From: Oliver Brose (oliver.brose_at_t-online.de)
Date: Sun Apr 18 2004 - 03:37:44 PDT
>Date: Sat, 17 Apr 2004 21:37:38 -0400
>From: Alan Davis <mdawd_at_earthlink.net>
>
>I have never lost data on a 32MB card and I have three of them. Even when
>one went bad a few months ago, I was able to do a backup off it and lost
>nothing. Am I just lucky, or is the Newton just good, or both?!
>;*)
>
>On 04/17/04 11:17 AM, "Oliver Brose" <oliver.brose_at_t-online.de> wrote:
>
> > Of course, but just how reliable are 32MB cards?
I guess it's both ;)
As I said, I once had this used 16MB card (possibly used in a router before, or not, I just don't know) which would frequently crash, especially if I did something stupid such as not using cardEject. I usually just lost my use of Lextionary for the day, but if you study the English language that can be quite disastrous. My new 16MB did not let me down yet, but it is like riding the bike you fell with, or playing with the dog that bit you. You loose a certain amount of trust, and it just does not feel as comfortable.
Maybe I am strolling OT, but over time I noticed that reliability is the single most important thing I need from a device. Not speed, not 99999999999 features. Reliability. The Newton has it, unless you just tool around too much with alpha & beta stuff, and that is a great bit of why I use it. It just never fails. I dropped it, it was exposed to cold, heat, and moisture, it can be out on campus with me all semester long or be put away for weeks, but it will always power up, and it never lost data. This aspect of reliability, to be able to rely on a electronic device just as you rely on ... a brick, a hammer... is a quality that is seemingly lost these days (listen to the 25-year-old mouring the good old days...).
I have a Sony Ericsson P800 smartphone. I say I have it, not I use it. I cannot use it because it spends all its time broken or in repair. Within the last two months I have gone trough four (4!) replacement units, all under warranty. The first one was DOA, the second was just dead after three weeks, the third came with a dim backlight and broken jogwheel, and the last one the certified service-centre sent me is dirty and has scar-like bubbles on the display although I specificly asked for a tested and inspected unit, so I will send it back on monday and by thursday I will have my P800 No. 6. All SE says is "please send the unit back, we'll replace it". When my APBS was broken three times in a row, Apple gave me a better, more recent model in exchange, no cost, no fuss. SE won't do so. Needless to say I wrote a nice letter to SE's management. I have to say that the phone is great when working, the PDA features are okay, I especially like to have my schedule in color. But I cannot rely on it. If I did not mak
e a backup after a fresh entry I feel uncomfortable upon leaving the house. I even though about just carrying my old Motorola with me for emergencies.
My attitude is that I will always opt for the more reliable option if it does not inherit some prohibitive features. In this thread that will be internal memory. I can make as many backups of my internal memory as I want, whenever I want, wherever I want. If the Newt gets lost or destroyed, I will have the backup. Making a card-backup is more difficult (boot into OS9, etc.) and time consuming, it cannot be done on the road, so I am not doing it as often as I should. It looses out in terms of reliability.
Whoops, this turned into quite a rant...
Oliver :)
-- But having just found out that the camp ground front desk computer is connected via WLAN, I just can't resist... it being after midnight... and a nice warm clear night to write a mail to NewtonTalk... Ah, the smell of wireless mail at night... from newtontalk.net -- This is the NewtonTalk list - http://www.newtontalk.net/ for all inquiries Official Newton FAQ: http://www.chuma.org/newton/faq/ WikiWikiNewt for all kinds of articles: http://tools.unna.org/wikiwikinewt/
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