[Scandalous Ion Cannon]

Who here thinks it is because of marketing or... USB 1, 100 song limit and a phone that is 18 months old the day it comes out?

http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?p...=a6NrxjkDWJKA#

[Cubeoid]

The phone is a piece of ****.. iTunes on a phone in stupid and pointless.

[Randman]

I think it's because it's Motorola.

[starman]

Originally Posted by Randman

I think it's because it's Motorola.

^^ We have a winner.

Broken Bluetooth sucks.

[Cubeoid]

Originally Posted by starman

Bluetooth sucks.

Fixored®

[Randman]

Bluetooth doesn't suck. Quite the opposite. That's like saying wi-fi sucks. Hello, welcome to the 21st century.

[starman]

Originally Posted by Cubeoid

Fixored®

Did Bluetooth kill your dog? BLuetooth works perfectly for me.

[Cubeoid]

Originally Posted by Randman

Hello, welcome to the 21st century.

Hi!

[Scandalous Ion Cannon]

Originally Posted by starman

Did Bluetooth kill your dog? BLuetooth works perfectly for me.

I have to agree that it sucks. It is a battery hog, slow, requires pairing and has piss poor range.

[Eug Wanker]

I wonder if the 100 song limit is Apple's doing.

But yeah, I think they chose the wrong market. It seemed to me the iTunes phone was a phone most appropriate for the geek market initially, but this phone doesn't have the specs to make it as a geek phone.

640x480 camera with crapola image quality? Definitely not geek material. The people who actually want music on their phones have been buying Sony Ericssons.

[Scandalous Ion Cannon]

Originally Posted by Eug Wanker

I wonder if the 100 song limit is Apple's doing.

It is. A SOFTWARE limit because Apple doesn't want it to eat into shuffle and Nano sales.

[Warung]

Originally Posted by Cubeoid

iTunes on a phone in stupid and pointless.

Not at all. As soon as S/// comes out with an iTunes compatible cell phone, I'll be all over that.

[Diggory Laycock]

Originally Posted by Scandalous Ion Cannon

I have to agree that it sucks. It is a battery hog, slow, requires pairing and has piss poor range.

Pairing is good - added security.

Battery hog / range / slow - compared to what?

[CharlesS]

It looks like the next version of the RAZR will have iTunes on it. If that is the case, I think they'll find a lot more success than they have with the ROKR...

[Eug Wanker]

Originally Posted by CharlesS

It looks like the next version of the RAZR will have iTunes on it. If that is the case, I think they'll find a lot more success than they have with the ROKR...

Perhaps, but methinks the RAZR is already starting on its decline. Unless they improve the specs and kill the 100 song limit, iTunes isn't gonna help.

[starman]

RAZR also has broken Bluetooth.

[Scandalous Ion Cannon]

Originally Posted by Diggory Laycock

Pairing is good - added security.

Battery hog / range / slow - compared to what?

The newer Sony phones skip pairing somehow.

Battery hog next to every other wireless RF mouse that has better range and the battery lasts a year. Slow next to the first ever WiFi.

[Millennium]

Or maybe because the interface sucks?

Seriously. Apple's scroll wheel has probably contributed more to the iPod's success than any other single factor. It scrolls smoothly in either direction at a variable and easily-controlled speed, unlike basically any other MP3 player interface out there. I preferred the first-gen models that had an actual wheel instead of the pad-that-works-like-a-wheel, because the wheel was slightly more intuitive. The spinning motion in those models is concrete; you're actually spinning a wheel rather than just pretending to do so. But in any case, it's a paradigm that Just Works when the pointing device is your thumb.

Contrast this with the ROKR's interface, which if I recall correctly is all button-based: arguably the worst possible interface for an MP3 player. It doesn't allow for continuous scrolling, requiring repetitive pressing to get through a long list. You might be able to get basic continuous scrolling by holding down the button, but if this is the case then you won't be able to control the speed, which makes it very hard to precisely control where you're going.

