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I have never used one, but one of those RCA Lyra may work. They have a composite video in and a recording mode. They record to MPEG-4, however, but you do get up to 80 hours of recorded video.

Use your current camera and hook the AV outputs into the Lyra. Its not DV, but that's what VirtualDub is for.

So, will there ever be an all in one multimedia/communications/organizing device? In spite of the fact that people will continue to try to make them, the features by their very nature are contradictory and will result in units that may be decent at some tasks but mediocre at best with others.

It's interesting that the Player supports Macs yet the required firmware update doesn't. Theoretically, for this product, you don't even need a computer because it can read the Compact Flash card you use with your digital camera. Well, I guess file rename, create folder, thumbnail views, zoom, rotate & pan aren't thing you'd really need or expect anyway... oh wait, the spec sheet sepecifically said "zoom and rotate"!

It's interesting that the Player supports Macs yet the required firmware update doesn't. Theoretically, for this product, you don't even need a computer because it can read the Compact Flash card you use with your digital camera. Well, I guess file rename, create folder, thumbnail views, zoom, rotate & pan aren't thing you'd really need or expect anyway... oh wait, the spec sheet sepecifically said "zoom and rotate"!

It's interesting that the Player supports Macs yet the required firmware update doesn't. Theoretically, for this product, you don't even need a computer because it can read the Compact Flash card you use with your digital camera. Well, I guess file rename, create folder, thumbnail views, zoom, rotate & pan aren't thing you'd really need or expect anyway... oh wait, the spec sheet sepecifically said "zoom and rotate"!

I've got an RCA RP3715A, that i think was no more than $20-$30cdn, but does most of what you're looking for. http://www.rca.com/product/viewdetail/0,2588,PI459 18,00.html.

- Has two different alarms that can be set, and will then go off at those times every day without having to be reset. (Music and what I like to call Insane-O-Wake)

- The "tone" (Insane-O-Wake) alarm starts quietly and gets progressively louder, and this thing is VERY LOUD, it wakes up both my roomates who are a few feet down the hall and on occasion think the alarm is in their room, if i'm i'm not there to turn it off (a downside to having it not need to be reset).

- It has the option of a 9v battery to keep time if the power goes off
- Large easy to hit snooze button, if you hold down the snooze button, the snooze duration increases..

It's great, I'd highly reccommend it. Although my roomates might not.

Cheers,

This is just silly. The only DAPs similar to these 'mini-iPods' are the Rio Nitrus @ US$219.99 SRP and the RCA Lyra RD2760 @ US$249.99 SRP.

So what we are to believe is that Apple is going to put out a 'mini-iPod' that has 3 times the capacity for less than half the price? Make sense: after all, Apple is known for putting out products that are all of sleek, stylish, well-made and cheap.

Wait, no, they aren't; we forgot the Apple Tax(tm)!

I can believe that possibly Apple is reading a 'mini-iPod', but if it's less than US$300 I'll be damned surprised.

I've been using Rhapsody for over a year. I love it.

First, you can do all the normal stuff you'd expect from an on-demand streaming service; make playlists of songs, add entire albums to your library, listen to pre-programmed channels, or create your own channels by selecting a list of artists, etc.

The sound quality is high and the connections reliable. It's not for dial-up users. You need broadband.

In addition to streaming the songs most can be burned to CD for 79 cents/each. I seldom use this feature. I use this gadget to get the audio from my PC to the stereo while streaming.

Here's what really makes Rhapsody valuable to me: The Rhapsody desktop app integrates the Muze database, the same database you'll find at music store kiosks for doing searches. With this you can do searches by artist, album, and song title. Also, for each artist you see similar artists, influencers, and followers, all hyperlinked together. I can spend hours just following links among artists, finding music new to me that I'm more likely to like.

Music is also categorized by genre, with a playlist of typical songs for the genre and a list of albums and artists considered important to the genre.

A small negative: I'd like to see the ability to search by genre and include boolean expressions in the search.

Price: $10/month ($8 if paid quarterly). Not bad.

Oops. RCA, too. (Not to whore; just being completionist...)

While I do believe he is correct, I think he may be off base with the PDA. This is one of the only devices that I would like to see be more "all in one". I'd personally like a Sony Ericsson p800 style PDA phone that had the screen from a Clie NZ90, GPS, iPod sized hard drive, megapixel camera, the VERY cool remote control center from Sony, 802.11g and Bluetooth + an Mp3 player and DIVX/MPEG4 decoder. While something like this would be in the high end (probably where the NZ90 is = $800 + $100 802.11 card) I still think it'd fly off the shelf, and possibly be subsidized by cell phone companies, at least in part with service agreements.

