Am I An Apple Genius?
June 24, 2008 by Jason Bean
Filed under Computers
Yesterday I was on the north side of Indianapolis so I took advantage of the moment and stopped by the Genius Bar at the Apple Store here. I’ve been having problems with my iPod synching and someone said I should take it up there and see if they can revive it.
First I’ve got to say that the process for setting up and confirming an appointment with one of the Apple Geniuses is very user-friendly on the Apple website. The only challenge is finding the page to do it quickly. I’d be promoting that little sucker if I was Mr. Jobs.
Everything went without a hitch. Showed up at my scheduled time. The Genius looked at my iPod and tried to get it to synch on their system. To make a short story twitter sized, he didn’t tell me anything I didn’t already know. It’s broke.
Does that make me a Genius?
Hmmm, wonder if they’re accepting applications. They tried to sell me a new iPod, which would actually be cheaper than fixing mine. That’s a good idea because I am actually interested in purchasing a classic 160GB model. I don’t want to run out of room anymore and it would be nice to literally carry everything with me.
However, since I blog about Microsoft, I’ve really been debating on getting a Zune instead to try it out. The one big caveat is whether or not there’s anyway to hook up my Zune to my car stereo that I’ve already got wired with an iPod adapter. Does Zune have anything like that? Can I use the same wire with an adapter? Is it more of a question on if the Sony stereo recognizes the Zune? Probably the latter.
Jason,
It shouldn’t be too hard to hook your Zune up to your car stereo. The cables required for such an operation are less than $20, but it might run you a pretty penny for a professional install unless you can do it yourself. The cables can be found here: http://tinyurl.com/5k5j92
If you’re cool with simply broadcasting the Zune signal over FM and using the car’s FM tuner to pick it up – check out the official Zune Car pack here: http://tinyurl.com/5kghbn
My preference? Go buy yourself an in-dash multi-media behemoth like the JVC KD-NX5000. That sick puppy has a 40GB internal hard drive, built in Navigation with Live Traffic, DVD, CD, Mp3 playback, and optional SAT-RAD, blue-tooth, and iPod adapters.
It’s under $700 here: http://tinyurl.com/68v366
and you can probably get it installed for just under $1k.It’s not ideal for everyone, but I’m pretty much only listening to music if I’m in my car or in front of a computer at work, so I’m a total fan of simply using the internal hard drive for songs.
My Sony stereo (CDX-GT320) is iPod cable ready and has an aux input which I could use easily. So that would be free. For your behemoth and install we’re looking at about what I paid for the car itself. I drive a ‘96 Toyota Camry and proud to say it’s got almost 227,000 miles on it.
Good deal! Ride that bad boy into the ground! And it sounds like the cable’s are a perfect option for you!
I also forgot to mention that I have an 1:30+ commute each way, each day… hence my inherent desire to make my car ever more tolerable.
And for some unsolicited financial advice: make a $200-$300 car payment to yourself (put it in a separate savings account) for as long as you’re ridin dirty with no car payment. In about a year you’ll either be able to buy a shiny 97 Corolla, or make a decent down payment on an upgrade. You’ll also be used to the payment, so that if you have one, it’s not so sudden.
I’d love to pay myself the “car payment” but it’s going to pay for other bills first. Thanks for the input and stopping by the blog.
So… “Apple Genius” = “Guy who can upsell customer on new Apple Merchandise”.
And people wonder why they’re so profitable!
“They tried to sell me a new iPod, which would actually be cheaper than fixing mine.”
A great example of how the Genius Bar is a scam. Instead of taking the time to fix it, the suggest you buy another iPod, because they claim that it would “be cheaper” than fixing one.
What a waste of a product. If iPods are meant to be that disposable, then I say it’s time to buy another PMP. I got a Zune, and don’t have any of these issues or had to buy a whole new one.
So much for Apple being “green”. If being green, is selling pretty, disposable products, then that’s just sad.
Sorry for the rant, but I hate Apple’s policy.
Funny you didn’t tell us what was wrong with the iPod. There are plenty of other establishments that fix them, at reasonable prices. Buy a Zune & go down with that ship when it happens. From the comments on this site, I think I have just witnesses A MS waterboy circle jerk. A common & annoying event that happens all to often on the web.
A “MS waterboy circle jerk” what the heck is that? Can there not be Microsoft product fans just like Apple? That wouldn’t be possible would it? I did provide a link back to the error I was getting in my original post. I realize there are potential other fixes, I just think it would be nice for the manufacturer to be able to provide the fix and advise about other options to keep their customers happy and pleased.
Mate. Lets be honest, Apple is for dumb people who are computer illiterate. I mean I would call people who use Linux as genius but not the same case for microsoft users. I would at a level think.
Linux – Genius
Microsoft – Normal
Apple – Dumb
Get a Zune! I’ve never seen one in the wild.