Zune Tips Weblog

This is totally off the topic of Zunes, but it’s a slow day and I thought you might find it amusing (or even informative!).

Up until a few years ago, I really never traveled very much for my job. I probably flew on a plane a total of 6 times over a 15 year period. With my latest job, I actually travel quite a bit visiting customers throughout the USA helping them with issues and problems. After the first 6 months working for my current employer, I was on a flight to Sacramento, CA and I noticed during check in that I was upgraded to a first class seat. I asked the person at the ticket counter about this, and she said I was automatically upgraded because I was a Silver-Elite Frequent Flyer and they had an empty seat available in First Class. What a pleasant surprise, since I didn’t know I had traveled enough that year to have earned such a privilege, and it would be the first time I’d ever flown first class.

First off I get to board early with the other first class passengers, and my seat is huge and roomy. There’s two of us seated where normally there are three (in coach class), and my legs aren’t crammed up against the seat in front of me. As the other passengers are boarding, the special flight attendant designated for first class says to me, “my name is Danielle, and I will be attending you during the flight. How should I address you?”. Huh? I thought. I responded with, “… I guess you can call me Dave”, but later I thought I should have said, “you can call me Master-of-the-Universe!”. She then asked if I wanted anything to drink, which I responded, “a cup of coffee would be nice”. Quickly she handed me a steaming cup of coffee (in a ceramic mug) and then began to attend to the other first class passengers. Read the rest of this entry »

Since getting my Zune 80 as a Christmas present, I’ve been on the lookout for other Zuners. Living in the Seattle area, you would think my chances are pretty high in seeing another Zune owner since Microsoft is nearby, Seattle is a high tech area, the University of Washington is here, etc. However, I haven’t come across one person with a Zune. Lots of iPod owners, but no Zuners…. until yesterday.

I was in Bremerton, WA waiting for my ferry ride back to Seattle, and I saw two guys comparing their Zunes in the local Starbucks. They were both shocked to find the other holding a Zune, and talked briefly about their particular models (both has the Zune 30). I was going to say something, but I was stuck in line ordering my drink. So there you have it– there are other Zunes in the wild!

Most likely, I would think that people keep their Zunes in their coat pocket and thus they aren’t so visible. Also, they could be well concealed in leather cases and pouches. In any case, it’s good to see a few other people using their Zunes in the Seattle area.

Sorry for the lack of postings recently, as I’ve been away on business travel. I was actually looking forward to my most recent trip, as I was planning to make use of my new Zune 80 for the plane flight. Normally, I would fly Alaska Airlines or Northwest Airlines for my trips, but this time it made more sense for me to fly Delta Airlines to my destination. As this was my first time with Delta, I wasn’t sure what to expect for the flight. I was pleasantly surprised to find my outbound and inbound flights were on a Boeing wide-body aircraft (very roomy), and each seat had a personal entertainment system in the headrest. I was able to watch various satellite TV shows and play a few trivia games during the flight, and because of this I never made use of my Zune 80 for entertainment. My business meetings all week ran very late, so I didn’t have an opportunity to even use my Zune after hours to watch a movie or video podcast. So as a result, I never took my Zune out of it’s travel case!

I also was trying to be more observant of others around me who were using a Zune device, but I didn’t come across any other Zuners. Lots of people using iPods and other media players on the plane, in the airport, and on the subway trains, but nobody with a Zune. So to date I still haven’t come across another Zuner. Never fear, I do have two more trips coming up where I might come across a Zune owner in my travels.

Here’s something that I came across at ZuneBoards.com called zNav, which is an application that generates jpg images of maps and directions. The zNav help page states: zNav is a utility program that uses Yahoo maps to build driving directions in an image format compatible with the Microsoft Zune. Additionally, you can do a business search for a location and create an image with the business name, address, phone number, and map. For any business found, you can get driving directions to or from that location.

Since the only type of “file” you can sync to your Zune are picture images, this utility generates jpg image files with the desired information. Nice if you carry your Zune with you frequently and want such mapping information handy. Since I have a Motorola-Q Smartphone (with online mapping capability) which I carry with me always, I probably wouldn’t use this application. Nevertheless, an innovative tool for storing non-entertainment media on your Zune.

… as goes the Capital One Commercial slogan. I’m just curious how much “stuff” people take with them when on travel. When I travel to a different city for a business trip, I really try to minimize how much stuff I bring with me. I use to take extra clothes just in case I get something dirty or have to stay an extra day. Of course, that never happens so I stopped doing that. I also brought two pairs of shoes (black and brown) if I stayed more than 3 days, but I stopped doing that also to travel lighter.

Now what I do before a trip is dump everything out of my carry-on shoulder bag and just bring these essentials: Read the rest of this entry »

Here’s something that I came across from the US Dept of Transportation regarding lithium batteries on airline flights. Starting Jan 1st, 2008 you can’t pack lithium batteries in your checked baggage. You can, however, carry lithium batteries on the plane in your unchecked bag. So if you plan to bring extra lithium batteries for your laptop, cell phone, or Pocket PC device you’ll need to carry it on the plane and not have it in checked baggage. I guess not having a replaceable battery for your Zune is a good thing in this case.

I normally carry an extra battery for my laptop and smartphone when I travel, but I keep them in my carry-on bag. It’s strange that you can’t have such batteries in checked bags but it’s ok for carry-ons. I guess the DOT is worried about batteries exploding or something, which obviously could happen in your carry-on bag as well. I wonder how many people know about this new rule?