Toy Stories

By Frank Greenhalgh

My mother used to say, "Men are only Boys grown tall. They're just children after all." Popular sayings generally found on little plaques in boutiques and gift shops (and eventually in dens and boats) proclaim: "The only difference between men and boys, is the price of their toys" and of course there is "He who has the most toys wins."

Well I must confess to be one of those "Boys" who now can qualify as a man (by the price of my toys). I have gone through life constantly looking for new toys and discarding the old ones. There's loads of stuff from past hobbies that just keep collecting dust as I search for my next toy. It gets harder and harder. Part of the reason is due to the fact that I no longer have the time I used to have to devote on any hobby. That limits the toy selection to something less time consuming. I would like to report on some of the toys I have discovered over the last year.

Hear This not That
The best toy I found was by accident. I didn't even know it existed, but then fate stepped in. I have a lot of headphones, professional ones that I use in my recording studio, communication types for ham sets. I even have a headset with an Infrared receiver built in so that I can watch TV while my wife sleeps. I thought I had done the headphone trip totally. Then it happened; I had to fly to Tokyo from New York. Using American Air frequent flier miles I was able to upgrade into first class. A first class seat on two fourteen-hour flights is easily worth 50,000 miles I thought. In addition to a seat that was made for people my size and age came first class service and food, and a marvelous pair of headphones. Noise canceling headphones. I had never even heard of "Noise canceling headphones" but there they were. You put them on your head and you heard the noise of the aircraft engines. Next you turn on the noise cancellation and the aircraft noise drops into the background. You can sleep, watch the movie, or listen to the audio tracks provided on the in-flight, without the ambient sound disrupting your attention. For the first time I found myself watching a movie in flight and actually enjoying it. I left them on with no input when I slept just to reduce the sound!

When Christmas came and my wife asked what I wanted for Christmas I thought of the headphones, but had no idea where they were sold. "Perhaps only in Japan", I thought. I went on line to Amazon.com and looked at the gift selection for the "Man who has everything". There they were "Sony Noise Canceling Headphones."

On Christmas Eve I sat with a fan turned on pretending it was creating jet noise while I turned the noise-canceling feature on and off to verify that it worked. "What a toy" I thought. "Can't use it unless you're in an airplane." Fortunately, I do fly a lot and have learned to love my headphones. If you need a toy and you fly a lot check it out.

Short Lived Toy
Business cards are wonderful. But what do you do with them? After a sales trip I would generally just add them to a pile of cards with a rubber band around them. Eventually the piles of cards increased to the point where it was becoming difficult to find a card when you needed a phone number or address. Then came "Card Scan". Card scan consists of a small scanner designed to scan business cards, and software that takes the scanned results and puts it into the various designated cubbies such as Name, Title, Company, Address, Phone Number, Fax Number etc. The software works surprisingly well and although it does make mistakes it allows easy editing. I bought Card Scan. It connects through the serial port and operates quite smoothly. You insert a card into the scanner the software reads it and stores it. Within a few sessions I had scanned the approximately 300 business cards I had into my computer. What fun. No typing, no tabbing from field to field. Great toy, useful too. After scanning all the cards you can then "synchronize" the results into your own PIM (Personal Information Manager) such as Day Timer, Outlook, Contact etc. What fun. I now had taken three hundred names and addresses and exported them into my PIM and my Palm Pilot. I was done. So was Card Scan. I unplugged it from the computer and put it on the shelf. It has stayed there for the last six months. I still get cards but not enough to warrant setting the whole thing up again and reading them. Maybe this summer I might use it again. Very short lived toy.

Palm This
My first PIM was a Sharp OZ7000. I bought it back in 1990. It was for the period, a very advanced hand held information manager. I neatly entered all my names, addresses and phone numbers in this "State of the Art" machine with 32K of memory. A few years later I was able to transfer, via a digital port, all the information to the next generation Sharp Electronic Organizer (YO610) which now had 128K of memory. The new machine had advanced in many ways. The most important feature was that the keyboard became a QWERTY keyboard and not an alphabetical one. Much easier to input if you can type a little. The only problem was that by now I had added a PIM (Daytimer) to my computer and had two sets of data. If only I could have the data synchronized.

Then I met people who were raving about their "Palm Pilots". A PIM that allows instant synchronization with your computer's PIM and has a unique data entry system. I bought one. I also had to buy software (Intellesynch, not included) to perform the synchronization function. The Palm Pilot turned out to be a dud compared to the Sharp machine. First the display on the Palm Pilot was very hard to read even when the back-lighting was on. The font sizes were too small. Second the data entry using a plastic stick and a script to represent various letters and numbers was Neanderthal. Third was the battery life. This modern PIM uses two AAA batteries that last about a month or two before they must be replaced. My Sharp would run for about two or more years before it indicated it was time to change the batteries. To add to the list is the Palm Software. If it is installed after the Card Scan software, it takes over the serial port and must be uninstalled if Card Scan or another device wishes to communicate through it.

I carry both my Palm Pilot and my Sharp with me now. I wish I could synchronize the Sharp and update it. If I could I would throw the Palm Pilot in the garbage can. Needless to say I consider the Palm Pilot one of the biggest frauds around. Still I notice that it is very popular. Is this because its users never had anything else before they bought a Palm Pilot? Am I missing something?

Summary
Toy buying was less than satisfying over the last year. I find that the Sony Noise Canceling Headphones are great. I also have found that my family loves them. My wife watches the movies with them when we travel. My grandson can use them with the computer to play his software on the plane, and I can astonish my fellow passenger by showing him or her how different it is to listen to in flight audio with this headset.

The Card Scan accomplished what it claimed it could. Now I have an additional three hundred names in my files which I really only require about twenty. I also must remove the Palm Software and reinstall it every time I use the Card Scan.

Finally the Palm Pilot is a constant irritation. Battery replacement data entry and the display are not up to today's standards. Why this machine is so popular I will never know. After forking out over $300 for it I don't even have the courage to see if there are other Palm type things which overcome these problems. I synchronize my Daytimer in my portable with my main computer and use that as my PIM.

What toys do you like? Let me know.

He co-founded CEAG Electric Corporation (now ABB CEAG) and developed the first mainframe power system using the droop paralleling concept. He has written numerous articles and columns, presented papers at the milestone PowerCon convention and consulted for ABB CEAG and other companies. Recently his accomplishments include the development of two Web sites, www.fgl.com with the Power Corner and www.amityville.com. Frank is presently functioning as "Director of Technical Sales" for Toritsu Tsushin Kogoyo Corp.