love James Patterson. His books feature quick chapters and are perfect vacation reads. Typically I read one book within two days - start to finish.

Last summer I brought his book Honeymoon with me on vacation. It's a great murder mystery where the action literally starts in chapter one. There's no tedious build up to get right into the action.

I've seen this book on closeout in Barnes & Noble --- and recommend it highly.

Re: The E71 is Making Me Rethink My Impending iPhone Purchase…

Wayne Schulz — Mon, 26 May 2008 06:47:18 -0000

Mitchell,

The E71 seems similar in size to the Blackjack II -- so I'm not sure that's the only reason for a switch.

What's in the E71 that makes it more desirable than the Blackjack II?

If I recall you only had the Blackjack II for a few months. What was wrong with it?

Re: Final Thoughts on the BlackJack II

Wayne Schulz — Mon, 26 May 2008 20:16:10 -0000

It's too bad because on the surface the Blackjack 2 is a really cute phone.

Re: The E71 is Making Me Rethink My Impending iPhone Purchase…

Wayne Schulz — Mon, 26 May 2008 20:20:45 -0000

@raymond_u: Give the iphone a little credit. For a rev 1 device (remember this is the FIRST release of the O/S) - it ain't bad.

My Blackberry (which I just abandoned for the iPhone) STILL couldn't do html email (without a sw add-on) and the browser stunk. Two area's where the iPhone blows Blackberry right out of the water.

I was actually quite surprised to read in BusinessWeek that when they reviewer saw the Blackberry 9000 that the browser wasn't improved. An improved browser is rumored but so far unseen on the next BB release.

IMHO, if Blackberry can't match the iPhone's Safari browser they can expect to start experiencing sales declines.

In case anyone missed it , my 10 reasons for kicking Blackberry to the curve and switching full time to iPhone are here:

http://www.geardiary.com/2008/05/19/goodbye-bla...

Re: Cure Your Commute: The Simply Audiobooks Giveaway

Wayne Schulz — Mon, 26 May 2008 20:23:58 -0000

When this contest winds down it would be great if we could summarize all these books. I'd love to pick up a few to read based on recommendations.

Re: Six Flags Amusement Park Reduces Daily Admission by $10 - Buying Season Passes In Lousville Reduces Annual Pass Price up to 50%

Wayne Schulz — Tue, 27 May 2008 14:38:17 -0000

The person with me in the photo is actually my nephew. I thought that all kids were supposed to like roller coasters. So I got him to join me in line at Six Flags in Mass.

Little did I know that he didn't want to go on.

Fast forward three years.

Now he drags me on rides that I don't want to go on.

Re: Software Development 101: Thou Shalt Test Thy Software

Wayne Schulz — Thu, 29 May 2008 08:38:40 -0000

Why do you think I'm investing most of my hardware money in a Mac.

Re: Buzz Lightyear Flies The Space Shuttle: Launches Mother Of All Disney Product Tie Ins

Wayne Schulz — Thu, 29 May 2008 10:02:34 -0000

This opens up a big can of worms imho.

First, how much did Disney pay for these rights?

Second, when can Mr. Incredible or Superman make the trip ?

Third, how long before the backlash (probably lobbied for by a Disney competitor) about the commercial exploitation of Shuttle missions (and as a matter of fact I do think the Shuttle has enough educational opportunities without flying a plastic Disney character on the mission)?

On the plus side.

I would much rather hear about Buzz Lightyear than listen to those totally annoying reports about what music the Shuttle astronauts woke up to. Does anyone really care what the hell music they play their??

Re: Review: ivideosongs.com, The Website Every Budding Musician Needs To See!

Wayne Schulz — Fri, 30 May 2008 05:43:54 -0000

Wow - Doug this is cool. My son is very interested in guitar and he'll probably be thrilled to look this over.

It's also cool to see that John Oates has found a side gig for when Daryl is off doing solo projects.. :-)

Re: The Planet Explodes

Wayne Schulz — Mon, 02 Jun 2008 08:36:48 -0000

It's great that at least they keep people informed.

What I hate is that it sometimes appears that all online hosts trumpet their redundancy. But there's almost always some point of failure.

Geardiary's stats have been down the last three days with a note on the home page that the cause is The Planet outage.

Love the headline...

Re: Nokia 2610 Free via T-Mobile To Go

Wayne Schulz — Mon, 02 Jun 2008 08:39:11 -0000

Another thing these throw away phones are good for is if you go on vacation to a spot where you know your regular phone does not get coverage.

You can pick up a prepaid phone, fill it with some time, then while on vacation you at least have a backup phone.

This Nokia will work on a post-paid T-Mobile SIM. In order to get the rebate I'm quite sure you will have to put some time onto the phone.

If you want to use this phone on a carrier other than T-Mobile - you'll need to get it unlocked (the phone is locked so it will only accept T-Mobile -- any other SIM will product "Sim rejected" or similar error message).

Re: Applying the heat: the iwavecube™ personal microwave REVIEW

Wayne Schulz — Mon, 02 Jun 2008 09:16:15 -0000

Cool - I wonder whether Sharper Image stores will have these on clearance for their Bankruptcy sale?

Re: Jack Discovers the Joys of Flying SOLO

Wayne Schulz — Mon, 02 Jun 2008 09:50:48 -0000

I am toting a Skooba which I'll try to write up this week.

Short story is I love it for carrying by laptop when I'm biking. The padding is super comfortable.

It's a bit bulky to tote in a car or use on an airline.

I bought it because I want to ride my bike around town and be able to bring my laptop. It's fitting the bill quite nicely and the padding and shape is perfect for what I'm using it for.

Re: iPhone Telescope from USB Fever-No way!

Wayne Schulz — Mon, 02 Jun 2008 16:12:58 -0000

Wow - for the money how can you go wrong. We need to add this to the "good gifts for Father's Day" list.

Re: Happy Birthday Clinton!

Wayne Schulz — Tue, 03 Jun 2008 09:29:35 -0000

Happy Birthday Clinton! I consider you the voice of reason of Geardiary.

Re: Free AT&T Wi-Fi Rolls Out At Starbucks - Finally

Wayne Schulz — Tue, 03 Jun 2008 10:45:40 -0000

The way they handle this is actually pretty smart.

First you have to register your Starbucks Card account online with Starbucks.

Then you open a WIFI account with AT&T; and create a user name and login. As part of the process you supply them with your Starbucks account. By providing the account you are giving AT&T; the ability to look at your activity with Starbucks for the purposes of determining if you've made any purchases/additions within 30 days.

I think a work around for the one session of 2 hours per day is to buy multiple Starbucks Cards and use them as needed to create additional ATT WIFI accounts.

Re: Great Scot! It’s the Flux Capacitor now at Think Geek

Wayne Schulz — Wed, 04 Jun 2008 08:14:09 -0000

oh my - $250 for flashing lights in a box.....I smell "Woot!" for these

Re: AT&T 3G Data Speeds Up 20% - Hopes for 20Mbps by 2010

Wayne Schulz — Wed, 04 Jun 2008 10:37:06 -0000

I'm with you. In Glastonbury CT the AT&T; 3G footprint is oddly reminiscent of the way cellular data coverage USED to be. We have coverage around major highways and population areas but once you go away from those areas the coverage falls back to pokey EDGE.

Hopefully WIMAX has a trick up their sleeve - because if 20 Mbs is remotely achievable within 2 years that is going to be a game changer.

Of course by then we'll all be on metered service...

Re: Bypass SIM Locked Phones with SmartSim

Wayne Schulz — Wed, 04 Jun 2008 10:42:20 -0000

I might order one and try it with a prepaid phone. Wouldn't it be cool to use any prepaid GSM phone as a spare without regard to the carrier.

That's assuming that it works as advertised.

For $7 shipped I have a hard time seeing what could go wrong...unless of course it somehow shorts out the phone.

Re: Scam: your computer was infected our spyware

Wayne Schulz — Wed, 04 Jun 2008 19:58:53 -0000

hehe -- the scam was a pretty good one. Do you know if Western Union can put a stop payment on a money order? I'm just wondering.

Re: Online Dating: Choosing a Site

Wayne Schulz — Sat, 07 Jun 2008 06:02:42 -0000

Great article - and you have captured the essence of online dating (aka OLD).

I know there is lots more good stuff to come.

A couple things that I've really found annoying about the sites you mentioned:

eHarmony - It's been a while since I was a subscriber - and I only used it for a little while. But when I was on it (complete waste of time and money imho) I think you could not see the other person's pictures unless you were a paid member.

eHarmony also have a VERY lengthy process of what is essentially sending question and answer multiple choice quizzes to your matches. You go through several rounds of this until you get to "open communication" where you can freely email. I found the whole process exhausting. And my estimate of a week to get to open communication is an optimistic one - many people take weeks to fill out the questions. ZZZZZ.

For anyone shy about writing a profile , eHarmony is a pretty good choice. It's just soooo damn generic. You cannot get any type of feeling about what the people like to do or who they are.

As an example of generic:
On eHarmony there is NO indication of whether the other person has children. I have two. They're age 8. Do you think I'd match up with someone who had kids in the middle of high school (My experience: No). On eHarmony it can take you easily a week to get to the stage where you email each other (and ask some of these more detailed questions that their checklists doesn't cover). Too long in my opinion. Also a big fat waste of time.

Reading eHarmony profile after profile (which are almost entirely bullet point listings with very little free form text) about how the person loves their family, likes to go to the gym, can stay in or go out. Well jeepers why don't these profiles just say they like to breath. I mean they're so generic and full of "me too" words that I found the profile text nearly useless.

What eHarmony is great for is the folks who are terrorized that their next door neighbor might be browsing a site and see their photo. Since eHarmony only exposes your photo to those you match with - there is very little risk of someone discovering that you're online dating. It is also good for people who "don't know what to write" in a profile (Tip: Write about anything that other people don't - this makes you stand out).

When your profile text is generic (as I feel it is with eHarmony) you are in what I call (and you talk about) as the "Match beauty contest". I would tell people that if they don't have a good profile text that the only thing anyone would be able to go on is their photos (which most people choose poorly and ignore the "standard set of 3" must have photos - head, body, candid).

Match - There are a lot of annoying things about Match. The biggest pet peeve I had back when I did OLD is that you could not view other profiles without having a membership yourself.

Now that membership doesn't have to be paid - but you have to create a user name and login. And unless you hide it - the profile is viewable to everyone. I hated when a site required you to join just to view - which most of them do.

And one of Match's features (which a user who is browsing cannot opt out of) is that your profile shows up on anyone's page that you looked at in the "who's viewed me". For women I think this could cause unwanted attention if you're looking at a profile out of shock or because it's funny (in a bad way).

To me it isn't anyone's business if I'm looking at their profile.

(Note: On Match there is ONE way around showing up in the "who viewed me" and that's to make your own profile "invisible". But as soon as you make it visible again I think it shows up retroactively).

So after a while I fought back. When I was OLD I didn't think it was anyone's business if I was looking at their profile. And I did a LOT of profile reviews for people and didn't want to be showing up as looking at their profile several times as if I were a creepy stalker.

Instead of logging in as myself, what I would do on Match was create an extra profile. But because I found profile writing fun - I was at least creative.

Here's the guy that I used to use for browsing only (Note: This was a non-paying account and I NEVER contacted or did anything but browse with it).

http://tinyurl.com/44aldg

A couple other sites that deserve mention:

Plenty of Fish - plentyoffish.com - free (and freewheeling) - lots of casual daters. To me it seemed that 80% (or more) were there just to email or chat. The site also has some bizarre restrictions on what you can write in your profile and should you break the rules they'll delete your profile without any warning or recourse.

Craigslist - craigslist.com - free and only a good spot for those very experienced with OLD. Almost all the profiles are pictureless -- so you need to be experienced and know how to ferret out the creepy from the just plain weird from the potential matches.

Re: BlackberryForums - 5 Giveaways to a Million Contest

Wayne Schulz — Sun, 08 Jun 2008 08:21:02 -0000

Oh yeah I'm sure they're hurting without my participation...(not)

...and of course you know I'm going to be forced to buy a Blackberry 9000 when that thing comes out -- if for nothing else than to make Mitchell jealous.... :-)

Re: Blackberry Touch Screen Pictures Appear Online

Wayne Schulz — Sun, 08 Jun 2008 14:04:44 -0000

I'm still not all that excited until I can see this thing in action.

The make or break parts of the device:

- Web browsing -- Blackberry better start kicking some butt here with a much beefed up browser -- and I don't mean a cheezy requirement that I need to subscribe to BES to get a decent browser. Out of the box I want an iPhone like browser that renders the pagers like they appear on my desktop. Every single phone manufacturer has to get this right. I've tried Opera before and it didn't do it for me.

- Why does the iPhone have 4 keys -- and the Blackberry "TOUCH" have 9? Ok - yeah the Blackberry doesn't have to copy everything about the iPhone, but shouldn't the touch interface take the place of some of these hardware keys??? Is this an example of Blackberry rushing to modify their stock OS just to fit it into a touch design?

I still want to see HTML email and I want it without any requirement to subscribe to BES.

So far all the early "leaked" images and devices have fallen short at demonstrating that the next generation of Blackberry's is anything but an incremental step forward.

These leaks are an interesting way to continue to create just enough uncertainty in the minds of potential purchasers. Now Blackberry has to live up to their leaks.

Re: Slingplayer Mobile (Pre-Alpha) for iPhone Demoed

Wayne Schulz — Mon, 09 Jun 2008 08:39:23 -0000

This is a much "weirder" story than it seems.

Crunchgear is reporting that the demo they were offered would take place in a Starbucks at WWDC (I'm not sure if Crunchgear was serious).

Matt Miller at the Mobile Gadgeteer seemed to think it odd (as do I) that Slingplayer is not going to ship at the announcement of iPhone v2

If there is a "silver bullet" to attack the iPhone with, it looks as if streaming media apps (which it seems Apple is prohibiting) may be the bullet.

Re: Apple WWDC Coverage Best Bets

Wayne Schulz — Mon, 09 Jun 2008 08:44:02 -0000

USA Today is reporting that the new iPhone will be priced at $199. I think it's safe to assume that will be a 2 year new subscriber price.

It's probably also safe to assume that the Samsung Instinct will be priced at or below that.

Here's the story:

http://www.usatoday.com/tech/wireless/phones/20...

Re: New Unlimited Rate Plan for iPhone

Wayne Schulz — Mon, 09 Jun 2008 09:33:58 -0000

I just joined the unlimited plan because it's going to replace both my mobile phone lines.

The $119 is steep until you consider that I make almost all my office calls on my cell phone.

I was also paying around $8/mo for 6pm NW which I was able to eliminate.

The one thing that I think stinks with AT&T;'s unlimited plan is they should include SMS just like Sprint does with Simply Everything.

Re: TechCrunch Predictions: Filmed while driving to WWDC 2008

Wayne Schulz — Mon, 09 Jun 2008 12:54:49 -0000

You have to give these guys credit -- they're working hard for their money!

And yea, a "front end into the parking garage" would have guaranteed this front page YouTube status for a while.

Re: Watching iT Happen…

Wayne Schulz — Mon, 09 Jun 2008 17:51:05 -0000

Hmm -- I'm seeing $39 voice plus $30 data (up $10 ) for a total minimum of $69.

The rollover minutes are only good for a year too -- they have a rolling 12 month expiration. Use them within that period or lose them.

I'm disappointed that AT&T; used this opportunity to impose a price hike while Apple also seems to be restricting severely the streaming apps you can use on the iphone.

For $30 you can get 500 minutes and unlimited EVDO Rev A on Sprint SERO. Granted you want have an iPhone that works on it - but you'll be more than $30 per month richer.

Re: iPhone AT&T Contract Details according to store internal memo

Wayne Schulz — Tue, 10 Jun 2008 10:19:57 -0000

It looks like existing users will be able to upgrade at the new customer price:

"If you are an existing iPhone customer in good standing, you will be able to extend your contract for two years when the iPhone 3G launches and get the ill-na-na $199/$299 price point. Doesn’t matter when you bought an iPhone either."

@doogald - I will argue that the extra $10 is a rip off because the typical things one would purchase a 3g plan for -- namely data streaming -- are prohibited. I don't really need 3g to pull down my calendar or get email upgrades.

Re: New Sprint Plans Arriving June 15th - More Details Trickling In

Wayne Schulz — Tue, 10 Jun 2008 12:29:02 -0000

I really think that Sprint is on track with their Everything plans. I love the fact that you don't have to worry about the data and messaging costs.

It also takes them away from the nickle and diming that you see so often with phone companies.

Re: New Sprint Plans Arriving June 15th - More Details Trickling In

Wayne Schulz — Tue, 10 Jun 2008 12:37:35 -0000

That's a really good point about making newer phones "incompatible" with SERO. Because as it stands now you can load up a Moto Q, tether it to your laptop, and still only pay $30/mo for unlimited EVDO data (I regularly rang 800k down on my plain EVDO Mogul)

Re: Hello “What’s On iPhone”

Wayne Schulz — Tue, 10 Jun 2008 15:21:08 -0000

What a great idea!!

Re: Duracell 600 watt inverter - $99 plus free shipping from Amazon

Wayne Schulz — Wed, 11 Jun 2008 11:31:57 -0000

ok I couldn't resist -- I'm in for one. At $99 this is a GREAT car battery jumper. I used to have a cheap one that didn't have the AC outlets -- and that one cost $70.

Plus I will enjoy watching Mr UPS man deliver my 25lb batter for no shipping charge...

Re: iPhone AT&T Contract Details according to store internal memo

Wayne Schulz — Wed, 11 Jun 2008 13:58:20 -0000

@CrazEtooN - No, I'm not re-thinking returning to a Blackberry. I'm still 100% using the iPhone. If I do begin using a Blackberry again it would only be to test software for GearDiary.

The thing I miss most about the Blackberry? Surprisingly it isn't the keyboard or email. It's the built in password program. I didn't realize how much stuff I had stored in there (mostly client login information).

I think the AT&T; data increase is troubling because Apple limits what you can run on that data. Unlike other PDA data plans (which have no such restriction) Apple is disallowing companies from marketing apps that may stream data (either via EDGE or 3G).

So I guess I am questioning exactly what 3G is going to provide? My observation is that web browsing on wi-fi is not THAT much faster -- and certainly 3G is going to clock in slower than a full wi-fi connection.

I just think AT&T; is nickle and diming people.

Re: Unlimited Data? Yes Please!

Wayne Schulz — Wed, 11 Jun 2008 20:52:57 -0000

Dude you need bandwidth rehab!!

I'm about 30 to 60 mb per month -- at least I think that was what my last AT&T; bill said.

Re: Ford/Lincoln/Mercury getting ‘SIRIUS’ about travel

Wayne Schulz — Thu, 12 Jun 2008 10:29:31 -0000

Thanks David - this is so unbelievably cool. It might even tip me toward buying a Ford in the future...

Re: AT&T GoPhone blowout: Pay $ 80 for Nokia 2610 with $100 airtime card - net cost = -$20

Wayne Schulz — Thu, 12 Jun 2008 12:36:52 -0000

I think the answer is yet. I know I did this on my T-Mobile prepaid and I think I read that it was possible on AT&T.;

What I know you cannot do is take the phone from one carrier to another without unlocking.

Prepaid phones make excellent backup / replacement phones for people who break their regular (post paid) phone and don't want to shell out a few hundred bucks for an out of contract replacement.

