I've been dealing with this problem for a while, and I've only had a few instances where I *thought* it might be the problem with a specific person's internet, but I've never actually SEEN it on any system other than my own.
I work next to people that see this all the time, their solution is to Uninstall the NIC from device manager and get it to re-detect it. This is obviously not the best solution.
I'm not sure where the error comes from but it seems to primarily effect wired interfaces where you will shutdown and restart connected to the same, or a different network. I havn't been able to determine exactly WHY or WHEN it happens, so all of that is theory, but here's what happens.
The routing tables receive an incorrect entry stating that the local area adapter has a default gateway of 0.0.0.0
This entry, while not being assigned by any dhcp, is immune to release/renew attempts made by normal adapter "repair" operations.
Essentially, this entry tells the computer that every possible address on the internet should be sent out onto the local area network. That every possible IP address is local. So your computer, when connecting to Google, (for the purposes of this example, we'll use a common Linksys, NAT, private Class C network with local DNS and DHCP), you would need to go ask your DNS for Google's IP... in this case, your DNS will be an address local to you, such as 192.168.1.1 (most common router IPs), which will respond with something not-local, such as 173.194.32.104 . Your computer then checks it's routing tables and falsely determines that it should be able to connect to Google directly, which it obviously can't do... so it requests a connection and fails (on OSI layer 2) every time.
The easiest solution to the problem is to reboot, uninstall the adapter or similarly clear the routing tables using an indirect method.
The most efficient way is to do a "route delete 0.0.0.0" with added options to tell the route command to delete just the incorrect entry.
MY solution is just to perform a "route delete 0.0.0.0" which will clear ALL default routes, then do an IPCONFIG release and renew.
I don't know where this problem came from but it seems to only affect Windows Vista and Windows 7.
Hopefully that helps some of you folks out there. Happy routing.
Friday, July 30, 2010
Another post about Android
I was reading an Android Spin Article about Why Android will win the mobile wars and I got the thinking of so many things as to why or why not this could be true.
They have an excellent point in regard to devices. While there's only one iPhone (only one current model), there's around 15-20 Android devices on the market at any given time. Though iPhone is more user-oriented rather than developer-oriented, and Android vice-versa, I believe, in the end, it will be Android's developer-oriented approach that will cause developers to CREATE a more user-friendly approach.
Though there are a lot of Android devices around sporting similar technical specs (3.7-4 inch screen, 1Ghz chip, 512 or so of RAM, MicroSD expansion, Android 2.1), aka the Nexus One oriented model, there are phones out there with varying features, more than just the size of the screen, the look of the buttons, and the resolution of the camera. Some have hardware keyboards, like the Motorola Milestone (my device) or the backflip.
As we slowly prepare for the next-gen of android operating systems and associated hardware (rumors of a dual-core 1.5Ghz snapdragon chip in the mix), we're quickly approaching cellphones that are more powerful than some people's home computers. Of course the two are not directly comparible, since desktops use the CISC x86 instruction set and cellphones use a RISC, ARM archetecture (mostly).
These so-called "cellphone wars" are heating up, and the iPhone, while a powerful device, since it is only ONE device against so many, is looking at a very tough battle to stay relevant, as time goes on. Blackberry has their niche business market, and Windows Mobile... well, I'm pretty sure that most Winmo users have been looking for something *not apple* and *not blackberry* to move to for a while, and that may account for some of this Android love. I know that's what pushed me to it.
They have an excellent point in regard to devices. While there's only one iPhone (only one current model), there's around 15-20 Android devices on the market at any given time. Though iPhone is more user-oriented rather than developer-oriented, and Android vice-versa, I believe, in the end, it will be Android's developer-oriented approach that will cause developers to CREATE a more user-friendly approach.
Though there are a lot of Android devices around sporting similar technical specs (3.7-4 inch screen, 1Ghz chip, 512 or so of RAM, MicroSD expansion, Android 2.1), aka the Nexus One oriented model, there are phones out there with varying features, more than just the size of the screen, the look of the buttons, and the resolution of the camera. Some have hardware keyboards, like the Motorola Milestone (my device) or the backflip.
