I’ve noticed lately that many of the people I talk to who work with computers have become a nostalgic lot. We’re all getting older. We speak fondly of our first Apple, lovingly recall reading our first issue of PC Magazine or PC Computing and chortle at the memory of attending some computer event where some now-bygone industry luminary was blind to his own company’s future downfall.

I’ve learned about a website for people like us: Old-Computers.com. You can read up on practically any ancient computer that ever existed and watch a 75-minute demo — perhaps the first ever recorded — given by Doug Engelbert and other researchers at Stanford in 1968 showing how computers could share information. (You’ll recognize such concepts as the mouse, hyperlink and email.)

Are you old enough to remember the Kaypro? I lugged one around in the mid-80s, thinking I was really cutting edge with my portable. (It had the heft of a sewing machine.)

Young people don’t talk about their first computer. The computing machines themselves are irrelevant. It’s all about the services they use. But you watch. Someday they’ll get that same  dreamy tone in their voices when they remember their first iPod or cellphone.

Mother’s Day is coming up soon, so I’ve been shopping for some digital picture frames to load and send out to the multiple moms in my family. Boy, are they pricey! Local stores are selling them for around $99 apiece. That’s too much for my budget, which hovers around $50 apiece. So I’m heading online to see if better deals can be found.

PriceGrabber says there are about 160 digital picture frame options listed in its database.

For example, there’s the miniature Axion 1.1-inch mini-digital picture frame that’s heart-shaped and comes in pink. No idea how many images the heart-shaped frame holds, because the description doesn’t tell. But I do know the resolution is 96×64 and that you need to load it from a PC, the way you’d load files onto a USB drive — by plugging it into a USB port. For $20, it’s a bargain, until you realize that the product name appears front and center, which kind of makes it look like something you’d pick up for free at a computer tradeshow. Sweetness rating: 1 heart.

Now, here’s an interesting addition to the offerings — an egg-shaped picture frame from Tricod. This also is about 1.1 inches in size, but it comes in a more tasteful silver — or blue, gray, pink or red. Since it has a tiny ring at the top, it can hang from a pendant or be used as a keychain. This one holds 56 images and includes software that will resize your photos automatically for you. It costs about $30. Sweetness rating: 3 hearts.

If you want to offer a wallet too, here’s a useful $40 item: The Women’s Digital Photo Wallet. The memory stores 55 color images, which show up on a screen that’s 1.4 inches on the diagonal (as are all the sizes I’ve referenced here). Also, the viewer is rechargeable, which means you don’t need to buy new batteries. The disadvantage of this offering, however, is that it’s wallet-based. Wallets are usually something you can pick out for a guy, in my experience (think Father’s Day), but not something most of my female friends and family members would cotton to. They have their special needs. Sweetness rating: 2 hearts.

For the more traditionally minded among us (and those of us who spend time trying to figure out appropriate Mother’s Day gifts could truly be called traditionally-minded), here’s a sub-$50 frame from Matsunichi (Mitsubishi’s less well known cousin). This is a 5.6-inch frame with 320×234 resolution. Here’s the tricky part to this frame though: You have to load your own memory card into the frame. It doesn’t have built-in memory. That’s great if you already have memory cards to hand over to the gift recipient. If you don’t have extra cards, that’ll be an extra expense (but it does allow you to supply a new card every year without having to worry about supplying a new frame too). Also, reviewers report that if you lose the documentation, you’ll never figure out how the frame operates because it’s not intuitive. On the other hand, they say the resolution is excellent for the price. Sweetness rating: 2 hearts (because for that price it only comes in black).

After a bit of pondering my options, I’m thinking the egg is my choice here. Why? It’s totally, weirdly appropriate for Mother’s Day, no?

The iPod Touch is all the rage, deservedly so, but there are other touchscreen Portable Media Players available.

Many have heard of the Archos 605, which was covered in the Blog posting “Internet Browser: $30“. Here are two other players which are well worth mentioning:

The first is the feature-packed Cowon D2. The Cowon D2 is a compact 3 by 2.2 by 0.6 inches with a 2.5 inch (diagonally) touchscreen. The touchscreen can be operated using an included triangular stylus or a finger. The player supports multiple audio file formats, as well as JPG photo display and video playback. It also has an FM radio along with voice, radio and line-in recording. The battery is rated for over 50 hours of audio playback and 10 hours of video playback. Firmware updates have added extra functionality including flash-based games and an optional flash based interface. There is also an SD Card slot which supports High-Capacity SD Cards.