Re: AT&T GoPhone blowout: Pay $ 80 for Nokia 2610 with $100 airtime card - net cost = -$20

Wayne Schulz — Thu, 12 Jun 2008 13:33:33 -0000

I hear you. I don't know about the data side of things. The prepaid should work the voice portion -- am not sure how they handle the data.

Re: Beerbelly Cooler: Offbeat Father’s Day Gift

Wayne Schulz — Fri, 13 Jun 2008 06:17:57 -0000

...better than the Wine Rack...I'll save that for Mother's Day next year...

Re: You’re gonna Flip over the new Mino from Pure Digital Technologies

Wayne Schulz — Fri, 13 Jun 2008 09:22:30 -0000

I'm almost definitely in for one of these. I have the older style and it is so easy to use. For a while I took video with my compact camera which supports both still and video.

The flip is MUCH better quality than what I got via my digital camera.

Re: Kitt Car now up for auction on eBay - own a piece of TV history

Wayne Schulz — Sat, 14 Jun 2008 08:55:39 -0000

There are multiple "KITT" cars floating around -- so I'm not sure if this applies to this particular car. But I heard that at least one of these was up for auction and pulled due to concerns about authenticity.

I guess smart people like you guys who watched the show aren't easily fooled.

My guess is this runs so-so and it a show car. I can't see how they'd sell it for street legal.

Re: Sony Ericsson F305 and S302 appearing prior to June 17th expected announcement

Wayne Schulz — Sat, 14 Jun 2008 12:15:43 -0000

Ok this looks cool (the F305) -- I'm guessing that you only rock the phone to use it as a controller versus the all out swinging you might do with the Wii controller.

Re: Meet Winerack - Beerbelly’s adventurous little sister

Wayne Schulz — Sat, 14 Jun 2008 17:35:30 -0000

Judie I have to admit you look a lot different with dark hair. Way to take on for the team. I though you'd never try one on never mind agreeing to be photographed wearing it!

Re: Double chins, losing hair, gold paint around your mouth? Airbrushdate spins your (booking) photos into online dating gold!

Wayne Schulz — Sun, 15 Jun 2008 14:22:02 -0000

Yes I thought about submitting the one where I first woke up in the morning. I totally forgot about that. I think I was so awestruck that they got rid of the gold spray paint...

I was really prepared to have airbrushdate be a bust but I was impressed. What's not to like about a service that lets you approve the work before you pay!

For $9.99 I can't see how anyone who wants a better set of online pictures could go wrong....except the more natural looking the photos the better luck I think you'll have.

Re: Shower Light + Hot Showers: The “you smell good” Review

Wayne Schulz — Sun, 15 Jun 2008 20:25:21 -0000

I never thought of using this to get the kids to get interested in taking their shower. Cool idea.

Re: Meet Winerack - Beerbelly’s adventurous little sister

Wayne Schulz — Sun, 15 Jun 2008 20:32:18 -0000

@artsygirl - I thought you were going to point out that the person you were hiking with squealed like a girl when he spotted a snake. But nobody would believe that...

@Judie - the contest is "leave a comment with your bra size"...whoever is bold enough certainly earns one..actually we should maybe bundle up a bunch of the stuff we've covered that is humorous.

Re: Gasedge.com tells you whether traveling further to buy cheaper gas makes sense

Wayne Schulz — Sun, 15 Jun 2008 20:47:29 -0000

I think the US is going to go through a complete transformation in the automotive industry. The SUV and super SUV's (like the Hummer) are gone. The new car is the mini. I'm not sold electric will rule the landscape but you never know.

I am always wondering if a .15 / gal difference in price makes it worthwhile to drive across town. Now I can tell (or at least get an idea) by using the site.

It would be nice if they told you what level of savings would be needed to make it worthwhile to travel to another gas station.

Re: Batman Dark Knight Mega Cape and Cowl w/5 foot wingspan- - $36 at Amazon.com

Wayne Schulz — Mon, 16 Jun 2008 10:56:47 -0000

Geez - I am so terrible at writing headlines....your's is awesome!

Re: No iPhone 3G Tethering..?! What the Hey.?!?

Wayne Schulz — Mon, 16 Jun 2008 11:03:38 -0000

aka - we're not sure our network really has the bandwidth but we're going to smile and say it does....but just in case - no tethering until we work the kinks out....

I will be interested to see what AT&T;'s footprint for 3G is on 7/11. In Glastonbury it is really spotty (at least according to their map)

Re: Online Dating: Writing Your Profile

Wayne Schulz — Mon, 16 Jun 2008 11:20:47 -0000

Rule of thumb for dating profile pictures - always use a minimum of 3 photos of this variety:

1. Head shot
2. Full length body shot
3. Candid shot (doing something that you talk about in your profile)

There's nothing worse than a profile that talks about all the different activities the person does -- then the pictures don't support it with a candid. If you have good enough candids, you will greatly reduce how much you have to write.

Here are some NEVER do's with respect to photos:

1. Never pose with a guy of the opposite sex no matter who he is or how old. Ever.

2. No pictures in belly shirts, bikinis, lingerie

3. No pictures holding a cigarette

4. No pictures holding liquor of any type

5. No pictures of you with your friends

6. No sunglasses

7. Always have current photos

8. If you can use candids for all three types - do it!

9. Smile (unless you have no teeth)

10. Do NOT obscure your body behind a tree, car, stone wall, dog, park bench, stairway, wall, another person.

11. Avoid those really awful super close up head shots

12. Do not use dark, dingy web cam shots that look as if they were taken in some opium den

Ok, now for profile writing:

1. If you write "Make me laugh" -- I'm suggesting that most guys are on to the next profile -- seeing this text makes me feel as if I'm either on an audition at a comedy club or on "boyfriend tryouts"...arrgg

2. A generic profile text listing is akin to the "Match Beauty Contest" -- people have nothing to judge you on but your photos.

3. As I said, look at all the other profiles and write something that is different than what other people are writing about.

4. NEVER say anything negative in a profile.

5. It's tempting - but do not put in warnings like "If you do not have a photo don't contact me" -- simply deal with these outside the regular profile. You do NOT have to reply to anyone who doesn't send a photo.

6. Good golly - if your profile talks about loving to laugh -- the profile better damn well be funny. It doesn't have to be a comedy show for the entire text -- but some portion of it needs to be marginally humorous.

7. Whatever you talk about in your profile as being "your passion" should be backed up with profile candid photos. Love Disney? You should have some pictures of you at Disney. If you talk about traveling all the time and every photo of you is a dingy web cam picture -- I'm immediatly thinking that you are lying in your profile.

8. BE SPECIFIC -- talking about "going out" is too generic, liking "to travel" is too generic. Where do you go. Where have you traveled. People respond to that.

I disagree with Judie's aversion to the lengthy Match profile text. If you spend some time writing the text -- it really weeds out lots of people and in return lets the other people "self qualify" themselves as to whether they are good matches.

To me the eHarmony "checklist" approach was too generic.

Just my .02

Re: Happy Birthday Doug G.!

Wayne Schulz — Tue, 17 Jun 2008 05:52:50 -0000

Hey Judie you forgot to mention my favorite review - the chain mail suit!

Happy Birthday Doug!

Re: Great Question: What will the iPhone 3G cost current AT&T customers?

Wayne Schulz — Tue, 17 Jun 2008 09:14:57 -0000

Hmm - I guess I'm one of the few who thinks he figured this out.

It's been pretty widely reported that:

1. Existing iPhone users can upgrade at the new customer price - $199/$299

2. New customers can buy the iPhone 3G for $199/$299

3. AT&T; customers not under contract are going to pay a higher price which last I checked had yet to be stated by AT&T;

Personally I found the ability to purchase replacement phones via a retail counter to be a huge selling point. Too bad that the opportunists who bought armloads and unlocked them ultimately spoiled it for everyone.

Re: Put some sizzle in your flossing habits - Bacon flavored dental floss

Wayne Schulz — Tue, 17 Jun 2008 12:50:49 -0000

I don't know about anyone else. but when bacon toothpaste comes out --- I'm in for a tube!

Re: Vilcus Dactyloadapter Circuit Tester; Ummm, Yeah

Wayne Schulz — Tue, 17 Jun 2008 17:53:45 -0000

This is really bizarre -- where exactly do these people "who get a kick out of direct contact with electricity" live? Is there a secret club to join? Do they have a web site? A newsletter. Hmmm

Re: The Nokia E71 and E66 Multimedia Computers Make an Appearance

Wayne Schulz — Tue, 17 Jun 2008 20:34:45 -0000

Boy does the E71 remind me of the Blackberry. Nokia may be my next phone - assuming that Sprint doesn't let the Instinct use a SERO $30 plan..

Re: Sneak peek at Google Android

Wayne Schulz — Wed, 18 Jun 2008 10:08:01 -0000

Don't write off Google just yet. They have a rather big pocketbook and if it's in their best interest to move dominantly to mobiles -- I think that they will.

Android is going to be on different carriers and device manufacturers. It is poised (imho) to give Apple a big run for their money.

Re: Darth Vader costume brings the force to Buy.com - featuring breather inside helmet cast from original Lucas Films molds

Wayne Schulz — Wed, 18 Jun 2008 22:22:27 -0000

I'm pretty sure that Mohegan Sun Casino in Uncaville has a lifelike model that looks like this that sells for about $5k.

Re: Would the Real iPhone Pricing Please Stand Up..?!

Wayne Schulz — Thu, 19 Jun 2008 06:12:29 -0000

Frustrating - yes. But not all that unusual. Look at Sprint and their iPhone lookalike. Launch day is here -- and nobody at Sprint knows for sure what plans the phone can or can't be launched with.

I think it's all a sign of competition and not wanting to provide too much information ahead of time so competitors can form a strategy. At least in the iPhone's case I believe that's what is happening.

Re: Treo 800W in Sprint stores on July 13 - Red Blackberry Curve too?

Wayne Schulz — Fri, 20 Jun 2008 12:44:15 -0000

BP = BrightPoint - a master dealer that most indirect dealers do their ordering through. This lets non-corporate stores stock up but does not signal general availability through retail .

The difference in the dates will account for why you read a lot of reports of people walking out of non-corporate owned Sprint stores with a Samsung Instinct 4 day prior to the official launch date.

They are not supposed to go on sales before the retail date -- but some stores "slip" by a few days...

Re: Browsing the Alltop Rack

Wayne Schulz — Fri, 20 Jun 2008 13:17:40 -0000

They've done a great job on:

a- Making it easy to understand what RSS feeds are (essentially headlines of articles which when clicked take you to the full article) without having to worry about readers or loading in the RSS url.

b- Creating the site so it's iPhone friendly - and since the top sites are all on these feeds - by bookmarking AllTops you get a really quick read of the days news.

I'm not ashamed to admit that instead of stumbling downstairs first thing in the morning to read a newspaper (how old fashioned) -- I get all my news off the computer - usually from the iPhone while still in bed. The last few days I've been amazed at how thorough these feeds are.

In the office I use Google Reader a lot. But the problem is that I just don't like the iPhone interface on it. For my usage the interface doesn't translate well. So now I find myself using Alltops instead because I can read through the headlines on a lot of news very very quickly.

Awesome!

Re: New case disguises your iPhone as a chocolate bar without the sticky mess

Wayne Schulz — Fri, 20 Jun 2008 13:19:56 -0000

I also have no idea how you're supposed to use a camera with this thing on your iPhone. Anyone spot an opening that looks like it might be used for that purpose?

At first I thought maybe they titled it wrong and this was for the Touch (which doesn't have a camera) except if I remember correctly the Touch has the opening for the headphone on the bottom -- so it does indeed seem that this is for an iPhone.

Yum..

Re: ID PILOT Identification labels help organize the rats nest of electrical cables under your desk

Wayne Schulz — Fri, 20 Jun 2008 13:21:28 -0000

I think this is perfect for my Mom. Every time I go to her house she has this jumble of yellowed masking tape marking all her wires. Seems this would be a much neater job.

Re: www.urlzen.com-What’s a Shorter Word for “Abbreviation?”

Wayne Schulz — Fri, 20 Jun 2008 15:11:25 -0000

Maybe it does this already -- but I need a way to copy/past from the browser. When I copy a URL, have it automatically shortened for when I paste it elsewhere.

Re: Evidently We Are Pretty Smart

Wayne Schulz — Fri, 20 Jun 2008 15:50:27 -0000

Shouldn't people who are dumb be warned against taking it on our site and maybe pointed over to arstechnica?

Re: Popping Popcorn with Mobile Phone Radiation

Wayne Schulz — Fri, 20 Jun 2008 15:53:14 -0000

I didn't see the explanation of how they did it though.

Re: www.urlzen.com-What’s a Shorter Word for “Abbreviation?”

Wayne Schulz — Fri, 20 Jun 2008 15:59:42 -0000

Either that or see if you can add to the shortcut menu when you swipe over and right click on a link to copy it. Maybe the menu choice could be "copy link to urlzen format".....or similar

Re: Woot Off! still going on today

Wayne Schulz — Fri, 20 Jun 2008 16:43:12 -0000

I wish that Woot! had a more reliable way to notify you when a new Woot was coming up for sale. I must have signed up for a dozen of those "woot off alerts" and none of them worked worth a damn (the worst were the ones that I couldn't get my cell phone off and I would keep getting text messages).

Re: The MWg Zinc II Windows Mobile Pro Review, Part Two

Wayne Schulz — Fri, 20 Jun 2008 23:30:29 -0000

Maybe it's just me - but as soon as I see that a device takes so-so pictures -- I want to move along.

I've started to use my cameraphones as replacements for a regular camera -- so the quality of the photos they produce need to be passable or I'm usually on to the next candidate.

Re: Being Prepared for Anything: What Would You Take?

Wayne Schulz — Sat, 21 Jun 2008 15:43:26 -0000

Ok here's what I would have to take:

1. Kids
2. Something to amuse them
3. Phone
4. MBP
5. Normal clothing and toiletries

As I read your article I thought about how much I've started to store offline. I have some photos and stuff on my hard drive but I try to upload as much as I can. That makes me a little less nervous about losing things off the computer.

Oh I'd leave with at least a 6 pack of Diet Pepsi. If I couldn't hold 6, I'd take 2 cans - one in each pocket.

Re: Being Prepared for Anything: What Would You Take?

Wayne Schulz — Sun, 22 Jun 2008 07:31:06 -0000

Hey TrvlngDrew - that's my favorite Robert De Niro line from the movie Heat!

Re: Confirmation of your iPhone upgrade status is now online at AT&T

Wayne Schulz — Mon, 23 Jun 2008 07:53:48 -0000

They have yet to unequivocally announce the no contract pricing.

"Fuzzy" pricing seems to be more the norm as the competition in the cell phone market heats up. Witness Sprint's Samsung Instinct which only received a final price the day before the official launch.

The price will be high enough to discourage unlockers. I was in New York City yesterday and just about every storefront offered to unlock iPhone's. Apparently unlocking is big business - and I think Apple and ATT would like to curb it as much as possible.

Re: HP iPAQ 910 Business Messenger gets unboxed

Wayne Schulz — Mon, 23 Jun 2008 11:16:44 -0000

This is a nice looking phone. If I were into WM, it could be my main ride. Especially given that it's pretty reasonable via Amazon (unlocked).

The one thing that makes me nervous is that it was a while in the making. I'm always hesitant when I see something that takes a long time from announcement to final release...

Re: Unboxing the Sprint Samsung Instinct

Wayne Schulz — Mon, 23 Jun 2008 12:18:04 -0000

Those are great pictures -- I like. Just think Sprint would have been a lot wiser to undercut AT&T; on the service plan. At $40 for 500 minutes and unlimited data I think Sprint would have a lot more keepers. The Instinct unfortunately came out with plenty of time to let people return the phone after they peek at the iPhone.

I'd love to play around with it -- but I don't think it would become my main phone unless they'd let me put it on my Sprint SERO $30/mo plan.

Re: Unboxing the Sprint Samsung Instinct

Wayne Schulz — Mon, 23 Jun 2008 12:36:59 -0000

Oh, there's a rumor on SprintUsers forum that July 13 there is supposed to be a SERO plan that is compatible with the Instinct.

I'll believe it when I see it.

Re: Confirmation of your iPhone upgrade status is now online at AT&T

Wayne Schulz — Mon, 23 Jun 2008 12:53:34 -0000

Chris - maybe I get this display because I'm an iPhone subscriber. I signed up in January 2008 -- so I'm definitely not "normally" qualified for any upgrade.

I'm curious whether this special "status" allows me to upgrade to ANY phone or just an iPhone....

If it's any phone, I wonder whether people who have an iPhone but aren't upgrading the iPhone might try scoring a cheaper phone as an upgrade and then eBaying the phone?

Re: HP iPAQ 910 Business Messenger gets unboxed

Wayne Schulz — Mon, 23 Jun 2008 15:34:01 -0000

Probably a combination of battery life and keeping the cost down. This one is $449 at Amazon which is pretty reasonable (the extra $50 off is via a coupon code)

Re: Documents To Go for Blackberry now available - $69

Wayne Schulz — Mon, 23 Jun 2008 16:40:49 -0000

I have to look into this but I'm pretty sure some versions of OS 4.5 have Documents To Go included -- it may just be a viewer. I'll post more info when I know it.

Re: Sweetslap.com offers the Top 20 Things Not To Say During Sex

Wayne Schulz — Mon, 23 Jun 2008 18:08:25 -0000

I'll admit I cannot figure out whether this site is goofing around or serious. I saw them in a press release this morning - so I think they're on the up and up.

Are there really people this clueless as to need these types of hints?

Re: Blackberry Bold gets compared with the Kickstart

Wayne Schulz — Tue, 24 Jun 2008 12:55:56 -0000

By using the phrase "Lipstick on a pig" -- I don't mean that the phones are ugly (though I'm not sure on the Kickstart). Rather I think that the level of functionality that people expect from their phones has risen above the "push email" level.

It's no longer amazing to get instant email. What's amazing is when your browser can get to all the same sites on your mobile as your desktop.

We shall see -- I for one will be very interested to see if RIM can step up to the plate and deliver an improved system and not just a coat of paint on an older OS (aka Lipstick on a pig).

Re: Gizmodo Visits Lego

Wayne Schulz — Tue, 24 Jun 2008 17:34:56 -0000

I love that it looks like they keep these in a vault. It would be interesting to know if there are any other big collections that are similar to these (private collectors, etc).

Re: AMD Tech Day: Second Half

Wayne Schulz — Wed, 25 Jun 2008 18:18:24 -0000

It would be cool to see if Evernote would read those slides (graphics recognition is one of the big selling points)

Re: HTC Touch Diamond: First Impressions

Wayne Schulz — Thu, 26 Jun 2008 05:41:18 -0000

Thanks for the first impressions. I like the looks of this but your comments are pretty much what I was expecting.

Re: Engadget has the Blackberry Bold with a quaint 1990’s era WAP looking browser

Wayne Schulz — Thu, 26 Jun 2008 06:57:36 -0000

Do you have a link to the Phonescoop review of the html browser?

I will add in any additional reviews of the browser -- it's just that so far I have been unable to find any.

The first review out of the gate was Crackberry and their review proclaimed the browser largely unchanged.

Then Engadget posted some pictures from what appeared to be some sort of media event -- none of which seemed to spotlight the browser. Gizmodo followed a few hours later (after I'd gone to bed) with a video that also skipped over giving an in depth review of the browser (though they did give a quick shot of it displaying Gizmodo).