I still hope Apple is considering such a device or at least with most of the features listed here with a compact flash & SDIO slot.

I know there's a little link overload, just illustrating how easily this could be done right now!

All of this could be squeezed into a current form factor Sony Clie.

RCA LYRA RD2780

- 20GB HD
- 3,5" LCD
- 5.2 x 3.14 x 0.98 inches
- MP3, MP3PRO, WMA, MPEG4, JPEG
- USB 2.0 or flash card
- video in/out
- 15 hours battery time
- Available in summer 2003
- $399 in suggested retail price

Picture + specs

Preview:

Pressrelease from RCA

Pressrelease from thomson

pics

The design is of course not at nice as with ipod, but still quite nice compared to archos. The screen is by far better than the one on ipod and is larger than the one on archos. I would go for this gadget because of the big screen and the overall design.

...on why, perhaps, folks get slashdotted:

-rw-rw-r-- 1 jdf jdf 57197 Dec 17 10:12 original.html
-rw-rw-r-- 1 jdf jdf 10425 Dec 17 10:28 text.html

Yes, that's 47 kilobytes of javacript, headers, footers, CSS, and associated crap for about 10K of real info. Sure, there's also pictures and such, but this is basically 4x the original in overhead alone. Anyhow, here's the text from the site:

Pick a toy--any toy--for holiday gift-giving.

By Joan Lynch, Maura Butler, and Matt Miller -- EDN, 12/12/2002

Holy spokes, Bikeman!
Attach Hokey Spokes to your bike, and you'll have not only the coolest ride in the hood, but also the safest. Inventor and MIT graduate Dave Hoch wanted to take the terror out of night bike riding and designed the transparent "blades" to wirelessly communicate patterns or words with each other. You can put up to six blades on each wheel; a computer on each strip controls 16 LEDs in a variety of colors. Each blade costs $29.95 at www.hokeyspokes.com. Illumination Design Works, 1-617-924-4014.

Keyboard portability on a roll
Road warriors who prefer a full-sized keyboard with their laptops or PDAs will appreciate the Manhattan True-Touch Keyboard. When you're on the move, you can roll up the flexible, plastic unit and tuck it away. The keyboard features a QWERTY design and 104 raised keys that provide goodand quiettactile feedback, but using them will take some practice. Choose from PS/2 or USB connectivity. Units are dustproof and moistureproof and offer a lifetime of 15,000,000 keystrokes. Keyboards are available for around $27 from ThinkGeek, www.thinkgeek.com.

The "PC" PC
In an environmentally friendly move, NEC designed its PowerMate eco PC with 100% recyclable plastic and a 15-in. LCD flat-panel screen that contains no boron. The motherboard is made with lead-free solder, and the computer has no fan, which reduces the amount of dust dispersion for users with respiratory problems. The eco contains a 900-MHz Crusoe processor and a 20-Gbyte hard drive. And of course, it's Energy Star-compliant. The eco starts at $1599. NEC Corp, 1-800-338-9549, www.nec.com.

Free space
Combining a DVD player with a hard-disk-based PVR (personal video recorder), the Scenium Digital Media Recorder (DRS7000N) could be just the thing for overcrowded home-entertainment centers. The $599 unit features progressive-scan output for the clearest pictures and plays a variety of discs, including MP3 CDs and DVD+Rs/RWs. The PVR section handles the usual trick features, such as pausing live shows, and offers more than 30 hours of recording on its 40-Gbyte disk. Best of all, unlike PVRs such as TiVo, there's no fee for the EPG (electronic-program-guide) service. RCA/Thomson, 1-317-587-3000, www.rca.com.

The power of pictures
CyberLink's PowerProducer lets you produce your home movies and photos on DVD or CD for sharing with friends and family. If you're completely inexperienced, a step-by-step wizard-style program eases the way. It takes just three steps to import photo or video files from video-capture devices; you can then add special effects; adjust color; and trim, merge, and split video. The "QuickBurn" feature captures video from DV camcorders directly into DVDs in one click. Prices begin at $49.95. CyberLink USA, www.gocyberlink.com.

Mouse exterminator
Rid your desktop of mice with the iGesture Pad. The touchpad, which is just a bit smaller than a mouse pad, lets you use finger gestures to complete the same operations you would with a mouse. The $179 pad recognizes hundreds of hand gestures, including those that let you point, click, drag, and scroll. Twist your hand to open a file; spread your fingers to zoom. The USB-connected device is thin and small enough to travel and accepts commands from the right or left hand. Hmmm, wonder how it handles gestures you might make when your computer isn't behaving the way you'd like it to? FingerWorks, www.fingerworks.com.

