I’ve been running now for a couple of times with Nike Plus so it’s a time for a proper review. For those who are not familiar with the product, Nike+ or Nike Plus or NikePlus is a training gadget which you insert to your shoe and your ipod. It records your run, the speed, distance, calories and finally sends all the data to the web.
Thinking about all the other training devices I’ve used or seen, this one is definitely the easiest and most comfortable to use. If you’re familiar with other Apple designed products this should be no surprise. The user interface is just nice and very intuitive and the Nike Plus web site makes you addicted with everything it offers.
Nike Plus works only with iPod Nano (any generation model) and as far as I know, there is no hack for that. You can use several sensors in one iPod – a thing which neither Nike nor Apple mentions on their website. We are currently having two sensors and one iPod at home and it works without problems.
Nike Plus sensor is supposed to be put into your Nike Plus shoe. There’s a hole for the sensor inside the shoe in which the sensor fits perfectly. I had no interest buying a pair of new shoes for nerdy running and after some googling it appeared to me I wouldn’t need to: you can put the sensor under the shoelaces of any shoe and it works like charm. However – make sure to make a small bag for the sensor, otherwise you’ll kick it out.
You can build your own running playlists to your iPod and have a “Powersong” which it will play when you’re about to reach your goal. Never tried that yet, but I’m confident that “Eye of the Tiger” is the most used Powersong among the users ;)
Anyway, this thing works. I wouldn’t have imagined how easily technology can motivate your training and how much fun comparing your stats online can be. Near perfect, but it still lacks GPS. Nike Plus has a GoogleMaps integrated map solution, but the runs do not appear there automatically. A perfect running device would show where you’ve been running OR would guide you through the path which you would have drawn to the service earlier. Also exporting the data from the Nike Plus website has had some hiccups already for some time – I hope they are working on it. See some exported running data below.
Daniel Bloomberg directed a music video for Justice’s Phantom pt.2.
And for the Finnish fans: Justice is coming to ProvinssiRock this year.
The Bad Plus, a jazz trio of piano, double bass & drums, playing Aphex Twin’s Flim.
See also a live footage clip after the jump and more clips on DJ Orkidea’s YouTube group.
Desert Planet tour video
I’ve had a pair of CDJ-400s now for a couple of days and this is the first hands-on review. Pioneer had some delivery difficulties due to big amount of orders and I had to wait for the players for some weeks.
It’s funny that the change from vinyl to CD took really long and wasn’t an easy step, but leaving CDs behind and going 100% digital feels very comfortable. And the change has been very, very fast.
For now, I haven’t put a single CD inside the CDJ-400s. When I got the package, the first thing to do was to insert the USB sticks and try them out. I tested the players with an old 512mb stick and a new 2gb stick. The device reads the sticks very fast and the playback goes without any problems. You can browse the content of sticks while playing them and easily browse them by ID3 tags (album, artist, trackname).
The screen font size is very big. With a smaller font it would’ve been easier to show longer track names completely. This would be a needed feature especially if you’re having several remixes of one track and you’re seeing only the beginning of the track’s name.
If you’re familiar with Pioneer CDJs, there are not many things for which manual would be needed. However, finding out how to set an automatic loop wasn’t that easy and I ended up browsing the manual. The looping is fast and you can create nice looping effects easily. Entertaining.
The different jog wheel illuminations are a cool feature and I’m definitely going to take the most out of the MIDI features in the near future. The build-in effects feel totally unnecessary, even the much hyped vinyl/scratch effects.
Then, how about the jog wheel feel? I wouldn’t compare the wheel with CDJ-100 (or with CDJ-200, which I deeply hate), but rather with CDJ-800 or CDJ-1000. I would say the feel is closer to CDJ-1000 than CDJ-800. It’s very nice to play and the pitch bending goes without any problems. For scratching the wheel feels a bit too small, at least at first.
All-in-all, I’m very happy of my CDJ-400s. They don’t lack anything which I would have needed and I wouldn’t complain playing gigs with them. If you have any questions concerning the players, feel free to ask.
A couple of CDJ-400 links:
CDJ-400 image
CDJ-400 on Flickr
CDJ-400 on YouTube
CDJ-400 jog wheel illuminations
CDJ-400 review
Voice blogs only in Finnish, sorry.
Tiettävästi maailman ensimmäinen DJ-keikan aikana äänitetty ääniblogientry ;) sekä läjä muita äänibloggauksia Tampere/Turku-viikonlopulta.
Metaverse hits the road this weekend again and arrives to Klubi, Turku and Hämeensilta, Tampere. I’m waiting for these events a lot, especially seeing the much hyped and little used Hämeensilta as a club venue.
The tour is running very well at the moment. We just got the news that Metaverse record has hit #16 on the official Finnish chart. That’s very good news and on my behalf I deliver the humblest Thank Yous for the support. It’s always awesome to see electronic music hitting the charts.
If you haven’t checked already, take a look at the latest photos and videos of the tour on Orkidea’s site. The photos are under each past event on the main page and videos on the video gallery page.
Here are the event details of the weekend:
DJ Orkidea video interview by Dancefoundation. Orkidea telling about his studio gear and showing what every trance producer in Finland has to have in the studio… ;)
And a radio interview, in Finnish:
YleX:n Mika Niva haastatteli DJ Orkideaa puhelimitse Pop-tehdas-ohjelmaa varten viime tammikuussa. DJ Orkidea (a.k.a. Tapio Hakanen) käy lävitse muun muassa uransa alkuvaiheita, DJ-kulttuuria, valoja sekä omituisimman keikkakokemuksensa Berliinistä.
> Uran alkuvaiheita, haaveet, suomalainen DJ-kulttuuri (MP3) kesto: 8.19
> Omituisin keikkakokemus, valoista, konsertti-kulttuurista (MP3) kesto: 10.28
(thanks, Cascadeus)