As we slowly prepare for the next-gen of android operating systems and associated hardware (rumors of a dual-core 1.5Ghz snapdragon chip in the mix), we're quickly approaching cellphones that are more powerful than some people's home computers. Of course the two are not directly comparible, since desktops use the CISC x86 instruction set and cellphones use a RISC, ARM archetecture (mostly).
These so-called "cellphone wars" are heating up, and the iPhone, while a powerful device, since it is only ONE device against so many, is looking at a very tough battle to stay relevant, as time goes on. Blackberry has their niche business market, and Windows Mobile... well, I'm pretty sure that most Winmo users have been looking for something *not apple* and *not blackberry* to move to for a while, and that may account for some of this Android love. I know that's what pushed me to it.
Thursday, July 15, 2010
Routers
There are so many options for routers around these days... I have different recommendations for everyone.
For those who don't really know what they're doing, get a major brand, generally Linksys, or D-Link, and run through the quick start guide ** DON'T JUST PLUG IT IN AND GO ** Leaving your device unconfigured can lead to a lot of security holes in your local network, so just don't do it.
For those who do know, I've used, and prefer dd-wrt. it's lightweight, works on router-specific hardware, and is remarkably fast. of course, your capability of using dd-wrt depends on what router hardware you're installing it on, so choose wisely. pick something that has the features and capabilities you need from your router, and then see if it's dd-wrt compatible. if not, find alternatives.
Also check the router compatibility, to see if any features are incapable of being used yet.
For anything larger than in-home, SOHO style, I would normally recommend independent router/wifi/switch setups, because if any one goes out, it's pretty trivial to figure out which.
I've also used Untangle, this is good for SOHO or small business setups where they need constant protection, that is centralized, away from user interaction and controls. Untangle requires some pretty heavy hardware so be sure to buy something appropriate for the job it's going to have to do, beyond that, it should be able to do just about anything you need it to... with few exceptions to that.
No matter which solution is best for you, whether listed here or not, be sure to read through the documentation to familiarize yourself with the menus and capabilities of the product.
Happy Routing.
For those who don't really know what they're doing, get a major brand, generally Linksys, or D-Link, and run through the quick start guide ** DON'T JUST PLUG IT IN AND GO ** Leaving your device unconfigured can lead to a lot of security holes in your local network, so just don't do it.
For those who do know, I've used, and prefer dd-wrt. it's lightweight, works on router-specific hardware, and is remarkably fast. of course, your capability of using dd-wrt depends on what router hardware you're installing it on, so choose wisely. pick something that has the features and capabilities you need from your router, and then see if it's dd-wrt compatible. if not, find alternatives.
Also check the router compatibility, to see if any features are incapable of being used yet.
For anything larger than in-home, SOHO style, I would normally recommend independent router/wifi/switch setups, because if any one goes out, it's pretty trivial to figure out which.
I've also used Untangle, this is good for SOHO or small business setups where they need constant protection, that is centralized, away from user interaction and controls. Untangle requires some pretty heavy hardware so be sure to buy something appropriate for the job it's going to have to do, beyond that, it should be able to do just about anything you need it to... with few exceptions to that.
No matter which solution is best for you, whether listed here or not, be sure to read through the documentation to familiarize yourself with the menus and capabilities of the product.
Happy Routing.
Tuesday, July 13, 2010
TELUS APP for Android
Just a quick note.
I try to orient my blog for the world but this one is canada-specific, though everyone should enjoy the amounts of fail in this one.
I'm a Telus Mobility subscriber, and they call a lot of their self-service options My Telus or some such non-sense. With that said, they released their second Android app onto the market in the past week... the first was a music application (to buy music wirelessly).
This second app is for 'direct access to mytelus' The app, seems to be a launcher for an application or website that does not yet exist. so currently this app does nothing but load a page that says "coming soon"
... why telus? WHY? why not make an announcement online and wait to release the application in whole, or when the service is ready?
This whole thing is failing so hard that it's hard for me to understand much else.
I try to orient my blog for the world but this one is canada-specific, though everyone should enjoy the amounts of fail in this one.
I'm a Telus Mobility subscriber, and they call a lot of their self-service options My Telus or some such non-sense. With that said, they released their second Android app onto the market in the past week... the first was a music application (to buy music wirelessly).