Carry all
The multifunction Duex is an MP3/WMA player, voice recorder, and data-storage device in one portable package. Take off the bottom of the device to find a USB plug for attaching to the appropriate port on a computer. You can drag and drop music, image, video, and data files from the PC to the Duex and vice versa. The device features 128 Mbytes of memory for two hours of MP3 playback, four hours of WMA playback, and eight hours of voice playback; a backlit LCD shows song information in numerous languages. One AAA battery gives you more than 12 hours of music play. With a headphone/neckstrap, USB cable, software CD, manual, and one battery, the Duex mp302 costs $179. Innogear,
www.innogear.com.

Click it, stow it
The ultrasleek Pocket Digital is a handy, stylish way to capture favorite moments. The credit-card-sized digital camera captures and stores 52 high-resolution images at 1.3 megapixels. The lithium-polymer battery endures for hundreds of pictures and recharges through the USB connection. Image downloading is a snap. $129.95. Logitech, www.logitech.com.

The end of e-mail angst?
Neo (Nelson Email Organizer) might be just the ticket for reducing the stress associated with your daily barrage of e-mail. This add-on for Microsoft Outlook lets you work alongside or outside Outlook. Neo automatically sorts and prioritizes messages into intuitive folders. Searches are quick, and complicated filters are not necessary. The program deals with spam and bulk mailings and manages groups of messages by the type of attachments they contain (for example, all Excel files or Word documents together). Neo costs $39.95 for one copy; site licenses are also available. Caelo Software Inc, 1-250-354-5580, www.caelo.com.

Power protection
As more and more electronic equipment finds its way into more and more households, UPS devices could become commodity items for the average home owner. Six UPS models from Energizer will help protect home offices, home theaters, and PCs from power surges, spikes, brownouts, and outages. They automatically save open files, safely power down systems, and protect hardware when threatening power irregularities arise. Features include visual and audio warning indicators and USB connectivity. Prices range from $59.99 to $279.99. Eveready Battery Co, www.energizerups.com.

Surreptitious snapper
Fitting into the palm of your hand, the Mini Pen Cam 1.3 offers a still-image resolution of 1248960 pixels. Using its 16 Mbytes of flash memory, the device can store as many as 50 full-resolution pictures or 160 snapshots snapped at VGA resolution (640480). The $79.99 gadget also gives you the ability to shoot AVI-format movies, although their quality tops out at 624480 pixels and a choppy 10 frames/sec. In addition, the device, which runs on two AAA batteries, connects to a PC via USB to function as a Webcam. Aiptek, 1-949-585-9600, www.aiptek.com.

In touch, on the go
BlackBerry now lets you make and receive phone calls. The palm-sized BlackBerry 5810 wireless handheld device operates on GSM/GPRS networks to allow communication via wireless e-mail, SMS (short messaging service), or integrated GSM phone services, including call waiting, call answering, conference calling, and call forwarding. It comes with an earpiece and microphone for hands-free operation. You can even click on a telephone number inside an email message to place a call. The $499 device incorporates Java 2 Micro Edition. Research in Motion, www.blackberry.net.

Dude, you're gettin' a PDA
Like the PC before it, the PocketPC platform continues to attract more and more manufacturers. PC powerhouse Dell recently joined the fray with an aggressively priced model called the Axim X5. The device features a 3.5-in. transflective TFT with 240320-pixel resolution, as well as both CompactFlash and Secure Digital expansion slots. Two variants are available. The $299 model has a 400-MHz XScale processor, 64 Mbytes of SDRAM, and 48 Mbytes of flash ROM. A $199 configuration steps down to a 300-MHz processor and 32 Mbytes of each type of memory. Dell Computer, 1-800-999-3355, www.dell.com.

Risk averse
If you carry your office in a pocket-sized device, you're asking for trouble. What if you leave it on a plane or in a cab? The iPAQ h5450 tries to reduce the danger with integrated biometric security. A thermal fingerprint reader means only you can access your priceless data, and you can even add a layer of safety by combining the fingerprint sensor with a password. The $699 pocket-sized PC also includes a 400-MHz XScale processor, built-in IEEE 802.11b and Bluetooth capabilities, and an SDIO (Secure Digital Input Output) expansion slot. Hewlett-Packard, 1-650-857-1501, www.hp.com.

