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July 02, 2003

Comments

Ben

See in as you've gone and got gadgeted up, why not use your iPod in the car with this.

Marc Canter

The true nerd in you comes out.

:-)

Is the quality of the Danger's camera any better on the color model? That and their sdk/developer's policy are deal breakers - for me.

Pierre Omidyar

Ben, looks like your link didn't make it into the comment -- I'm using a standard tape deck adapter for my iPod in my car. I've heard you can also get some car radios with an accessible input jack, something I'll have to do in the future. Sure would be cool to have a dock or something for the iPod in the car.

Marc, the picture quality on the color sidekick is really great, seems like much higher resolution than the gray version, but that's probably because the extra color information makes images more readable. As far as I know the camera is the same -- I've heard they're working on a higher-rez camera, but haven't seen it yet.

Danger's SDK is openly available, I thought, but there is no approved way of getting the software you write on anyone's machine, other than hooking it up to a developer's kit. Obviously kills any desire to develop third party apps.

I don't know for sure, but I suspect this is a carrier (T-Mobile) problem -- they're afraid of customers installing software that kills their phone, and dealing with the associated customer support costs as well as replacement costs.

Danger has to get them to get over this to be a viable platform. Certainly other carriers using Palm OS have gotten over it, so it's possible.

Doug Kenline

Thank you for blogging for us Pierre! I love the Segway update!

Update: I had my first fall off the machine today, and skinned my elbow. I was doing something incredibly stupid, trying to climb a hill of loose gravel. Sheesh. Pretty stupid, thank you.

shawn

What is the battery life on the segway?

Pierre Omidyar

It's got a range of 10 to 15 miles on a full 4-hour charge. Less if the rider is really heavy or if you go up a lot of hills. If you ride it correctly downhill, at about 2/3 speed, it recharges the batteries. You can actually see the battery meter go back up.

The batteries are NiMH, so they have a limited life span of about 300 to 500 recharge cycles. They are expensive. Towards the end of their life cycles they don't hold as much charge. I have heard rumors that the company is working on Lithium Ion batteries, which would be logical, but also much more expensive. But in the long run probably more economical, since they could have a much longer life span.

Andrea

Pierre writes:
"Whenever I glide uphill on a sidewalk, I can't help but think about how I would have struggled on a bike"
Hey, that is the beauty of the bike: sometimes you struggle and sometimes you glide!

Thomas

Pierre, I have an iPod too, and I love using it my car via the cassette adaptor. Problem is: my wife's car doesn't have a cassette player, just CD. How to listen to the iPod via her car stereo?

A friend recently referred me to www.rcainput.com. They sell RCA hookups that allow you to connect your iPod (via the headphone output) into RCA jacks in the back of the car's head unit. Depending on what kind of car you're driving, an adapter costs under a hundred bucks (currently runs $79.95 for VW models) and is fairly easy to install.

I can't yet vouch for having installed an RCA input in my wife's car yet, as she hasn't given me clearance to augment her car's stereo, but I'm ready just as soon as she says "yes, you can."

Hope you're still loving your iPod.

Ben

Several months late, but here's the link for connection of iPod to car radio!

http://www.griffintechnology.com/products/itrip/index.html

Ed

Did you see the article on CNN today about the Pez museum? ;-)

http://www.cnn.com/2003/TRAVEL/10/13/offbeat.pez.museum.ap/index.html

Cheers!

Ed

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