There are two drawers at home that are clogged with the technical detritus of my life. Misfit electronic toys that are dead, forgotten, and expensive reminders of the insanity that compels me to squander my cash on the latest, smallest, coolest gizmo. Aside from the usual morass of cell phone chargers, docks, spare batteries, and gordian knot of firewire, USB, ethernet, crossover, printer, and optical cables, those drawers contain such relics as the first Logitech digital camera, which had an appalling resolution on the order of an old newspaper photo, at least three Palm Pilots, an HP Portable PC, weird TV graphic convertors, WebTV wireless keyboards, old Sony video camera (analog), and power blocks that have lost their way.
What’s in my pocket these days?
Well, there’s the Treo 650 — which isn’t as good as the Treo 600, but I killed that by profusely sweating into the ear speaker after taking a phone call during a bike ride during a July Heat Wave. Trying to sync the thing with Lotus Notes …. well, let’s just say doing anything with Lotus Notes involved is like trying to put cosmetics on a bad skin disease.
In the audio department, I’ve been playing around with an iRiver 799 for podcast recording. That just went to the crew here at CXO so they can have a device for remote recording. My Sony headphones, my two digital sony microphones, and my Sony minidisc recorder have all been donated to the cause. Then there is the Sony voice recorder which I never use and which, like most Sony products, has its own insanely incompatible memory stick with its very own usb dock for importing into the proprietary Sony voice management software. File that one under: "What was I thinking."
I’ve been listening to podcasts on an iPod mini — nice thing, but earlier this week I once again felt the power of gadgets compel me to piss away $250 on a black Nano, spending $11 for Apple to rush the thing to me to assuage my jones, but alas, the store says the order is still being "processed" which is a leading indicator that it will be backordered until Halloween.
Other than that, my life is remarkably gadget free.