Tuesday, March 3, 2009

And finally....Challenge #1: ListenNJ

I figured today was the perfect opportunity to jump on the PC PLUS, tackle this challenge, and get myself caught up with everyone. In the end, it wasn't too bad. Downloading the OverDrive software was easy, and I was glad I knew about that step in the beginning. Oh, and I downloaded iTunes. I wanted to experiment and see if I could get my title transfered to my iPod. Luckily for me I have a back-up, "regular" mp3 player as well. We'll talk about that in a minute.

I browsed the OverDrive audiobooks because I knew they would be iPod compatible. It was a little trying finding a title that was both available for check out and that sounded interesting. In the end, I went with Anne's House of Dreams by L.M. Montgomery. Check out procedure is amazingly smooth and once everything downloaded it played great on the computer.

The iPod transfer was a different story. I had doubts that this would run smoothly on a computer other than the one in my home, but I figured I'd try anyway. The hitch comes with iTunes, I think, though maybe I just wasn't doing something right. Because my iPod is already synched with my iTunes at home, I was a bit uneasy synching it with a "new" iTunes and undoing the 8GB of files already stored on my happy little portable device. I tried several times to transfer the audiobook to the iPod, but I always got an error message. And that is why I brought my backup mp3player, which worked just fine. I'll have to try Listen NJ at home to see if my iPod will cooperate from there. All-in-all, it wasn't a bad experience, but I can see it being tricky for the user who isn't keen on reading directions.