The second is the Samsung YP-P2, which is closer to the iPod Touch in size, although about half an inch shorter and slimmer, but almost as thin, and sporting a 3 inch screen. Whereas the iPod Touch has Wi-Fi, the P2 has Bluetooth. This is where it gets interesting. The P2 can be paired with Bluetooth headphones or speakers. It also can be paired with a cellphone and the built-in microphone used to for a conversation (a non-hands free device?). The touch interface of the P2 supports finger tapping and swiping actions, although is not that precise according to several reviewers. The menu is customizable, and Samsung have released a number of firmware updates with new features. It supports a couple of common audio and video file formats. The P2 is currently available in 4GB and 8GB capacities, with a 16GB version having been announced. Unfortunately it does not have a memory expansion slot.

Both the Cowon D2 and the Samsung YP-P2 have excellent sound quality.

What do you get when you cross a SanDisk Sansa Clip with a SanDisk Sansa View?
The Sandisk Sansa Fuze.

This MP3 player, slightly bigger than the third generation iPod Nano, is squarely aimed as a competitor to the Nano and the 4GB and 8GB Zune. At 3.1 inches by 1.8 inches by 0.3 inches and weighing 2.1 oz it is a reasonably small player. It comes in a variety of colors and capacities: black (2GB, 4GB), blue, pink and red (4GB), and silver (8GB). Like most SanDisk Sansa media players it has a microSD expansion slot, which accepts High Capacity (microSDHC) cards. This means that currently an additional 12GB can be added to the player. A variety of audio formats are supported, including MP3, WMA, WAV and Audible. Subscription music is also supported via secure WMA. The Sansa Fuze also features an FM radio, voice recording, picture viewing and video playback. Its screen is only 1.9 inches diagonally and has a resolution of 220 by 176 pixels, so is not that great for watching videos.

Reviewers are almost unanimous in pointing out that SanDisk’s media players are steadily improving in build quality, and the Fuze is no exception. At around $100 for the 4GB version and $130 for the 8GB version, the Sansa Fuze is very competitively priced. I would definitely add it to my collection if I did not already have a too many media players.

This week is spring break, which means one thing around my household: Road trip! Time to visit friends and family — anything to prevent this adult from imposing permanent damage on the family heir in a fit of parental insanity.

That includes time with my mom, who surprised me recently when she told me on the phone that she has wireless now. How did that transpire? “It was included with TiVo,” she told me. That’s right. TiVo sells a device — the TiVo AG0100 Wireless USB Network Adapter – that lets users connect their digital video recorder with their 802.11g or b wireless home network. I’m no TiVo user. What do I know? (Apparently, she didn’t know about it either until my brilliant brother – who always thinks up the greatest gifts — got a unit and installed it for her.)

My mom loves TiVo. She has two of the machines in her home, one on the big screen in her living room; the other in one of the guest rooms where she does a lot of hanging out and watching recorded shows from HDTV.

And now she can transfer shows from one to the other TV and surf at the same time while she kicks back in her giant black-leather massage chair.

Reviewers on PriceGrabber report how, although it costs a bit more than other options, they’re quite happy with how easy it is to install and how quickly shows transfer from one machine to another or from their TiVos to their desktops.

I may not watch much TV, but I am a great sucker-upper of wireless broadband. What this means is, I’ll have no excuse not to bring my notebook computer with me when we go to visit. Wonder if that chair is available.

SanDisk is known for making relatively cheap MP3 Players which offer good value. Their players usually have decent sound quality, but are not known for excellent sound quality.

Until know that is. Reviewers are raving about the sound quality of the SanDisk Sansa Clip. On anythingbutipod the Sansa Clip review by Grahm Skee notes: “Sansas have not been known for good sound quality. However, over the last few new releases they have been getting progressively better with the Clip being the best sounding Sansa to date- even treading onto audiophile territory”.
Some of this audio quality is possibly due to a chip, specifically the SOC (system on chip), which ABI were looking for when they disassembled the Sansa Clip.

The SanDisk Sansa Clip is an ultra compact MP3 player. At 2.2 inches by 1.4 inches by 0.5 inch (56 by 36 by 13mm) without the removable belt clip, the Sansa Clip is bigger than the iPod Shuffle. It has a small rectangular, 1-inch (25mm) screen, and is available in 1, 2 and 4GB capacities. The 2GB version is available in a selection of colors: red, pink, and blue. Both the 1GB and 2GB version are also available in black, and the newer 4GB version in silver only. This small player features a built-in microphone for voice recordings (in WAV format), an FM tuner, recording from FM and Rhapsody support. It supports MP3, protected and unprotected WMA, and Audible files. With such a small screen, photo and video are not supported.

Sometime ago I mentioned the Creative Zen V Plus (see Get them while you can) as a previous generation good MP3 player at a decent price.

Another “good deal” is the popular but underrated SanDisk Sansa e200 series of MP3 Players. SanDisk media players are usually quite competitively priced, and this one can be found at bargain prices. SanDisk also still sells it from their website. The Sansa View, possibly intended as a replacement, is larger and heavier than the Sansa e200 series.

