Anybody else moved from Android over to the dark side ...?

randella

Sporky said:

I'm amazed people rate the Apple keyboards - have you lot never tried anything with proper mechanical microswitches?

Yep, have tried pretty much everything and the Apple keyboard with scrabble-tile keys is the best for my digits hands-down (see what I did there? ) 

crunchman

ICBM said:

shaunm said:

Can anyone advise.

ive been an iPhone user for years but as of now I'm able to upgrade. I've been looking at the Samsung 7 Edge as an upgrade. Yes, I know it's a big phone but my main issue is that I have spent hundreds on ITunes and i don't know if this is lost money if I move away from the apple brand.

 Does anyone know if this is right?

You should still own the purchases so you can re-download them onto any iTunes-compatible device, including a PC - but I don't know if that includes Android phones. Or if you can get them onto a computer, you should be able to then export them as mp3s (unless they're older DRM-protected ones) and transfer to the phone.

If not just get an iPhone 6 - or a Plus if you want a big one - quick, before they stop making a decent phone with a headphone jack.

It's a bit more hassle but it's best to get your music from elsewhere as MP3 format, not the Apple format.  You can still import that into iTunes on a computer and then sync with your phone/iPod but you can play them on anything and you aren't locked into any one format/device.

I know this advice is a bit late for you but hopefully anyone else reading the thread can make use of it.

stickyfiddle

I can't work mechanical keyboards. I mean, obviously I can physically press the keys, but if I'm coding or typing for several hours that extra keyboard effort gets really annoying. 

Though I'd take almost anything over the latest apple butterfly-action keyboard thing. Eurgh.

Sporky

randella said:

Sporky said:

I'm amazed people rate the Apple keyboards - have you lot never tried anything with proper mechanical microswitches?

Yep, have tried pretty much everything and the Apple keyboard with scrabble-tile keys is the best for my digits hands-down (see what I did there? ) 

Well all right then.

I don't know. Kids today, never know the joy of a 121dB SPL Cherry Click or IBM Model M clattering away, driving your colleagues/spouses/pets insane...

The latest update on my iPhone has screwed email up. Hotmail no longer syncs properly, and it's threaded all conversations making it really hard to read and even harder to delete individual messages out of a thread without losing the lot. And no undo. It's like the smartphone dark ages.

4114Effects

Sporky said:

randella said:

Sporky said:

I'm amazed people rate the Apple keyboards - have you lot never tried anything with proper mechanical microswitches?

Yep, have tried pretty much everything and the Apple keyboard with scrabble-tile keys is the best for my digits hands-down (see what I did there? ) 

Well all right then.

I don't know. Kids today, never know the joy of a 121dB SPL Cherry Click or IBM Model M clattering away, driving your colleagues/spouses/pets insane...

The latest update on my iPhone has screwed email up. Hotmail no longer syncs properly, and it's threaded all conversations making it really hard to read and even harder to delete individual messages out of a thread without losing the lot. And no undo. It's like the smartphone dark ages.

Still using Hotmail is the dark ages ... still updating your Myspace page and checking Bebo too?

ICBM

crunchman said:

It's a bit more hassle but it's best to get your music from elsewhere as MP3 format, not the Apple format.  You can still import that into iTunes on a computer and then sync with your phone/iPod but you can play them on anything and you aren't locked into any one format/device.

You can convert them very easily in iTunes - by selecting mp3 under 'import options' and then 'convert files' - I do with all my music, I use iTunes and only use mp3 exactly because it is not platform-specific. The only exceptions were some of the older Apple-format downloads which were DRM-protected… and there's even a way round that if you can be bothered, although not in iTunes.

Sporky

4114Effects said:

Still using Hotmail is the dark ages ... still updating your Myspace page and checking Bebo too?

Nah, I think I had a Myspace page because someone told me I should, but never updated it. I assume Bebo is some sort of pervert thing?

stickyfiddle

Sporky said:

randella said:

Sporky said:

I'm amazed people rate the Apple keyboards - have you lot never tried anything with proper mechanical microswitches?

Yep, have tried pretty much everything and the Apple keyboard with scrabble-tile keys is the best for my digits hands-down (see what I did there? ) 

Well all right then.

I don't know. Kids today, never know the joy of a 121dB SPL Cherry Click or IBM Model M clattering away, driving your colleagues/spouses/pets insane...