Any iPod competitor is going to find beating the iPod to be extremely difficult unless they can come up with an interface that beats the iPod's at everything it does. Maybe such a system exists, but I don't know what it would be.

[CharlesS]

Originally Posted by starman

RAZR also has broken Bluetooth.

Could someone please explain what the heck you mean by "broken Bluetooth"? Thanks.

[PacHead]

Originally Posted by Millennium

Or maybe because the interface sucks?

Seriously. Apple's scroll wheel has probably contributed more to the iPod's success than any other single factor.

So why not release a phone with no buttons on it ?, just a scrollwheel like on the ipods. The people will have to ring the numbers old fashioned style, or they can just scroll to a contact number and press. Instead of trying to put an iPod into a phone, they should've put a phone into a regular iPod.

[starman]

Originally Posted by CharlesS

Could someone please explain what the heck you mean by "broken Bluetooth"? Thanks.

Voice only, no data. Commonly referred to as "broken Bluetooth" or "crippled Bluetooth" since Verizon/Motorola generally forces you to use their pay-per-use service to get wallpaper and ringtones on their phones.

Mike

[bad_quote]

My friend has one. Likes it. Ditched his old mp3 player. Uses the phone instead.

[CharlesS]

Originally Posted by Eug Wanker

Perhaps, but methinks the RAZR is already starting on its decline. Unless they improve the specs and kill the 100 song limit, iTunes isn't gonna help.

This is kind of ridiculous. The RAZR has been out for a year and the rumor mill is pointing toward a new one being released soon. Of course some people are going to wait for the new one and thus won't be buying the current one. The current one is still a big seller.

Or do you think that when Power Mac sales diminish after a particular model has been out for about a year and there's an update imminent, that this means Apple is starting on its decline also?

Of course the new one will have better specs. Did you think that it would have worse specs or something? I don't get it. The new RAZR will have a megapixel camera, EDGE support, more memory, a flash card slot, and iTunes. I personally don't care about most of these things because I already have a digital camera and an iPod, and broadband access is too expensive for me on a phone (more memory is nice, though). These things help get sales, though, so it's all good.

Originally Posted by starman

Voice only, no data. Commonly referred to as "broken Bluetooth" or "crippled Bluetooth" since Verizon/Motorola generally forces you to use their pay-per-use service to get wallpaper and ringtones on their phones.

Uh, what? That's for Verizon. The RAZR isn't available on Verizon yet (although it will be pretty soon as I understand). It's currently GSM, which means Cingular and T-Mobile in the US, and on those providers, as far as I understand, Bluetooth isn't crippled. The RAZR is on iSync's supported devices list.

[Millennium]

Originally Posted by PacHead

So why not release a phone with no buttons on it ?, just a scrollwheel like on the ipods. The people will have to ring the numbers old fashioned style, or they can just scroll to a contact number and press. Instead of trying to put an iPod into a phone, they should've put a phone into a regular iPod.

Then, of course, they wouldn't have had a very good phone. Cell phones need buttons.

This is what bloat is: trying to take two different devices which work in entirely different ways and putting them together in a way which either doesn't work well at all for one of them, or works but not very well for both of them. "Convergence" of such devices is doomed to fail miserably every time. People want gadgets, but they want gadgets that work well. You're not going to be able to converge cell phones and MP3 players until you can find some form of interface that works well for both of them. Right now, if such an interface exists, it has not been devised.

That is why, short of some massive UI breakthrough, the ROKR will continue to fail. Until it can make everything work well together, it's all just bloat.

[bad_quote]

Originally Posted by Millennium

Then, of course, they wouldn't have had a very good phone. Cell phones need buttons.

This is what bloat is: trying to take two different devices which work in entirely different ways and putting them together in a way which either doesn't work well at all for one of them, or works but not very well for both of them. "Convergence" of such devices is doomed to fail miserably every time. People want gadgets, but they want gadgets that work well. You're not going to be able to converge cell phones and MP3 players until you can find some form of interface that works well for both of them. Right now, if such an interface exists, it has not been devised.