Crunchgear this morning has a bunch of pictures but I couldn't make out any browser shots.

I'm very interested in posting up anything that contradicts my theory that the browser could be sub-par.

Re: Engadget has the Blackberry Bold with a quaint 1990’s era WAP looking browser

Wayne Schulz — Thu, 26 Jun 2008 09:29:10 -0000

Thanks - I just updated with the Phonescoop link.

Re: Dell Video Chat: Is this streaming video that even my Mom can set up?

Wayne Schulz — Fri, 27 Jun 2008 15:06:40 -0000

After telling my sister for years how stupid she was to use a Mac (probably my exact words) - it's funny to see that I've pulled a complete U turn and now I'm turning into one of those annoying Mac people who tries to convert everyone to Apple...

Re: Paper shampoo avoids carry on baggage hassles when traveling

Wayne Schulz — Fri, 27 Jun 2008 15:38:01 -0000

Yeah, it's called way too much free time on my hands..:-)

Re: HTC Touch Diamond: Update

Wayne Schulz — Sun, 29 Jun 2008 08:33:22 -0000

I'll be curious whether all the other manufacturers who push out "me too" touch screen phones have similar issues.

It's easy to get something that photographs "cool" -- but the real world experience is often quite different.

I for one am curious whether any of these devices (Samsung Instinct, HTC Touch Diamond) have legs beyond the early adopter purchases.

Re: The DoneRight Timer-Because the Kitchen is No Place for Math!

Wayne Schulz — Mon, 30 Jun 2008 16:12:35 -0000

This thing is cool looking!

Re: GearDeal: Freeze dried astronaut ice cream - .99

Wayne Schulz — Mon, 30 Jun 2008 16:13:25 -0000

There's no way this can taste good. I imagine it tasting like a really dry cookie.

Re: Online Dating: the Do’s and Don’ts

Wayne Schulz — Tue, 01 Jul 2008 06:34:08 -0000

Judie - I may have glanced over this but how many people did you meet face to face during this online dating experience?

You have a lot of "well I ignored the conventional online dating wisdom and it didn't affect my search" yet I'm not sure how well ignoring conventional wisdom would have worked if you'd met 5 - 10 or 20 people (not uncommon at all for online) - especially given that it seems like a 3 hour drive to get to a nearby city/suburb in your area is not uncommon.

Believe me if you were to get into the active online dating mode where you have first meets with lots of people - I think you'd be much more into coffee meets than dinner out. There are a lot of problems with these lengthy dinner first meets - not the least of which they are both time consuming and expensive for a meeting which statistically usually doesn't work out.

Anyone who ventures into the online dating world should think about reading about the actual experiences of others before starting up their own adventure.

A good resource is iVillage:

http://messageboards.ivillage.com/iv-rlcyber

Plenty of Fish is also free and has a very active message board - though I don't think they're as serious an online dating service (it's free so you'll probably find a lot of casual lookers there)

Re: Online Dating: the Do’s and Don’ts

Wayne Schulz — Tue, 01 Jul 2008 11:56:36 -0000

If anyone is reading this and doing online dating but not getting the results that they want --- I would be happy to review your profile and give you feedback.

I did the whole online thing about about a year - and learned a lot about what works for profiles.

You can email me directly through the site.

I just need your profile name and the site you're on (eHarmony is not viewable so I can't offer much advice there).

I'd love to do it as an article but realize not everyone is into sharing -- so this would all be one email analysis with suggestions.

email - wayne@geardiary.com

Re: AT&T posts iReady video: Gets you ready for iPhone 3G launch day 8am on July 11 - announces no commitment pricing

Wayne Schulz — Tue, 01 Jul 2008 15:17:49 -0000

This is especially odd when you consider that Sprint offers a SERO plan where for $30 you get unlimited text, EVDO Rev A and 450 voice minutes (something that costs you $89 under the plans shown above.

Re: New Hallmark Card - you turn the crank - the card comes to life & plays music

Wayne Schulz — Tue, 01 Jul 2008 22:20:58 -0000

I'm not sure if they're available online. I bought mine at the Hallmark Store. I happen to have a store that is a short distance from my house so I rode down there Saturday and picked one up (I spotted the card initially in a review on Boing Boing - Gadgets).

It's a really neat card -- I'm not sure on what the postage to mail it would be.

Re: AT&T roadmap for 2008 - Blackjack 3, Wi-Fi Blackberry Curve,

Wayne Schulz — Tue, 01 Jul 2008 23:05:30 -0000

Feedback was that a "super thin" Palm was scene but not observed on the map. I think the thin Palm was in all likelihood the Palm 850.

Unsure of whether that will be destined to show on AT&T; by year's end or now.

We're definitely as curious as you are.

Re: Online Dating: the Do’s and Don’ts

Wayne Schulz — Tue, 01 Jul 2008 23:10:38 -0000

Most of the meetings don't go horribly. It's just a matter of finding the people that you feel like you match with. I've been guilty of jumping right to dinner on the first meet and after a few of those I was left wondering why I was paying all the money and sitting through two hours of polite conversation when I could have accomplished the same objective (initial meeting) in 1/4 the time.

The more you do the more you start to get the hang of how to manage these meets efficiently.

It sounds rather cold but in the end online dating is a big numbers game imho.

Re: Put your photo on M&M candies - sure to impress family, friends and your last online date

Wayne Schulz — Wed, 02 Jul 2008 14:27:24 -0000

Yeah - I've gotten these emails about 6 times already. I actually ordered these once -- they're not too bad. Pretty quick to ship. Just really expensive for M&Ms.; I guess you're buying the novelty of it.

Re: Sprint SERO rumors swirling - July 10 may be the last day for current plans

Wayne Schulz — Wed, 02 Jul 2008 14:29:22 -0000

If you are remotely thinking Sprint --- jump on one of these plans before the rumored cutoff date of 7/10.

Worst case if the rumor is unfounded -- you can always return it.

For $30/mo you can now get a WM device and tether it to your computer for unlimited EVDO Rev A data speed.

When I did this on my Mogul I easily got 800k downloads.

FWIW - an unlimited dedicated Broadband connection via Verizon is running me about $70/mo

Re: Drop.io - easy file exchange without bothersome registrations

Wayne Schulz — Wed, 02 Jul 2008 14:43:10 -0000

Faxing is the one area that I didn't try. I noticed they seem to need a specific cover sheet and that they caution that it may take a while. Maybe they use OCR on the cover sheet to route the fax to your area.

I think the ability to leave any length MP3 is super cool.

If someone were in need of transcription services you could just call and leave a number of recordings for your transcriber to download -- and I think with a little effort you can even have those items show up in RSS fees too.

Re: Drop.io - easy file exchange without bothersome registrations

Wayne Schulz — Wed, 02 Jul 2008 15:02:44 -0000

Hmm - I must have missed the instructions for sending. I see how they say you can receive faxes but not how to send them from there.

Re: Let Freedom Ring (iPhone 3G style)

Wayne Schulz — Fri, 04 Jul 2008 20:56:11 -0000

I'm just back from NYC where I stumbled upon these folks in line. I was told by security and the police department right off the bat that they'd talked to them and apparently there was some plan to break a record for most time in line.

It seems likely that they're all together and who knows whether this is a giant hoax or whether these people will really stay out in the sun and rain for a solid week.

Given the enormous publicity that surrounded last year's iPhone launch I can't help but wonder whether this is largely a publicity stunt with more to come as the launch gets closer.

It strikes me as just too odd that suddenly a line of about 10 people forms 7 days ahead of launch.

Then again maybe someone should tell them that the phone is being released NEXT Friday....

Only in New York..

Re: Let Freedom Ring (iPhone 3G style)

Wayne Schulz — Sat, 05 Jul 2008 07:04:21 -0000

I'm leaning toward a publicity stunt of some type.

Here's part of what appears to be their web site (and it seems likely to be one of their sites because the police and security at the site told me that the group was waiting in line to buy an iPhone for Barack Obama and John McCain.

July 4th, 2008

Happy Independence Day!

We the people love Apples.
Apple iPhones!
The Big Apple!
Apples grown locally in New York State!

We are here on a mission to set a new Guinness World Record for "longest time waiting in line to buy something."

Until now, there was never anything we felt excited enough to wait for a ridiculous amount of time. We can't wait for the iPhone 3G.

As the old adage states, "an apple a day keeps the doctor away." So, for the next seven days, expect to see us eating a lot of Apples, and sharing Apples with our friends. We will have local apple farmers deliver us apples every day. And as the line grows, we will give locally-grown apples to everyone waiting on line.

We are excited about the new Apple iPhone, and the Independence it will provide us. We are so excited, in fact, that we have arrived an entire week in advance of the on-sale date. Coincidence or not, we think that Independence Day is a great day to begin Waiting For Apples!

We have come from all parts of the country, and even from abroad, to set a new record for longest time waiting in line to stimulate the economy of NYC. We could have set this record anywhere, and on anything. But, we heart NYC, the Big Apple. And we love Apples grown in and near NYC. So, what more nourishing place than right across from Central Park, the "lungs" of New York City.

We will celebrate many elements of the New York City's PlaNYC 2030 sustainability agenda:

* We will spend a lot of time in a great public space, around the clock.
* We will use mobile solar power from Solar1.
* We will drink NYC's renowned tap water.
* We will have local healthy food (especially Apples) delivered by our community gardener friends, Greenmarket farmers, and locavore restauranteurs via bicycles and pedicabs.
* We will compost our foodscraps, to help sustain our fragile soil.
* And most importantly, we will talk to whoever happens to stop by about local organic farming as a critical element to sustainable healthy living, food security, youth education, and climate change mitigation.

We have many theme songs, among them:

The Longest Time by Billy Joel,

La Isla Bonita by Madonna,

Livin' on a Prayer by Jon Bon Jovi,

Rockin' in the Free World by Neil Young,

Living in the Promised Land by Willie Nelson,

Across the Universe by the Beatles and also Fiona Apple, and

Feeling Groovy (59th Street Bridge Song) by Simon and Garfunkel.

Our theme album is:

More Songs about Buildings and Food by The Talking Heads.

By the way, we are not just buying iPhones for ourselves. We will also purchase iPhones for Barack Obama and John McCain, because the world needs an American president to "think different!"

Feel free to stop by and grab an Apple!

Peace, Love, Freedom, Happiness,

TheWhoFarmers

Athea, Brian, Casey, Dane, Daniel, Dori, Heyward, Lloyd, Kaitlin, Makiko and Yumi.

Re: Figured out what to do with your old iPhone? How about throwing it in the blender?

Wayne Schulz — Sun, 06 Jul 2008 09:14:36 -0000

I should have added that my friend Mark pointed me in the direction of this video. It's not new but worth another look because it did some serious damage to that phone.

Mark say's he has one of these blenders and can vouch for it's effectiveness.

Re: iPhone 3G made available for online ordering for O2 customers in UK

Wayne Schulz — Mon, 07 Jul 2008 07:48:32 -0000

Yes you're right - it doesn't seem like they are accepting 16GB orders. I don't see where they've excluded them from ordering online.

I wonder if Apple has built in a way to "brick" phones automatically now due to the subsidy. Will be interesting to watch.

Re: Day 1: Week of iPhone accessory giveaways

Wayne Schulz — Mon, 07 Jul 2008 09:04:32 -0000

Remember we are drawing from all the people who submit the correct entry -- so if you want a Beerbelly -- enter away :-)

Re: Review: Deskinacar and Accessories

Wayne Schulz — Mon, 07 Jul 2008 21:31:26 -0000

Awesome - those items are pretty competitively priced too. As someone who has tried to use his laptop on the passenger car seat - I can testify to how helpful it is to have a more permanent (and flat) spot for your laptop.

I've used eGrips quite a bit and the concept is great - but you are right on with gumming up your device. On ever device that I used the grips started to peel away -- which left a slight mess. This usually happened about 2 to 3 months into using the eGrips.

Nice pictures Joel.

Re: The Amazon Kindle Review

Wayne Schulz — Mon, 07 Jul 2008 21:35:22 -0000

Nobody was a bigger doubter than me about the Kindle. Except for the button placement I loved it. When I traveled it was so nice to just grab my Kindle instead of 4 or 5 different books.

I really like automatic delivery of the NY Times as well as Time and Newsweek. I'm not opposed to paying for electronic copies of those magazines if it saves me from quickly reading them and then wasting paper by tossing them in the landfill.

Funny how we all pretty much liked/disliked the same thing and none of us read the others' review.

Re: Increased Data Plan Prices…for What?

Wayne Schulz — Mon, 07 Jul 2008 21:45:14 -0000

Chris I think you're right on the money. I'm curious whether after the hype has died down (about a week probably) whether we'll see all sorts of backlash about the increased data cost not being worth it.

Truthfully - I don't see a heck of a lot of difference between EDGE and Wi-Fi use on my iPhone. Not enough that I'm on the edge of my seat (no pun intended) waiting to get a 3g iPhone.

My reasons for upgrading?

- To get 16 GB of storage (double what I have now)

- To have the latest and greatest (aka - keep up with the Joneses)

Obviously to some extent I'll want to have one to participate in these conversations and write about different applications.

Re: Blackberry Thunder - as good as or better than an iPhone?

Wayne Schulz — Tue, 08 Jul 2008 05:48:20 -0000

I've seen a lot of people try to get around the mandatory Blackberry data plan -- however it seems to take away a lot of functionality if you don't subscribe. Push email isn't active (the main claim to fame on the Blackberry) and some people have problems browsing the web.

While it's true that there are users who completely forgo the Blackberry data plan and are happy -- those seem to be in the minority.

I don't have as much of a problem with the required data plan (all PDA devices usually require some type of plan) as I do with the extra point of failure for my email. Since ALL my email must travel through RIM servers -- I've just added one more place where the data can be delayed by an outage or other issue.

Re: Review: mStation 2.1 Stereo Tower

Wayne Schulz — Tue, 08 Jul 2008 05:52:55 -0000

I paid $150 for the iHome for iPhone and the sound is absolutely terrible. The $250 you paid seems like a comparable steal.

Bose wants $269 for their iPod dock.

Ultimately this seems like one of those devices that just has to "fit" the room.

I'm curious whether the remote also will control the iPod functions? I know on the iHome it sorta kinda does in a most awkward manner..

Re: HTC Diamond Review Part 3 - The Verdict Is In

Wayne Schulz — Tue, 08 Jul 2008 12:24:52 -0000

I think part of the problem is that damned iPhone has raised the bar so high. In order to be better you first have to be equal to the thing -- and there are so many ways that I see these devices falling down (speed, browser, interface).

Thanks for the review!

Re: iPhone 3G unboxed - escapes early via Portugal

Wayne Schulz — Tue, 08 Jul 2008 12:51:28 -0000

Engadget was reporting it via a link from the iPhone Portugal web site. Apparently one of the members there got their hands on an early version.

Not sure where this one slipped out of...

Seems like it's authentic -- though there certainly is a whole industry built up around creating fake photos of products.

Re: Skooba Design’s Checkpoint Friendly Laptop Bags: Yes, We Have Photos!

Wayne Schulz — Tue, 08 Jul 2008 17:59:04 -0000

...now how about some shoes that we don't have to take off at security...

Re: More Checkpoint Friendly Bags; These From Mobile Edge

Wayne Schulz — Wed, 09 Jul 2008 06:04:22 -0000

According to an email I received from Matthew Olivolo, their Director of Public Relations, they “are going to the airport to do testing on Thursday (July 10) and then pull the trigger on production.”

...let's hope they don't pull the trigger while testing at the airport...well, never mind

Re: Day 3: Week of IPhone accessory giveaways - pair of i2i Stream music sharing devices

Wayne Schulz — Wed, 09 Jul 2008 10:27:47 -0000

Not saying that's right or not --- but isn't that crazy! :=)

Will draw tomorrow am from all people who submit a correct comment.

Re: Day 4: iPhone accessory giveaway - Beyza Case for original style iPhone

Wayne Schulz — Thu, 10 Jul 2008 07:02:54 -0000

My favorite place -- is Bryant Park. Not so much for the scenery but for the fact that it has clean bathrooms which are fairly convenient to get to. Grand Hyatt (right next to Grand Central Terminal) is a good source for bathrooms as well.

Does it sound crazy that I'm talking about bathrooms as one of my favorite places in NY? Well it isn't as crazy once you realize that there aren't many PUBLIC places that you can use (or would want to).

Re: Day 4: iPhone accessory giveaway - Beyza Case for original style iPhone

Wayne Schulz — Thu, 10 Jul 2008 07:09:23 -0000

Another place I love is Ping restaurant in Chinatown.

They serve Dim Sum (which I'm sure I've spelled wrong).

Now let me describe Dim Sum (probably incorrectly)..

It's like a Chinese buffet where the waiters walk around with the buffet items. They'll tell you (in very broken English - which is half the fun) what each dish is. You nod your head if you want to try it. Wave them away if you're not interested.

The price is remarkably cheap - and it's a great way to sample a lot of different dishes.

I'm not a huge fan of oriental style food - but I love to try this at least once per year.

Here's the details from NYMAG:

http://nymag.com/listings/restaurant/pings-seaf...

Re: She Said Yes!

Wayne Schulz — Thu, 10 Jul 2008 10:25:15 -0000

Congratulations - I love this picture!

Re: Unboxing the Sprint Samsung Instinct

Wayne Schulz — Thu, 10 Jul 2008 11:10:12 -0000

Amazing that Best Buy is reporting this is their best selling phone ever -- I'm wondering if that includes the Motorola Razr as well? Maybe they were talking about smart phones?

Re: Happy Birthday Wayne!

Wayne Schulz — Thu, 10 Jul 2008 12:25:43 -0000

Thanks guys. Now back to our regularly scheduled iPhone programming..

Re: The real iPhone news is the App Store and not 3G

Wayne Schulz — Thu, 10 Jul 2008 16:10:11 -0000

Good question - I loaded Evernote, NY Times, AOL Radio and Twitterific to my 8GB iPhone (which also has some jailbroken stuff) and it's showing 214mb of "other" storage used.

My sense is that there's not a lot of space being taken up by the apps.

Re: GearDeal: iPod Shuffle 512MB $12.95

Wayne Schulz — Sat, 12 Jul 2008 07:34:07 -0000

Yeah unfortunately a lot of the great/good deals are for a limited time. I usually won't post a deal unless it is one that I rarely see or it's of exceptional value (to someone). I'm not huge on refurbs and usually only post Apple's because they seem to be as reliable as new (according to peopel who buy them).

Re: Online Dating: the Experience

Wayne Schulz — Sat, 12 Jul 2008 09:34:38 -0000

I found online was a great way to meet people. You absolutely need a thick thick skin to keep at it very long.

My experience was that the best services were also the biggest (Match).

The worst were the freebies and/or cheap ones.

But just like you can meet someone in line for a restroom --- I found there's no one size fits all / easy answer for dating.

Re: Apple lists ways to extend iPhone battery life - don’t use any of the new 3G features

Wayne Schulz — Sun, 13 Jul 2008 07:00:48 -0000

Yeah - geez -- were those the weirdest "how to save battery" life tips ever??

The only thing they left out was run it off the charger..

Re: 72 hours On iPhone OS 2.0

Wayne Schulz — Mon, 14 Jul 2008 16:35:28 -0000

I love AOL Radio -- it is darn close to what you can get from Satellite - except it's totally free.

