Traveling without a laptop

Ever since I bought my first laptop well over a decade ago, I think that I've taken one on every trip with a few exceptions. With the rise of the iPad, no longer do all my trips necessitate me taking a laptop. In the last year, I've been on 2 trips with just my iPad, a Bluetooth keyboard (to make it easier for me to blog :-)), and a MiFi for connectivity. The first trip my wife forbid me from taking my laptop and I survived; the second trip which was last month I actually didn't want to travel with my laptop.

The iPad 2 has pretty much sealed the deal that I don't have to travel with a laptop on non-work trips. Now that I'm a salaried employee and actually get time off where people are bugging me, I don't feel compelled to fix bugs, write code, tweak a server, etc. Also the power of the iPad to edit videos makes it an ideal device to take on a vacation where I can take pictures and shoot video, then assemble a movie while still on vacation (the catch here is that our digital camera has to store the video in a format that the iPad can read when I put the SD card in the camera connection kit; I'll address this in another post).

The "limited" abilities of the iPad are a huge plus to me as there is no way that I can write code on it and I don't feel guilty about it. There is no doubt in my mind that on my next vacation, my laptop will be left at home.

Are we safer?

Every time I fly, which isn't all that often, I feel compelled to write something about the sorry state of the TSA. In the last 6 months, I've flown 3 times and on 2 of the legs, I was supposed to go through the full body scanners (in 1 case everyone had to go through), but opted out as I believe the government needs to be a bit more honest with the public on the safety of the devices by letting the FDA monitor them and by performing regular maintenance on them (they're used far more than any x-ray machine in a medical facility). While the officer explained the process, it was a complete waste of time.

This past trip, at the San Diego airport they were only putting select people through the full body scans, but for some reason that didn't speed things up. I arrived at the airport at 5:30 am for a 6:40 am flight, but by the time I made it through security at 6:10 am, everyone that wasn't stuck at security was already on the plane. The screening process is getting longer and longer and I don't think we're any better off than years ago. All the statistics say that air travel is safer than driving. Many experts say that we need to profile, but this would be considered discriminatory. It's easy for me to say we should do this as my physical characteristics wouldn't make me a candidate for profiling.

While in the Portland airport, I had dinner at a restaurant past security. I was given a knife for my meal. While the knife wasn't all that sharp, it was a piece of steel and as anyone that has watched a movie or TV show knows, pretty much any flat object can become a weapon.

We have spent far too much money on this ridiculousness that isn't making us safer and is wasting our time. To be comfortable, I'm going to have to arrive at the airport an extra half an hour early in case the TSA decides to frisk everyone; for this trip, it would have meant getting up at 4 am! Uggh!

Amazing advancement in digital video

Over the last few years, the advancements we've seen in digital video absolutely amazes me. Since I recently converted all my videos to a format that can be displayed on the iPad, I've been watching a bunch of video with my son as he loves watching videos of our dog. Using AirPlay on the iPad streaming to the Apple TV, we can watch the videos on our 37" TV.

As we watch the movies, I can clearly tell which camera we used to take the video. Some of the older video is just awful and is quite grainy like half of the videos we seen on the news from people's cellphones.

My first modern day digital camera that I bought in 2003 was an Olympus Digital Stylus 300 that shot 3 megapixel still pictures with no ability to shoot video. My next camera that I bought in 2005 was a Pentax Optio S5i that shot 5 megapixel still pictures and 320x240 video. Since the 320x240 video was pretty awful, I had a Panasonic Mini DV camera which shot video about 4 times the resolution of the Pentax (720x480). However, the Mini DV camera became a pain to carry and a second device just wasn't convenient. So when I saw the Flip that shot at 640x480, I bought one as I wanted to capture all the moments of my son's life (like any good parent). The Flip worked well and we took a lot of video, but like the Mini DV camera, carrying a second device basically proved to be the end of the Flip.

As I wanted better video, in 2009, I went with a Canon PowerShot SD960IS which takes 12 megapixel still images and 720p video. 720p is 4 times the resolution of the Flip and 16 times the resolution of the Pentax! This increase in resolution is amazing and makes a huge difference in the experience of watching video.

In just 8 years we've seen compact digital cameras go from having no capability to shoot video to overpassing standalone consumer video cameras. The consumer cameras we see today in some ways are better than commercial video cameras of just a few years ago.

Is there such a thing as too many features?

I recently bought a new Sony Cyber-Shot DSC-WX9 and after scouring the manual, I have to ask is there such a thing as too many features? The main feature I was looking for in a new compact digital camera was the ability to record videos in a format that the iPad could directly read.

The Sony has all the buzz words and more; it has image stabilization, 3D shooting, 1080i video recording, motion detection, background defocus, iSweep Panorama, backlight correction HDR, and something called Smile Shutter technology (which is actually quite cool where it takes a picture when it detects the subject smiling). I've figure out how to use a few of the features, but how am I going to remember to turn on a feature when I want to take a picture? I have no idea. Worse, I have to explain to my wife how to use it and use some cool features.

Does the average non-techie person figure out how to use 1/4 of the features of the devices? Should manufacturers reduce the number of features and make them easier to use? I doubt this will happen as features sell devices even if people don't use them.