As you will soon find out, I conduct periodic reviews on software and gadgets that I acquire. As I am low on cash, resources, and influence, this is not very often. Recently, however, T-Mobile bought out SunCom, and I was due for a phone upgrade. Naturally, I wanted the HTC Dream, or G1, with Android, but I neither have $200 spare dollars, nor do I think the G1 is quite ready.

So I got the Samsung t819.  I have never owned a Samsung phone, but I have heard relatively good things about them.  This phone is a “slider” phone with a 1.3 mega pixel camera, 30MB internal memory, and exansion for a micro-SD card.

If I had paid money for this phone, I would almost certainly be more harsh in my reviews.  However, I got it for free, and so I can’t say that I am altogether dissapointed.  In fact, the phone has been quite good, despite a few odd features and non-features.

Here is an example of a picture taken with the phone’s camera.

What I Like:

• Micro-SD Expansion – I bought a 2GB Micro-SD card for the phone, which gives me ample room for pictures, music, and videos.
• Large display – the display is 176 x 220 pixels, and the colors look great.  Compared to other phones I have had (Motorola Razr V3, Motorola L2, Nokia 6030, Palm Treo), I would say that this phone is perhaps the best in direct sunlight.
• Small size – When closed, the phone is only about 3″ x 1.5″, only a little bigger than a closed Razr.
• 1.3 MegaPixel camera – This camera is different than many slider phone cameras because it is located on the back of the bottom layer of the phone, which means that you can take pictures without opening the phone.
• Music Player – The mp3 player on the phone is very nice, with visual effects, good playback, etc.

What I Don’t Like:

• Samsung menu – The menu on this phone is not customizable by way of colors or order of appearance.  The phone does not try to show off the great display, as the menu colors are all dark greys and blacks, with the exception of the pink highlighted items.  The pink is also mandatory and cannot be changed.
• Phone Memory – The phone’s internal memory is a generous 30MB, but you are limited in what you can do with it.  For example, I am a big text messager, and I generally send/receive more than 50 texts per day.  With the t819, they store automatically to your SIM card, and there is no way to change this.  After the 30 messages, the “full” icon appears, even though you can keep receiving and storing to the phone.  After 200 texts, however, the phone memory is also full.  To me, this doesn’t make sense.  I bought a 2GB memory card so that I could store texts.  However, the phone does not allow this, nor does it have an auto cleanup funtion.
• Call quality – Ok at best, but most calls sound muffled.

All in all, I am still satisfied with the phone.  I will update this post if I have any major problems later on.

Ok, so I wanted to incorporate this information in the website (and hopefully I still will), but I thought I’d just go ahead and blog about it in the meantime.

Essentially, this is a list of things that I use on my site and server, things that I find nifty, visually appealing, or just plain cool.

Web Site Stuff

• Godaddy – Let’s just say it – I LOVE GODADDY!  I use them to purchase all my domain names, hosting, email plans, etc.  They have fantastic customer support (and I should know, seeing how much I call them), great prices, and who doesn’t like Bob Parsons?  Well, actually, a lot of people don’t, but we don’t talk about them.

• Linux Host – Yes, I have Linux hosting through Godaddy.  If you aren’t a Linux junkie, there’s really only one difference – you have to watch your capitilization.  With Linux servers, “atree.png” and “atree.PNG” are NOT the same thing.  Other than that, Linux allows you to run more things…plus, you can call yourself a geek.

• Apache Server – I’m actually not this technical, but I can tell you that I run on an Apache server, and Apache is the most popular software for servers out there.

• MySQL – I have MySQL databases on all my sites.  It allows me to run my forums, blog, etc.  The databases are easily backed up, accessed, and modified.

• WordPress – WordPress is absolutely amazing.  I use WP as a CMS now instead of strictly for blogging purposes, though I use it for that as well.  WordPress is unbelievably customizable, user-friendly, plug-in supported, and FREE!

My Computer

• HP Pavilion dv6000 – I recently purchased an HP laptop for school, and I am extemely satisfied.  I was able to get it for well under $700, and it has 3G RAM, 160HD, a 2.0GHz AMD TURION 64×2 processor, 3 USB ports, an SD-MS-Pro-MMC-XD memory card slot, external remote, etc.  The reviews are good, and I am very pleased.

