geeky goodness

So this afternoon my iPod died. :(

I don't know what happened. I had just downloaded some new tunes, went to hook up my iPod to sync it, and the screen suddenly went dark and I have been unable to get a response since. It is at least 3 years old, possibly 4, (I can't quite remember which Christmas it was I got it) but I'm thinking it's long past its warranty and probs not even worth fixing at this point since it's so old. Curse you planned obsolescence and curse you Moore's law!

So now I have to go iPod shopping and I need some advice. What should I get to replace my iPod? Should I get another classic iPod? The truth is, I barely used a quarter of my old iPod's capacity. I am a music lover, but not a music geek, and I never used it for movies or tv shows... although I could have. And I might use it in the future for audiobooks, so maybe I would have eventually used all that extra capacity. And is there a fabulous alternative to the iPod that I'm not aware of? I've heard some good things about Zune, but does that work with iTunes? Bleh. Anyway, that's something I gotta do now. Another unexpected expense. Heh heh. Good thing I'm getting a raise.

And now onto some geeky goodness that didn't cost me a dime... DOSBox. I got a new laptop just under a year ago. It has Windows 7 on it. And it would not play any of my favourite DOS games like Crystal Caves, Commander Keen, Duke Nukem, etc, games which still played on Windows XP. And I was so sad. But then I thought, surely I'm not the only person stuck in the early 90s. And sure enough, I found DOSBox. It took just a few minutes to download and install, it was free, and now I can play all my games on my new computer. It basically creates a DOS interface, so it would work best if, like me, you were already somewhat familiar with general DOS commands (you basically need to know how to change and view directories, they give instructions for the rest, and you're golden!). I just spent the evening playing Commander Keen 5, complete with full music and sound effects, which did not play even in Windows XP, and I hadn't been able to play that game with the sound since our old 386 kicked the bucket. Now all I need to do is install NES and SNES and I'll be in time warp gaming bliss.