Saturday, July 22, 2006

Make way for DivaGeek!

I love my Lyra (MP3 player), but not being able to create a true playlist is getting to me. Or at least not being able to figure out if my Lyra will create a playlist yet. Well, it "creates" a playlist if I select the songs -- but I am not allowed to re-order them. That sucks!

Right now, as part of my fitness plan, I'm walking about 20 minutes on the treadmill (with a 5-minute cooldown) 3 times a week. I could really care less about the musical order of the first 20 minutes -- though I think I've actually found a great group IN order on my Lyra. But for that last 5 minutes, I have found that the perfect song for me is Boston's "Cool the Engines." And naturally, that songs falls smack dab in the middle of the 20-minute grouping I already have. Arrrrrgh. So it's either listen to it twice (which isn't a problem -- I love Boston), or skip it then go back.

It's my only complaint about the Lyra. Yeah, I know, if I wanted to go all DJ on it, I shoulda bought an iPod, right? Well, my PC is so ancient that it doesn't support i(Products) -- iPod, iTunes, iAm2cheap2buyanewPC....... That may change, too, but it will be a while. And when I do buy a new computer, I am seriously considering the Mac Mini. Teensy footprint (and God knows, I could use the space saving), big power. I am really, honestly, truly considering the Mac.

Actually, I've liked Macs since college. I worked as a computer lab student assistant, and in one of our locations, we had a Mac lab. One of my coworkers helped with it, because he had set up a Mac lab at his high school. Trey helped me learn to enjoy and loosen up around Macs. I felt at ease with PC's -- didn't entirely understand them, but could live with them. Macs were .... well, artsy and fun and how was I supposed to "learn" on them? But when I needed to scan a picture (yeah, WAY back in the days of a 256-grayscale flatbed scanner!), I had no choice but to use the Mac -- it was the only computer in the whole complex with a scanner attached. And the frat brother who did our chapter newsletter had started it on a Mac -- and wanted to leave it on a Mac. So I had to learn the hard way.

And I grew to like them a lot. Still didn't understand them, but liked them. I have loved and hated PC's for the better part of 20 years now, and I can be almost at one with them sometimes. Our brains think alike -- and sometimes short out alike too. Macs -- they're almost otherworldly. It's time for the Mac Mothership to come and claim me.

And when I get it, I can get an iPod and program things as I want them to be. Mooohooohooohahaha! (evil laugh)

1 comment:

Talmadge said...

Tal sez: why not consider one of the Creative MP3 players .... I love my Zen Vision:M 30GB! Three options for interfacing with your PC:
1) WMP, if you're just masochi--er, I mean, into that sort of thing. :-)
2) with the drivers installed, it'll drag and drop, and,
3) Creative Media Explorer - a not-too-shabby piece of software ... it rips and converts and synchs, but also allows you to create playlists and designate the order while the player is tethered. Even edits ID3 tag info right on the player without having to resynch (great if you've tagged one CDs' worth of tunes as "Rdo Stewart" - true story).

Only catch: it works with XP only. So if you're still running 98, disregard all this nonsense.

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