As this week’s column goes live I am probably on my way to Kevin’s wedding near Philly. It’s a whiz-bang trip of just a couple days that will not give me much time to get work done but I’ll detail here what I’m taking with me just in case. I’ve spent some additional time with the T-Mobile G1 since the firmware was updated and I’ll share that with you. It’s the time of year I think about pruning my gadget tree to make room for the new year coming up and this week I spent way too much time reading a great ebook I’ll tell you about. Pour yourself a cup of coffee and take a load off for a bit.
Philly here I come
Kevin’s wedding is finally upon us and I’m probably 35,000 feet up in the air heading that way as this goes live. I’m really looking forward to this trip even though it’s just in on Friday and out Sunday morning but it will be very cool to see Kevin tie the knot. We’re both getting asked if it’s going to be live-blogged but let’s give Kev and Barb some privacy here. Who knows if at least one photo will appear from the festivities. :) I can’t wait to see Kevin in a tuxedo like a penguin.
I don’t expect to get much work done on this trip, after all it falls on the weekend and everyone deserves those off, right? I am always trying to be prepared though and this trip I’m bringing the MacBook and my Verizon USB modem for 3G connectivity. That’s pretty much it. This will be my first trip with the new MacBook and I’m going to give it a test to see how well it travels. I did pick up that second battery so the 8-10 hours I’m seeing from that will be plenty no matter what. We’ll see how it goes and I’ll let you know.
I am going to take a new gadget that just showed up yesterday. It’s embargoed right now so I can’t say anything about it yet but will be able to soon. It’s pretty cool and very appropriate for this type of trip and I should get some quality time with it to share.
It’s just the Android
I haven’t shared my first impressions of the T-Mobile G1 Android phone yet as I was waiting for the firmware/ OS update to appear. It made sense to hold off until that arrived since it might change things so that’s what I waited for. It finally showed up on Wednesday of this week via a brief notification on the phone that it was available. I clicked Install and that’s what it did for about five minutes. It was painless and required no intervention on my part and I’m impressed with T-Mobile for how well the process went. I’m not sure exactly what the update affected although the phone is definitely snappier than before. It wasn’t slow before but it’s noticeably faster now.
I’ll be doing a real posting of my first impressions soon but I can tell you now that if you’re already using all the standard Google Apps then you’ll love the tight integration with the G1. GMail and Google Calendar work very well on the phone and I enjoy using them with the G1. I am also happy with the performance of the T-Mobile 3G network in Houston as it seems pretty snappy almost everywhere I go.
Pruning the gadget tree
It’s approaching the time of year when I consider getting rid of the gadgets that I don’t use much. There are always so many notebooks, phones and the like that I reach a point I can’t even turn around in my office. This is necessary to make room for any cool new gadgets that show up here. This year I am thinking of parting with two gadgets that I previously would never have considered losing.
The first is my real workhorse desktop replacement, the 17-inch MacBook Pro. It really surprised me when it first occurred to me that I could part with it as it’s been the computer always in use at my desk for well over a year. The only reason I can even think about doing this is the new MacBook I bought recently. It’s more portable and with its better processor, GPU and front-side bus it is just plain faster than the older Pro. Not that the Pro is slow, far from it and the only way I could get rid of it would be by adding a larger external screen for use at my desk. The new 24-inch Cinema Display from Apple would be perfect and would allow me to use the same computer at the desk that I carry with me while mobile. One computer is easier to keep synced than two, that’s for sure. I haven’t decided about this yet but am seriously considering it.
The other notebook I’m thinking of divesting is the HP 2710p. I am having serious trouble reconciling doing this though as it’s been such an integral part of my work life for so long. It’s still an extremely capable notebook and a stellar Tablet PC but it kills me to see it sitting in its dock on my side table not being used much. I take it out from time to time but it’s no longer my main mobile device so most of the time it’s just sitting there charging. This decision is especially hard because it’s the only Tablet PC I own currently. The fact is I don’t use the note-taking ability of it in my work anymore so I mainly use the Tablet mode for sitting around surfing the web and that’s not a compelling reason to keep it as I don’t do that much anymore. I would have to bring myself to the point I could do get rid of it however and I’m not there yet.
New programs I like
This week I picked up a couple of free programs to give a shot, one that is new and the other that is old. Gimp has been an image editor that many have been swearing by for a long time but I admit I have never tried it. I find myself needing to edit images more frequently these days to I decided to give it a shot. It’s free after all, right? I installed it on the MacBook and I’m pretty impressed with it so far, although it’s overwhelming at first. It’s staggering to consider how much capability has been crammed into a free program like Gimp. It runs under the X11 windowing system but the OS X installer handles that for you with no problem. It’s going to be a long time before I’m comfortable with Gimp to use it routinely.
The other program I grabbed is brand new for the iPhone and it makes handling my To-Do list much easier and better. I have mentioned my fondness for Remember The Milk in a past column and it’s still my task manager of choice. The only thing I felt the RTM process was missing was a native iPhone app to make working with my data better. That was released this week and I jumped on it quick as it’s a free download. Now it does require a RTM Pro account which I already had ($25/ year I think) but otherwise it’s free. I am loving this program on the iPhone and the ability to quickly jump in and see my tasks I need to be thinking about and to add new ones as needed. I’m very impressed with the RTM folks and how they are continuing to improve their offering. It makes me feel good for my choice of RTM.
eBook of the week
This week I ripped through one of the finest page-turners I’ve read in a while. Shadow Man by Cody McFadyen starts the series with FBI agent Smoky Barrett and it is so full of twists and turns that it kept me tapping the page-turning button constantly. It’s a great start to what looks to be a wonderful series and I can’t wait to start the next book.
Wrap-up
This concludes the peek into my week at Mobile Tech Manor and I enjoyed your visit. There is always something happening here so stop by next week if you can.
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