Bragging rights
The Zaurus SL-5600 gives the gadget geek ample reason to crow. It not only features a cool physical design with a hideaway keyboard, but also runs a version of Linux. The PDA boasts a 400-MHz Intel XScale processor, CompactFlash and Secure Digital expansion slots, 64 Mbytes of flash, 32 Mbytes of SDRAM, and a juicy 1700-mAhr battery. The device is slated to appear early next year, and pricing hasn't been announced yet, but its predecessor, the SL-5500, currently goes for $375. Sharp Electronics, 1-201-529-8200, www.sharpelectronics.com.

Stop graffiti
Thumb-pecked keyboards have become so popular on handheld devices that even Palm, the originator of the Graffiti handwriting-input system, now offers them. The $549 Tungsten W, slated for the first quarter of next year, features a tri-band GSM/GPRS radio and supports phone calls (via a headset), Web browsing, e-mail, and messaging. Powered by a 33-MHz Motorola Dragon-ball VZ processor, the PDA includes a Secure Digital expansion slot, Bluetooth, and a 320320-pixel color display. Palm, 1-408-503-7000, www.palm.com.

The morons are using a background containing solid black [lib.oh.us] when essential text on top of it is black.

Looks fine to me, but then I long ago decided that I knew my preferences better than any webmaster and forced my color scheme.

They use a number of different typefaces on pages, creating a non-uniform look, which slows down reading.

Same thing. Looks fine here.

The icons [lib.oh.us] are unintuitive or unclear. What does the icon for local history and genealogy represent? Looks like flying hot dogs to me.

I do agree, but I think that using icons on websites is just annoying anyway. I've never seen an icon at all that I think is a good idea. It's much easier to just have text links (unless you're catering to a non-English audience, perhaps, but this is a local US library). They have the text right next to each icon -- is it *that* hard to tell what's what on that page?

They link to pages that are under construction [lib.oh.us] without indicated that such is the case.

Uh..yeah? So?

From a technical standpoint (unless you have some layer of stuff that preprocesses your static pages), that's a *much* better system. If you update a page, you shouldn't track down every link to said page -- hell, they could be anywhere on the Internet.

I do agree that the fact that they used Tux on an FP site is a bit funny, but what's more likely is that the guy got all of the Tux stuff from a cheapo Web clipart collections (looking for "computer" stuff), and didn't have any idea what it meant. This isn't like the library blew zillions of dollars hiring techies...

They use ALL [lib.oh.us] CAPS [lib.oh.us] for a publication where emphasis can and should be marked in other ways.

The ALL CAPS bit is hardly that egregious. Yes, it's not the ideal mechanism, but the idea is to make a short bit of text clearly stand out and still be readable, which this successfully does. Sure, a professional publisher would get twitchy because it violates some "rules" that are reasonably-well grounded...but big deal. It does the job, which is what matters.

They use single line breaks [lib.oh.us] instead of paragraphs, which makes it very hard to read.

This is true.

It doesn't take Nostradamus to figure out that they will never keep static pages like this [lib.oh.us] updated, which will lead to large portions of the site being useless.

True enough. However, from what I can see, this is a library staff doing the work. This is not a company with a budget to hire a bunch of programmers and whatnot. I doubt anyone there has significant scripting knowledge. For the resources available, this is hardly awful.

I think the reason that I'm reluctant to criticize the site is that many sites that are considered "professional" do a far worse job than this one of holding to the spirit of HTML. They use Javascript for regular linking, they force pixel-level layout, they embed Flash bits all over. Going to this site reminded me of lots of mid-90s websites, when people still gave something of a shit about what HTML looks like. You've done a good job of finding issues with the website, and I suppose I'm a bit biased in favor of it. But even so, I wish more websites would look like this again, instead of some "professional" websites.

There's been some improvement. Designers have finally learned that websites should resize, that people don't all have Javascript/cookies/Flash on (and use fallbacks), that users are *not* going to change their resolution to view a website, that hierarchies are good, that images of text (instead of just text) are bad, that massive amounts of tables with tons of links are bad...when the initial move away from simple, HTML-2.0-ish sites started, I wasn't that thrilled, but it's started to come back around.

Som examples of sites that I really don't like (though they're considered "professional" and major sites):

ICQ. There's a lot of, uh, *stuff* on the main page. This "massive amounts of stuff on the main page" motif has survived multiple redesigns.

HotBot. Lots of stuff, ugly color scheme (which appeared after the Wired purchase of HotBot).

Sony. Nobody likes rollover menus.

RCA. Rollover menus from hell.

Kraft. Nonresizeable (and wide), rather bizarre news format (which also limits them to four news items).

BIC (Yeah, the guys that make pens). All the effort of rendering fonts into an image so that you can make a website look unreadable.

Kleenex. When I go here, I want to find out how much lotion is in a given tissue, not look at a bunch of Flash crap.

