Sometimes, you just gotta buy that toy. You know you don't really need it; you know that life as we know it will not come to an end without it, and you wish it was cheaper - but its just tough to be rational at times like these.
So, I broke down and bought it.
"It" is a Creative Labs Nomad II portable digital music player - the Sony Walkman of the 21st century. Digital music players are little palm-sized portable devices that store and play digital music - specifically MP3 files - usually through headphones. You can get lots of MP3 song files from the Internet, as I have previously discussed, or by copying (called ripping) from your current CD collection - all in CD quality sound. There are no tapes or CDs to insert - its all self contained.
The biggest differences between an MP3 player and a Walkman or portable CD player is that they are much smaller and since there are no moving parts, the music never skips when you bump the player. You load the music in from a cable on your PC (the newer players use a fast USB connection) and can change the playlist in the player any time it suits your mood.
The device comes complete with all the cables you need, headphones, and software. The memory in the Nomad can hold 1-2 hours of music, depending on the size of the files and the format. Prior generations of these devices did not have enough memory to hold more than 30 minutes of music; more memory and better compression techniques have improved things a lot.
Now my sessions at the rec. center, or my bike rides around the island, are so much more pleasant when in the company of George Winston or Spyro Gyra.
Just to keep you up to speed, the Nomad is really not the latest type of portable MP3 device on the market. Creative Labs (soon to be followed by all the major manufacturers) will also be offering these devices with build in hard drives that can hold thousands of songs, or with CD players that can also read MP3 format. But these will be larger and more expensive.
Now, y'all are probably wondering why I am wasting a column just talking about my toys. Well, there is a moral here - that big brother is still out there, and still wants your money. The big brother is Microsoft and the next battlefield for your money on the Internet is music distribution. In a prior column, I discussed the music sharing software Napster and how the big music interests are closing it down. Once they have shut down free music sharing, the next hurdle is to make money on Internet music distribution. Microsoft, Liquid Audio, and others are buckling on their swords.
But where Microsoft has the edge is this: One of the advanced features of the Nomad II is that it supports not only MP3 format, but other formats as well. Microsoft knew that MP3 was already an established standard and it would be playing catch-up in that format. So, they invented a new and better format for digital music, called Windows Media (WMA files). Windows Media supports not only music, but video as well. It can compress music files to 1/2 the size of MP3 files with the same audio quality - this means twice the number of songs in your Nomad.
This is typical Microsoft strategy. Not only do they invent their own format, they make it a de facto standard by technical excellence and by providing the software for free. Windows Media Player 7, available from their website, is an excellent package, and its free for the taking. So, MS has won the battle for space in my Nomad. Most of the songs I download into it now are WMA.
Watch this space: music and video media content in the future will be under the Microsoft banner, and your next album may have a MS label instead of Warner Bros. or Motown.
(Bob Seidel is a local computer consultant in the Southport / Oak Island area. You can visit his website at www.bobseidel.com or e-mail him at bsc@bobseidel.com).