This second app is for 'direct access to mytelus' The app, seems to be a launcher for an application or website that does not yet exist. so currently this app does nothing but load a page that says "coming soon"
... why telus? WHY? why not make an announcement online and wait to release the application in whole, or when the service is ready?
This whole thing is failing so hard that it's hard for me to understand much else.
Tuesday, July 6, 2010
What I use.
A lot of people regard me as an authority on IT, Computers and Electronics as a whole. While I'm far from being perfect, I will say that I usually do my research before making a decision.
The most important thing for anyone to do while buying a new gadget, unless you're a first adopter, is to look it up. Look up features and specifications, and most importantly, look up BAD reviews. No matter what happens, the bad reviews will tell you about the parts of the device that may annoy you. Nearly EVERYTHING will have poor reviews somewhere, so look them up, they'll often tell you something that you will not see anywhere. Good reviews will usually just go over features you already know the device has, so skip those.
As an authority to many on all things digital, people are often curious about my gadgets and devices and what makes them so special. I'm usually pleased to tell them all about what I love and hate about the devices I use.
That's going to be the main focus of this posting. What do I use, and more importantly, why?
To preface, often I seek devices with similar traits, things like SD cards, and USB connectors are important to me. Having only one connector that connects to a specific device, in my opinion, is bad, since, if I lose that cable or stop using the device, I can no longer use that transfer method or cable (depending on which I stopped using), making both useless as soon as one becomes useless. So you'll notice that most, or all of my devices are exclusively SD, or include SD functionality; all of my devices include or are compatible with either mini or micro USB. While there are exceptions to this, often, I'll avoid a product BECAUSE it's lacking one or the other.
With that said, I begin. The core of my gear is, was, and probably always will be my cellphone. It is the single most important device day-to-day, and the one device that can do every task in a limited fashion. So I'll break this down into five parts: Video, Pictures, Music, Multimedia (video playback), and other.
My Cellphone: Motorola Milestone, AKA Droid.
(550Mhz, 256MB RAM, 512MB ROM, upto 32GB microSD, HSPA, Android 2.1)
Starting with Other, I'm mainly talking about web-browsing, games, etc. This is the ONLY area that my cellphone is not my best piece of equipment for the job. Instead, my computer works better. However, on the go, my cellphone is the best way to look up maps, browse the web for just about anything. For games, again, my Laptop will win hands-down, but the second best device for that is my cellphone. In this category my cell loses in almost every respect to my computer, as it does in certain other areas.
Laptop: Alienware Area-51 M15X
(2.5Ghz Core2 Duo, 4GB RAM, 320GB HDD, nVidia 8700M GT)
Moving on to Pictures, my cell does a 5MP shot with dual LED flash, which is fairly good. however, the picture quality is really lacking. As a photographer, I would never take pictures from my cellphone seriously. I also have a Canon Powershot A640, which is a 10MP Digital camera with 4x optical zoom. While I'm very disappointed with my Digital camera on the whole (being that I would prefer a DSLR), it produces VASTLY better pictures, and has a MUCH better flash. I've used quite a few shots taken from my Powershot for prints.
I got this camera about 2-3 years ago, refurbished, so I saved a lot of money on it. It's fantastic for the cost, great features, but not nearly enough to satisfy my picture-taking appetite. I tend to stick to Canon because I know the brand, I started with a Canon AE-1 45mm SLR, and I've consistently seen good results coming from Canon; that's something I'll pay for. I've heard and seen good things from Nikon and some other brands too. I will always stray away from Sony and Fujifilm, since each has their own, almost proprietary, memory standards (Memory stick for Sony, and xD for Fuji), which does not fit into my basic qualification of SD memory.
Next up: Video. My cellphone will take 720x480 video at ~30fps (I believe). My Canon Powershot will take video at 640x480 at ~30fps (which is the "square" version of my cellphone's res). I also have a Sanyo Xacti VPC-ZH1, which is a 720p (30fps) digital camcorder. It utilizes SDHC as it's primary storage. As a rule, currently, I avoid dealing with video that's larger than 720p wide screen, at 30fps. Not because I don't like it, or because it's too hard on my computer, but because I don't see a value in it.
