Headworx

Me to Bose customer service: Subject: Prescription lenses for Bose Frames Message: How can I order prescription lenses (-3.25 / -3.50) for Bose Frames? Reply: We do not offer prescription lenses. Of course I know you do. Just "not for this (European) market". Get yourself a fake US address (such as the MyUS.com ), buy them via the US Bose Online shop and you are good! The workaround: I knew it would end up like that, so when making my buy decision, I already had a plan B. Which has been - use the prescription insert from my adventure sunglasses made by Rudy Project . The Rudy system is one of a kind and works extremely well - I have tested them in Himalaya, Tian Shan, cycling, windsurfing... And it is so simple. Unfortunately the Bose Frames are not Rudy - compatible, but it turns out with a help of a Velcro strap (and small cut-outs in the rubber nose pads) the fit is very good. The workaround works so well that I canceled my plan to get prescription lenses via an US address...

I remember the first time I switched on the Bose noise cancelling headphones - the first model that came out, some 20 years ago. It was a jaw-dropping experience, as flying on a noisy jet aircraft, I suddenly found myself is a quiet library. And then when I played the music, I was teleported to a concert hall. Have been using them - the original QuietComfort and then the wireless (Bluetooth) QuietComfort 35 ever since. 2020 is of course a non-fly year, so the headphones sit in my suitcase waiting for the vaccine. But thanks to the travel cuts I have now much more time to walk in the countryside, which I enjoy a lot. Recently I have brought back the idea of listening to audiobooks on the run . It is an interesting saga of technology (or rather product) failures, which I will continue describing soon. But this week it is not about a failure, as the next product from Bose I have tried, is bringing similarly jaw-dropping experience. The Bose Frames. I opted for the 2nd generation sporty ...

Last week I announced the success with streaming Audible from the Garmin fēnix to AirPods . Unfortunately have been unable to repeat this stunt anymore. Problem Description Hi, recently I wanted to play audio (MP3) over Bluetooth (Apple AirPods) when hiking. The music function on its own works fine - the watch is streaming audio to the AirPods just fine. The Hike activity on its own is fine too - I've been using it every day for couple of years. Unfortunately trying to do both audio and activity at the same time does not work. If I start the activity first, then trying the music function either tells me there are no music files on the watch (there are) or (even if it finds the audio files) the "play" button does not start playing. If I start music first (and it is playing), then after starting the activity the "distance" counter does not move (stays at 0.00), only the time counter is moving. After numerous attempts to sort this out (about a dozen of c...

Some things seem to be obvious. And they can indeed be obvious. Such as listening to an audiobook during a daily exercise run. And probably they even can be obvious to do on some platforms. I don't have an Apple watch, but I presume there is the Kindle (or Audible) app for it. So that a synced audio narration can be played via headphones connected to the watch, with no phone present. Yes, I do not carry a phone with me on my daily trail runs, but hey, all the latest generation smart watches are advertised they can play audio over Bluetooth. So why not? Actually even for the Apple platform, the obvious part is not entirely obvious, as due to the platform restrictions you cannot "add" (purchase) a narration to a Kindle book directly on an iOS device. You need to use browser or add the narration using a non-iOS device, such as a PC or an Android phone. This is designed to be easy: Purchase a book -> start reading -> add narration -> switch to listening But on iOS yo...

Bad implementations are a big risk to standards, especially to emerging ones. Users can never experience and appreciate the specification of a standard directly. Only via products that claim compliance to the standard. Of course there are tests, but at the standard qualification test it is impossible to conduct the most important tests: quality, stability. And also user experience is almost always out of scope. "Bluetooth never worked for me" - told me once a man responsible for smart home strategy at a tier-1 platform provider. And it did not matter how much I could pitch to him the virtues of Bluetooth mesh. "No... Bluetooth does not work. It has problems connecting, it has problems with interoperability, I don't like this technology." he kept on repeating.  He left the company since then and I'm now hearing they like Bluetooth a lot. But I could not even blame the guy. It was his experience. He certainly was unlucky to experience badly implemented produc...

I love Nikon cameras. Yes I know. I am a dinosaur. I'm spending a night under stars now at the top of Babia Gora, watching (and memorizing through heavy glass on sd cards) the wonderful arch of Milky Way spanning over the Tatra mountains. I tugged here on my back two full frame DSLRs and a 15kg worth of lenses, tripods, heads and other photographic equipment. People don't do that, unless this is their bizarre hobby. "Why bother taking all those pictures if you can find better ones on Google?" asked me once a tour guide when going to the Antelope Canyon. The problem is that just few hobbyists like me are not able to support the dying digital camera business. Some seem to be excited by the news of Sony overtaking Nikon to secure 2nd place right after Canon. But the truth is they are all dying a slow death. The death caused by the lack of software innovation. "Software?" you will ask... aren't they being forced to the niche corner by smartphones and drones?...

A file still remains the material artifact of ownership. Even though a file is not physical - it is just a sequence of bits, you can own a file. Have it on a hard drive of your computer, back it up to a USB pen drive, upload it somewhere etc. It clearly is yours . Handing over the file to a service which promises to continue serving you the content of the file may mean giving up the ownership.  This is exactly what happened to Google Music. It lured users (including myself) to upload music files they owned to continue listening to this music on any device, thanks to the synchronization feature. I uploaded the entire music collection I owned and enjoyed this music syncing automatically to my Android phone and to my iPad. But of course I kept the copies of the files. They cane up handy when I realized that to listen to music streamed from my Garmin watch, i needed the files to be actually uploaded over USB to the watch. And they are handy again as Google continues the tradition of dr...