One of the applications I'm trying is OmniFocus which works with the whole GTD cultlike approach to getting yourself organized. I really am hoping (and so far the results are positive) that I'll be able to rely on this app to juggle the umpteen odds and ends that become To-Do items. You really cannot just download OmniFocus without also getting the software program that runs on your Mac. The sync wirelessly via MobileMe.

Evernote is absolutely the best. There's a full iPhone client that you use to access ALL of your notes. You can also add iPhone pictures or voice recordings to notes.

I also agree with you Chris that the Apps show a little 1.0 roughness (for example AOL radio crashes every time I try to locate and then play a CBS radio station near me).

Overall I'm impressed with the version 2.0 OS -- and I haven't even upgraded yet to the 3G iPhone.

Re: Live Blackberry Thunder shots - does RIM have the worst security over their prototypes or what?

Wayne Schulz — Mon, 14 Jul 2008 22:42:55 -0000

I spent 10++ years with a Blackberry 24x7x365

Here's why I left

http://www.geardiary.com/2008/05/19/goodbye-bla...

Keyboard skins are nothing new. Windows Mobile apps have existed that create them for quite some time (I wrote about one today - iwindowsmobile - as a matter of fact).

Re: Live Blackberry Thunder shots - does RIM have the worst security over their prototypes or what?

Wayne Schulz — Mon, 14 Jul 2008 23:24:08 -0000

Oddly enough the thing I miss the most about Blackberry is the password keeper. I'm actually still carrying my 8320 solely for that purpose (in my backpack).

Re: One+ Months Later With the i-mate Ultimate 8502 and 6150

Wayne Schulz — Tue, 15 Jul 2008 22:49:44 -0000

Think that's bad - Boy Genius Report has a review of the Blackberry Bold which I would characterize as mostly lukewarm...

Not a good sign for a device seemingly looked upon as the next big thing from RIM.

They mention more than once that the case has a cheesy fake chrome border -- and the screen is subject to scratching.

Re: Blackberry Bold and Thunder release rumors

Wayne Schulz — Wed, 16 Jul 2008 09:07:04 -0000

What has me concerned is that the Blackberry Bold build quality doesn't seem that great (according to the BGR review). There also was not much that they've described in the review that seems different and there are NO screen shots of the browser.

I still think that this post is probably going to accurately describe the Bold:

http://www.geardiary.com/2008/05/08/will-critic...

Re: HP iPaq 910C gets some reviews

Wayne Schulz — Wed, 16 Jul 2008 09:08:15 -0000

The reports of camera problems would be a deal breaker for me -- I use my phone as a camera replacement and if I couldn't take decent photos I would not use the phone.

Re: Apple lists ways to extend iPhone battery life - don’t use any of the new 3G features

Wayne Schulz — Thu, 17 Jul 2008 17:34:56 -0000

Over on the MacRumors forum someone indicated that turning off location services greatly improved their battery life. Might be something to try. Haven't been able to test since I've been in the office and connected to power lately.

Re: iPhone 3G box sale for $650 via eBay proves greater fool theory alive in 2008

Wayne Schulz — Fri, 18 Jul 2008 10:41:32 -0000

I smell "bid retraction"....

I found this on Howardforums this morning -- a goldmine of useless stuff with occasional diamonds of info and the bizarre...

Re: Hello…?! Can You Say TeleNav??

Wayne Schulz — Fri, 18 Jul 2008 11:28:23 -0000

Just thinking a similar thing last night. What's strange is AT&T; has NONE of their native apps (crapware that they'd normally force on you) on the iPhone.

Damn, maybe that's worth the extra $10 /mo to AT&T; for their 3G data...

Also notably missing from the APP store is any type of streaming TV - a-la-Slingbox -- which makes me wonder whether after launch AT&T; has some ideas of providing some of those APPS (Nav, Streaming TV) on a carrier branded platform.

There also are no (to my knowledge) APPS in the store that carry recurring monthly fees.

Good questions as usual Chris.

Re: Check the list of Starbucks stores slated to close

Wayne Schulz — Fri, 18 Jul 2008 14:35:41 -0000

One in CT is in a big outdoor mall -- maybe a mile from another Starbucks. The others in CT I have not been into.

Re: HTC’s official Sprint Mogul update is out: Windows Mobile 6.1 and Sprint TV added

Wayne Schulz — Sat, 19 Jul 2008 14:14:25 -0000

Hmm looks like they pulled it. I was reading some sites that said the update had been removed yet I was still able to download it via the link as of late yesterday. I'll update the post. Thanks!

Re: Spritz the bowl before you go .. and no one will ever know

Wayne Schulz — Sun, 20 Jul 2008 19:42:50 -0000

I couldn't stop laughing after I found this online...

Re: We Get Mail: Pleo Rides Again

Wayne Schulz — Mon, 21 Jul 2008 08:51:38 -0000

For a moment my evil mind thought these two robots were about to do something else..

Re: The Inside Scoop - eWallet iPhone Sync Coming “Soon”

Wayne Schulz — Mon, 21 Jul 2008 10:36:20 -0000

Omnifocus uses MobileMe storage -- seems to work well with the downside that anyone who wants to sync must also subscribe for $99/yr to MobileMe.

Re: Access Gmail even when IT blocks your way

Wayne Schulz — Mon, 21 Jul 2008 17:20:08 -0000

The only catch is that this doesn't work for Google Apps for Domains (which I use) --- however it's useful for everyone else on regular GMAIL. Glad it was helpful!

Re: My iPhone Reception Sucks…

Wayne Schulz — Mon, 21 Jul 2008 17:51:17 -0000

I guess I got lucky. Except for a lot of lagging (especially in contacts) and the random crashes - everything seems ok. Oh - battery life is terrible but I don't think that will be fixable (telling people to turn off features that they upgraded to is hardly a fix).

Re: Sprint SERO: An Alternative To Verizon’s New $30 Data Plan

Wayne Schulz — Tue, 22 Jul 2008 05:48:01 -0000

Unfortunately I think that Sprint have done away with the old SERO plans -- so you're probably ok to stay on what you have - but moving to a bigger plan under the old SERO pricing is going to difficult if not impossible.

Re: iPod Touch Tip: Play Videos with the Screen Off

Wayne Schulz — Thu, 24 Jul 2008 09:56:54 -0000

Cool tip Mitchell - I just tried this on my iPhone 3G and it works as well.

Re: The $1000 iPhone 3G

Wayne Schulz — Thu, 24 Jul 2008 13:05:24 -0000

I think we are going to see these becoming available again pretty quickly at most Apple stores. So eBay will be for people who enjoy over-paying...

There's always a market for the stupid on eBay (witness the $650 someone paid for a box)

Re: Pocket Informant for iPhone - Fall 2008, $19.95

Wayne Schulz — Thu, 24 Jul 2008 13:19:57 -0000

See anything on the Blackberry version? Last I remember it was "real soon now" too..

Re: Custom ringtones that sing your name

Wayne Schulz — Fri, 25 Jul 2008 17:28:29 -0000

Thanks - I updated the article.

Re: Happy Sysadmin Day!

Wayne Schulz — Sat, 26 Jul 2008 06:51:00 -0000

Gee - they have a day for everything...next up - "Objects that can be found on Planet Earth day"...if they can make a card for it then I have no doubt they'll create a day ....

Here's my gift suggestion -- a care package:

http://www.geardiary.com/2008/07/25/send-your-c...

Re: Review: Wicked Lasers Executive Series

Wayne Schulz — Mon, 28 Jul 2008 13:59:57 -0000

Up next on 30 news we'll have a story about a man arrested over the weekend for shining his laser and interfering with airport traffic. Hear the man's dubious claims of "I was just doing a GearDiary review and pointing at some stars"....that's next when we return to 30 News ...

Re: Teach Me Time alarm clock keeps the kids in bed so you can sleep on weekends

Wayne Schulz — Thu, 31 Jul 2008 15:15:06 -0000

If my kids were younger I'd definitely be in for one of these (at least one) -- what a great idea!

Re: MagMyPic introduces high resolution prints of fake magazine covers

Wayne Schulz — Fri, 01 Aug 2008 06:39:17 -0000

Hey I made that all by myself (and it's the total and complete extent of any artistic capabilities that I have)..

Re: Verizon: Why did I bother to go to your store??

Wayne Schulz — Tue, 05 Aug 2008 16:13:47 -0000

Tip: Retail cell phone stores are for two purposes --

a. To shoplift accessories

b. To pay your bill because the phone got shut off and you only have cash

Re: iPhone 2.0.1 ROM Update Now Available

Wayne Schulz — Tue, 05 Aug 2008 16:18:07 -0000

Thanks for catching this guys -- I was out walking last night when you posted. When I got home I updated my firmware to 2.0.1.

So far the lagging that really annoyed me seems gone. This was especially present in the SMS and Contacts applications.

Luckily I'm in a strong signal area - so I have only experienced very limited tower to tower transfer issues (but have seen a few).

This seems to have been an effective bug fix/patch.

Re: What do do when the sky turns gray and those Google clouds turn into thunder and lightning

Wayne Schulz — Wed, 06 Aug 2008 14:53:09 -0000

I moved from a hosted Exchange service to Google Apps for a number of reason --

First, I too LOVED Hosted Exchange. I used Exchangemymail and their uptime and quality was never an issue. It is IMHO the only way to use Exchange for a small business (under 10 mailboxes).

Here's why I moved:

1. It's true that OWA (Outlook Web Access) gives you access to your Outlook emails via a think web client. However at the time you could only access a VERY limited subset of your emails via the web. Searching historical emails was impossible (I think this has changed with am upgrade to the capabilities of OWA).

I found it rather 1980S-ish that I couldn't log in via the web and search all my emails.

2. I did not want to continue synching my ENTIRE email box to my desktop. I found when I synched that much Outlook data that it became much more prone to data corruption. On the version of Outlook I used (2003) - I believe all that data was stored in one big data file which always seemed to corrupt at the worst possible moment. Indeed during my period of using Exchange I had Outlook corrupt on me probably three or four times (just once is too many times imho).

3. I found that Blackberry Internet Service (about $10 to $15 cheaper per month) would offer push email via Google

4. Google incorporates probably the world's best spam filters (for which I paid an additional fee to my Exchange provider)

5. The biggest reason (aka - straw that broke the camel's back) that I left? Searching through Outlook email was a huge PITA. I tried several programs -- X1, Google Desktop. They were all pretty good -- but every last one of them had this annoying habit of grinding away at my hard disk at the least opportune time. I started to see slowdowns in performance which grew worse and worse. (Note: I believe that some of this has improved with newer versions of Exchange/Outlook as well).

6. My hosted Exchange limited me to some pitifully small inbox -- I want to say around 500 MB. My Google Apps for Domain inbox is 25 GB in size.

There are some big limitations to Google.

1. Searching Google emails does not search inside attachments (not a big deal for me but could be for others).

2. If something goes wrong with your Google account -- I am worried that the support may take a long time to respond (based largely on articles such as this one).

On a scale of 1 to 10 I say that my experience with Google Mail has been at the 8 level. There are several times where I will notice temporary "unavailable" messages. These are frustrating but typically pass quickly (under 5 minutes).

I don't think I would consider going back to MS Exchange unless there was something at work which required it.

Re: Psst - Sprint - I know why you’re failing and it’s not call quality or your customer service..

Wayne Schulz — Thu, 07 Aug 2008 14:03:09 -0000

Personally I would like to pay full price for a phone and have no contract. I'm not that concerned about the subsidy since I switch phones on average about every 6 months.

In Connecticut Sprint has an excellent footprint and the service (except for Nextel) has been excellent.

My guess is a LOT of the pain and loss of subscribers has come from the Nextel side of things. The whole merger was BADLY botched and probably will come unraveled soon (I see people already calling for Sprint to sell off iDen).

What would have ever possessed Sprint to think that walkie talkie would be a service people would continue to demand in light of the widespread free mobile to mobile services. Sure construction crews are big on this - but truth be told they could just as easily use cellular m2m for a big portion of their convos.

Nevertheless the weirdest rumor I read is that Google may acquire Sprint. I see zero upside to Google now taking on the thankless job of running a cell company. If I were Google I'd let someone else manage that for me and no way would I ruin the "Google" brand by pasting it on a cell phone company.

Re: Review - iPWR Mobile Power For iPhone and iPod Touch

Wayne Schulz — Thu, 07 Aug 2008 17:38:30 -0000

Will this allow you to sync through?

Also, what's it like talking on the phone with this hanging off the bottom? I envision it falling off while I hold the phone to my ear.

In my mind this seems like a re-charge solution rather than something that I'd use attached to my iPhone.

Re: Happy Birthday Mitchell!

Wayne Schulz — Fri, 08 Aug 2008 05:34:59 -0000

Mitchell also drives his car on the wrong side of the road. You forgot to mention that. I think that's noteworthy..

Happy Birthday Mitchell!!

Re: Apple iPhone + Unsupported Rumours = Big News Day

Wayne Schulz — Fri, 08 Aug 2008 12:22:22 -0000

umm, ok. Sorta. Kinda.

Don't most apps make use of some type of digital signature.

Is there another precedence (outside of spammy trojan stuff) for a public URL that is used to ok a program for access of any type.

I'm not so sure the overall tone of "Big Brother" is totally off the mark. Is it overstating the importance of this online list?

I don't know? Fact is nobody knows.

I saw Daring Fireball this morning -- and really I think his is just another opinion. I wasn't really swayed one way or the other.

I still find it odd that there is a URL that possibly the phone dials into - and yeah, I think it's newsworthy and warrants mention as a possible issue.

Re: whocanisue.com - because chasing ambulances is so 1980s

Wayne Schulz — Fri, 08 Aug 2008 16:14:26 -0000

Look at how the financial markets have taken a hit because so many people overspent and incurred way too much debt. I tell you the whole "buy it on credit and expect the government to bail you out" makes my blood boil.

The government then takes more steps (free money handouts aka stimulus) which basically reward the reckless spending and debt habits...

Re: Apple- Are You Kidding (Mobile)Me?????

Wayne Schulz — Fri, 08 Aug 2008 17:11:51 -0000

These customer service representatives all go to the same (outdated) school that gives them 80 hours of "Patronizing the caller 101".

Too bad there isn't a "Dial one to skip the fake friendly BS and get support from someone who will tell it like it is"

Re: iPhone Application “Kill Switch” Confirmed

Wayne Schulz — Mon, 11 Aug 2008 11:05:19 -0000

Definitely interested to see how this blacklist plays out.

Right now I think the biggest issue with App Store is that slow speed with which new programs and updates are added. Once they fix that I'm sure this blacklist will come to the forefront (eventually).

Re: iPhone Application “Kill Switch” Confirmed

Wayne Schulz — Mon, 11 Aug 2008 11:52:33 -0000

I'm actually more curious about why there is no SlingPlayer for iphone.

Is it because Apple is trying to position a revised Apple TV in that space??

Also think about how this list could possibly be used in other ways -- expiring licenses, banning competing applications ...

Agree that until someone is affected, this will bubble below the surface...

Re: Symantec Norton Internet Security 2009 Beta Write Up Coming

Wayne Schulz — Tue, 12 Aug 2008 16:41:05 -0000

Wow. People still use Norton....Hopefully they can shake their "resource pig" image..

Re: The story of Journey’s latest lead singer - this guy sounds better than the original!

Wayne Schulz — Wed, 13 Aug 2008 09:12:34 -0000

I'm playing the original YouTube of this guy while my kids are making pancakes -- it's scary how close it is. And the guy comes across as pretty likable in the story.

I can never figure out why these guys can't get past their petty squabbles. I think the music business is only going to get tougher as live music appears destined to be the prime way that performers earn money thanks to the file sharing that goes on.

Re: The story of Journey’s latest lead singer - this guy sounds better than the original!

Wayne Schulz — Wed, 13 Aug 2008 10:30:34 -0000

I wonder why the newer album is available on iTunes and only via a third party seller on Amazon?

I bought two Journey albums this morning. Watching these comeback stories always has that effect on me...

Re: The story of Journey’s latest lead singer - this guy sounds better than the original!

Wayne Schulz — Wed, 13 Aug 2008 10:31:42 -0000

...and Amazon has the Revelation album ($23) for about 2x what Walmart ($11) shows it for..

Re: The Sprint Palm Treo 800w WM6 Phone Review

Wayne Schulz — Thu, 14 Aug 2008 10:41:29 -0000

No rattlesnake pictures?

Re: Treo Pro - aka Treo 850 - coming soon to a GSM theater

Wayne Schulz — Thu, 14 Aug 2008 19:56:38 -0000

Word is that it's announcement is imminent -- which seems to be backed up by the premature appearance of the specifications on the Palm site.

Re: iPhone + Apps = Gooood!!!

Wayne Schulz — Mon, 18 Aug 2008 06:45:14 -0000

Too funny - I was just about to email you to ask if you could summarize some of your favorite applications.

I am desperately trying to love OmniFocus. The sync ability through MobileMe (which for $99/yr I do find worthwhile despite it's rocky start - and I predict it will be a hit) is really cool. I mean really. It's great to have an updated list on both the iPhone and desktop.

The main problem I've had with OmniFocus is it's too damn easy to delete stuff.

Example:

I took off for vacation on Saturday. I put the list of things to pack for the kids in my OmniFocus on the iPhone. I had created a separate projects. For some bizarre reason if you click the project to indicate that is done --- the entire contents of the project folder are removed/labeled done.

You have zero opportunity to undo -- and I did not find a way to remove the items from any "trash" ares on the iPhone.

I found this WAY unacceptable for such a complex application that is sold to diehard GTD (Getting Things Done) followers.

The desktop application has a very similar issue -- using the backspace (which I realize may partly be a Mac shortcut issue as well) can very quickly and unintentionally get rid of lots of data.

In short I'd really hate to have anything complex or vital to my company setup in OmniFocus and then accidentally delete it.

I'm on the fence as to whether I can trust this application and whether I can keep using it. The cost in the App Store isn't cheap either - $19.95 -- plus to REALLY use it you need the desktop app for another $80.

PS - I would love to see a weekly summary of the best of the app store items.

Re: Turn your Treo 600/650680/700p/755p and Centro into a USB modem for only $9.95 (Expires 8/17)

Wayne Schulz — Mon, 18 Aug 2008 07:45:38 -0000

I did this with my old Sprint Mogul and regularly was able to get 800k download - by comparison my dedicated Verison Broadband Connect card maxes out at about 1.2 mb -- with more typical speeds in the 750-850k range.

Is it allowable under your contract? probably not.

Can the carriers find out?

I have been told no. But my guess is if you suddenly are downloading 5 GB of data per month someone is going to notice. As a backup Internet connection I think you'd be ok.

Just my .02 -- ymmv

Re: iPhone + Apps = Gooood!!!

Wayne Schulz — Mon, 18 Aug 2008 17:43:35 -0000

Slight correction to my previous comment about OmniFocus.

My issues with projects disappearing on the iPhone was partly my error and (imho) partly a weird user interface design.

Turns out you can go to the home, settings, projects and then select "show all" and you will indeed see even tasks which you have market completed.

Don't ask me how or at what point these tasks would be purged (I think there is a clean up utility).

I'm deciding to hang in there with OmniFocus because I believe it may have the best mix of features. The learning curve is steep and the UI is a tad confusing. I'm betting it will be worth it.

Re: iPhone update 2.0.2 available

Wayne Schulz — Mon, 18 Aug 2008 18:01:04 -0000

I'm up at the Ridin Hy Dude Ranch for the week so I have not been able to do this update. I probably won't apply it until Saturday when I get home.