That is why, short of some massive UI breakthrough, the ROKR will continue to fail. Until it can make everything work well together, it's all just bloat.

One could argue that the iPod was the convergance of a turntable, mixer, equalizer, generator, and huge library of music. Thus, it accomplishes what many gadgets used to do. The difference? It did so eloquently. I think that a phone with a scroll wheel could be pulled off well. It would need a scroll wheel and a couple buttons, kinda like the first gen ipod. If the UI was done right, it would be fantastic.

[starman]

Originally Posted by CharlesS

Uh, what? That's for Verizon. The RAZR isn't available on Verizon yet (although it will be pretty soon as I understand). It's currently GSM, which means Cingular and T-Mobile in the US, and on those providers, as far as I understand, Bluetooth isn't crippled. The RAZR is on iSync's supported devices list.

When I looked at a RAZR over the summer, BLUETOOTH DID NOT WORK.

Note that iSync's page says:

Motorola RAZR v3

and after doing some reading on Google, it seems like Tiger fixed the Bluetooth problem, previously you could only sync the phone with a Mac using USB ONLY.

Mike

[CharlesS]

Originally Posted by starman

When I looked at a RAZR over the summer, BLUETOOTH DID NOT WORK.

Note that iSync's page says:

Motorola RAZR v3

Look at the iSync page again. Notice how Motorola gives most of their phones model numbers that start with the letter "V"? E.g. V60, V66, V80, V180, V220, etc.

V3 is the model number for the RAZR. There's only one version of the RAZR, and that is the V3. The V3 is the original RAZR. I think there's also some new V3x now that's only available in Europe or Asia or something. In the US, the V3 is the only RAZR until the new one comes out.

and after doing some reading on Google, it seems like Tiger fixed the Bluetooth problem, previously you could only sync the phone with a Mac using USB ONLY.

Funny, that's not what Google seemed to turn up for me.

Originally Posted by http://www.macintouch.com/bluetooth05.html

I'm surprised that the Motorola V551 reportedly doesn't sync to the Mac via a cable, as most Motorola phones will sync just fine this way. I can use a USB cable to get iSync to work properly with my Motorola V3 RAZR phone, but the cable connection is useful because it also charges the phone. Bluetooth on the PowerBook G4 17 otherwise works great with the Motorola V3 RAZR. It's possible to browse audio, video, and photo files on the phone (send and receive) via Bluetooth File Exchange. The same program can also be used to "Send File" to upload games and other Java applications to the phone via Bluetooth. And the application BluePhone Elite works very well to give "screen pops" on the Mac whenever anyone calls on my mobile/cellphone.

Notice that that was March 30, before Tiger's release.

This page also says something similar: sending files via Bluetooth File Exchange worked, so data transfer was definitely possible. Just iSync didn't. And since updating to the latest version of Tiger and iSync fixes it, it seems to me that this was more of a problem of Apple not supplying a driver to make iSync recognize the RAZR over Bluetooth than Moto crippling Bluetooth.

And anyway, it's fixed now, and the RAZR is on the iSync supported devices list and seems to work by most reports, so who cares? The RAZR definitely doesn't have "broken Bluetooth."

[bad_quote]

The only thing lame about the rockr is hte size of the memory. 4 gigs and it'd be awesome.

[Diggory Laycock]

Originally Posted by Scandalous Ion Cannon

Battery hog next to every other wireless RF mouse that has better range and the battery lasts a year. Slow next to the first ever WiFi.

Come on - that's like saying:

"Your BMW three series sucks - it doesn't have the fuel economy of a moped, and doesn't have the torque of a Land Rover."

You're making a three-way comparison. Ever heard of engineering trade-offs?

Now if there was a form of wifi with the bandwidth of 802.11g and the power consumption of an RF mouse - then that would be a fair comparison.

You can't compare BT to something that doesn't exist.

