I broke down and bought a Dell DJ

Over the past several years, my digital music collection has grown substantially. My collection is also legitimate, having been ripped from my own CD collection. Altogether, I have close to 20GB of music sitting on my hard drive(s). [I realize that 20GB of music is miniscule to some. I work with people who have several hundred gigs of MP3's. But for a legitimate collection, 20GB is getting up there]

Now, 20GB isn't a big deal at home. I have all of the files stored on the house server, and stream them over the network to any other point. But on my laptop, 20GB represents half of the hard drive space. It finally became too much, and I decided I needed a dedicated function device to handle my music.

I know that the iPod is all the rage. All the cool kids have one. But I despise the fact that to use an iPod I have to either use iTunes or hack the system. I use Musicmatch software, and have since '98 or '99, and frankly, I don't want to change. So I started looking for compatible MP3 players and came across the Dell DJ.

I like Dell. I have had good luck with Dell products. And the price of a 30GB MP3 player is lower than a comparable iPod. On top of that, impulse technology purchases are a forte of mine. Ten minutes and five clicks later, I began waiting for the DJ to arrive.

When I got my DJ, I moved all of the music files onto it and deleted them off the hard drive of my laptop. I then promptly signed up for the new Napster service which lets you download music to your portable player for a monthly fee (just in case I get a hankering to listen to the Bon Jovi boxed set or something).

I love it. I just love it. What a good idea this was. I am currently sitting here listening to the Coldplay live CD (which I downloaded) as I type this.

How did I struggle through life without this before???