Early reports don't seem to indicate much change. Probably only time will tell if this update fixes things or just continues to hack away at the annoying app crashes and contact lags.

Re: Bummer…Muxtape Went BOOM!

Wayne Schulz — Tue, 19 Aug 2008 06:58:24 -0000

I love the concept of Pandora and Muxtape and all the other online streaming applications.

The big problem is that when you slice through the technology - they make their living off someone elses work.

Long term music probably has to progress to the point of where songs are considered commercials for bands - and money is made in other ways - licensing to film/tv and touring.

Aren't we already seeing the impact of file sharing in the price of concert tickets? It wasn't so long ago when I was in college and the price of a ticket to the Police was $20 (which we considered abnormally high). Now $100 per ticket is passe (though the highest prices seem only to stick for established bands).

If I were in a band, I would absolutely hate that instead of collecting royalties I were forced to constantly tour away from home.

Unfortunately I think this is the new model.

If they ever succeed in taxing broadband connections so that a portion goes to the music industry I think that will be a big mistake because you'll see every "affected" interest group (think travel agents, software companies, book publishers, movie studios) come out of the woodwork looking for a tax of their own.

Re: iPhone update 2.0.2 available

Wayne Schulz — Tue, 19 Aug 2008 17:03:34 -0000

I don't know how much of the dropped calls are capacity issues. I suspect quite a bit. In my office I have full signal coverage and I've gone lengthy periods of time with no dropped calls -- then suddenly I'll have one or two in a day. If there was an inherent firmware issue then I'd expect to see more drops in a somewhat consistent way.

I believe Apple is sending out these updates without any notice of what they fix because they don't want to invite more criticism of "not fixing what they said it would".

My guy says most of the iPhone issues are memory related and that may be due to the OS and how it handles the third party app space. It's possibly an overall design flaw or you'd think Apple would have resolved the problem with the first or second update.

My experience with the iPhone is not perfect. Clearly the 3G is a much bumpier path than the first generation. Still compared to the competition Apple's iPhone 3G is still the phone to beat and I think it will be for the next two years.

Re: Let the Games Begin: Apple Sued for Dropped Calls & Slow Data Speeds

Wayne Schulz — Wed, 20 Aug 2008 22:07:27 -0000

I am not experiencing an abnormal amount of dropped calls with my 3G. My guess is that Apple's praying a recall won't be needed (and in most instances of crap devices does the mfg EVER recall anything? ... my experience is they ignore and plow forward).

Name me one major device that recalled or did more than issue product patches (like Apple is doing). I can't think of one.

Prediction:

$ 7.5 million dollar settlement split as follows:

Ambulance Chaser : $7.45 million

Consumer: $ .55 million (in the form of vouchers that expire within 3 days and must be used in person at the Apple store and represent $5 off a $ 500 purchase).

Re: American Airlines Turns On the WiFi Access

Wayne Schulz — Wed, 20 Aug 2008 22:25:00 -0000

I wonder how they will support this in-flight...

I'd definitely spring for $13

Re: Digital Life 2008 postponed (aka cancelled)

Wayne Schulz — Fri, 22 Aug 2008 13:32:43 -0000

Hmm - I think it is her. When I looked at her bio online she was a Knicks dancer -- and I'm pretty sure that DigitalLife wouldn't have let people in dressed in Knick's dancer uniforms unless they were the real thing.

Nice catch.

PS - The photo is from last year at Digital Life. She was working a digital imaging booth where you could have your picture taken and then printed out on one of the printers. I made the guy use my Blackberry Curve to take this photo and when I got home I uploaded it for the original Digital Life story.

Re: Jott emerges from beta - fee based services start September 8, 2008

Wayne Schulz — Fri, 22 Aug 2008 16:38:43 -0000

As soon as I get back from vacation I'm going to check out Note2Self. I think both would fit well with my usage. The appeal of Jott is that it transcribes and can integrate via API to various online services.

The appeal of Note2Self is that you can send longer notes. I'm pretty sure I used an earlier version on either my Mogul (WM) or maybe my Blackberry. I do remember it as being handy.

Re: One Man’s Trash is Another Man’s Treasure: A Open Source Guy’s View on The Dash Express

Wayne Schulz — Sat, 23 Aug 2008 20:00:50 -0000

hmm. Didn't know it did that. Can I have it back? :-)

Re: The iPhone v2.0.2 3G Patch; Thoughts?

Wayne Schulz — Sat, 23 Aug 2008 20:05:10 -0000

I thought it interesting that only the 3G iPhone was mentioned and that I'd never received this type of SMS text from ATT regarding any of my iPhones before.

Re: Review: Digital Foci Photo Safe II

Wayne Schulz — Sun, 24 Aug 2008 07:38:46 -0000

The pictures make this look rather large - negating any benefit of toting this device versus a laptop.

Re: Fancy Yourself as a Tech Writer?

Wayne Schulz — Sun, 24 Aug 2008 14:18:30 -0000

Even if you don't aspire to be a good writer - this is an excellent way to learn about WordPress and all the behind the scenes stuff that goes into writing.

I never (and still don't) have a clue --- but am amazed at the amount of stuff that I have picked up about writing and formatting for online.

Also, as a byproduct of doing a lot of writing - you'll do twice as much reading of product sites, other blogs, etc.

This makes you a great source of entertainment at family gatherings as you'll be able to launch into 20 minute dissertations about the applications or hardware that you've been reading/writing about....I catch myself doing this all the time (laying out the latest product offerings from Palm or Apple along with what's good or bad about them).

Re: The iPhone v2.0.2 3G Patch; Thoughts?

Wayne Schulz — Sun, 24 Aug 2008 14:21:55 -0000

I loaded the patch last night.

My iPhone 3G never exhibited any issues with AT&T; or 3G -- so I'm not able to judge whether the patch was any help with signal / reception improvements.

What I have seen so far is my GMAIL no longer hangs (imap retrieval) which it was doing about 1 in 10 times that I checked emails.

It's still too early to tell if the GMAIL is a permanent improvement or if I'm just having a "good" GMAIL day.

Re: Engadget follows up on their Palm intervention of one year ago

Wayne Schulz — Sun, 24 Aug 2008 18:45:48 -0000

Has Jeff Hawkins played ANY role (publicly) since his embarrassing unveiling of the Foleo at the All Things Digital show?

Re: Purebuds earbuds one word review: Amazing

Wayne Schulz — Sun, 24 Aug 2008 18:57:34 -0000

One thing I forgot to mention to Lynn (who happens to be my sister) -- you probably want to take the surround sound (flat) ear adapters off. I found that the bass or all purpose ones held my ear better when I was exercising.

I'm ordering my own pair right now.

Re: Review: EOS Wireless Speaker System

Wayne Schulz — Mon, 25 Aug 2008 06:41:35 -0000

This is not a bad price when you consider that to connect my upstairs radio to iTunes I purchased an Airport Express for $100 -- only about $30 cheaper than additional speakers and that solution required me to supply my own radio and cabling.

Re: Rumor - The Apple-Rose Machine is at it Again!

Wayne Schulz — Mon, 25 Aug 2008 10:01:47 -0000

The image of the new Nano looks like a photoshopped magnifying glass.

Why even include the wheel - make the whole thing touch.

The only portion of the Rose Rumors that were interesting were the Nano -- the rest I found too vague.

Very very interesting to see if this whole re-design ties into Apple's statement that the financial community should expect lower margins.

Re: Geopher Lite brings geocaching to iPhone

Wayne Schulz — Mon, 25 Aug 2008 12:10:11 -0000

Thanks - I'll make the change.

Re: Internet Presidential Campaign Creator lets you run for President if only on TV

Wayne Schulz — Mon, 25 Aug 2008 23:20:16 -0000

Clever how they did this...first I'd seen it though it's probably been around forever.

Re: HTC Brings Sexy Back: Introducing the S740

Wayne Schulz — Tue, 26 Aug 2008 07:03:10 -0000

Mitchell and his prior reviews have me spooked on this entire line...

I'm also not a big fan of these slide out keyboards. In practice they seem fine for casual users (one or two emails per day) -- but if you do heavier texting and/or emailing they're a pita to use (imho).

Re: American Airlines Turns On the WiFi Access

Wayne Schulz — Tue, 26 Aug 2008 09:04:39 -0000

Interestingly I spotted a news article yesterday about how some airlines are making the stewardesses police the passengers to make sure they are not surfing adult oriented material...

I agree totally with nickel and diming for fees. If you look around that is (sadly) how most mature industries make ALL of their profit.

With cell phones we have text message rates that are absurd ($20 for unlimited texting on AT&T;???) - regulatory recovery fees which are nothing but hidden rate hikes. Even look on eBay and see all the .99 items with $50 shipping (slight exaggeration).

Re: ReZap alkaline battery charger provides 10 tries at explosion or leakage

Wayne Schulz — Fri, 29 Aug 2008 08:02:48 -0000

...the "Hammacher Institute" certification is what convinced that this thing would be safe...

Re: ReZap alkaline battery charger provides 10 tries at explosion or leakage

Wayne Schulz — Fri, 29 Aug 2008 23:12:24 -0000

Gotta love the most recent comments in the original story...

Re: Use Tweetdeck to send and receive Twitter messages and keep your eye on breaking news topics

Wayne Schulz — Mon, 01 Sep 2008 08:14:31 -0000

My user of Twitter is very light. A few days ago I was using TweetDeck and watching the TwitScoop column which does a nice job of summarizing the top twitted keywords in darn near real time.

I'm also a suck for the Adobe Air apps that let you use the same interface on almost any OS (Win/Mac).

Re: Review- CellRanger Redux From “Signal-Challenged” NJ

Wayne Schulz — Mon, 01 Sep 2008 20:30:37 -0000

I have full signal coverage in my area (Glastonbury CT) so I didn't need something like the Cellranger.

It was already all out of the box and the original packaging had some things missing or I would have offered it to a reader.

I also tend to like to get rid of any item which doesn't get returned that I've reviewed with a positive review -- my thinking is that I should put my money where my mouth is and buy the item if I'm positive on it and it's something that I would keep using.

With the PureBuds earphones review I did just that. Earphones are personal (nobody wants to share my earwax). My sister is not too fussy -- and since we're in the same family I sent those over to her. I bought my own pair because I found myself recommending them a lot via Twitter and other online sites (Amazon Review).

Most of the other items submitted for review go back to the company providing them, or if they aren't returnable tend to gather space in my dining room before I gift them to someone who needs them.

Re: Review- CellRanger Redux From “Signal-Challenged” NJ

Wayne Schulz — Mon, 01 Sep 2008 20:32:05 -0000

BTW - to answer the question of "if you had full coverage how did you test" --- I have a trucking client who has only 1 bar of signal. I did most of my testing in that area. I also tested near my office which has a slightly lower signal.

Overall for the price you can't go wrong with this.

Re: Review: Brunton Solaris 26 Foldable Solar Array and Solo Portable Power Pack. Al Gore Will Love You For This One

Wayne Schulz — Tue, 02 Sep 2008 06:27:14 -0000

Great review! I am happy to see there is actually some solar charging device on earth that works as advertised. I would love to see car manufacturers build something like this into their car roof!

Re: We take the iStik magnetic 3G Nano case out for 26 miles of road testing

Wayne Schulz — Tue, 02 Sep 2008 13:30:58 -0000

Hey Lynn - how easy is it to pop that think off your shirt, select some music, and put it back on??

Re: September 09, 2008 = Apple Update Day

Wayne Schulz — Wed, 03 Sep 2008 05:45:48 -0000

Yes to everything but new iPhone software. Apple has been low key on the problems and will continue to follow the SOP in the cellular industry of not talking about the issues so that people think it's "just their phone" instead of being a system wide issue.

Apple hasn't made any announcement (not even a list of what's fixed) on the previous two iPhone 2 updates and I bet they are low key on 2.1.

After all - how do they introduce it -- "we know our software had problems"....

Re: Where’s my cell phone?

Wayne Schulz — Wed, 03 Sep 2008 05:59:58 -0000

Thanks for the heads up - I've changed the review to indicate that calls must be in the US and Canada.

Re: Internet Presidential Campaign Creator lets you run for President if only on TV

Wayne Schulz — Wed, 03 Sep 2008 06:03:12 -0000

I'm not sure how to make this shorter or whether you can even make use of their work for your own video -- we didn't create the program (which is very clever btw) -- you might follow the link and see if they have a "Contact Us" where they could offer assistance.

Re: GearDeal: INXS - Kick MP3 album at Amazon - $1.99

Wayne Schulz — Wed, 03 Sep 2008 06:08:58 -0000

I think you're right -- if measured against other charts -- on the Hot 100 (Top 40) it looks as if Need You Tonight was it..

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/INXS_discography

Re: GearDeal: INXS - Kick MP3 album at Amazon - $1.99

Wayne Schulz — Wed, 03 Sep 2008 06:11:25 -0000

Thanks - I updated the review

Re: The iPhone 3G as a Business Tool - Part 1

Wayne Schulz — Thu, 04 Sep 2008 05:21:15 -0000

Some additional iPhone problems in the business world:

1. Battery life and lack of replaceable battery - I said this way back on the Justanotheriphone weekly chat - corporations won't keep phones that their salespeople cannot use all day (they will buy them - but I've seen boatloads of Moto Q returned for lack of battery life).

2. Remote kill - Corporations won't deploy masses of iPhones with corporate assets unless and until they can kill (wipe the data) remotely any lost iphones.

3. Accelerometer - Need to be able to lock this down so that if you don't want the screen to swivel then it won't. Right now the implementation is too consumer gamish.

Example - I'm testing Splash Shopper. When I'm in the supermarket with my iPhone at my side - the screen starts doing its swivel gymnastics - I should be able to turn the swivel off.

4. Wi-Fi preferred connection is flawed. As you know the way it works now is either Yes - connect to everything you've ever connected to before or no. The problem is that the auto connection goes by the SSID which can be the same for different Wi-Fi networks - and many of the SSID are broadcasting for connections that aren't open or require a login acknowledgement (such as hotels). Attempting to auto-connect to these just puts your iPhone into "offline" data state. Big flaw that I'm shocked they haven't fixed.

Re: Jerry Seinfeld laughs all the way to the bank

Wayne Schulz — Fri, 05 Sep 2008 06:50:02 -0000

Compare this to the successful Apple commercials -- which very definitely caused people to think about Apple in a new light --- and I don't get it.

This is obviously part of a series of commercials but Bill Gates is already widely known. If I know more about Bill from commercials -- what impact does that have on my use of Microsoft. Do I go into the office and recommend Vista because Bill has a funny commercial with Jerry Seinfeld where they are trying on shoes?

Re: Jerry Seinfeld laughs all the way to the bank

Wayne Schulz — Fri, 05 Sep 2008 08:49:55 -0000

Special news bulletin:

Bill Gates is retired.

He no longer runs Microsoft (though many think he does)

Putting money into promoting his image fits right into what appears to be Microsoft's strategy of trying to stay back in the old days.

Judging a campaign from one video isn't really fair.

However if the rest of them are like this it will go down in history as a "don't do this" example of what happens when someone tries to create a "viral" ad campaign with a $300 million checkbook backing them.

Re: Dance Off with the Star Wars Stars

Wayne Schulz — Fri, 05 Sep 2008 09:45:28 -0000

Priceless!!!

Re: GearDeal: Emergency food kit with 275 servings lasts 20 years - $74.99

Wayne Schulz — Fri, 05 Sep 2008 21:54:47 -0000

Probably my refrigerator habits. Lynn's my sister so she has some first hand experience that doesn't come through in the article...

I'm definitely thinking of getting one of these. I think it's a great idea.

Would imagine that you also stock several gallons of water to mix with this as well.

Re: iTunes 8.0 - The iPod cannot be synced. An unknown error occured (13213)

Wayne Schulz — Wed, 10 Sep 2008 06:13:14 -0000

This error condition occurred during a sync and was not related to the initial upgrade to version 2.1 firmware.

I was able to go through and sync several times without error.

Once I received this error my Touch was in a perpetual "Sync" mode and the error continued displaying until I followed the steps.

Re: iTunes 8.0 - The iPod cannot be synced. An unknown error occured (13213)

Wayne Schulz — Wed, 10 Sep 2008 10:00:42 -0000

I had two or three syncs as well. Once this error popped up I had trouble getting rid of it until I found the above info on the Apple site.

Will be interested to see if this is more widespread when the iPhone upgrades is pushed out Friday.

Re: AOL announces integrated email

Wayne Schulz — Wed, 10 Sep 2008 14:15:07 -0000

oops - thanks for catching this. Corrected it (I totally have to rely on Wikipedia for all this stuff)

Re: Balanzza digital airline luggage scale reviewed

Wayne Schulz — Thu, 11 Sep 2008 12:01:07 -0000

Cool idea!

I'm always afraid to look at my "no luggage" weight...

Re: Balanzza digital airline luggage scale reviewed

Wayne Schulz — Thu, 11 Sep 2008 12:50:58 -0000

Good point -- I'm going on a trip next Thursday and I'll test the accuracy compared to the airlines.

I should have mentioned that I tested it against my bathroom scale and it weighed the same.

I can test the 100lb question tonigh.

Re: Balanzza digital airline luggage scale reviewed

Wayne Schulz — Thu, 11 Sep 2008 14:05:03 -0000

Tip: Take the heaviest stuff in carry on which is not weighed and only need fit above you in the bins (some size restrictions). Learned this during SCUBA trip to Bahamas where the instructors advised keeping regulators and dive computers with us to avoid both theft and the weight issue.

Just don't forget (like I did) that liquids aren't allowed in carryon or they'll give you a lecture as if you're just emerging from first grade and then send you on your way without your liquids.

Re: Seinfeld & Gates - the second advertisement

Wayne Schulz — Fri, 12 Sep 2008 13:59:42 -0000

I watched it on my Mac..

Re: iPhone 2.1 Firmware Now Available

Wayne Schulz — Sat, 13 Sep 2008 05:15:54 -0000

Upgraded to 2.1

Totally eliminate App Crashes - nope.

Does it feel more stable?

Yup.

But it always does for the first day or two.

I think most people are going to wait to compare notes after a week or two of use.

Backup time does seem faster. In the last week I was hit by the "slow backup" disease which kicked my backups to 1hr+ in length (prior to that they were fast). Now my backups are under a minute.

Jury is still out -- suspect that this will go down as yet another bug fix.

As I read elsewhere online -- I wish other phone manufcturers would put out this many updates to correct issues with their phones as Apple has...

Re: Jack Potty makes toddler toilet training fun

Wayne Schulz — Tue, 16 Sep 2008 13:14:51 -0000

This makes me wish the kids were still young enough to use this --- though I don't think I want to go back to the "potty years"

Re: iPhone 2.1 Software Update - T +4 Days & Counting

Wayne Schulz — Tue, 16 Sep 2008 14:00:02 -0000

I never had a huge issue -- after 2.1 my phone seems a tad better. I haven't been able to test the battery out as of yet (the last few days I've been by a charger).

Apps definitely still crash. Safari definitely still crashes.

My crashes were not frequent enough pre-2.1 for me to have an opinion on whether the upgrade reduced them or had any other effect.

To me it seems like the phone is about where it should be in terms of stability.

I take issue with your grade of 65.

There's no other phone on earth that can touch the iPhone for:

1. Browser
2. Depth of Apps (and the store has only been open since 7/11)

I think you may also be discounting the role that the AT&T; network could play in a lot of stability issues. I've had very similar symptoms on other carriers (primarily Nextel) when the towers in my neighborhood took at turn for the worse.