The e200 series is available in capacities from 2GB to 8GB. The rather confusing model numbers indicate the capacity: e250 is 2GB, e260 is 4GB, e270 is 6GB and the e280 is 8GB. The Sansa e280 was the first 8GB flash player available. The best values are probably for the 4GB and higher models. The e200s have microSD expansion card slots, so they can be expanded by up to 2GB. It is about the size of the second generation iPod Nano, but thicker. It is small enough to fit easily into just about any pocket.

One thing I like about this player is that it supports MSC (Mass Storage Class) and well as MTP (Media Transfer Protocol – Windows Only) USB modes. MTP mode requires using Windows Media Player or the Rhapsody software, but in MSC mode the player appears as a drive on your computer and you can just copy music files to it. This also means that it can be used with Mac and Linux PCs. The player has an FM Radio, which you can record from, voice recording and video playback – although at only 15 fps. All videos have to be converted by the SanDisk Media Converter to play on the 1.8 inch, 220 by 176 pixel resolution screen.

This is one of the few MP3 Players available today which has a user-replaceable battery. Instead of having to crack open the player and void the warranty, there are 4 screws on the back to remove the back plate and reveal the battery compartment.

Of course one of the advantages of buying a player like this over two years after it has been released is that most of the bugs have been ironed out with firmware updates.

Acronyms aren’t exclusive to technology, but technology seems to generate them at an alarming rate.

One of the first acronyms I was exposed to in my IT (Information Technology) career was COBOL - COmmon Business Orientated Language. It didn’t take long for me to get bored with programming in COBOL. Many years and a few programming languages later, I could still pick up the language again in a couple of days, it is one of those things you can’t forget, no matter how much you try. Little did I know then that I would eventually be developing in Visual Basic - BASIC being an acronym for Beginner’s All-purpose Symbolic Instruction Code, which explains why many BASIC compilers are named with the word BASIC in Capitals, for example BCX BASIC, QuickBASIC and PowerBASIC.

The latest version of Visual Basic is included in Microsoft Visual Studio 2008 Standard.

Another industry which seems to generate acronyms is the mobile phone industry. The mobile phone technology which the Apple iPhone uses is GSM, which stands for Global System for Mobile communications. There are about 2 billion GSM mobile subscribers worldwide. GSM phones use SIM (Subscriber Identity Module) cards. The other mobile phone technology with a large base in the United States, CDMA (Code Division Multiple Access), makes use of an ESN (Electronic Serial Number) instead of a SIM Card. CDMA has over 400 million mobile subscribers worldwide.

This is just the tip of the iceberg when it comes to acronyms in programming and mobile phones.

If you do a search for “MP4 Player” on Pricegrabber.com, the search results return the iPod Touch, the iPod Classic, the Zune second generation, and many other devices we would call MP3 players. This is not a mistake, as searches for “MP4 player” on other sites turn up the same thing. So what gives?

Based on an article entitled “Chinese MP4 player” in Wikipedia, and research on some other websites, there seem to be two definitions of MP4 Player:

The first, the broader definition referred to above, refers to an MP4 Player as the successor to the MP3 Player. The MP4 comes from the capability of these players to play MPEG-4 video. In addition to playing videos, MP4 players may have extra features such as video games, FM radio, voice recording and even video recording. These devices are also more commonly known as Personal Video Players (PVP), Portable Media Players (PMP) or Digital Media Player (DMP).

The second definition refers to Portable Media Players made in China. The Dane-Elec Meizu 8GB Portable Media Player is a good example of an MP4 Player. Other (not so good) examples are the numerous cheap knockoffs of iPods made in China, and referred to as “MP4 Players”.

Frankly, I prefer the term Portable Media Player, simply because it is descriptive, and does not include a number which can (and will) be incremented. Yes, there are already “MP5 Players” and “MP6 Players“, and the occasional “MP7 player“. I gave up Googling these after finding the MP7 Player…

Earlier this year I wrote about the Sandisk Sansa Connect in “Wireless Music” . I must admit to being quite tempted to get one of these little MP3 Players, especially after reading that the firmware had been updated and video playback capability had been added – the 2.2 inch 320 x 240 resolution screen is definitely good enough for video. Video playback support as well as subscription music from Yahoo Music on a high-quality device with a microSD slot which supports both microSD (up to 2GB) and microSDHC (4GB and higher) cards is a good deal.

Then I read that Yahoo was selling it’s music subscription service to Rhapsody, and that the wireless features of the device (with the exception of the LaunchCast internet radio) would probably no longer be supported from July 2008. That could explain some of the good price breaks on the Sansa Connect. If this happens it would be just another media player.

The Sansa Connect did however win the Best of CES award in the MP3 player category in 2007 when it was announced, so this is still a good media player. If you are deciding whether or not to buy this media player, then the possible loss of the ability to update subscription music wirelessly with the Yahoo Music To Go service should be taken into consideration and also determine the amount you would be prepared to pay for a disconnected Sansa Connect.