Students Get iPods as Study Aids

WIAKywbfatw writes "Georgia College & State University in Milledgeville, Georgia has given iPod digital music players to its students to help them with their coursework, as reported by BBC News. Apple donated about 50 iPods as part of an experimental project to illustrate creative uses for the machine, and University professors say the gadgets have helped the students think more critically about their Gothic Imagination course." I wonder if I can write off my new iPod as an education expense.

Creative uses?

[Drakonian]

I'm not seeing it.... unless they mean installing Linux. [sourceforge.net]

Re:Can they record?

[Dylan Zimmerman]

iPod's can't record, but if you really want something that does, then get a Sony Mini-disk player/recorder. They aren't that expensive and the disks hold quite a bit of audio.

Now, I wonder if the iPod's remote buttons are separate from the internal buttons from the iPod's point of view. If they are, then it should be possible to mod your remote and make it into a microphone that you could use with either hacked iPod software (yeah, right) or the Linux on iPod project. Just write a program that interprets the 'next' button on the remote as microphone data.

Re:Gothic Imagination course?

[Zathrus]

I was never into Gothic music, but my wife is (as evidenced by her collection of Bauhaus, SoM, and others).

For those actually interested:

http://www.faculty.de.gcsu.edu/~rviau/GothicIm.h tm l

Re:Can they record?

[JebusIsLord]

The creative nomad jukebox 3 can. you need an external mic though. this is why i bought one of those instead of an ipod, even though the ipods are admittedly sexier.

Re:Can they record?

[dadragon]

It'd be excellent for bootlegging live shows if they made a model that could record, although isn't it impossible to copy MP3s off an iPod?

No. The files just can't be seen from the Mac finder. They are stored in directories name .{something}, so they also don't show up without using ls -a.

All you have to do to get songs off the iPod is type:
find . -name "*.mp3" -exec cp {} /some_dir \;

and that will copy all the songs from the iPod to /some_dir

Re:Can they record?

[Herg]

The Archos Recorder [archos.com] is another MP3 player that has a recording function. It has a built-in mic, about 10 hours uptime per charge, and the 20GB model can be had for less than $250.

The interface to a PC is simply a USB HDD, so it can be used with just about any OS, unlike the iPod.

It doesn't run Linux, but there is an open-source replacement firmware available, Rockbox [rockbox.haxx.se].

Re:They don't say...

[EyesWideOpen]

While they don't say that they were given 5GB iPods, they do say they 'were given 5GB of music on their iPods' so it sounds like they probably got the phased-out models.

Re:Can they record?

[tmark]

If you want to record, get yourself a digital voice recorder. There's plenty of models out there, including ones by Sony and Olympus, and some of the come bundled with Dragon or ViaVoice dictation software.

Advantages (vs typical MP3 recorders):
- You're not limited by the memory of your little MP3 recorder as you can (at least with Sony models) just pop in a new memory stick.
- most models have VOR capabilities so you only record when there's *something* to record. I would guess most MP3 recorders, since they're designed to record music, won't have this.
- most models allow you to set the mic sensitivity which widens the range of environments the thing will be useful in.
- many models allow you to do things you probably can't do with an MP3 recorder (like split tracks in half, or timestamp files).
- you don't need an external mic (though you can use one if you want). Having to tote an external mic to record *sucks*.
- you don't need external headphones since they have built-in speakers. I can't imagine most MP3 recorders have a built-in speaker.
- they record in mono which is all you need for capturing lectures.

If typical MP3 recorders did all of the above, I'd have bought one instead of my digital voice recorder. I just wish the model I bought could record to MP3. But the digital voice recorder is *designed* to capture voice, so all the right design decisions are there.

Recording on Gen 2

[RedX]

Don't be so sure that you can't record on the new Gen 2 iPod as a LINEIN setting [ipoding.com] has been discovered in Diagnostic Mode.

Nope.

[dasmegabyte]

The government is very explicit with educational expenses you can itemize. Books are not included and neither are mandatory fees...just tuition -- UNLESS it's directly related to your CURRENT career. So if i take linguistics (future career) classes, i can only write off the tuition for that classes' credits, and with calc classes (current career) I can write off pretty much everything. However, you might be able to write it off as a development tool; i am. The general rule is items used 80% (i think) of the time for work can be written off. My iPod has my current codebase and tasklist on it 100% of the time. So you know, there's $500.

Of course, the problem is getting the auditor to believe that.

Re:Write it off as a portable backup device

[bigmouth_strikes]

I doubt that would fly with most accounting departments.

"But listen, I'm first and foremost using the DV Camcorder as a backup device!"

Re:Can they record?

[blixel]

even though the ipods are admittedly sexier.

I have to admit I chose form over function when I bought my MP3 player, which was the iPod. I spent days reading reviews on cnet.com and a few other sources, compared prices, features, even created a spread sheet of my own so I could compare them quickly at a glance. In the end I decided the iPod just wasn't worth the money vs. the features it had. But I bought one anyway because of the size and sleek design.

Now that I own it, I can't say I'm sorry about my choice either. I'm happy with the product. My only regret is that I didn't wait another 2 months for the new iPods to come out because I think they are quite an improvement. The only bad thing about the new iPod is that they sacrificed battery life for size. The new iPod has a smaller battery and thus wont last as long between recharges. That aside, the even smaller design of the new one combined with some new features made me break down and buy the new one as well. I was dissapointed to see that Apple didn't include an FM tuner. That would be my personal first choice for a new feature to be added. I would also like to see voice recording, FM recording, line in/out on the device itself with the ability to RIP MP3's directly from a stereo without using a computer, more dumb little games, an FM Transmitter, and probably a few other things I'm forgetting. But to put all that stuff in the player would probably make it much larger and wouldn't be worth it to many people who need the ultra slim design of the iPod.

Re:Can they record? HERE'S HOW!

[glowurm]

Details of recording process [ipoding.com]

Seems somewhat primitive at this point, but has possibilities!

Yes, they can record

[Fred IV]

The new iPods can record, but the feature is hidden away in the diagnostic menu...


Linkage:
Diagnostic mode with mention of line-in recording [ipoding.com]
Mono recording short clips with diagnostic mode and earbuds [ipoding.com]

Maybe something Apple has planned for the next software update?

And I'm right up the road

[Sabalon]

I live about 40 miles from GC&SU. I know the head of IT there (though he probably doesn't have much to do with this, he is the chair of the statewide IT committee and is very on top of things) and I have to read about this on the BBC's site?

GC&SU is a nice campus - kinda out in nowhere, the campus (mostly old buildings) makes up a lot of the town. They have wireless all over the campus and purposly spills over into surrounding student hot-spots. I think they even have a point-to-point wireless link to the downtown to provide access to students while there.

Nice cafeteria too :)