[Diggory Laycock]

I thought Moto implemented BT badly in their phones by removing the OBEX file transfer protocol (under pressure from the US cellular carriers). This meant that you couldn't send files to your phone - you had to download them OTA (over the air) - i.e. over the cellular network.

[Scandalous Ion Cannon]

Originally Posted by Diggory Laycock

Come on - that's like saying:

"Your BMW three series sucks - it doesn't have the fuel economy of a moped, and doesn't have the torque of a Land Rover."

You're making a three-way comparison. Ever heard of engineering trade-offs?

Now if there was a form of wifi with the bandwidth of 802.11g and the power consumption of an RF mouse - then that would be a fair comparison.

You can't compare BT to something that doesn't exist.

I can't compare a bluetooth mouse to an RF one that has 10x better battery? Or are you saying that a bluetooth mouse is suddenly like a sports car?

[phantomdragonz]

ok I have a Razr, I have transfered pictures to and from my phone, I have also used iTunes to make custom ring tones...


so all of you saying that you need to use their pay-out-your-a$$ service are wrong...

I have not tried the data thing yet... but I dont intend to either...

but overall I think the RAZR V3 is a piece of ****, the speaker is not nearly loud enough, and the phone has 1 game demo, no actual full games, and the stock ringtones are BULLSH*T

the phone is made to look good, thats about it, there are much better phones on the market...


and I will say this again... I OWN A RAZR!!!!

Zach

[Diggory Laycock]

No - I'm saying that bluetooth was designed so that it could be used in a wide variety of devices - not just mice.

[Scandalous Ion Cannon]

Originally Posted by Diggory Laycock

No - I'm saying that bluetooth was designed so that it could be used in a wide variety of devices - not just mice.

Fine, now how is Apple bluetooth mouse better than RF?

it isn't because bluetooth is a limited range power hog.

[nredman]

Originally Posted by CharlesS

It looks like the next version of the RAZR will have iTunes on it. If that is the case, I think they'll find a lot more success than they have with the ROKR...

i have heard that the RAZR is a piece of crap...breaks easily

[Diggory Laycock]

That wasn't your original claim - you didn't say BT was bad for mice - you said it was bad full stop.

If power consumption is your primary concern (and mousing) then fine - don't use a BT mouse - or a BT keyboard.

However - those non BT devices won't work with any other device - they'll need specific drivers - whereas a BT keyboard that conforms to the Keyboard Input Device Profile (or whatever the profile is called) will work on a Mac, a PC, my Nokia phone, any BT device that accepts that profile.

You can always design a very efficient solution to fit a very specific problem (like your RF mouse) - or you can design an entire comms layer that will work in Headsets, mice, keyboards, modems, phones, GPS devices, etc................

Let me try and make another analogy - if you are designing games you could either re-implement your own tweaked 3D system for each game, and get better performance - or you can use OpenGL and not have to engineer an entire 3D system for yourself - and save time and *lots* of money in testing, development, debugging, etc.... and your game is more easily ported.

[Weyland-Yutani]

MP3 player + GSM is a flop.

I'd rather have a good solid GSM and a good solid iPod rather than some bastardization between the two. I don't want to lose phone battery power because I was listening to music.

No, IMO this just doesn't jive.

cheers

W-Y

[Scandalous Ion Cannon]

Originally Posted by PacHead

So why not release a phone with no buttons on it ?

[Eug Wanker]

Originally Posted by CharlesS

This is kind of ridiculous. The RAZR has been out for a year and the rumor mill is pointing toward a new one being released soon. Of course some people are going to wait for the new one and thus won't be buying the current one. The current one is still a big seller.

Or do you think that when Power Mac sales diminish after a particular model has been out for about a year and there's an update imminent, that this means Apple is starting on its decline also?

Of course the new one will have better specs. Did you think that it would have worse specs or something? I don't get it. The new RAZR will have a megapixel camera, EDGE support, more memory, a flash card slot, and iTunes. I personally don't care about most of these things because I already have a digital camera and an iPod, and broadband access is too expensive for me on a phone (more memory is nice, though). These things help get sales, though, so it's all good.

