bits and bites (or, meli-melo)

Posted on March 10th, 2003 in my ramblings.

I wrote this up as part of a discussion from boingboing, but I should post it here. These are the gadgets I carry around regularly.

On the belt, a Motorola V101. Sure, it’s ugly as sin, bulky as hell, and sucks for actual voice calls. But it has a screen that you can actually read some text on and it’s beautiful for sending SMSes and using the ICQMobile integration just kicks ass. I think this phone is only available in Canada.

In my bag:

  • Apple Newton MessagePad 2100. Still the most usable PDA ever created. I organize my life and my work tasks on this puppy, and wouldn’t change that for the world. Of course, I’m a little biased since I happen to also run a very large Newton mailing list… This is actually kept in a BurroPak padded sleeve inside the bag. If you were a Newton user and you remember the BurroPak from Landware, you get a gold star.
  • Game Boy Advance with a 128 megabit flash cartridge. Real games on the go, and even Classic Nintendo games to boot.
  • AVC Soul Player CD/MP3 player. Coupled with some Sony MDR-V150 headphones. I don’t need an iPod; CDRs are still cheap. If I scratch one, I just re-burn it from my hard disk at home.
  • Canon PowerShot S230 camera. Man, I love this camera. It’s tiny, it’s 3.1MP, it uses CompactFlash, it shoots movie clips with sound, it has great low-light performance, and digital zoom that actually looks good. It has a Lexar 128MB CF card in it.
  • AComData USB CompactFlash reader. It’s also nice and small. It’s mostly for using a 16MB CF card that I use to ferry files back and forth from work without exposing data to the wilds of the net. Also for showing photos from the camera on any PC, of course. For $20 minus $20 rebate, I wish I had bought two.
  • Leatherman PST II multitool. For everything from a quick nail file to cutting wire. Also has a decent phillips-head screwdriver and three sizes of slot drivers, well suited for the inside of a PC case.
  • Sanford PhD Multi. Stylus, Pen, Pencil, and only $15.
 

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One reply

  1. Jonathan Wise says:

    Added on March 10th, 2003 at 9:56 pm

    I love Newton too, and I’m getting a GBA SP as soon as I start taking the bus. I have a Minidisc player that kicks ass, and looks cool too, so I’ll pass on the iPod as well. No digicam yet, but I do like the Canon.
    On my belt is a StarTac — crappy but small and elegant.

    And as much as I love my toys I’d trade them all in for a single device that does all that. If someone would just invent the bloody thing (Apple!!) I would sell my PC to get one. The technology is there, but there doesn’t appear to be anyone with the vision and experience to put it all together (Apple + Sega + Motorola == super cool, does everything machine!!)