To make good use of a video stream that is compressed, it needs to be valued based on image quality versus size, and you can get a much HIGHER QUALITY PICTURE from 720p, despite having a lower pixel count, than you can with 1080p video, even with a higher bit-rate. In my opinion, 1080p is never worth the extra space it's going to take up. unless pixels are the size of a fist, you're not going to see a significant difference between 720p and 1080p streams on similar sized screens (even larger home-theater screens). yes, if you're running an ACTUAL theater, you'll want to have 1080p as a minimum to project onto the several-hundred-inch screens, but for home-use, it is my personal belief that the difference between 720p and 1080p is lost.
With that said, I do believe 1080p has it's place, I just don't deal with video that would ever warrant dealing with a 1080p stream. Additionally, 720p is much easier to manage, has much smaller file size and can produce some stunning results.
For someone who intends to upload this on the internet, a lot of people will lose the detail of 720p in the translation to the compression algorithms used on you tube, never mind if it were 1080p.
So, for my purposes, this Sanyo Xacti camera does a Fantastic job, though I've only recently acquired it, and barely scratched the surface of it's use.
Music. While my Computer plays all kinds of streams from Grooveshark and similar services, my cellphone is great as a limited-use mp3 player. I say limited, because listening to music on my cell drains battery life more than I would like, additionally, because I don't want to have to maintain multiple playlists for multiple devices, I create one big playlist of random songs that I like listening to and dump them on every MP3 player I have, and go from there. So whether I'm listening to one media player or another, I basically get to listen to the same songs no matter what I'm listening to it on.
With that said, I'd rather save my cellphone's battery life for browsing the web, checking Facebook or Twitter, making calls, sending texts, etc. So I have a dedicated music player. The music player I use is the Sirius Satellite Stiletto 2 Unit. It has a microSD slot for expansion, and can record music live from the radio.
Of course, being a Sirius unit, it also has (both Satellite, and Internet Radio access to) many commercial-free music stations. I use this unit in my car, or while walking down the street. If I lose satellite coverage, I jump over to MP3 mode, and play all my recorded favorites (from the radio) randomly mixed with a random collection of favorites from my MP3 folder at home, stored on my SD card.
While the player has its problems, like adding static to an MP3 occasionally, it's fantastic for listening to live music, comedy, news, or whatever. It's capable and has very good battery life, in my opinion.
Next, is Multimedia. With this category, I'm primarily talking about playing multimedia (video) on the go. For this category, I have to reach back into the depths and reveal one of my oldest gadgets; but first, my cellphone can playback multimedia: as a current limitation of Android, the video files need to be in mp4 (AVC/AAC) format, in VGA or 480p res. Since most of my video collections, whether they're movies, TV or other, are AVI (DivX or XviD), this requires a transcoder to be able to play content on my cell, which requires time, etc.
My oldest, and one of my favourite gadgets, has been, and still is, my Dell Axim X51v. With a 624Mhz Intel Xscale CPU, 64MB RAM, 256MB ROM, Intel 2700G Video processor, SD card slot, Compact flash card slot, Wifi, and bluetooth, this 5-year-old Windows Mobile device has a lot to give.
Even now, at the time of this writing, there aren't many Winmo devices on the market that exceed the specifications of the Axim X51v; and running lenny's Winmo 6.1 or 6.5 with TCPMP (The Core Pocket Media Player) with full acceleration on the 2700G including DivX and XviD full-screen (640x480) jitter-free playback, the Axim is a device to trifle with.
Having both SD and Compact Flash is a bonus too. I have a 2GB Compact Flash that isn't compatible with many other devices that I use almost exclusively for multimedia files on this device... I can honestly say, that I am looking for, and have yet to find, a media player that has yet to parallel the capabilities of this device.
I used to use my Axim for my day planning before I bought a smartphone. It was excellent for keeping track of when I had to do what. Additionally, it had an excellent contact list, todo list, and other features that made it great. Now, though it may only be used as a media player, it's still top of it's game.
The only downside to the Axim is it's clearly dated screen. The 3.7" trans-reflective TFT display does not have very good viewing angles or very good contrast; beyond this small downside, the device performs better than most that I've encountered.
That's my basic kit. If I end up going out and need to do something specific, I can take the specific device out with me that I'll need (either the Canon Powershot, Sanyo Xacti, Sirius Stiletto 2, or Axim), otherwise the Motorola Milestone is a good catch-all for anything I need to do.