I know it will have better specs than the previous model. I'm just not convinced it will have good specs that justify its price premium, besides its looks, compared to the competition.

BTW, the Power Mac wasn't really a good example at least until the quad came out. It had been gradually declining overall. I think the quad would provide a nice boost to Power Mac sales though, along with Aperture.

However, I don't consider a tarted up RAZR plus iTunes will slow the RAZR's decline much, if the RAZR continues to emphasize form over function, and if iTunes is still crippled.

Originally Posted by Weyland-Yutani

MP3 player + GSM is a flop.

I'd rather have a good solid GSM and a good solid iPod rather than some bastardization between the two. I don't want to lose phone battery power because I was listening to music.

No, IMO this just doesn't jive.

I wouldn't mind having both though.

[driven]

The two things that are showstoppers for me:

USB 1.1 (BIG showstopper)
No scrollwheel. (Then again, neither does the shuffle ... and that works ...)

The memory is ok ... I'd rather have more but it wouldn't stop me from buying it.

I *do* like the idea of listening to music that auto-mutes so I can talk when the phone rings. I think they have at least hit the target with this thing, but they missed the bulls eye.

[Scandalous Ion Cannon]

Originally Posted by driven

The two things that are showstoppers for me:

USB 1.1 (BIG showstopper)

Does that really matter with 100 songs though?

[driven]

Originally Posted by Scandalous Ion Cannon

Does that really matter with 100 songs though?

Yes.

I have a laptop with USB 1.1 only. Even copying a dozen or so (smaller) files to the USB key is quite irritating.

[CharlesS]

Originally Posted by Scandalous Ion Cannon

Fine, now how is Apple bluetooth mouse better than RF?

it isn't because bluetooth is a limited range power hog.

Because it doesn't waste one of your USB ports?

Because you can pull your laptop and Bluetooth mouse out of your laptop bag and start working, instead of also having to pull out a USB dongle and plug that in?

Because it reduces wear and tear on your USB ports by reducing the number of times you have to plug and unplug stuff in the ports?

I really don't see the point of a wireless mouse if you still have to plug something into a USB port.

Originally Posted by nredman

i have heard that the RAZR is a piece of crap...breaks easily

I've read that a few places on the Internet. I've also read from other places that the thing is a tank and can take being dropped countless times and survive. I suspect the truth lies somewhere in the middle. The thing is, though, I once met someone in real life who actually showed me one that she claimed she had dropped a billion times. The thing was pretty scratched up, but it worked. Frankly, I think that if you can't take proper care of your stuff and are subjecting things to that kind of abuse, you shouldn't be buying expensive electronics in the first place.

Originally Posted by Eug Wanker

I know it will have better specs than the previous model. I'm just not convinced it will have good specs that justify its price premium, besides its looks, compared to the competition.

Price premium? Maybe it had one once, but now you can get it for free after rebates.

[Eug Wanker]

I definitely don't think the RAZR is built like a tank. Then again, neither are Sony Ericsson phones.

[CharlesS]

Originally Posted by Eug Wanker

I definitely don't think the RAZR is built like a tank. Then again, neither are Sony Ericsson phones.

Yeah, as I said, I suspect the truth is somewhere in the middle. Thing is, I never trust Internet reviewers who comment on the destructibility or indestructibility of a device, because who knows what crap they did to it to get it to break. Some people really abuse their stuff, and then whine about how easy it was to break...

As for "form over function", well of course it's nice to have something that looks good - we all understand that, because this is an Apple board, after all. But what functionality do you want? I've been looking for a phone with these features:

- decent reception
- quad-band
- Bluetooth so I can sync my Address Book with the phone

Surprisingly, there don't seem to be that many phones out there with this combination. RAZR is one of them, and is probably what I'm going to get. The features I listed above are actual "phone" features that have to do with using the thing as a... phone! I couldn't care less about the camera, because even a 1.3 megapixel camera is going to be crap compared to the 4 megapixel Kodak that I already have, and I will not end up using it. iTunes isn't a big deal to me either, since I already have a 20 GB iPod that can store way more than 100 songs! And the iPod probably wouldn't even survive one drop on the floor, but I don't do that to my stuff!