I've also experienced great service on T-Mobile that suddenly produced disconnects several times a day. My guess is that someone "tuned" the local tower in some manner that resulted in less signal sent in my direction.

Re: The iPhone 3G as a Business Tool - Part 2

Wayne Schulz — Wed, 17 Sep 2008 21:46:05 -0000

You hit the nail on the head Chris - with all these points.

Re: Microsoft: It was our plan to pay Seinfeld $10 million for two commercials about nothing

Wayne Schulz — Thu, 18 Sep 2008 10:52:20 -0000

I am not buying the "planned second phase" explanation one bit. This campaign was a perfect example of what an Ad agency does (try to win awards for cleverness) when given too big a budget.

I predict that the remainder of this campaign will suck just as bad.

Re: Why I’m Not Dreaming of… The HTC Dream

Wayne Schulz — Fri, 19 Sep 2008 23:08:02 -0000

I find phones that slide to be inconvenient -- at all the wrong times. I've always had problems with them opening when I go to put them into a belt case.

This is also one butt ugly phone.

At $200 after contract the only one buying this thing is the early adopters.

Re: No new Palm devices until Q1 2009

Wayne Schulz — Mon, 22 Sep 2008 08:36:19 -0000

I predict that Palm will sell out before the first Treo with new O/S hits the streets in 2009.

Their product line:

1. Centro - which is give away to retain market share (aka no profit)

2. Treo - which seem to all be Windows Mobile (royalty to Microsoft)

Their design is massively long in the tooth and they're rapidly losing "shelf space" (aka phone carrier) and mind share to Blackberry, HTC and soon Android.

I do not think they will regain even a portion of their prior luster.

Re: The T-mobile G1: Could be the one to beat Apple

Wayne Schulz — Tue, 23 Sep 2008 20:55:23 -0000

With all due respect - if someone can't plug an ipod/iphone into iTunes to transfer music - they're probably not a good candidate for what I anticipate is going to be an unstructured procedure to load apps and music to a G1.

Color me an oddball, but I kind of like iTunes. I like having one centralized place to download software (instead of having to juggle multiple sites with their bizarre "re-download" fees). I like that iTunes backs my whole iPhone up and if I have a problem the damn thing automatically restores. I like that there is at least some structure and discipline to the apps and not the crash happy wild wild west that for large measure permeates smartphone platforms like Palm where anyone and anybody can develop.

To completely ignore the huge development effort on the iPhone platform is to whistle past the graveyard.

I have probably a dozen apps that either have no WM, Palm or Blackberry counterpart (or if there is one the other platforms seem as if they're dumbed down versions). That development and distribution infrastructure is ultimately going the iPhone's secret weapon -- those not wise enough to figure out how to load apps or songs probably aren't smartphone candidates.

Just my .02

Re: Wednesday Walkaround: 2009 General Motors Collection

Wayne Schulz — Wed, 24 Sep 2008 21:13:33 -0000

Great Video!

What is your opinion on those hybrid SUVs? Are they going to sell? Did the price go up to fit them with the electric?

Re: Leadfoot Lipsett

Wayne Schulz — Fri, 26 Sep 2008 14:02:24 -0000

Jeepers - please tell me you didn't stand up while Judie was driving so that you could record that video.....

Re: Walmart discontinues DRM servers proving you should only buy DRM from large established retailers

Wayne Schulz — Sat, 27 Sep 2008 14:55:56 -0000

Re: Walmart discontinues DRM servers proving you should only buy DRM from large established retailers

Wayne Schulz — Sat, 27 Sep 2008 14:56:52 -0000

I was being sarcastic about Walmart - and the issue is that if one of the world's largest retailers shuts down DRM -- what could or probably will happen to others.

Re: Groundspeak Geocaching iPhone App submitted for release

Wayne Schulz — Wed, 01 Oct 2008 09:40:27 -0000

I will buy this as soon as I notice it going up on the App Store. Geocaching.com is an awesome site and it's a great way to get kids outside for some activity.

My use of this application will likely be limited to while I'm in the car looking to search for a place to Geocache. My experience with most GPS units in the woods is that even the dedicated Garmin (and other) units have a lot of trouble holding a signal - so I have zero expectations that my iPhone will be able to capture both GPS and 3G.

I can't wait to use this.

Re: Blackberry Storm gets official

Wayne Schulz — Wed, 08 Oct 2008 09:46:30 -0000

I think the only reason that that Storm is getting so much press is that it's an exceptionally uneventful quarter for technology news.

If a good story or two comes along - Storm will be blown right off the front pages. Pun intended.

I also think this is going to be a tough sell at $199 against the iPhone. Remember that basically all these data centric devices are expensive. You're not talking about a device that is going to be usable on a $30/mo data plan from Verizon. You'll probably wind up paying close to what an iPhone costs. At that pricing level people will wonder why not go with the real thing.

Re: The Freestyle Audio SoundWave is a MP3 Player That’s All Wet

Wayne Schulz — Wed, 08 Oct 2008 16:18:04 -0000

Geez - that's not a bad price for a waterproof MP3 player!

Re: My 43 seconds with Sony’s PRS-700 eBook Reader

Wayne Schulz — Mon, 13 Oct 2008 06:48:08 -0000

I use my eReader in a couple places:

1. On plane trips. Prior to owning a Kindle I used to LUG piles of books because I was never sure what I wanted to read. Now I have one device with all my books and access to a wireless library via Amazon.

2. At my kids' activities

Could I read books on my iPhone?

Probably. I just like a larger sized reader.

Re: My 43 seconds with Sony’s PRS-700 eBook Reader

Wayne Schulz — Mon, 13 Oct 2008 07:14:04 -0000

Chris - I got the impression from Mike Cane's review that the Sony reader supported a wider variety of formats - some of which could be read in a laptop/desktop eReader.

Re: My 43 seconds with Sony’s PRS-700 eBook Reader

Wayne Schulz — Mon, 13 Oct 2008 12:43:52 -0000

Yes, you are right - this is sidelit -- I just changed the text to indicate that. Thanks.

Re: Apple MacBook 2008 Event - Today 10am PDT

Wayne Schulz — Tue, 14 Oct 2008 06:17:17 -0000

It will be interesting to see what Apple introduces. Bigger specifications without additional functionality will be nice but probably not exciting enough to get me to order right away.

I'd love to use a MacBook Air but the pricing is way too high for what's included. I'm also not keen on the lack of DVD drive.

If any of these new devices include Blu Ray (which doesn't seem to be rumored as strongly) then all bets are off..

Re: WebIS - New Website Offers Early Glimpse of Pocket Informant For iPhone

Wayne Schulz — Wed, 15 Oct 2008 20:17:55 -0000

Damn.

I'm definitely all over this.

Re: A New Day, A New MacBook. But Which One??

Wayne Schulz — Thu, 16 Oct 2008 21:50:50 -0000

That looks like such a nice size. So tempting..

Re: Palm’s Treo Pro Sprint Bound?

Wayne Schulz — Sat, 18 Oct 2008 12:12:46 -0000

The Palm site sells GSM Treo Pros and the logs that WMExperts had showed the phones coming in via Sprint which is CDMA. I'll modify the story to make that clearer.

Re: If you could have only one screen of iPhone apps - which 20 would they be?

Wayne Schulz — Sat, 18 Oct 2008 16:57:58 -0000

Here's my top 20:

1. Calendar
2. Remote
3. Weather (because I need to know how to dress the kids for school)
4. Camera
5. Fox News
6. MyNetDiary (integrates beautifully to their web site)
7. Jott
8. Facebook
9. ToDo (Appigo) - integrates beautifully to Toodledo
10. Notebook (Appigo) - integrates to Toodledo notes
11. SplashShopper - my shopping list
12. Evernote - one work review - awesome
13. Twittelator Pro (great camera integration for Twitter messaging)
14. 1Password (Password keeper w/wi-fi sync to desktop)
15. iPod
16. Settings
17. Phone
18. SMS
19. Mail
20. Safari

Re: Open It! - The most useful product I have ever reviewed.

Wayne Schulz — Wed, 29 Oct 2008 05:35:17 -0000

I'm not sure they sold out due to the GearDiary mention -- didn't someone on TV spotlight these as well?

Regardless - they're awesome - I use them all the time to open just about anything that has tough packaging.

Anyone with kids needs a pair BEFORE the holidays so they can cut through all the packaging.

It's actually fun now to "defeat" the crappy packaging that manufacturers throw at us!!

I found this display of Open It! at Home Depot yesterday while I was in buying pumpkins for a school project.

Re: Gigaom pronounces unreleased, untested and unproven Blackberry Storm an iPhone and G1 killer

Wayne Schulz — Wed, 29 Oct 2008 12:49:40 -0000

The author had used an iPhone for 3 months.

Heck, maybe the Blackberry Storm WILL be an iPhone and G-1 killer.

I just don't think the "killer" title is backed by any evidence short of concluding that because it does email well that enterprise customers will flock to it.

Heck, someone could have called the whole Moto Q and Samsung Blackjack line of smartphones "killers" before they were released. After they came out everybody saw the battery life was awful and nearly every business that I come in contact with them cannot wait to throw them out.

It's just not wise in my opinion to pronounce anything a "killer" (which truthfully hardly ever comes true) before you get an idea of how it performs in the field.

Just my .02

Re: Griffin Aircurve boosts your iPhone audio without power

Wayne Schulz — Wed, 29 Oct 2008 21:19:26 -0000

1. You're right - the older model Touch did not have a speaker. But the new models that were recently introduced have a speaker although from memory they are in the back (or at least not in the same location as the iPhone).

2. My unit had two adapters included -- iPhone (first generation), iPhone 3G. I mistakenly thought it had three (the third being the touch).

This is my mistake and I'll correct it now.

Re: Who says reliable can’t be fun?

Wayne Schulz — Thu, 30 Oct 2008 11:02:00 -0000

Nice! Love these reviews. You have me thinking that I need a new Honda...

Re: Why I Sold My iPhone 3G

Wayne Schulz — Mon, 03 Nov 2008 05:53:29 -0000

I have very similar signal quality issues when I ride the Metro North train into New York City. For some odd reason the signal for AT&T; isn't very built up around the rail line.

Around my house the iPhone is pretty stable. I do experience ongoing Safari browser crashes and those seem to get worse with the addition of different applications to the phone - but nothing that I can point to specifically.

Overall my experience on the iPhone is far better than on WM but definitely worse (stability wise) than Blackberry (which tends to be an OS tank).

Re: The T-Mobile G1- An iPhone Junkie’s Perspective

Wayne Schulz — Fri, 14 Nov 2008 11:27:02 -0000

I'm an absolute believe that Android has the potential to be the next big thing (that's assuming it doesn't splinter into umpteen different flavors of phone OS).

The G1 is a nasty looking beast.. I'm not a big fan of sliders because they look cool until you use them day to day and have them start sliding open at the most inconvenient time.

One of the things I expect Android to spawn is a lot of custom branded phones -- if the OS can be tweaked easily -- why wouldn't ESPN for example create an OS for a phone that featured a lot of tweaks to point people toward their site.

To me this seem very much a 1.0 product but I expect the OS to gather steam FAST.

Re: BlackBerry BIS Email, Data and Connectivity Issues Being Reported Globally

Wayne Schulz — Fri, 14 Nov 2008 16:50:14 -0000

So far as I can tell this is not a total outage and it's sporadic as if some portion of their system keeps going up and coming down.

I've noticed it mostly overnight and at least one user on Orange overseas had a similar experience. Then someone at BlackberryForums posted a notice from Rogers (Canada) spotlighting what seems to be the same issue.

Re: BlackBerry BIS Email, Data and Connectivity Issues Being Reported Globally

Wayne Schulz — Sat, 15 Nov 2008 10:45:03 -0000

I did not have any BIS problems this morning (first time in three mornings). Also worth noting that I traveled yesterday from Glendale Arizona to Connecticut -- so I'm not sure if the location change played into this. Since I've read similar messages about service disruptions - I've tentatively ruled out (in my mind) location as being a factor. It also doesn't seem to be carrier related because I saw messages from subscribers on Verizon, I'm on ATT and another on Orange.

In any event BIS is probably back to normal as these interruptions are typically short term in duration (seldom more than three or four days).

Re: Griffin WindowSeat for iPhone & Touch - reviewed

Wayne Schulz — Sun, 16 Nov 2008 08:11:13 -0000

I didn't have any problems with scratching. The only issue is that you cannot use a case if you also want to have the WindowSeat hold your iPhone.

Re: BlackBerry Storm Review Wrapup

Wayne Schulz — Thu, 20 Nov 2008 11:12:24 -0000

I saw that review and wrote about it here:

http://www.geardiary.com/2008/11/19/blackberry-...

Personally after I was done reading it, I was left wondering if Walt even used a phone to test. My guess is that someone from RIM walked him through a few demos.

To give one sentence about the multi-media capabilities of the phone?

Huh? This is a consumer device. One sentence?

The entire review read like a mini-feature shoot out between iPhone and Storm with very little independent analysis of the key reasons to buy one over the other.

For some crazy reason I think the best reviews are going to be the reports actual users make in howardforums and blackberryforums after they buy the phone on Friday.

Re: ProClip Welcomes the Holidays

Wayne Schulz — Wed, 26 Nov 2008 06:54:10 -0000

ProClip is great. Even for a complete moron like me who can't install anything. I've had them for each of my devices. Problem is that I keep changing devices so quickly that I have to order a new ProClip.

What's great about these is they get your device up off your car seat so they're not sliding all around while you drive.

No drilling into the dash required (no messy adhesive either). These work by pressing their connections into openings in your dash. One click. Done.

Impressive.

Re: Microsoft Office 2008 for Mac - $69.99

Wayne Schulz — Thu, 27 Nov 2008 11:40:40 -0000

Yeah I wrote this up at around 6 this morning. I didn't notice an expiration but it seems to have gone up in price. All the other sites offering this deal changed too...

Re: The HP Magic Giveaways Begin!

Wayne Schulz — Fri, 28 Nov 2008 12:37:23 -0000

HP (or whoever organizes the contest) should have mandated that every site that is participating has an "ENTER HERE" (readily identifiable button) that visitors could click.

While I love the folks blabber that some of these sites run (for pages and pages) --- I'm a bit perplexed when it comes down to the big question...

TELL ME HOW TO ENTER ON YOUR DAMN SITE

/rant

Re: The HP Magic Giveaways Begin!

Wayne Schulz — Fri, 28 Nov 2008 12:55:40 -0000

nice!

Re: I Bit the Bullet…and Bought a New Mac Book Air

Wayne Schulz — Sun, 30 Nov 2008 07:14:52 -0000

Boy do I both love and hate these posts. Tells me what I'll need to buy next - usually a great expense. Can't wait to hear the comparison.

Re: Agoraphobic starter kit - 12 days of meals in a bucket - $ 49

Wayne Schulz — Wed, 03 Dec 2008 08:00:14 -0000

This would also be fun to bring to your in-laws over the holidays. Why waste time baking when you could bring a meal in a bucket!

Re: Missing Sync For BlackBerry Bold: Contact Synch has Known Failure

Wayne Schulz — Thu, 04 Dec 2008 09:13:54 -0000

I only used Missing Sync to take contacts from Mac Address Book.

For calendar I use the Google Calendar and Google offers a free sync utility that has worked beautifully and syncs my calendar wirelessly.

My tasks are on Toodledo which unfortunately doesn't have a BlackBerry client yet. Same for notes. (Toodledo can be synched to iPhone quite wonderfully using Appligo's TODO and NOTEBOOK apps)

Re: Mobius Day One

Wayne Schulz — Tue, 09 Dec 2008 18:50:53 -0000

Is it just me or could that "Windows 7 Goals" have been applied to just about every prior release including Vista?

I'm curious what (if anything) is in store for Windows Mobile.

Re: Today’s the last day to enter Geardiary’s HP Giveaway

Wayne Schulz — Wed, 10 Dec 2008 17:10:46 -0000

Just in case I was not clear in the article above.

DO NOT POST YOUR ENTRY IN THIS MESSAGE

GO TO:

http://www.geardiary.com/2008/12/04/gear-diary-...

Good Luck!!!

Re: Have Yourself a Merry Redneck Christmas

Wayne Schulz — Mon, 15 Dec 2008 10:53:31 -0000

Awesome! I could also build one of these out of Diet Pepsi in about 4 days. Wish I were lying.

Re: How I am spending the next hour or two…

Wayne Schulz — Mon, 15 Dec 2008 11:58:14 -0000

Uh-oh -- don't those Apple OS swaps have to be done behind closed doors? ;-)

Re: Escort Passport 9500ix Radar/Laser Detector is a great holiday gift - only $409.99 shipped at Amazon

Wayne Schulz — Tue, 16 Dec 2008 06:49:05 -0000

I was really skeptical at first because I had gone through a BUNCH of radar detectors. Two things really sold me on this Passport radar detector.

First, they changed the annoying beep that sounds off when you first start the car and the detector comes on. This seems like a small item but over the course of getting into and out of the car many times per day -- it's huge!

Second, I get hardly any false alerts. That doesn't mean I get NONE (I don't think any detector can do that unless it's also deaf to radar) but the number is so small now that I hardly know the detector is on the dash.

Enjoy this and let me know how you like it.

Re: Holiday Movie Time with the Gear Diary Team

Wayne Schulz — Sat, 20 Dec 2008 07:20:28 -0000

Deck the halls with ralls of rory -- we were just talking about this funny Christmas Story song last night as we searched in a near Connecticut Blizzard for a restaurant that was still open.

Re: GearDeal: Danbar Air-to-Air RC Combat Nano Copters - pair for $19.99

Wayne Schulz — Sat, 20 Dec 2008 13:32:07 -0000

I just got back from Target and they have single copters in the $60 range (cold day when I buy my son a copter like this that he's going to break the first day). $19 is more in the realm of realistic.

Re: Happy Birthday Chris!

Wayne Schulz — Tue, 23 Dec 2008 08:33:23 -0000

Happy Birthday Chris! Here, I have this gift for you. It's only one -- so it will have to be a combined birthday and Christmas.... don't you just hate that!

Re: Get out of Sprint ETF free -until January 1 2009

Wayne Schulz — Wed, 24 Dec 2008 08:39:20 -0000

I'd call again.

There were at least two people who had chat transcripts of this being done.

It will likely take some persistence and if Sprint can put you off from canceling they will.

Be sure to check out the script in the link. It seems to show some pretty good answers what what is probably also a script on Sprint's end.

Re: Get out of Sprint ETF free -until January 1 2009

Wayne Schulz — Wed, 24 Dec 2008 08:47:28 -0000

Yes it looks like they moved or merged a duplicate thread after I posted

http://forums.slickdeals.net/showthread.php?p=1...

Re: Skip the finger - flash that careless driver a rear window LED Emoticon

Wayne Schulz — Sun, 28 Dec 2008 06:34:33 -0000

I like!

Re: Skip the finger - flash that careless driver a rear window LED Emoticon

Wayne Schulz — Sun, 28 Dec 2008 21:38:28 -0000

Though I am tempted to walk into my local police station and ask them about the legality of posting another red light in my back windows. Somehow I am fearful that I'll be pulled over for having unauthorized lights..

Re: iPhone Pro? How about those damn push notifications first?