No matter what, always research anything you want to get. Bad reviews are good indicators of annoyances and downfalls of the product but like everything should be taken with a grain of salt. SD and mini/micro USB are good standards to live by too. Make your own decisions based on your own situation in life.
The most important thing for anyone to do while buying a new gadget, unless you're a first adopter, is to look it up. Look up features and specifications, and most importantly, look up BAD reviews. No matter what happens, the bad reviews will tell you about the parts of the device that may annoy you. Nearly EVERYTHING will have poor reviews somewhere, so look them up, they'll often tell you something that you will not see anywhere. Good reviews will usually just go over features you already know the device has, so skip those.
As an authority to many on all things digital, people are often curious about my gadgets and devices and what makes them so special. I'm usually pleased to tell them all about what I love and hate about the devices I use.
That's going to be the main focus of this posting. What do I use, and more importantly, why?
To preface, often I seek devices with similar traits, things like SD cards, and USB connectors are important to me. Having only one connector that connects to a specific device, in my opinion, is bad, since, if I lose that cable or stop using the device, I can no longer use that transfer method or cable (depending on which I stopped using), making both useless as soon as one becomes useless. So you'll notice that most, or all of my devices are exclusively SD, or include SD functionality; all of my devices include or are compatible with either mini or micro USB. While there are exceptions to this, often, I'll avoid a product BECAUSE it's lacking one or the other.
With that said, I begin. The core of my gear is, was, and probably always will be my cellphone. It is the single most important device day-to-day, and the one device that can do every task in a limited fashion. So I'll break this down into five parts: Video, Pictures, Music, Multimedia (video playback), and other.
My Cellphone: Motorola Milestone, AKA Droid.
(550Mhz, 256MB RAM, 512MB ROM, upto 32GB microSD, HSPA, Android 2.1)
Starting with Other, I'm mainly talking about web-browsing, games, etc. This is the ONLY area that my cellphone is not my best piece of equipment for the job. Instead, my computer works better. However, on the go, my cellphone is the best way to look up maps, browse the web for just about anything. For games, again, my Laptop will win hands-down, but the second best device for that is my cellphone. In this category my cell loses in almost every respect to my computer, as it does in certain other areas.
Laptop: Alienware Area-51 M15X
(2.5Ghz Core2 Duo, 4GB RAM, 320GB HDD, nVidia 8700M GT)
Moving on to Pictures, my cell does a 5MP shot with dual LED flash, which is fairly good. however, the picture quality is really lacking. As a photographer, I would never take pictures from my cellphone seriously. I also have a Canon Powershot A640, which is a 10MP Digital camera with 4x optical zoom. While I'm very disappointed with my Digital camera on the whole (being that I would prefer a DSLR), it produces VASTLY better pictures, and has a MUCH better flash. I've used quite a few shots taken from my Powershot for prints.
I got this camera about 2-3 years ago, refurbished, so I saved a lot of money on it. It's fantastic for the cost, great features, but not nearly enough to satisfy my picture-taking appetite. I tend to stick to Canon because I know the brand, I started with a Canon AE-1 45mm SLR, and I've consistently seen good results coming from Canon; that's something I'll pay for. I've heard and seen good things from Nikon and some other brands too. I will always stray away from Sony and Fujifilm, since each has their own, almost proprietary, memory standards (Memory stick for Sony, and xD for Fuji), which does not fit into my basic qualification of SD memory.
Next up: Video. My cellphone will take 720x480 video at ~30fps (I believe). My Canon Powershot will take video at 640x480 at ~30fps (which is the "square" version of my cellphone's res). I also have a Sanyo Xacti VPC-ZH1, which is a 720p (30fps) digital camcorder. It utilizes SDHC as it's primary storage. As a rule, currently, I avoid dealing with video that's larger than 720p wide screen, at 30fps. Not because I don't like it, or because it's too hard on my computer, but because I don't see a value in it.
