Ken McGuire

Category: Science Week

  • The N95 Is The Next Gadget I’ll Buy

    I missed yesterday’s Science Week blog post but couldn’t Thursday’s one as it’s an easy one for me. The question is asked, “What’s the next gadget that you want to buy?”. My answer, the 8GB Nokia N95.

    As mobile devices to it’s a massive step forward and one towards the ideal mobile device. Connectivity-wise you’ve got everything you need if you’re working in an online environment – bluetooth, 3G and WiFi. The recent opening up of some Eircom wifi hotspots if you’re already an Eircom BB customer makes public internet access that bit easier. I won’t always have my laptop with me but need a solid mobile device that will allow me to

    • Make and take calls (a given).
    • Have a good quality camera. The N95 shoots at 5mp and I would miss the 3.2mp on my Sony Ericsson K800i.
    • Access the internet over WiFi thus allowing easier access to emails, connections to the office, grabbing music and last minute details around gig weekends, upload photos on the go to my Flickr account and more.
    • Keep up with Jaiku via the S60 client (thus reducing my SMS bill).
    • Allow me to grab and store podcasts on the go (to feed my habit).
    • These points are just for starters…

    Again, in a non-laptop situation there’s always the possibility of mobile blogging, VOIP calls, mapping and more. I’ve written about the N95 being my Christmas present to myself this year, though admittedly it looks like I’ll be waiting until the New Year or whenever O2 sort out getting the N95 8GB model so I can make use of my contract upgrade. You can discover the N95 yourself here.

    When it comes to phones I’m not a gaming person and in the 13 months I’ve had the K800i I can recall just the trip to Toronto last year that lead me to play games on the phone. I’m more about getting things done and having a device that will assist me in day to day activities.

    Having used the first N95 briefly (briefly as in for a few minutes) and working alongside an N95 owner I can see the benefits of the device immediately. The use of IM before / after a client meeting, the ability to hop online and pull messages from MySpace or grab last minute mails before a gig (when you’re dealing with bands that communicate primarily through social networks as opposed to your actual phone then this is a must), passing spreadsheets or PDFs or word documents, plotting a trip on a map before you head away somewhere – and keeping that map in your pocket – that and the abundance of S60 applications that are available to run on the Nokia N95 to enhance your working experience.

    Plus, it fits nicely in your hand or pocket and the call quality and speakerphone quality is also good (somewhere the K800i lacks.)

    It’s been decided and I’ll wait patiently for my upgrade I think.

  • Favourite Invention From My Childhood

    The Irish blogging community was asked to offer up their thoughts on various elements of the science world this week as part of Science Week (see Jaiku channel here also). That said, I must oblige.

    My favourite invention from my childhood or something that at least stands out to me as a fond memory has to be the “blank tape”. I could be guaranteed a set of five tapes at Christmas or on a birthday and I was more than happy to oblige in making recordings for myself. It started off with the news, which I thought was hilarious. It started off with the old radio (which now resides in Sligo and has served many a builder and carpenter over the years), recording the news. I thought it was funny to hear it coming back to me, but it gradually moved on to recording songs off the radio – as everyone did.

    I was the master of mix tapes and continued the tradition right up to college (before making mix MP3 playlists, CDs and minidiscs).

    I took to a blank tape like a painter to a blank canvas. Every little second of room on the tape would be filled, thought having the end of your song cut off was a pain in the neck but it didn’t matter – flip the tape over and it was game on all over again. I’m sure I’ve still got a 1997 Radiohead recording from a 2FM Live set (possibly Glastonbury), some cheesy dance mixes from 1995, some worse dance mixes from 1992 (I was all of 9 years old) and it goes back further.

    It set me on the road to ruin and a fascination with audio so I’ll happily claim the blank tape as one of my favourite inventions (or my favourite) from my childhood. All that BASF and TDK or Memorex chromey goodness.

    Bliss.