Damion Chaplin
09-13-2006, 09:00 PM
We've all heard it before, whether from our wives or parents or even children: What's with all the digital music hubbub when it seems easier to just pop in a CD and listen to it? For years I heard this, and for years I pretty much ignored it. I did my thing, and if no one else got it, that was their thing and that was OK. For years I ripped all my CDs and listened to MP3s while my wife continued to use (and scratch :roll:) our CD collection. She was fine with her thing and I was fine with mine.
So how, you may ask, did I manage to convert my wife to digital music? Read on.<!>
Believe it or not, the catalyst was, of all things, a cassette tape player. You see, we've been driving the same Honda Civic for 5 years now. We were very spoiled with the fact that we bought it with a killer CD stereo system. The wife was just fine chucking CDs in the glove box and letting the jewel cases float around on the floor of the passenger seat. I knew I could always burn new copies of these CDs (that's Fair Use you know), so I wasn't too concerned.
All that changed about 6 months ago when my wife, experiencing problems with her arm, realized she couldn't drive a stick shift anymore. So as a stopgap measure, we bought a used Ford Escort ( :? ) with an automatic transmission. Unfortunately, this car did not come with a good stereo system or even a CD player. We were confronted by ye olde cassette player. The previous owner, a friend of ours, used a cassette adapter to listen to his iPod. Well, my wife didn't have an iPod (or any DAP for that matter), so she dug out her ancient tape collection (I ditched mine over a decade ago). And hilarity ensued as most of her tapes were stuff she recorded in high school oh-so long ago. But I guess she was fine with it, though she did complain that many of her favorite albums were on CD (we don't even have the ability to tape a CD anymore).
Then, last month, we went camping in northern California. It was a 4-hour drive, and during that drive, I introduced her to the concept of plugging my PMP into the cassette adapter and having access to any album she wanted to listen to. At last she realized how having your entire music collection with you can be a good thing. But she was still resistant. However, I clearly saw the glimmer in her eye when she said Do you have this? and I said Of course, so I surreptitiously started looking for a DAP she could keep in the car.
My goal was to find a simple MP3 player that held about 5GB of music and came in around $100. I figured $100 was about all I was going to get her to spend. For weeks I scoured the price-comparison sites and eBay for a fantastic deal. However, I found that the options available for about $100 were either crappy, low-capacity or both. I upped my goal to $150 and started looking again. I found many more options around that price, but none of them were really inspiring me. Eventually my dilligence paid off though, as I found an Archos Gmini 402 Camcorder (http://www.archos.com/products/video/gmini_402_cam/index.html?country=global&lang=en) for $175. I had owned the Gmini 400 for about 2 years and I've always felt it was easily the best gadjet investment I had ever made. The 402C is a very slight improvement over the 400, but for $175, I just couldn't pass it up. I showed it to my wife and she decided now would be a good time to take the plunge.
So I bought the Gmini402 Camcorder for myself and passed my older (but still killer) 400 to my wife for her to use in the car. I loaded it up with every album she would ever want to listen to, gave her some instructions (like how to create playlists on the fly) and let her go.
The result? Well, let's just say I came home evening before last and the first thing she said to me was "I love my MP3 player!" That was enough to make this geek smile while I tried my hardest to not say "See? What'd I tell ya?". So, can you believe, after 5 years of my MP3 madness, I finally brought my significant other into the light. And all it took was an old cassette player. :D
So now I want to hear your conversion stories! Did you find it harder or easier to convert your special someone? Still trying to convert someone? Let's hear about it!
Damion Chaplin is a graphic artist and digital media connoisseur who's very happy he won't have to burn any more CDs to replace destroyed ones.
So how, you may ask, did I manage to convert my wife to digital music? Read on.<!>
Believe it or not, the catalyst was, of all things, a cassette tape player. You see, we've been driving the same Honda Civic for 5 years now. We were very spoiled with the fact that we bought it with a killer CD stereo system. The wife was just fine chucking CDs in the glove box and letting the jewel cases float around on the floor of the passenger seat. I knew I could always burn new copies of these CDs (that's Fair Use you know), so I wasn't too concerned.
All that changed about 6 months ago when my wife, experiencing problems with her arm, realized she couldn't drive a stick shift anymore. So as a stopgap measure, we bought a used Ford Escort ( :? ) with an automatic transmission. Unfortunately, this car did not come with a good stereo system or even a CD player. We were confronted by ye olde cassette player. The previous owner, a friend of ours, used a cassette adapter to listen to his iPod. Well, my wife didn't have an iPod (or any DAP for that matter), so she dug out her ancient tape collection (I ditched mine over a decade ago). And hilarity ensued as most of her tapes were stuff she recorded in high school oh-so long ago. But I guess she was fine with it, though she did complain that many of her favorite albums were on CD (we don't even have the ability to tape a CD anymore).
Then, last month, we went camping in northern California. It was a 4-hour drive, and during that drive, I introduced her to the concept of plugging my PMP into the cassette adapter and having access to any album she wanted to listen to. At last she realized how having your entire music collection with you can be a good thing. But she was still resistant. However, I clearly saw the glimmer in her eye when she said Do you have this? and I said Of course, so I surreptitiously started looking for a DAP she could keep in the car.
My goal was to find a simple MP3 player that held about 5GB of music and came in around $100. I figured $100 was about all I was going to get her to spend. For weeks I scoured the price-comparison sites and eBay for a fantastic deal. However, I found that the options available for about $100 were either crappy, low-capacity or both. I upped my goal to $150 and started looking again. I found many more options around that price, but none of them were really inspiring me. Eventually my dilligence paid off though, as I found an Archos Gmini 402 Camcorder (http://www.archos.com/products/video/gmini_402_cam/index.html?country=global&lang=en) for $175. I had owned the Gmini 400 for about 2 years and I've always felt it was easily the best gadjet investment I had ever made. The 402C is a very slight improvement over the 400, but for $175, I just couldn't pass it up. I showed it to my wife and she decided now would be a good time to take the plunge.
So I bought the Gmini402 Camcorder for myself and passed my older (but still killer) 400 to my wife for her to use in the car. I loaded it up with every album she would ever want to listen to, gave her some instructions (like how to create playlists on the fly) and let her go.
The result? Well, let's just say I came home evening before last and the first thing she said to me was "I love my MP3 player!" That was enough to make this geek smile while I tried my hardest to not say "See? What'd I tell ya?". So, can you believe, after 5 years of my MP3 madness, I finally brought my significant other into the light. And all it took was an old cassette player. :D
So now I want to hear your conversion stories! Did you find it harder or easier to convert your special someone? Still trying to convert someone? Let's hear about it!
Damion Chaplin is a graphic artist and digital media connoisseur who's very happy he won't have to burn any more CDs to replace destroyed ones.