Tools and Toys for a Long Commute

Amy is a Keyport, New Jersey resident who has a three hour commute all the way to Manhattan, something which frustrates and bores her. She thinks technology can help, so I dispatched Jon Chase to Hook Her Up.

Jon is a tech journalist and a perfectionist when it comes to choosing the right gear to maximize both productivity and sloth. He'll outfit Amy with the right tools and toys to make her commute bearable.

Jon's first point of buisness; productivity: Amy needs to type up emails on the ride to Manhattan. The pet-photography biz is dog eat dog, but Amy doesn't need the extra monthly bills that an Internet-connected mobile device would mandate. Getting back to her clients each night would do the trick. For that reason, Jon chose a Palm LifeDrive PDA. This device syncs with Amy's computer at home so that she can type emails on her PDA, but they are actually sent through her computer when she syncs the two.

Jon outfitted Amy with with a Mac Mini, equipped with maxed out RAM, and plugged it into the CRT she already owned. To make her mobile, we went with the highly underrated Palm LifeDrive, a sort of PDA/media player combo. It has a  3-4 inch LCD screen, a 4 Gig hard drive built in, Palm Desktop  software, SD card slot (removable media), Bluetooth (a wireless connection to the computer and peripheral devices), Wi-Fi (wireless Internet), and it can read and work in Microsoft Office and Adobe Reader files.

To really maximize the LifeDrive, Jon bought Amy a Bluetooth wireless keyboard that folds out to nearly full size. Instead of using Graffiti or the stylus-based hunt and peck keyboard, Amy could actually type out her emails. In order to easily sync her mobile device with her home computer, Jon purchased and installed The Missing Sync software for Palm OS. Jon also gave Amy the ability to listen to music by loading up her Palm LifeDrive with purchased songs and supplying her with Bluetooth wireless headphones.

One problem with this setup is that the Bluetooth headphones don't natively play the LifeDrive's audio files in stereo, so Jon downloaded and installed Softick Audio Gateway, a driver (piece of software) for the LifeDrive that brings out the complete audio experience. 

In my next post, more info on Bluetooth and how it can make your life clutter-free.