travel

New Toy

Upon my return from the city that never sleeps, I came to the realization that I had two major problems I needed to solve quickly. First, my trusty Motorola RAZR had serious battery issues, which resulted in less than five minutes of talk time and an hour of standby. I should note that I have absolutely nothing against the phone. It's the best I've ever owned. I believe it was simply in need of a new battery. Second, I had an access problem. Whilst in New York, I was without network access for 8 or more hours per day. Unfortunately, this is not an option in today's business environment. This also isn't an isolated issue. All of my clients are Fortune 500 companies. They all take security seriously. This means no wired or wireless access when visiting them. Being the "kill two birds with one stone" kind of a guy that I am, I set out to find a solution to my quasi-related problems.

I knew such a device existed that could give me "anywhere access" and more than 5 minutes of talk time. I also knew that I would almost assuredly stick with my current provider, T-Mobile. I surveyed the current offerings from T-Mobile and found I had a couple options. I could go with one of the ever popular Blackberry devices or, take a chance on a device I had previously not heard of; the T-Mobile MDA.

Two things instantly drew me to the MDA. First, the device can slide open to reveal the keyboard. I've never liked the Treo or Blackberry because of the keyboards. Yes, I do realize that there is a Blackberry that only has a numbered keypad but, then, how do you type messages with it? Sort of defeats the purpose in my mind. Second, the MDA runs Windows Mobile 5. Our salesforce uses Treos and I've seen their struggles with Outlook integration and synchronization. I know there are far fewer issues with Windows Mobile devices. So off to my local T-Mobile store I went. A few hours later, I was the proud owner of a T-Mobile MDA.

Having owned the phone for about a week now, I can say that it's quickly in its way to supplanting my beloved RAZR as the "best phone I've ever owned". It syncs up with Outlook just beautifully, has Bluetooth, IR and WiFi connectivity options, has great call quality and decent battery life. Combined with T-Mobile's Total Internet service, I have high-speed network access via their EDGE network almost anywhere I go. I can even share the connectivity with my laptop via Bluetooth. Using the qwerty keyboard, I can send emails quickly from anywhere. I have, indeed, killed both birds with one stone.

The phone is certainly not without its flaws, however. My biggest gripe is the lack of a numeric keypad. Of course, I can't really gripe about this. I knew this would be the case going in. It's a small price to pay for all of the features and benefits I've gained by moving to this device. All in all, I'm very pleased with my decision. I reccomend mobile business users who aren't sold on a Blackberry or Treo, for the same reasons I was, to give a Windows Mobile device like the MDA a try.

Tags: T-Mobile MDA, MDA, RAZR, Motorola, Motorola RAZR, Blackberry, RIM, Treo, Palm, Palm Treo, New York, Bluetooth, EDGE, Outlook. Windows Mobile, Bryan Bartow, spudnik187

The Big Apple

I was alerted Friday afternoon that I would be making a trip to New York city on Sunday. This is the first time I've been here during the summer months and, I must say, it's much nicer during August than it is January or February. The weather has been tolerable during the day and incredible during the evening, with temperatures around 70 degrees. I'm amazed that a city with infrastructure of such size can operate so efficiently. It's really quite amazing. People all over the place all of the time, yet they're always moving quickly and with a purpose. It really is incredible to experience.

Road Weary

It's been over a week since I've posted. I've been in beautiful San Jose, California on business. I managed to write a quasi-thorough review of Microsoft Word 2007 Beta 2 whilst traveling. I'll post it shortly and hope to have a screen cast of the review up tonight or tomorrow.

While the weather in San Jose was awesome, my wireless internet experience was not. I'm shocked that I can go to one of the most wired cities in the world and stay at a hotel where I don't have access to wireless internet. I'm not going to rat out the offending hotel (well known, upscale chain), but I was disappointed to have to string an ethernet cable around the room to get access. And don't get me started on the $10 a day price, either. Makes me wish I could afford one of these.

Tags: travel, San Jose, California, wireless, Microsoft, Microsoft Word, Bryan Bartow, spudnik187

Traveling…

I'm writing this from a Starbucks in San Jose, California. I must say I can see why people love to live here. The weather is beautiful, and that might be an understatement. Of course, the cost of living would be tough do deal with, which might also be an understatement. The high temperature today in San Jose is expected to be 74 degrees whereas it will probably reach 95 degrees in Austin. I just wish I could bring some of this weather back home.

The wonders of air travel

It's amazing to think that I had meetings in 3 different states in the same day. Commercial air travel is a true marvel (or, at least, it is to me). If only I could get internet access while in the air. I've heard Boeing was working on it, but I have yet to see anything come to fruition. It boggles my mind to think that thousands of flights are managed 24x7x365 with almost never any problems. If any virtual team of people gets things done, it's air traffic controllers.