The latest update on my iPhone has screwed email up. Hotmail no longer syncs properly, and it's threaded all conversations making it really hard to read and even harder to delete individual messages out of a thread without losing the lot. And no undo. It's like the smartphone dark ages.

You can undo by shaking your phone. Don't ask what genius came up with that... 

And I think you can change the threading thing in settings. Somewhere....

crunchman

ICBM said:

crunchman said:

It's a bit more hassle but it's best to get your music from elsewhere as MP3 format, not the Apple format.  You can still import that into iTunes on a computer and then sync with your phone/iPod but you can play them on anything and you aren't locked into any one format/device.

You can convert them very easily in iTunes - by selecting mp3 under 'import options' and then 'convert files' - I do with all my music, I use iTunes and only use mp3 exactly because it is not platform-specific. The only exceptions were some of the older Apple-format downloads which were DRM-protected… and there's even a way round that if you can be bothered, although not in iTunes.

If you download the music from iTunes (rather than rip it) then you are getting it in a compressed format.  Wouldn't you lose even more quality by converting from one compressed format to another?

Sporky

stickyfiddle said:

You can undo by shaking your phone. Don't ask what genius came up with that... 

One who was very angry with their phone?

ICBM

crunchman said:

If you download the music from iTunes (rather than rip it) then you are getting it in a compressed format.  Wouldn't you lose even more quality by converting from one compressed format to another? 

Not sure - I've never noticed. I re-encode at 128kbps anyway, for iPod use, so I may not be able to tell anyway…

crunchman

ICBM said:

crunchman said:

If you download the music from iTunes (rather than rip it) then you are getting it in a compressed format.  Wouldn't you lose even more quality by converting from one compressed format to another? 

Not sure - I've never noticed. I re-encode at 128kbps anyway, for iPod use, so I may not be able to tell anyway…

I rip to 320kbps.  I can definitely hear a difference between that and 128kbps even on an MP3 player if I'm listening to it in the office where it's reasonably quiet.  I'm not sure that I could tell a difference between 192 and 320 though unless I plugged it into my HiFi but then I'll just listen to the CD.

ICBM

crunchman said:

I rip to 320kbps.  I can definitely hear a difference between that and 128kbps even on an MP3 player if I'm listening to it in the office where it's reasonably quiet.  I'm not sure that I could tell a difference between 192 and 320 though unless I plugged it into my HiFi but then I'll just listen to the CD.

Same here... that's why I don't bother with mp3s higher than 128k - they just take up more space, and for the way I listen to them - background through a large mono speaker in my workshop generally - there's no point in higher quality. I was happy enough with AM radio for many years! I can hear the difference between 128 and 320, but 320 doesn't have any real practical application for me. Never really tried listening at 192.

It would be interesting to see if you can hear the difference with a re-encode to mp3 at 320.

Sporky

I've found 160 to be about the sweet spot for me. At 128 cymbals are really splashy even in the car, at 160 that seems to go away.

crunchman

Sporky said:

I've found 160 to be about the sweet spot for me. At 128 cymbals are really splashy even in the car, at 160 that seems to go away.

For everyday use I think you are right. 160 or 192 is good.    Below that it's the cymbals that sound nasty.  I just figure that storage will get cheaper and cheaper so if I rip to the highest bit rate now I won't want to do it again a few years down the line.  I've still only used about half the space on my current MP3 player so the storage is not an issue for me.

ICBM

crunchman said:

For everyday use I think you are right. 160 or 192 is good.    Below that it's the cymbals that sound nasty.  I just figure that storage will get cheaper and cheaper so if I rip to the highest bit rate now I won't want to do it again a few years down the line.  I've still only used about half the space on my current MP3 player so the storage is not an issue for me.

The problem for me is that I have over 140GB of music even at 128kbps .

I had been thinking about an iPhone 7 when I saw it could be got with 256GB, but then I saw the price… and no headphone jack without using a crappy adaptor.

grungebob

DiscoStu said:

Like Sporky, I got a 6S with my job. It's nice to look at and the battery seemed pretty good but I just didn't like it.
We used Microsoft Office apps and OneNote and files from my laptop would constantly fail to sync to the iPhone, they gave me an iPad too and they simply refused to transfer to it. Effortless transfer to my Android handset though.
I lost the Apple stuff when I lost the job and I don't miss them.

Odd I use same stuff and it all works perfectly