New Toys

So, got all kinds of good stuff for Christmas this year, but one thing I didn’t get (and sorely needed) was a new iPod. I’ve had an iPod Mini for a few years now and, while it’s served me well, the battery is nearly dead. It’s to the point where I leave the car after having it on the charger, walk the dog around the block (in the cold), and try to turn it on inside only to have it tell me there’s no battery life left. Apple charges something like $100 to replace the battery in an old iPod, so a new one only made sense…

With money from Christmas (thanks, everyone!), I offset the purchase of a 4 GB iPod Nano (4th Gen), and it’s a glorious machine. One of the neater things I’m doing with it, as it has a full-color screen now, is downloading video podcasts to waste my “valuable” time with.

Problem was…I had a Griffin iTrip FM Transmitter so I could listen in the car. The thing worked pretty well, for the most part, and transmitted at 87.9 FM, which is almost never used anywhere (i.e. no interference, so relatively clear signal). Well, that iTrip doesn’t work with the new Nanos, so I needed a replacement. Wally World had one for $20, so I grabbed that. Belkin, the company that makes it, even has a website set up to give you an idea as to which stations in your area should be available for use with their transmitter. However, Belkin’s transmitters only go down to 88.1…sooooo, of the four stations they suggested, none of them worked well at all. I even went back and grabbed another Belkin for $30…perhaps it was a better model or something. Yeah, also crap. Didn’t work. Nada. I went to Walmart.com to look around and the user ratings for those two transmitters were both 1 star out of 5…so…not so good…

Anyway, went to Best Buy today for a THIRD transmitter. I grabbed this one, a DLO TransDock Micro FM transmitter. It was on sale, thankfully, but cost considerably more than the Belkins from Wal-mart…and, I guess you get what you pay for, ’cause it works like a charm. It searches for the best channel wherever you are and produces a signal I can actually pick up with the car.

Long story short, I’m back to iPod functionality, which is beautiful. All kinds of happy now 🙂

On another, unrelated note, I’ve essentially taken this week off of work, catching up on games and movies that I got for Christmas. Total, I got 10 movies (8 DVD, 2 BluRay), so it’ll take me awhile to get through them all. Got some clothes, some money, some candy…etc., etc., etc.

The best present, however, is my Bluetooth mouse (kinda like that one, but not quite)…thanks, Dad (you too, Mom, but I know Dad picked it out, so he gets the most thanks… :-P).