Newton Poetry

Grant Hutchinson is taking part in a clever project:

A box full of electronic junk? Most excellent. But, wait a minute … a box full of electronic junk that you are encouraged to take things out of, put things into, and then continually track on the interwebs? It sounded too good to be true, but that’s exactly what “The Great Internet Migratory Box of Electronic Junk” or TGIMBOEJ is all about. Loosely described on the project’s site as “… halfway between P2P zip archive sharing and a flea market …”, it was something I was destined to participate in.

What was in Hutchinson’s Great Internet Migratory Box of Electronic Junk (hereafter, the junk box)? Oh, some Newton and Mac peripherals, of course, like an original MessagePad stylus and an Apple Desktop Bus Mouse II.

Want to participate? Grab a sturdy cardboard box, some e-junk, and fill out a form. Then give the box to someone, and help move it along every two weeks while tracking its progress.

I know I’d love to pass along an old external hard drive casing and a few Apple mice myself.

Tai Shimizu, a photo blogger, got his hands on a Newton MessagePad 2100 and posted his initial thoughts – along with some gorgeous isolated pictures of his new gadget.

Shimizu seems most impressed with the handwriting recognition capabilities and the user interface:

The UI of the Newton feels saturated with innovation, even when compared to new devices. The idea of the notepad being the centerpiece of the device is not only vastly different than current UI paradigms, but extremely useful due to the addition of the assist functionality.

The pictures, like the one above, are great.

Morgan Aldridge at Makkintosshu points to МУЗЕЙ APPLE NEWTON, a Russian site devoted to the MessagePad. There’s a page for each of the Newton models, OMP through the eMate, with technical descriptions for each, as well as a video, photos, and original Newton documentation.

It’s a good idea to run the site through Google Translate (Russian > English) so you could read the text.

“A beautifully designed museum site for Apple Newtons in Russian,” Aldridge says. “Especially excellent device photography as well.”

He’s right: some of the close up eMate shots are spectacular.

Just a head’s-up: I’m looking for more web sites to add to my Newton Sites page.

Last October, I posted the page after collecting Newton-related web pages over the year. It was a lot of work, but way worth it. My fear was that a lot of these sites would be lost or forgotten, meaning we’d lose a lot of the history and how-to of the Newton platform.

Since then, however, I’ve been collecting more sites to add to the page – including a few more blogs, instruction sites, and old MessagePad and eMate reviews.

That’s where you come in. Browse through the page, and let me know if I’m missing something.

Frank Gruendel has done it again. Last time, it was a dual-screen Newton. This time, he’s hot-wired a proto backlight into a Newton MessagePad 100 (or OMP).

Check out Frank’s Pda-Soft site for a fun photo tour of the project. It’s just a preview, but already Frank has started a buzz on the NewtonTalk list.

OMPs, and any MessagePad pre-MP130, lacked backlighting, making it hard to noodle with Newtons in dark or low-light conditions. It wasn’t until the MP130 that Apple got smart enough to include it.

But now? Sky’s the limit. Congrats, Frank!

How about that? An April Fool’s giveaway that’s not a joke.

The Unofficial Apple Weblog is giving away a Newton MessagePad 130:

If you want to join the chorus of Newton owners, here’s a unique opportunity: win a mostly-functional (delivered as-is) MessagePad 130 that has been sitting in a box in Mike Rose’s office for years now. The left side of the screen is wonky, but other than that it seems to be in working condition. Along with the MP130, you’ll get a leather Newton case, a Fodor’s 1994 Travel Guide card, a copy of the MessagePad 2000 manual, and a bonus: a copy of the 1996 World Wide Web Yellow Pages.

You have until Sunday, April 5 to enter to win.

Looking through the Newton Poetry archives, I realize that there are quite a few articles about how to do stuff – fax, connect with OS X, reset – that may have been lost in the shuffle.

Those articles are some of my favorites, because I’m learning how to do them at the same time you are. That’s what I like about writing Newton Poetry: getting my hands dirty with little projects. It’s a blast.

Connect your Newton with Mac OS X
One of the more popular features, this article explains how to use NCX to sync your 2.x Newton with a modern Mac running OS X. You can also learn how to connect with Escale and with NewTen.

Send a fax with your Newton
Faxing with your Newton is old school. The fax seems like an ancient technology, but with a 1.x or 2.x Newton and a simple modem, you can send faxes through the phone line.

Reset your Newton
Let’s say the worst happens, and your Newton somehow locks up or is frozen by a software error. There are different levels of restarting your Newton, and this post explains them all.

Take screenshots on your Newton
Recently, I learned how to take screenshots of my eMate using the Newton Toolkit. There are other, more complicated ways, but this one was the most immediately useful for my needs.

Install packages on your Newton
The Newton is kind of like the iPhone in that you can take it out of the box and it’s immediately useful and usable. But the fun part of owning one is installing cool apps that make it even more useful. That’s where installing .pkg files comes in handy.

Power your Newton with rechargeable batteries
This is more of a tip I learned when using my MP110. Instead of relying on my long-dead Apple battery pack, I bought some Eneloop batteries and used the heck out of them. Soon, I’ll be exploring more energy options with my eMate 300.

Read Newton eBooks
Not only is your Newton a pre-Amazon Kindle eBook reader, but there’s a plugin for Firefox that lets you read Newton eBooks in your web browser.

Check that out.

Frank Gruendel from pda-soft.de has created a multi-display FrankenNewt. Scribble on one screen, and the results show up on the other.

Frank has always been a source of great hardware fixes and DIY projects. Now if only someone could get an actual dual-screen Newton going…

[Via Newtontalk.]

[Update 3.8.09: Reader Ivan found an archived page with the correct links. Also check in the comments section for more links.]

Thanks to a reader, the almost-original Keyspan drivers page has been found.

Torner left a comment on my post about Tripp-Lite purchasing Keyspan. Keyspan makes (err, made) serial-to-USB adapters that us Newton fans use the heck out of, but after they were purchased their drivers download page disappeared.

The new Keyspan drivers page looks just like the old one, but with a new URL, and is much easier to use than Tripp-Lite’s version.

Good sleuthing, torner!

I might be a little late here, with Christmas coming up, but if you’re still looking for the perfect gift for the Newton lover in your family, this might be it.

Here we have the Apple Newton plaque, custom designed by artist Cynthia Malaran that’s available for purchase (only $60!) at Shanalogic.com. Cynthia has all kinds of retro tech plaques (I like the Mac one) ready for the geek who has everything.

I’d venture to say Cynthia has crafted a mock-up of the MessagePad 2000. And I’m no art critic, but that stylus looks a little chubby, don’t you think?

You might not get it in time for this year’s holiday season, but there’s always next year.

[Via Geeksugar.com.]