Slashdot Mirror
Next Generation of MP3 Glasses
Doggie Fizzle writes "A review of the Nu Tech Dark Shadow 256MB MP3 Sunglasses shows one of the latest attempts to multitask common items, whether we want it or not. The Oakley Thumps may have come first, but at 3x the cost of Nu Tech Dark Shadows, even frugal geeks can look smooth... From the review: "I am a sucker for any tool or gadget that tries to combine more than one use or function into a single item, but I also have learned from experience that many times such items fail to perform well at any of the tasks they were designed to do.""
This is an interesting item but it is so 1990. The review's comment of "I am a sucker for any tool or gadget that tries to combine more than one use or function into a single item" is exactly why we don't need so many all-in-one items, but instead, mininetworked items.
Why is Bluetooth such a relative failure? My PDA has bluetooth and I use it ALL the time. The problem is that I don't see very many viable, workable, user friendly bluetooth devices.
If I want an MP3 player, what I'd really want is a portable deposit/store/memory bank (SD card is fine), a very tiny MP3 player and a bluetooth set of headphones. I can't find anything of the sort that WORKS.
My bluetooth headset for my phone has TERRIBLE sound quality. The bandwidth for bluetooth should allow for a decent sound in stereo, but the mono headset is just crap. Can anyone recommend a good stereo set of bluetooth headphones that work?
I believe the future of portable music will probably not be the MP3 player, especially as network availability becomes more pronounced. I use Shoutcast on my PDA phone to stream my entire MP3 collection from home as I want to. GPRS at 33.6K is fairly crap quality, but when I am in range of a public WiFi router (my phone has WiFi as well) I can get pretty awesome quality streaming. Nowadays I am near a public WiFi router probably 15% of the time, compared to 5% last year.
Will we even NEED storage or a large bulky scratchable iPod when we can stream terabytes of music in a few years?
Sorry I don't share your enthusiasm, but I don't think you will look smoother, only geekier. I am geeky enough and I don't want to wear it on my face. Besides, the audio actually sucks....what, I had to try it on...common gimme a break!