Wayne Schulz — Mon, 29 Dec 2008 05:53:45 -0000

Removable battery
Wi-Fi that let's me select by SSID which ones should auto connect and which should not
Faster processor

Re: The Altec Lansing moondance GLOW Review

Wayne Schulz — Mon, 29 Dec 2008 21:49:30 -0000

This is the first time I've seen an alarm clock that has a remote snooze. Looks like Amazon has this for $129 which isn't bad considering I've seen the crappy iHome that I bought for $99 at Target.

Did this distort at all when you turn the music up? My iHome did like crazy.

Re: Gear Diary’s Favorite Gadgets of the Year 2008

Wayne Schulz — Tue, 30 Dec 2008 01:55:47 -0000

I'm just playing around with the Sling web interface after having downloaded the BlackBerry Slingplayer this morning. Very impressed. Tivo has smartly moved all the remote control into their UI instead of forcing us to use pop out remotes. If I had played with this for a little while longer it probably would have made my list.

Re: Too lazy to park it yourself? Use Ford’s new Active Park Assist

Wayne Schulz — Tue, 30 Dec 2008 01:57:27 -0000

Looks perfect for those who never mastered the art of parallel parking.

Re: What’s On iPhone’s 2009 Survival Kit

Wayne Schulz — Tue, 30 Dec 2008 03:26:42 -0000

Not only is Whatsoniphone a great site -- but Dan is darn near impossible to stump with a question on what application is best for a specific use -- whether it's for iPhone or Mac.

I'm probably easily using 1/2 dozen applications that he turned me onto - and every single one of them is great.

Re: SlingPlayer Mobile for BlackBerry now available

Wayne Schulz — Tue, 30 Dec 2008 12:22:51 -0000

This is an odd duck that shuts out Mac users. The help files claim that you can add your SlingBox password via the BlackBerry client but what I see is view only.

I have no idea why Sling won't allow me to setup my password online versus having to use the Windows v2 client.

Update: Looks like you can set this up manually on the BlackBerry. You just have to chose NOT to login to Sling then supply your Finder ID and Password.

Re: Nike Air Zoom Triax - $46 shipped (Nike+ iPod system)

Wayne Schulz — Wed, 31 Dec 2008 20:05:26 -0000

When I bought my Nike shoes (with Nike+ support) I hesitated because I felt like a fool paying an extra $20 for a shoe with a hole in it.

I'm however quite happy that I don't have another thing (Nike+ pouch to attache to a shoe) to juggle when using the Nike+. All I have to do is remember to put on the right sneakers and the sensor is already mounted for me in there.

Re: Smack Talking with the VERSUS SCOREBOARD

Wayne Schulz — Sun, 04 Jan 2009 02:59:01 -0000

How cool would it be if they embedded 1/2 dozen of the stereotypical athletic event songs so that you could hit a button and it would play "we will rock you" -- or something similar..

Re: The HP Mini 1140NR Vivienne Tam Edition Is Here!

Wayne Schulz — Sun, 04 Jan 2009 02:59:58 -0000

...lot of red going on there..

Re: Samsung Epix Review

Wayne Schulz — Mon, 05 Jan 2009 06:00:07 -0000

Great review Chris. And thanks for clarifying that the nail polished hands in the photos were those of your daughter ;-)

Re: The Latest from Macworld…

Wayne Schulz — Tue, 06 Jan 2009 03:48:33 -0000

Awesome....everything is just a few hundred clicks away

Re: Keep your seat! Web TV from Samsung and Yahoo!

Wayne Schulz — Tue, 06 Jan 2009 05:38:45 -0000

So long as TV makers don't get greedy and require subscriptions to receive this -- I'm all in!

Re: CES: Palm Event

Wayne Schulz — Thu, 08 Jan 2009 01:20:28 -0000

Prepare for disappointment [my prediction]

Re: Palm Pre launches at CES 2009

Wayne Schulz — Thu, 08 Jan 2009 04:12:22 -0000

Can I be the first to coin the nickname - "Palm Pray"?

This could be the first device with the power to simultaneously make (or break) the financial stability of two companies...

LOTS of details need to be filled in on this. What was shown today was the sizzle. Now Palm have to deliver the steak and it can't be burnt or rare when it hits the table...

Re: Palm Pre launches at CES 2009

Wayne Schulz — Thu, 08 Jan 2009 04:17:04 -0000

Disappointed that Palm talked about how easy development would be for this new platform and even used Pandora and a quoted time of "3 days to convert their application" -- yet they showed no third party apps despite bringing Facebook on stage do do a happy dance but no demo (maybe the app was supposed to be ready - and if so what does that say about Palm's statement about how easy the development is?)

This thing may yet fly and be great -- I'm just pointing out a couple "oddities" that I noted.

Re: Palm Pre launches at CES 2009

Wayne Schulz — Thu, 08 Jan 2009 04:26:40 -0000

Can I be the first to coin the nickname - "Palm Pray"?

This could be the first device with the power to simultaneously make (or break) the financial stability of two companies...

LOTS of details need to be filled in on this. What was shown today was the sizzle. Now Palm MUST deliver the steak and it can't be burnt or rare when it hits the table...

Re: Palm Pre launches at CES 2009

Wayne Schulz — Thu, 08 Jan 2009 20:19:14 -0000

Crunchgear has a post that seems to backup your thoughts Chris

http://www.mobilecrunch.com/2009/01/08/hands-on-w...

Re: Kogan Agora Delayed

Wayne Schulz — Fri, 16 Jan 2009 07:40:14 -0000

ouch - stick a fork in them. Sounds like they're done.

Re: Review: ProClip for the T-Mobile G1

Wayne Schulz — Fri, 23 Jan 2009 06:09:25 -0000

Bummer on the connector. The big upside to these devices has always been the ease at which:

1. You can get them mounted to your dash without a lot of gooey tape (thankfully)

2. Replace only the bracket that holds your device. My phones last about 6 months and each time I switch I just order the appropriate phone holder and don't have to toy with removing the entire mount.

I've had mine in both my Honda and Explorer since forever.

Re: Valentine toilet paper shows your love - “top to bottom”

Wayne Schulz — Mon, 26 Jan 2009 12:20:20 -0000

Wow - I didn't notice all those "related" posts. Everyone loves toilet humor, right.

Re: Google upgrades Maps to include Google Latitude location sharing

Wayne Schulz — Wed, 04 Feb 2009 07:13:23 -0000

Stick a fork in half the "where am I" sites -- they're cooked, cooked, cooked.

Re: Google upgrades Maps to include Google Latitude location sharing

Wayne Schulz — Wed, 04 Feb 2009 10:52:54 -0000

I like this idea and it's intriguing on a number of levels.

First, Google just ditched a bunch of "projects" because they weren't making money.

Would they have started this project if they didn't expect to make money or expand it? (my guess is no).

Down the road we'll absolutely see opt-in for coupons, discounts, etc based on your location showing on a map. The advertiser will not be privy to this but there will probably be some incentive to the users to keep themselves logged into the Google Latitude.

This is probably the angle Google expects to take rather than dabble in the trendy and unprofitable social media space -- and probably why you don't see them making a bid for Twitter and/or Friendfeed. Both nice services but no profit model on the horizon.

Re: Light Laptop Stands: Why didn’t I think of that?

Wayne Schulz — Fri, 06 Feb 2009 21:38:57 -0000

I'm going to try it out on my MacBook Pro -- I think Tony may be right about putting stress on the chasis. I like it as a temporary solution for portable work on a flat surface.

Re: How Would You SKU Windows 7?

Wayne Schulz — Fri, 06 Feb 2009 21:40:44 -0000

What was so bad about two SKUs -- heck half the reason I went with a Mac is I didn't want to screw with what version of Vista to get. I was terrified of making a mistake and being stuck with a less than fully functioning OS.

Re: Glasi Hergiswil Pilsner Beer Glass Review

Wayne Schulz — Sun, 08 Feb 2009 21:41:59 -0000

Ok, admit it, you had to take about 5 or 6 test runs "just to make sure" ....;-)

Re: Zagg (formerly invisibleShield) installation video

Wayne Schulz — Sun, 08 Feb 2009 21:46:24 -0000

Good point about all the little pieces that come with some of the Zagg/InvisibleShields.

I've taken to only applying the front and back shields. Except for once or twice I've never fooled with the sides or any of the other sundry small pieces that I technically should apply.

Worth noting that these are often on special - so it's worth a search of fatwallet.com or slickdeals.net to see if anyone is chatting about a promo. There's also a twitter account @zaggdaily that you can follow to receive promotions.

The two pieces of equipment that I order for almost all my devices are the Zagg/InvisibleShield and the ProClip (which I like because I just buy a new face and I don't have to remove any of the underlying mounts).

Re: Kindle 2 announced - Whispersync is what everyone should be excited about

Wayne Schulz — Mon, 09 Feb 2009 11:05:45 -0000

Think about the market for sync for schools? How about if Amazon worked out a way to get dumb (read cheap) terminals to sync so that kids no longer had to carry 20 pounds of paper back and forth to school each day.

This is still probably a year or two away but all the writing is on the wall that makes the environment ripe for this type of feature.

Many newspapers are shutting or eliminating home delivery,.

What better way to publish than an electronic delivery that cuts out enormous overhead costs of paper, delivery labor, etc...

Will be interested to see if Whispersync develops farther than just a sync between Kindles.

Re: Kindle 2 announced - Whispersync is what everyone should be excited about

Wayne Schulz — Mon, 09 Feb 2009 11:21:04 -0000

I agree - in this economy the market for $359 eReaders is going to be limited to early adopters. We were just talking that there's still no color and it remains to be seen if the rendering of magazines will be any better.

I have a Kindle 1 and am not getting that "gotta upgrade" urge. The pages on my Kindle 1 turn plenty fast. I am not sensing that I'd ever use the text to speech. Better battery life and screen contrast would probably be my key motivators if I'm to upgrade at all.

Now you know me -- and that urge may come by the end of the day. However as I watched Engadget's live coverage -- I just didn't see anything (save for the long term potential of Whispersync) that was different enough that I felt I had to upgrade.

And I'm a little curious how Whispersync initially is going to work. Surely they're not going to allow people to gift their old Kindle 1 to a relative who would then still be able to read the old content synchronized by Whispersync.

Re: Kindle 2 announced - Whispersync is what everyone should be excited about

Wayne Schulz — Mon, 09 Feb 2009 13:33:01 -0000

Once the reviews are in I think people will:

1 Ridicule this for the huge bezel - that wide border has got to be a joke, right?

.... anyone yet pointing out that this beast doesn't have a touch screen to flip pages

2. Price

.... $359 is too much money - hey Amazon did you notice that the price of every other consumer device is headed in one decided direction

3. Not different enough from v1 Kindle

.... I mean the design is just, so , Kindle-y

4. Lack of ability (still) to render images for newspapers/magazines

... I'm not sure on this one until I see more reviews -- but it seems like we just get more shades of (Y-A-W-N) gray...

Re: YAY! Google Contacts Has New Merge Feature

Wayne Schulz — Tue, 10 Feb 2009 11:14:52 -0000

Nice catch!! I need need need!

Re: YAY! Google Contacts Has New Merge Feature

Wayne Schulz — Tue, 10 Feb 2009 14:57:01 -0000

They also did something about not showing the "suggested" contacts all the time -- used to be that I'd see my regular contact list and also have an available list of people I'd emailed but not added to my contact list.

That free standing list is gone and now I just see my contacts and total contacts.

The old way was a bit confusing anyhow.

Re: In New York for Fashion Week with HP and Vivienne Tam

Wayne Schulz — Wed, 18 Feb 2009 06:03:18 -0000

Bloggers take Manhattan!

Re: Paid Android Apps Hitting the Android Marketplace

Wayne Schulz — Fri, 20 Feb 2009 17:21:08 -0000

Android sucks....no pull my finger app? ;-)

Re: Fashion Week with HP and Vivienne Tam

Wayne Schulz — Sun, 22 Feb 2009 07:05:03 -0000

Very cool. That notebook is starting to grow on me as well.

Re: Wireless dental camera stops kids from lying about nightly brushing habits

Wayne Schulz — Sun, 22 Feb 2009 07:06:09 -0000

I was afraid of that -- ugg...

Re: Dalai Lama reincarnated on Twitter - changes to non-affiliated account - keeps 21,000+ followers

Wayne Schulz — Sun, 22 Feb 2009 16:45:20 -0000

I fail to see how Twitter can shut down an account that has 20,000 for violating TOS and then transferring those users to a new account. Mind boggling. We'll read about this some more I'm sure.

Re: Dalai Lama reincarnated on Twitter - changes to non-affiliated account - keeps 21,000+ followers

Wayne Schulz — Sun, 22 Feb 2009 21:23:25 -0000

However in this case Twitter appeared to physically shut down this account (there were screen shots showing that the account was not available). The press reports seemed to indicate that the account was taken offline because it impersonated another person.

When it came back - apparently Twitter allowed whoever is behind the account to transfer all their followers (obtained via what was reported to be an impersonated account).

Totally wrong, imho.

Re: Review: Clarion Mind – Media, Internet, and Directions All-In-One? Not Quite.

Wayne Schulz — Mon, 23 Feb 2009 06:12:21 -0000

Great review Doug.

I get the feeling reading this that the review might have been a little different if this was a $100 device. It also seems that the market is ripe for a way to +easily+ use our cell phones as a data source.

Re: Unlock your BlackBerry 8900 Free

Wayne Schulz — Mon, 23 Feb 2009 10:27:00 -0000

If you are asked "why you want to unlock" simply say you are traveling to the Bahamas and your company requires you to use a prepaid SIM card which you would like to insert to your BlackBerry device.

Forget for a moment that once you unlock the BlackBerry 8900 that it will accept an AT&T SIM (though it will NOT use the 3G network - you'll still be stuck with slow EDGE)

Re: Review: Clarion Mind – Media, Internet, and Directions All-In-One? Not Quite.

Wayne Schulz — Mon, 23 Feb 2009 10:30:19 -0000

I wonder if the pricing comes about because of the huge lead times between when they create a device and when it comes to market. It seems to me that any GPS priced over $200 is going to have a tough time when people make point by point comparisons to what other multi-use devices provide for about the same money.

Re: iPhone 3G vs BlackBerry Storm

Wayne Schulz — Mon, 23 Feb 2009 13:23:52 -0000

My sister just bought a Storm and she seems to like it. I'm in agreement with you -- when I tested one (briefly) I didn't see the point of a keyboardless BlackBerry. It seemed like a lot of work and the applications were stil the same old crappy BlackBerry JAVA stuff (though they seem to be getting better)

Re: Sprint Referral Rewards Program is now $100 through 3/31/09

Wayne Schulz — Tue, 24 Feb 2009 17:37:47 -0000

In my neck of the woods Sprint service is good. I wonder if their churn is primarily from Nextel? I have to believe there are a lot of people who got tired of the walkie talkie fad -- and once you take away Direct Connect Nextel just doesn't have as much to offer.

I'd be curious to see what percent of Sprint's losses come from Nextel versus Sprint.

Re: Justifying the Kindle

Wayne Schulz — Tue, 24 Feb 2009 22:32:05 -0000

When the first Kindle came out there was nobody who ridiculed that thing more than me.

Like Chris I thought the lack of screen color and backlighting would make it DOA.

Fast forward and there's a Kindle on my bookshelf that I NEVER would EVER think of leaving home without while traveling. My Kindle use is mostly on planes and while traveling.

Once you experience the ability to put ONE thing into your carry on bag when you are traveling you will be a believer. I love the delivery system that allows for fast purchasing of books via wireless (I absolutely hate cabling anything).

I have not been able to work up a sufficient enthusiasm to order the Kindle 2 as of yet --- however as with a lot of my purchases that may come with time and as I read more about Kindle 2 from Julie and Judie and Doug and Dan (I think that's everyone who purchased one).

Re: Tam Spotting

Wayne Schulz — Thu, 26 Feb 2009 06:14:52 -0000

Cool look to this - and I like the "digital clutch" advertising. How can you go wrong for $125 less...

Re: Wondering where to get lunch? Have a free Quiznos sub

Wayne Schulz — Thu, 26 Feb 2009 12:38:00 -0000

That stinks. I always vote with my $$ in situations like that. I think as they saw me walking out they'd think twice about whether they'd lost a customer for good.

Re: BlackBerry Storm random thoughts

Wayne Schulz — Thu, 26 Feb 2009 20:15:21 -0000

As an update to this story. My college roommate is the one who bought the BlackBerry Storm. I went and spent some time with it (and photographed it for this brief article).

Fast forward two months or so and he's since sold it and bought a Curve.

Re: dub is yet another address sync that I have to pester my friends to join - what am I missing?

Wayne Schulz — Fri, 27 Feb 2009 07:03:42 -0000

Tested this with BlackBerry. It does indeed sync into your BlackBerry address book. Yet for a 1.3mb download -- it doesn't sync a BlackBerry PIN if the person is using a BB? There's no spot on the instant messenger to capture BB PIN info.

Re: Why school projects should be banned [rant]

Wayne Schulz — Fri, 27 Feb 2009 07:33:56 -0000

Most of my rant on this was a compilation of private messages that I've received from other parents. Each time we're tasked with a "project" it's widely discussed as being little more than a challenge to see if the parents can manage the project at home for the kids.

Mine are 9 years old -- so their ability to create and manage a project may be a bit less than older kids.

I'm trying to think whether for the 4 years that my kids have been in school whether there have been any home work assignments that look like they're anything except a photocopied "McGraw Hill". Right now I can't think of any (and I pasted in an exact image of an assignment from this year).

My stepfather was an elementary teacher until his retirement a few years ago. I can remember every night that he would create his own lesson plans and be grading well into the evening - so I guess some of that exists -- just none that I've observed yet in the Glastonbury Schools.

Re: Why school projects should be banned [rant]

Wayne Schulz — Fri, 27 Feb 2009 07:40:21 -0000

I think our science fair is Tuesday. I'd love to (but will not) take photos of exhibits and have a contest where we judge "most likeliest done by a parent"....

Re: An HP Mini Note Webcam Fix On the Way?

Wayne Schulz — Fri, 27 Feb 2009 07:45:21 -0000

I saw the video before it was removed and thought it was great. There did seem to be a pretty good chance of cracking something with the amount of space that had to be opened up at the top. I remember thinking to myself -- why does she know how to do this so well....

Curious to see how widespread this issue is and whether a recall has to occur.

Re: Why school projects should be banned [rant]

Wayne Schulz — Fri, 27 Feb 2009 10:08:04 -0000

My favorite "project" story happened when the kids were in second grade. The Friday before a 3 day holiday weekend we got the call that my son had not sufficiently finished his project in class and therefore was being sent home with this project to complete. It was due when school resumed on Tuesday.

I also have great fondness for parent teacher conferences which occur in April (two months before school's due to release) where the teacher suddenly announces the poor performance of your student, that she's "concerned" whether the child can progress to the next grade level and all manner of issues that you'd asked about at the prior 3 conferences and were not raised.

Tip: When faced with an "April surprise" be sure to use the following two abbreviations as you listen compassionately. It's your right under federal law to request this at any time. Schools absolutely hate it:

1. NCLB
2. PPT

I thought the "teacher" was going to fall over backwards in her chair.

PS - The third word schools hate to hear in combination with the two above "parent advocate"

Re: Why school projects should be banned [rant]

Wayne Schulz — Fri, 27 Feb 2009 10:31:56 -0000

Planning and Placement Team

My understanding is that should you feel your child qualifies under No Child Left Behind, that you are able to call a meeting where the school must provide you with either their reason your child doesn't qualify or create a plan under federal guidelines.