[Scandalous Ion Cannon]

Originally Posted by CharlesS

Because it doesn't waste one of your USB ports?

Because you can pull your laptop and Bluetooth mouse out of your laptop bag and start working, instead of also having to pull out a USB dongle and plug that in?

Because it reduces wear and tear on your USB ports by reducing the number of times you have to plug and unplug stuff in the ports?

I really don't see the point of a wireless mouse if you still have to plug something into a USB port.

I heard Laptops come with a trackpad and you can use wired mice on them.

Never heard of anyone caring about wearing out USB ports.

Any reason apple couldn't use internal RF instead of bluetooth?

[Eug Wanker]

Originally Posted by CharlesS

Surprisingly, there don't seem to be that many phones out there with this combination. RAZR is one of them, and is probably what I'm going to get. The features I listed above are actual "phone" features that have to do with using the thing as a... phone! I couldn't care less about the camera, because even a 1.3 megapixel camera is going to be crap compared to the 4 megapixel Kodak that I already have, and I will not end up using it. iTunes isn't a big deal to me either, since I already have a 20 GB iPod that can store way more than 100 songs! And the iPod probably wouldn't even survive one drop on the floor, but I don't do that to my stuff!

I think the camera is more important than the music capabilities. And for mid to high end phones it seems I am not alone. Camera MP and quality are major selling point for these phones.

The current RAZR is not even a consideration for me, because of its lousy 640x480 camera. Hopefully, the next RAZR gets a 2 MP with reasonable quality (ie. SE K750i quality), but somehow I doubt it.

And I have an 8 MB dSLR too.

[Buckaroo]

Although I can not use iTunes, I am fairly happy with me Nokia 6230. I was able to install a 1gb memory card. I forgot what kind, but it works pretty good. I prefer Nokia anyhow. I was able to carry songs on my cell phone almost a year ago.

[ajprice]

One big factor of the ROKR being a flop is that it doesn't look much. If the thing was an iPod white/metal RAZR, PEBL or SLVR with iTunes in it, it would probably be flying off the shelves, as it is, it looks like an old brick of a phone, and nobody is interested.

[CharlesS]

Originally Posted by Scandalous Ion Cannon

I heard Laptops come with a trackpad

Some of us hate trackpads. After using one for too long, my index finger starts to get sore.

and you can use wired mice on them.

And the point is? I thought the discussion was Bluetooth vs. RF, not Bluetooth vs. wired.

Of course, if you are talking RF vs. wired, then I agree. RF offers very little benefit above wired since you have to plug it into the USB port anyway.

Never heard of anyone caring about wearing out USB ports.

When you have a laptop with USB ports that are dead and no way to replace them, causing you not to be able to hook anything up to it, it's really annoying.

Anyway, someone brought this up in an argument a while ago on these very forums. I was skeptical at first, but afterward I looked it up and he was right - USB ports are rated for a limited number of insertions. Apparently the best thing to do with USB is to keep either a hub or a USB extension cable permanently connected to your Mac's internal USB port, and only plug/unplug stuff from the hub/cable instead of the port itself, so if the port wears out it's easily replaceable. Of course, that only really works for desktops...

Anyway, not having to plug something in is the only benefit of a wireless mouse. RF mice offer no extra convenience over wired as you still have to plug something into the USB port, and they offer the added benefits over wired of having a battery that will run out, and costing more. In my opinion, RF mice are a waste of money.

Any reason apple couldn't use internal RF instead of bluetooth?

Bluetooth is a standard. Or maybe they should have a jillion different RF transceivers inside the laptop, one for Logitech, one for Microsoft, one for Kensington, one for Joe Mouse Maker, etc.?