To make good use of a video stream that is compressed, it needs to be valued based on image quality versus size, and you can get a much HIGHER QUALITY PICTURE from 720p, despite having a lower pixel count, than you can with 1080p video, even with a higher bit-rate. In my opinion, 1080p is never worth the extra space it's going to take up. unless pixels are the size of a fist, you're not going to see a significant difference between 720p and 1080p streams on similar sized screens (even larger home-theater screens). yes, if you're running an ACTUAL theater, you'll want to have 1080p as a minimum to project onto the several-hundred-inch screens, but for home-use, it is my personal belief that the difference between 720p and 1080p is lost.
With that said, I do believe 1080p has it's place, I just don't deal with video that would ever warrant dealing with a 1080p stream. Additionally, 720p is much easier to manage, has much smaller file size and can produce some stunning results.
For someone who intends to upload this on the internet, a lot of people will lose the detail of 720p in the translation to the compression algorithms used on you tube, never mind if it were 1080p.
So, for my purposes, this Sanyo Xacti camera does a Fantastic job, though I've only recently acquired it, and barely scratched the surface of it's use.
Music. While my Computer plays all kinds of streams from Grooveshark and similar services, my cellphone is great as a limited-use mp3 player. I say limited, because listening to music on my cell drains battery life more than I would like, additionally, because I don't want to have to maintain multiple playlists for multiple devices, I create one big playlist of random songs that I like listening to and dump them on every MP3 player I have, and go from there. So whether I'm listening to one media player or another, I basically get to listen to the same songs no matter what I'm listening to it on.
With that said, I'd rather save my cellphone's battery life for browsing the web, checking Facebook or Twitter, making calls, sending texts, etc. So I have a dedicated music player. The music player I use is the Sirius Satellite Stiletto 2 Unit. It has a microSD slot for expansion, and can record music live from the radio.
Of course, being a Sirius unit, it also has (both Satellite, and Internet Radio access to) many commercial-free music stations. I use this unit in my car, or while walking down the street. If I lose satellite coverage, I jump over to MP3 mode, and play all my recorded favorites (from the radio) randomly mixed with a random collection of favorites from my MP3 folder at home, stored on my SD card.
While the player has its problems, like adding static to an MP3 occasionally, it's fantastic for listening to live music, comedy, news, or whatever. It's capable and has very good battery life, in my opinion.
Next, is Multimedia. With this category, I'm primarily talking about playing multimedia (video) on the go. For this category, I have to reach back into the depths and reveal one of my oldest gadgets; but first, my cellphone can playback multimedia: as a current limitation of Android, the video files need to be in mp4 (AVC/AAC) format, in VGA or 480p res. Since most of my video collections, whether they're movies, TV or other, are AVI (DivX or XviD), this requires a transcoder to be able to play content on my cell, which requires time, etc.
My oldest, and one of my favourite gadgets, has been, and still is, my Dell Axim X51v. With a 624Mhz Intel Xscale CPU, 64MB RAM, 256MB ROM, Intel 2700G Video processor, SD card slot, Compact flash card slot, Wifi, and bluetooth, this 5-year-old Windows Mobile device has a lot to give.
Even now, at the time of this writing, there aren't many Winmo devices on the market that exceed the specifications of the Axim X51v; and running lenny's Winmo 6.1 or 6.5 with TCPMP (The Core Pocket Media Player) with full acceleration on the 2700G including DivX and XviD full-screen (640x480) jitter-free playback, the Axim is a device to trifle with.
Having both SD and Compact Flash is a bonus too. I have a 2GB Compact Flash that isn't compatible with many other devices that I use almost exclusively for multimedia files on this device... I can honestly say, that I am looking for, and have yet to find, a media player that has yet to parallel the capabilities of this device.
I used to use my Axim for my day planning before I bought a smartphone. It was excellent for keeping track of when I had to do what. Additionally, it had an excellent contact list, todo list, and other features that made it great. Now, though it may only be used as a media player, it's still top of it's game.
The only downside to the Axim is it's clearly dated screen. The 3.7" trans-reflective TFT display does not have very good viewing angles or very good contrast; beyond this small downside, the device performs better than most that I've encountered.
That's my basic kit. If I end up going out and need to do something specific, I can take the specific device out with me that I'll need (either the Canon Powershot, Sanyo Xacti, Sirius Stiletto 2, or Axim), otherwise the Motorola Milestone is a good catch-all for anything I need to do.