So here's why I like their website. It renders cleanly in older and text-based browsers. It's fast and small. No Javascript or pop-up menus are present. It doesn't tell you to change your resolution. It provides actual email links (i.e. you don't have to go through a form). It's fairly easy to find what you want, and the immediately useful information (library hours, telephone numbers) are right on the front page.

There are, as you've found, some issues. But I'd far rather read their website than any of the big, "professional", heavily-funded websites that I listed above.

Frankly, the only popular website that I really think has good design any more is Google, which has a team that's fanatically committed to a spartan, light interface. Everyone I talked to said that it looked out of date or old when everyone else was going bigger, flashier, and more bitmapped...and now, look who's on top. :-) People *like* simple, fast web pages, not big monstrosities.

It's true that the guy didn't say Flash, so I probably misread it. I just see the one website in a long time that gets back to the basics, and I see tons of people slamming it...it comes off wrong.

Lemme check out your own website...I'm guessing that we'd differ on some of the things you did as well.

You use frames -- I firmly feel that frames are a bad idea, and after a four year love-hate relationship (i.e. designers loved frames, viewers hated them), they pretty much went away. As such, you have to slap a "this webpage is better with browsers X, Y, and Z at the bottom of your page.

You complained about hard to read icons, yet your own site has a block of six quite unidentifiable icons. Sure, you can run the mouse over them to get the text, but then they partly cover up neighboring icons. So I pretty much end up moving the mouse over an icon, moving it away, moving it onto another one...repeat six times *just* to find out what the links on your site are.

You apparently did the ford.se site, according to your CV. This is Flash only.

You use Javascript for normal links

Your poetry page has a miniscule frame that makes it extremely difficult to read any text.

On the upsite, your site *is* accessable with older browsers, even if it's a little annoying to click through frame-related links.

Everyone has the elements that they find valuable in a website. I rather like theirs. :-)

You should try the REB1100 . I got one from OfficeMAX several months ago on clearance for $80. You can download the older eBook librarian software which allows you to create .reb files from HTML or text files.

What AOL has to consider is its 34million users turning round and saying "the latest version of AOL is broke", if it's not rendering IE specific content correctly.

Well, from my own standpoint of hating both Microsoft and AOL, but occasionally finding them both to be useful if only to check-and-balance the other and keep either of them from becoming a permanent monopoly, that's a win no matter which way it goes. If AOLers blame AOL for failing to render some sites correctly, maybe some of them will decide finally to drop that sucky service and get a real ISP. If, on the other hand, they blame the webmasters, that will push a few of them to start considering standards compliance a little more. (While most sites work fine for me in Mozilla now, a few still don't; I just tried RCA's site and found the menus overlayed into a horrible mess and the input forms don't work correctly, because of all the jumbled HTML and JavaScript with incorrect syntax.)

This device actually has a 10GB hard drive (not 20), as mentioned in the RCA press release here:
http://www.rca.com/content/viewdetail/1,2811,EI700 226-CI258,00.html

Mine claims 38mbps down and 10 mbps up. My mileage varies ever so slightly, however.

Yes, a few sets ARE shipping with built-in HD tuners/decoders. Here's one to start you off with.

Finally, wow! Has someone already transmitted a signal that a particular (functioning) HDTV decoder can't decode? No? Could it be because there IS a standard established for HDTV broadcasts (if you don't want the technical data, here is a FAQ from the FCC about DTV)?

Do YOUR homework, ace modded-up complainer.

I don't think *any* sets are shipping with built in HD tuners/decoders yet, . . .

There are some RCA ones.

Disclaimer: I work for Thomson, but this is not an official statement, blah blah, etc.

I'm looking for something in the $500 range and after some minor scrounging I came acrossthis RCA system(the RT2500). I know at the price I'm not going to get anything fantasic but does anyone know if this is a total peice of crap or an OK deal.

Privacy is something that concerns me with the Guide + feature of some RCA (and JVC) TVs. If you don't know what this feature does read here.
Basically it gives you a TV guide on your TV so you can see what's on now, and for the next three days, you can set it up to automatically watch shows at certain times, and set up to watch it weekly, daily, once, etc. After a little bit of setting up, every night it downloads the information for the next three days. What I want to know is if it is uploading as well. I can't find any info about it on their website. I would think that the information it could gather would be quite interesting to the TV networks.
It is an amazing feature that I could never live without now, I believe it will be a standard feature in HDTVs...but I'm not sure.

Mind you, GE and NBC are still part of that whole military-industrial-entertainment complex (GE is a major defense contractor).

-j