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comment by WanderingEng
WanderingEng  ·  2571 days ago  ·  link  ·    ·  parent  ·  post: Pubski: April 5, 2017

Running: I ran my best half marathon on Saturday. 1:58:04, beating my previous best of 1:59:00. It was a totally flat course, and I actually feel better about the 1:59 run. But I feel good getting a run under my belt this year; I hadn't eaten a Gu since November. Next half is end of May, but I may do a 20k in early May.

Phones: My iPhone 5 is slowly dying. Does anyone have a phone they love? A coworker just got an LG G6 and likes it.





kleinbl00  ·  2571 days ago  ·  link  ·  

The Google Pixel is a great phone. I would say it's the best phone I've had since the iPhone 3G. And fortunately for me, T-Mobile will give you $325 in credits if you port one to their service, distributed over two years. Considering Google Fi felt so bad about the living hell they put me and my wife through that they refunded her 5X in full, we're at two Pixels for about $750.

user-inactivated  ·  2571 days ago  ·  link  ·  

    Does anyone have a phone they love?

I love my 5C. ^_^ My sister gave it to me as she switched to a newer one, and I couldn't be happier with this powerful and well-polished device.

Which is why it's such a shame to see yours wither away. What's happening to it?

WanderingEng  ·  2571 days ago  ·  link  ·  

The only actual problem is twice recently it started clicking all over the screen. It has warped slightly, probably because of the battery expanding with age, and I think it's putting some pressure on the screen. At 4.5 years old, it doesn't hold a charge as well as it once did.

So no major issues, just smaller things adding up.

kleinbl00  ·  2571 days ago  ·  link  ·  

In my experience with iPhones (had everything from the 3G to the 5), once they start going a little, they're gonna go a lot real soon.

WanderingEng  ·  2571 days ago  ·  link  ·  

I can believe it. My 3GS was solid for three years, and in the last six months the battery would last 12 hours with no use or less than 8 with use. Given this phone is over 4.5 years old and has been charged probably 2000 times and has been in some harsh conditions (but not severely dropped), it has held up well. No phone out there feels perfect, but it's time to compromise on something good enough.

And between loss of the headphone jack and the clear superiority of Plex over iTunes for managing and adding music to my devices, I no longer see a need to stick with Apple. Rather, I see benefits to moving away from their ecosystem.

kleinbl00  ·  2571 days ago  ·  link  ·  

A caution about Plex - it is dogshit on mobile. As in, won't play a song all the way through. As in, stops randomly. You can try and jog with it but it won't last a mile. It's amazing.

And Plex does not store your files anywhere you can get to it without jailbreaking your phone. And once you find those files, they are assigned garbage hash-speak filenames. So even if you wanted to do something like sync via Plex and playback via Doubletwist or something? yeah no. not so much.

I achieved an uneasy peace with Google Music because T-mobile doesn't hit me for streaming that so I play whatever i want. Often, it fails to find the song on the first, second, third, fourth, fifth or sixth time but once you've pounded it a few times, it comes around. However, when I switched to Fi I found myself pretty much fucked unless I was willing to eat the data from running.

I have griped to Plex about this, as have many others. For a company that really wants you to believe they're serious about music, they're stunningly unserious about music. I mean, how hard is it to, you know, play a fucking MP3 file?

cgod  ·  2570 days ago  ·  link  ·  

I just started a free trial of Google Music, liking it all right so far. I've vowed to become aware of what going on with pop music and it seems like Google Music will deliver. I haven't kept up with pop in about 15 years.

kleinbl00  ·  2570 days ago  ·  link  ·  

Shit, son, I don't pay for it I let it upload my iTunes and stream it for free.

I've found that of my friends who pay for it, they generally have like one album of all my eclectic shit.

But then, I have zero interest in pop music. I don't have to. God speed.

cgod  ·  2570 days ago  ·  link  ·  

The pop thing is an experiment. I'm severely disassociated from popular culture, I've watched one episode of one show so far this year, i haven't gone to a movie yet this year, I don't follow any professional sports and I just listened to Drake for the first time in my life this week.

Podcast are pretty much the only hook pop culture has in me.

I'm not going to watch shows and I'm sure as shit not watching grown men get paid millions to play kid games. I feel weird about how little involved I am in today's culture. I've been developing an unhealthy animosity for the American way of life and value system for years now. I need to reconnect somewhere and music is that which I most dearly love after people. Maybe I'll come out of it more of a hater than ever.

WanderingEng  ·  2571 days ago  ·  link  ·  

Plex has worked mostly seamlessly for me on my iPhone. I listen to synced music all the time at work and in my car, but only from Apple devices (work iPhone 6 and my five year old iPad). It's definitely concerning if you're having issues with it on Android. At home I'm to the point of streaming Plex rather than using iTunes, even though the music is local as well.

Maybe I'll hold off on upgrading from a monthly Plex plan until I know it works for my future phone.

kleinbl00  ·  2570 days ago  ·  link  ·  

Yeah it's pure crap on Android. Controls things just great. Streams just great. But localized media? Yeah, sucks.