No matter what, always research anything you want to get. Bad reviews are good indicators of annoyances and downfalls of the product but like everything should be taken with a grain of salt. SD and mini/micro USB are good standards to live by too. Make your own decisions based on your own situation in life.
Sunday, July 4, 2010
Audio Codecs
@nickromyn is someone I follow on Twitter, today, he posted a question about Android and it's capabilities regarding ALAC, the Apple Lossless Audio Codec.
Though Nick is an avid MAC user, he's not completely hopeless when it comes to PCs and related technologies. He's not a complete Apple Fanboy, in the sense that he'll give credit where it's due. Where most Apple Fanboys won't even recognize that a product has any merits that may be in any way shape or form better than their beloved apple product (link NSFW, language).
His message was focused around managing playlists/media using a centralized system (like iTunes), which I'm not sure is universal on all Android based devices.
Before I get to my main point, I'll go over this first: I have the Motorola Milestone, which has the capability of using the motorola media center software, which will do a lot of that; additionally, I'm sure that there's more than a few apps that will do it, if google hasn't made something that will interface with the device already... I'd also be fairly certain HTC has put something out to go along with the Sense media player too, so there's that.
My main point is on Audio Codecs. Since Nick pointed out support for ALAC specifically, I have a few points to make about the matter that I'd like to go over now.
First of all, as far as Lossless audio codecs go, I would never use ALAC, because FLAC exists. FLAC, or Free Loss-less Audio Codec, is an open source developed, lossless codec freely available to anyone, or any developer, to include in their device or project. Most media players have picked up support for this relatively obscure format, and are fully supporting it. Additionally, FLAC support has been incorporated into Andoroid's core system, so the native media player can use FLAC files transparently. ON TOP OF THAT, if you're adamant about using ALAC, there's applications in the market that WILL play ALAC format files.
My second point is file size. I don't care what compressor you use, if you're doing lossless encoding, that's going to take up a lot of space. Additionally, the sound renderer (aka sound card) on your portable device will NEVER be able to render all the detail in a lossless file, and even if it could, the quality lost on the connectors, headphones, integrated amplifier, etc, plus crosstalk and static, you might as well have saved the time and space, and not used lossless.
Which brings me to my next point: "lossy" audio codecs.
MP3, or MPEG-1, Layer 3, is a fantastic format, widely adopted by almost everyone and everything for every purpose you could imagine sound being used for. It renders a fair quality representation of the original media and maintains a low processing overhead, plus reasonable size constraints for the quality rendered.
That being said, it's ancient. MP3 players can date back to the early 90's. and in regard to computers, that's like king tut.
other, better, and more versatile formats have been created. The movement started in 2000, with Vorbis and OGG, A format I still love. It's an entirely open source format (similar to FLAC in concept, just, lossy), but it never caught on. The open source community couldn't compete with the thousands of "MP3" players on the market that simply did not support OGG/Vorbis.
A few years later, MPEG teamed up with ISO and IEC to create AAC, or Advanced Audio Codec, rendering higher quality audio at the same bit-rates as MP3. in direct comparison, there is no down-side to AAC over MP3. What they needed now, was a way to get it into our hearts, minds and "MP3" players.
Being that it was the next major format to be blessed by the MPEG, getting implimentation wasn't entirely difficult. It was slow at first, and the success of AAC relies heavily on it's sister codec for video, AVC (Advanced Video Codec), better known as m4v. Combining AVC and AAC produced the ever-familiar mp4 files, which are multimedia files. Almost every modern cellphone will natively record (and decode) mp4.
And the hard work was done. With cellphones quickly replacing both digital cameras and MP3 players, plus having built-in, usually dedicated (on chip) decoding of AAC and AVC, the MPEG and partners have paved the way for wide-scale implementation of .m4a files.
... now if we could only get people to start USING them. ha.
but honestly, in the race for audio codecs, you're not going to find something better than AAC by any significant margin, anytime soon... and definitely not something you can decode on the fly using an integrated dedicated decoder chip (which significantly reduces power consumption, and therefore reduces overall power drain, which therefore increases battery life).