Software

• Wubi – This is basically Ubuntu without the partition.  At startup, I can choose to either boot Vista or Ubuntu.  Now, admittedly, I choose Vista 95% of the time, because it’s what I’m used to.  Sue me.

• ObjectDock – I don’t like the look of Vista, so I decided to use a Mac-styled dock.  Well, actually, I use 3 separate docks, but ObjectDock is my favorite.

• Firefox – DUHHHHHHH.

• Thunderbird – This is a very efficient email client alternative to Outlook.  The neatest thing is that I can have separate accounts all organized in one place, so my university, google, and website mail all comes to one location, separated into different folders.

These are just a few favorites.  More will follow.

You can imagine my shock and anger when I plugged up my iPod, only to find that iTunes “could not read it”.   I was told that I needed to restore my iPod to factory settings, thus erasing ALL of my 40G of music, videos, photos, and games.  Needless to say, I was a little, to borrow a British expression, “cheesed off”.

Since my iPod is enabled for disk-mode (which I strongly suggest, and you’ll see why in a minute), I opened My Computer and saw “Ryan’s iPod” under “Devices with Removable Storage”.  I opened the folder, and there were all of the iPod folders, in perfect (it seemed) condition.  The weird thing was that when I turned my iPod on, I could see cover art scrolling in the side bar, and it showed my 38.4G of storage that had been used in the Settings tab.  When I would go to play an artist, however, it said that there were no artists, songs, or albums on the device.

To make a long story short, I was forced to back up ALL of my music and videos to my computer, reset my iPod, and then put them all back on again.  As I had almost 40G of stuff, this took several hours to accomplish.  Apple could not, however, make this process remotely simple.

After googling my problem, I found that the music is in a hidden folder in the “Ipod Control” folder.  After accessing this, however, you are faced with 40 separate folders, each containing numerous songs and videos, though few are actually labeled with their appropriate names, and the few that happen to be are all jumbled together.   So, I had to open 40 separate folders and copy every song into a main folder on my desktop.  Over 3,000 songs, split up into separate folders, with names like “XYAB.mp3″.

Oh no, the process isn’t over yet!  After trying several ways, i found that the only way to put the music back on my iPod was to import it all back into iTunes, (which took close to an hour, since iTunes also had to search for the cover art) and copy it from there to the iPod.  This also took over an hour.  Finally, I had my original iPod.

That night, I went out and bought a 320G external hard drive for about $100 to back up my music.  It’s just not worth the time, stress, and effort to go through that again.  But you can be assured that if it happens again, Apple will be experiencing it all with me, as an involuntary passenger on my trip of loss and anger.

So I had my iPod.  Well, sort of.  All of my games, notes, and pictures still weren’t replaced, and some cover art from lesser known bands was missing, but it was a lot better than nothing.  I still, however, am a little ticked at Apple.  I received this iPod for Christmas this past year – scarcely 6 months ago!  Is this why I spend $250 on your product, for it to cause me hours of frustration, anxiousness, and anger?!

The iPod has brought me much joy, amazement, and boredom-killing fun, and some may argue that it is to be expected to have problems and bugs.  However, for something so expensive, and as an average consumer, should I have to deal with them?

Ok, so first of all, I graduated high school! Woo Hoo! And due to all the gifts (money!) from friends and family, I thought it was time to buy a camera. I’ve never been big on photography, but with the addition of this camera, that is slowly changing.

So first, let’s talk about the actual camera. I bought a Fujifilm FinePix J10. It has 8.2 Megapixels, 3.1X Zoom, a 2.5″ LCD Screen, Image Stabilization, and a Lithium-Ion Battery, all for well under $150. In fact, had I not paid Amazon an enormous amount for shipping so I could receive it before graduation, it would have cost about $110.

What I mainly like about the camera is the size and weight. It weighs about 4oz and, at less than an inch thick and 4 inches across, it fits easily into my hand, pocket, or backpack compartment. Also, as opposed to some cameras, it can use Secure Digital cards. This was especially good for me, since I had already purchased a 2G card for my phone, so now I can simply switch them out until I get a new one. Also, with my new HP Pavilion dv6000, I can simply insert the SD card right into the side instead of hooking up the camera and transferring the pictures.

The camera has worked well for the little time I have had it. It’s very light thanks to the Lithium-Ion battery, so I can take it almost anywhere. My teacher also showed me the macro-mode, which allows you to take very good close-up shots. You can see how I used this on my dog, Marly, who looks completely thrilled, below.