In most of those meetings you are allowed to bring a "parent advocate" -- and the unspoken issue is the schools never know whether that advocate is an attorney, specialist or your neighbor......so it puts them on their highest level of alert.

And always strive to be the nicest parent in the school should you find the need to complain. The hotheads are always discounted all the way up the school chain of command.

Re: Going green? How about reusable toilet paper?

Wayne Schulz — Fri, 27 Feb 2009 10:34:23 -0000

I think these can double as cloth napkins (when clean, naturally)

Re: Why school projects should be banned [rant]

Wayne Schulz — Fri, 27 Feb 2009 13:29:06 -0000

Do you have a link that you might share to your guides?

Re: Why school projects should be banned [rant]

Wayne Schulz — Fri, 27 Feb 2009 14:37:05 -0000

Do you have a sample page --- even half a page in JPG or GIF that we could use as an illustration. I like this concept. wayne@geardiary.com

Re: Unboxing the Amazon Kindle 2

Wayne Schulz — Sat, 28 Feb 2009 06:25:37 -0000

Wow - I'm loving that case. The first generation has such an awful case it's embarrassing. This one actually seems like something you might take out in public!

Re: Unboxing the Amazon Kindle 2

Wayne Schulz — Sat, 28 Feb 2009 06:26:39 -0000

Oh and I still think that BIG bezel around Kindle 2 is some type of inside joke Amazon is playing.

Re: Kindle Case - Another Option

Wayne Schulz — Sat, 28 Feb 2009 20:52:14 -0000

Does the case stay on -- my first generation case is awful and is very easy to knock off.

Re: And my useless gadget of the year award goes to…

Wayne Schulz — Sun, 01 Mar 2009 14:01:42 -0000

I spotted this in BJ's Wholesale --- they seems to make a smaller table top version. This one came about up to my shoulders.

Re: What’s the best BlackBerry Twitter Client?

Wayne Schulz — Mon, 02 Mar 2009 06:46:57 -0000

I've been with Socialscope on my BlackBerry and it seems to offer the best combination of readability and usability.

twitter.com/mas90guru

Re: Target has $50 prepaid phone cards for Verizon, Boost, T-Mobile, AT&T for $44

Wayne Schulz — Mon, 02 Mar 2009 19:36:44 -0000

I don't think it's a bad deal at all. Worth noting that if you sign up for T-Mobile with $100 min prepaid -- your minutes won't expire for a full year!!

Re: Palm Pre still not ready for mere mortals to hold

Wayne Schulz — Mon, 02 Mar 2009 20:19:40 -0000

If the Pre does come out a winner - this will most certainly be the comeback story of the century.

Re: gCalWall creates iPhone wallpaper containing Google calendar events

Wayne Schulz — Tue, 03 Mar 2009 14:25:26 -0000

Yeah the only real issue I have was getting a decent background color -- I tried looking for solids like you had on the screen shots but kept getting a lot of busy backgrounds. Other than that I like the concept a lot - especially given that I'm on Google for calendar.

Re: New iMac, Mac Mini, Pro, Time Capsule, Airport Express expected today from Apple

Wayne Schulz — Tue, 03 Mar 2009 14:26:15 -0000

Apple's trend is not toward easy to remove anything...

Re: Febreze Odor Removal Appliance = awesome

Wayne Schulz — Wed, 04 Mar 2009 12:02:09 -0000

What I liked about this is there's no masking odor (as if I were to use Febreze from the can) -- the odor is just gone. And the device is affordable for about $20 and the filters for about $10 seem to be reasonable.

I was pleasantly surprised to say the least.

Re: Amazon Kindle for iPhone now available

Wayne Schulz — Wed, 04 Mar 2009 12:10:22 -0000

I haven't spent a lot of time with this since writing about it this morning. I agree that I dislike putting in my entire Amazon account number.

I completely love the idea of flexibility and being able to start reading a book in one place and wind up on the same page on my Kindle.

I haven't tried, but according to WSJ you can download direct to your Kindle for iPhone -- though it must be done through Safari and not within K4I.

Re: Palm Pre still not ready for mere mortals to hold

Wayne Schulz — Wed, 04 Mar 2009 14:30:06 -0000

Sprint has a great network in CT. The problem that Sprint might face is other carriers enter into a price war which brings the whole industry down. The weakest players would probably fare worse.

Personally I cannot wait to see how this all plays out. It's looking like the Pre needs to get out damn quickly to help Palm financially -- and to a larger extent Sprint.

Re: Is Microsoft’s “Teaching” Approach to Windows Mobile Working for You?

Wayne Schulz — Sat, 07 Mar 2009 06:07:21 -0000

Did Apple or RIM have these types of discussions? I can't remember....

Re: Review: Nextar Z10 Microprojector

Wayne Schulz — Sat, 07 Mar 2009 06:09:53 -0000

Wow - great review. I missed whether you were able to hook this to a laptop (even if at a lower resolution)

Re: Spring Forward Tonight

Wayne Schulz — Sat, 07 Mar 2009 10:44:30 -0000

Thanks for the reminder -- with kids the whole daylight savings starts to look less and less relevant because I'm up before the sun either way..

Re: BlackBerry Pearl user describes the Storm upgrade experience

Wayne Schulz — Sun, 08 Mar 2009 11:57:29 -0000

Thanks Lynn -- I hadn't heard a lot of feedback of slowdowns when multiple applications are open. It's also worth noting that the browser shot is probably of a mobile page that Geardiary served and I'm pretty sure there's a way to get the Storm to present you a regular graphical page.

Re: Can Ooma replace my Vonage office line (saving $65 per month)?

Wayne Schulz — Mon, 09 Mar 2009 07:52:46 -0000

The thing I like the most so far as Ooma is they did not require me to enter any billing information to start using their service.

I'm growing increasingly tired of all the service fees that get charged to my credit card and the huge pain in the ass it is to try to cancel (this is after spending an hour on the phone with Sirius trying to cancel and eventually having to dispute the charge with Visa).

My monthly vonage bill is about $65 -- which probably includes fees and perhaps an additional charge service.

So far I'm pretty determined to show Vonage the door - not because of their service quality (which has always been excellent) but because I have so many cell phone minutes that even if Ooma doesn't work I'm seriously thinking that I'll just use my cell for outgoing calls (and probably still never go over my monthly alloted minutes)

Re: StarPlayr for iPhone discontinued on March 10 2009

Wayne Schulz — Mon, 09 Mar 2009 12:39:17 -0000

The way I read it "in our best interests to discontinue" -- I assumed that they were threatened with some type of lawsuit or were told if they continued that Sirius would change the login methodology so as to break their app.

I know this app has been around on the desktop (and I think WinMo ) for quite some time.

I'd been testing for the past month and loved it.

I think Sirius has made many strategic errors not the least of which is to ignore the mobile market (and I don't count their overpriced limited channel offerings via ATT), tie their success to the auto industry and create what I believe is a billing scam that makes it tough to leave the service once you've signed up.

Re: 100 foot USB extension cord - $35.99

Wayne Schulz — Mon, 09 Mar 2009 12:40:23 -0000

Yes I'd love to have someone test this out. Unfortunately I don't have the slightest idea how to go about measuring it.

Re: One Fishy USB Port

Wayne Schulz — Wed, 11 Mar 2009 06:39:51 -0000

ok I get it now - the fins are the ports... cute!

Re: Barbie gets anniversary bug

Wayne Schulz — Wed, 11 Mar 2009 08:02:58 -0000

Judie got a new car? Seriously - I thought that was the picture until I read the title.

Re: Review: The Amazon Kindle 2

Wayne Schulz — Mon, 16 Mar 2009 11:08:43 -0000

Nice Job Guys (and girls) !

As a Kindle 1 owner there is not enough here to convince me that an upgrade to Kindle 2 would make my life simpler/better.

The Kindle 1 takes some getting used to. Once I avoid pushing the wrong keys I think it operates pretty similarly to Kindle 2 in terms of functionality.

There's also not a ton of online "chatter" about Kindle 2 leading me to believe it's mostly a meh upgrade for someone who owns Kindle 1. However it wouldn't be the first (or last) time I've been wrong about something like that.

Re: Review: The Amazon Kindle 2

Wayne Schulz — Mon, 16 Mar 2009 16:01:37 -0000

I think we're going to hold at just a MacBook Pro for a little while. Her next leap is an iPhone.

Re: Happy Birthday Dan!

Wayne Schulz — Thu, 19 Mar 2009 09:16:35 -0000

Happy Birthday Dan!

Re: I’m An Apple Fanboy, but The New Shuffle…

Wayne Schulz — Fri, 20 Mar 2009 08:36:41 -0000

I think Apple's "theory" is that people who buy shuffle's don't bring their own earphones.

That said - I agree with you that proprietary headphone adapters are not good, I won't buy them and I hope nobody else will.

Re: Did your eggs balance at 7:44 today?

Wayne Schulz — Fri, 20 Mar 2009 19:07:24 -0000

I am pretty sure this IS an old wives tale -- just don't tell my Stepfather because he believes...

Re: Telenav Shotgun is an all-in-one Internet connected GPS for business travelers

Wayne Schulz — Mon, 23 Mar 2009 15:27:55 -0000

Nice job! I found myself wondering if an Internet connected GPS may be worth a second look. The concept of always updated maps is nice though the fee is not so much..

Re: reQall Improves Free Service and Adds New Pro Version

Wayne Schulz — Wed, 25 Mar 2009 16:31:11 -0000

I'm testing out the BlackBerry version of reQall and it works pretty well. The only thing I haven't been able to make work is the Google Calendar integration.

I plan to subscribe to this and use it as my primary shopping list maker and thought gatherer.

Transcription of words is not 100% --- and I'm ok with touching up many of the notes which I think are more memory joggers than final form written masterpieces.

Re: Why eReader for BlackBerry is a fail

Wayne Schulz — Thu, 26 Mar 2009 06:29:14 -0000

The same availability argument could also be made about just carrying a paperback book around.

My opinion is that just as the iPhone did, the Kindle raised the bar for what we can expect from an eBook reader.

Trying to memorize my EXACT registered name -- as well as full credit card number I used to purchase a book 3 years ago -- is not user friendly to me.

This has happened to me multiple time when I've switched devices and decided to give the reader another go. Sure, the books transferred but not after a LOT of frustrating brain wracking.

Not the user experience I'm looking for in the future.

Re: Alltel Expands My Circle By Five

Wayne Schulz — Thu, 26 Mar 2009 18:11:48 -0000

I hear that Grandcentral/Google Voice is good for expanding that circle by everyone..

Re: MacHeist 3 Bundle is on Sale NOW!

Wayne Schulz — Mon, 30 Mar 2009 05:51:07 -0000

I bought the bundle if for no other reason than I want them to continue. I like that they're generally ok with gifting parts that you already own.

Re: Nintendo Wii Adds SDHC Support

Wayne Schulz — Wed, 01 Apr 2009 05:21:39 -0000

Nice Catch! My kids mostly use my Wii but this will be good nice.

Re: Review: Pocket Informant 1.0 for iPhone

Wayne Schulz — Wed, 01 Apr 2009 11:17:18 -0000

Nice! This is my all time favorite calendar. I have it on my BlackBerry Bold and my iPhone. While I don't use Outlook (made the switch to Google a few years ago) -- the Google Calendar synch works perfectly on iPhone.

My favorite part of the program is the weekly view. For some reason the smartphone makers never work a decent weekly view into their calendars.

Re: Where in the World Is the Palm Pre???

Wayne Schulz — Wed, 01 Apr 2009 14:29:03 -0000

Agreed and I think that Palm has to hit a grand slam -- and even then there is a real danger of them being either taken over or going out of business.

This is a super competitive business and Apple has raised the bar very high.

So far there are a lot of predictions about the success of the PRE based on exactly zero people using it in the field.

That means there's a lot of expectation that could potentially deflate very very quickly.

Re: Review: Pocket Informant 1.0 for iPhone

Wayne Schulz — Wed, 01 Apr 2009 14:32:43 -0000

I'd guess it may be an ok price. PI has a pretty strong following and name recognition. I bought it without a lot of advance thought especially knowing how easily iphone upgrades get applied via iTunes.

Re: April 1st - Google Had A Good One Today… Or Did They?

Wayne Schulz — Thu, 02 Apr 2009 06:46:42 -0000

I agree with all your points. Auto-pilot is not that far fetched (funny, but not far fetched)...

I'm also big time on the voice mail to text bandwagon (though I use phone tag) and since my Google Voice account just went live (finally) -- I'm thinking of switching everything to them.

Re: TealOS? No more says Palm

Wayne Schulz — Thu, 02 Apr 2009 20:28:43 -0000

Been wracking my brain to remember the other Palm developer who came out with a very highly widgetized "platform". I don't think it was these guys - but maybe.

They had a lot of promo and some buzz - then promptly disappeared.

Re: Etsy computer HD clock

Wayne Schulz — Fri, 03 Apr 2009 21:13:45 -0000

Nice find!

Re: Gaming in the clouds…

Wayne Schulz — Fri, 03 Apr 2009 21:17:04 -0000

Isn't it great when the old concept of dumb terminals comes full circle. And I'm so happy to ditch Microsoft Office for Google Apps. I set my kids up with Google Apps and I have no idea why schools don't make it their standard package as well because every home with a computer and an Internet connection has a copy of Google Docs -- which is free and requires zero maintenance!

Re: Verizon Donates Iconic $2 Million Painting ‘The Lineman’ to Norman Rockwell Museum

Wayne Schulz — Wed, 12 Mar 2008 18:15:04 -0000

Very cool story - we just took a trip to this museum last month. If anyone is close enough to drive there it's worth the trip. They have several original pictures on display. The building is all brand new and nicely laid out.

While we were there the ground floor level had an exhibit of every Norman Rockwell cover.

Re: Gizmodo on integrity…

Wayne Schulz — Tue, 15 Jan 2008 06:16:20 -0000

I unsubscribed from Gizmodo RSS when I read Brian's response. Stopped reading them. Same general response I've had when I run into creeps posting in online discussion forums.

I've learned ages ago that railing against online oddballs and pointing out their creepy ways only draws attention, defense and longevity to their craze.

Re: What made me cry: Microsoft’s World Wide Telescope

Wayne Schulz — Wed, 27 Feb 2008 18:51:40 -0000

Great, another product that won't run outside of Internet Explorer. I wonder what other Microsoft product will be required in order to run it.

Re: The Offline Wars about to heat up?

Wayne Schulz — Sun, 02 Mar 2008 20:42:28 -0000

Interesting read. I completely dumped Microsoft Exchange and Microsoft Office in favor of Google Apps for Domains.

I found I don't need most of the Microsoft firepower and the ability to work anywhere there's a web browser and without regard to unlocking software keyed to a specific hardware configuration -- is rather enjoyable.

Some of my friends tell me that Salesforce is really all about a "pricing model".

I disagree with that. I think Salesforce wins because it takes the messy synchronization and application maintenance out of the equation.

Oh, and since I tossed out Microsoft Exchange and Microsoft Office -- I've also switched to a MacBook Pro and iMac as my main machines.

Is there still Windows in my world? Sure. There has to be - it's just too damn pervasive.

But Windows will occupy less and less of my world each year.

And I think that's what terrifies Microsoft.

PS - Until and unless Microsoft gets off the "sell the stack" mentality - they are going to continue to lose market share. The only question is not "if" but "how fast".

Re: Plaxo is better than new Google Calendar sync

Wayne Schulz — Thu, 06 Mar 2008 06:59:52 -0000

I'll have to check out Plaxo but I'm not really sure I want to bet against Google.

I'm fairly comfortable that Google will fashion their own "Exchange Killer" within the next year.

Already I am syncing my Google Calendar and Email to my Blackberry with no Exchange (Google makes a calendar sync for Blackberry that works well). It's only a (short) matter of time before this suite of tools is rounded out with contact, notes and tasks sync as well.

Re: The TechMeme killer or the Google Reader killer?

Wayne Schulz — Tue, 18 Mar 2008 21:16:26 -0000

Techmeme jumped the shark when it spent three days spotlighting lacy underalls and mark whatshisname.....sheez - if there are two bigger bores in the world I don't think I need Techmeme to find them...

Re: Palm did what Nokia, RIM, and Microsoft couldn’t: build a better experience than Apple

Wayne Schulz — Sun, 11 Jan 2009 15:16:25 -0000

This has yet to ship yet. There were exactly zero point zero third party applications demoed.

You need to separate hysteria and hope from market reality.

Will this be a hit? We'll see when it ships.

Re: Why I haven’t posted for two weeks

Wayne Schulz — Fri, 06 Mar 2009 08:40:48 -0000

Ditto to what Jeff C say's. I don't get the whole Friendfeed "clubiness" and I think it's a big risk to align with a site that in my opinion isn't going anywhere having conversations with other bloggers.

Re: Does Palm Pre have a chance against iPhone? IMO: No, but it probably doesn’t matter

Wayne Schulz — Wed, 25 Mar 2009 04:54:51 -0000

Pre's OS isn't out yet. Almost nobody has even held the device.

On what basis can anyone claim Palm will do well (or not) without
Knowing how well Pre works?

The best indicator is Android. Success there had been way way
Below hype and expectations.

Don't think Palm will survive independent.

Re: Rumor: BlackBerry 9900 “Pluto”, 9220 “Magnum” launch at WES 2009?

Wayne Schulz — Wed, 24 Dec 2008 22:34:50 -0000

This is a cropped image of a "road map" that seems to be nothing more than a compilation of the various rumors from sites like BGR and Crackberry.

The original full image can be seen here. The bottom shows the source which clearly leads me to believe it's a rumor compilation.

http://www.alleyinsider.com/2008/12/whats-next-...

Re: Otter Box Prepares To Launch BlackBerry Storm Cases

Wayne Schulz — Mon, 19 Jan 2009 20:40:03 -0000

Agreed on OtterBox. I'm using their Impact series which are a bit thinner and more suitable for every day use. For me OtterBox is what I buy after Zagg screen protector. Both are a must.

Re: The BlackBerry business card

Wayne Schulz — Sun, 14 Jan 2007 12:24:40 -0000

PIN is a terrible contact medium since once you switch Blackberry's you have a brand new PIN. Could we see the government intervene and legislate PIN portability? kidding.

Re: Palm Foleo: The Entire D5 Demo With Walt Mossberg and Kara Swisher

Wayne Schulz — Wed, 05 Sep 2007 09:18:10 -0000

How did Jeff Hawkins keep a straight face?

I've never seen a product faced with more skepticism and laughter...

Here's what I *think* they wanted to announced:

- Foleo
- Loaded with Google Apps (or similar)
- Remote ability to store data

At the last minute I'm guessing the licensing fell apart but Palm didn't want to lose the chance to keep their name in front of users given the iPhone which was soon to be released.

So Palm made a risky bet that a little bit of FUD would buy them some breathing room.

Ultimately they weren't able to come up with anything to drive this contraption (that's the kindest word I can think to call it -- since FLOPEO seems like it would only fit after the device had actually been released).

My guess -- 6 months to a sale of Palm. Buyer is anyone's guess but I'm betting on RIM.

Re: Microsoft to Yahoo: Two Days to Respond or Else!

Wayne Schulz — Fri, 01 Feb 2008 15:46:32 -0000

I can't wait for Google to get in there and make a bid.

Talk about the "mother of all bidding wars"