If you're really determined to use ALAC or FLAC on your android powered device, you're more than welcome to burn the batteries and do it, but you probably wouldn't notice much, if any difference over the m4a version of the file... except of course, with your battery life ;)
To note, I believe most AAC decoder chips will also handle MP3, so fear not, using your trusty old MP3s won't drain your battery dry either... they just might not sound as good as their m4a equivalents.
Though Nick is an avid MAC user, he's not completely hopeless when it comes to PCs and related technologies. He's not a complete Apple Fanboy, in the sense that he'll give credit where it's due. Where most Apple Fanboys won't even recognize that a product has any merits that may be in any way shape or form better than their beloved apple product (link NSFW, language).
His message was focused around managing playlists/media using a centralized system (like iTunes), which I'm not sure is universal on all Android based devices.
Before I get to my main point, I'll go over this first: I have the Motorola Milestone, which has the capability of using the motorola media center software, which will do a lot of that; additionally, I'm sure that there's more than a few apps that will do it, if google hasn't made something that will interface with the device already... I'd also be fairly certain HTC has put something out to go along with the Sense media player too, so there's that.
My main point is on Audio Codecs. Since Nick pointed out support for ALAC specifically, I have a few points to make about the matter that I'd like to go over now.
First of all, as far as Lossless audio codecs go, I would never use ALAC, because FLAC exists. FLAC, or Free Loss-less Audio Codec, is an open source developed, lossless codec freely available to anyone, or any developer, to include in their device or project. Most media players have picked up support for this relatively obscure format, and are fully supporting it. Additionally, FLAC support has been incorporated into Andoroid's core system, so the native media player can use FLAC files transparently. ON TOP OF THAT, if you're adamant about using ALAC, there's applications in the market that WILL play ALAC format files.
My second point is file size. I don't care what compressor you use, if you're doing lossless encoding, that's going to take up a lot of space. Additionally, the sound renderer (aka sound card) on your portable device will NEVER be able to render all the detail in a lossless file, and even if it could, the quality lost on the connectors, headphones, integrated amplifier, etc, plus crosstalk and static, you might as well have saved the time and space, and not used lossless.
Which brings me to my next point: "lossy" audio codecs.
MP3, or MPEG-1, Layer 3, is a fantastic format, widely adopted by almost everyone and everything for every purpose you could imagine sound being used for. It renders a fair quality representation of the original media and maintains a low processing overhead, plus reasonable size constraints for the quality rendered.
That being said, it's ancient. MP3 players can date back to the early 90's. and in regard to computers, that's like king tut.
other, better, and more versatile formats have been created. The movement started in 2000, with Vorbis and OGG, A format I still love. It's an entirely open source format (similar to FLAC in concept, just, lossy), but it never caught on. The open source community couldn't compete with the thousands of "MP3" players on the market that simply did not support OGG/Vorbis.
A few years later, MPEG teamed up with ISO and IEC to create AAC, or Advanced Audio Codec, rendering higher quality audio at the same bit-rates as MP3. in direct comparison, there is no down-side to AAC over MP3. What they needed now, was a way to get it into our hearts, minds and "MP3" players.
Being that it was the next major format to be blessed by the MPEG, getting implimentation wasn't entirely difficult. It was slow at first, and the success of AAC relies heavily on it's sister codec for video, AVC (Advanced Video Codec), better known as m4v. Combining AVC and AAC produced the ever-familiar mp4 files, which are multimedia files. Almost every modern cellphone will natively record (and decode) mp4.
And the hard work was done. With cellphones quickly replacing both digital cameras and MP3 players, plus having built-in, usually dedicated (on chip) decoding of AAC and AVC, the MPEG and partners have paved the way for wide-scale implementation of .m4a files.
... now if we could only get people to start USING them. ha.
but honestly, in the race for audio codecs, you're not going to find something better than AAC by any significant margin, anytime soon... and definitely not something you can decode on the fly using an integrated dedicated decoder chip (which significantly reduces power consumption, and therefore reduces overall power drain, which therefore increases battery life).
If you're really determined to use ALAC or FLAC on your android powered device, you're more than welcome to burn the batteries and do it, but you probably wouldn't notice much, if any difference over the m4a version of the file... except of course, with your battery life ;)
To note, I believe most AAC decoder chips will also handle MP3, so fear not, using your trusty old MP3s won't drain your battery dry either... they just might not sound as good as their m4a equivalents.
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