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BirdJam Ipod (1 Viewer)

Lewie

Well-known member
I am thinking of getting a BirdJam ipod. I have nver used an ipod before. Was considering either the regular ipod, or the i-touch ipod, since the i-touch has a bigger screen. Any one out there using Birdjam? Comments on the different ipods? Thanks for any help.

Lew
 
slej (etc), its software or ipod + software with sounds (song) of birds and their pic, North American only I believe - but also it seems primarily to be used to attract birds. Highly unethical in UK and indeed illegal in some cases.

Probably because of "here little birdie" - bang, bang!

Mike
 
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I am thinking of getting a BirdJam ipod. I have nver used an ipod before. Was considering either the regular ipod, or the i-touch ipod, since the i-touch has a bigger screen. Any one out there using Birdjam? Comments on the different ipods? Thanks for any help.

Lew

I've had one for about a year now and use it all the time--an excellent product. I mainly use it with the iMainGo speaker which has a satisfyingly loud clear relatively distortion-free output.

I have the regular ipod, not the i-touch. Why do you want a larger screen?
 
I've had one for about a year now and use it all the time--an excellent product. I mainly use it with the iMainGo speaker which has a satisfyingly loud clear relatively distortion-free output.

I have the regular ipod, not the i-touch. Why do you want a larger screen?

Fugl:

I thought it might be nice to see a bigger picture of the bird, but it is not a big deal; I would have my bird book. Thank you very much for the response.

Mike:

I would use it to help me identify bird songs in the field, especially in the summer and warblers during migration.


Lew
 
where do you get your bird songs? Again, sorry about my ignorance,
But having just heard about it, I like the idea, and can only find some bird songs on Itunes.

Also, I would have the classic ipod if I were you. If you are using an ipod touch on the field, The screen would get scratched, and it could play the sound of a bird of prey etc. at the wrong moment! Also, the classic ipod has quite a large screen.

Also, you want alot of memory. an ipod touch can have about 32gb, while a classic ipod can have a memory of 160gb. Also, the ipod touch costs near enough £300, while a classic ipod with five times the memory is only £200.

Also, an ipod classic is very easy to use. I borrowed my cousins and I could run it easily after two minutes of using it. I have never tried an ipod touch.
 
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where do you get your bird songs? Again, sorry about my ignorance,
But having just heard about it, I like the idea, and can only find some bird songs on Itunes.

Also, I would have the classic ipod if I were you. If you are using an ipod touch on the field, The screen would get scratched, and it could play the sound of a bird of prey etc. at the wrong moment! Also, the classic ipod has quite a large screen.

Also, you want alot of memory. an ipod touch can have about 32gb, while a classic ipod can have a memory of 160gb. Also, the ipod touch costs near enough £300, while a classic ipod with five times the memory is only £200.

Also, an ipod classic is very easy to use. I borrowed my cousins and I could run it easily after two minutes of using it. I have never tried an ipod touch.

slejpner-son

From what little research I have done, you can purchase the ipod with the the bird songs/picture software pre-loaded on the new ipod, or buy just the software and load the software on your present ipod. They have Eastern USA and Western USA birds. Not sure if they have European birds. The address is
http://www.birdjam.com/ I am not endorsing them. Just giving the WEB address.

Good point about the touch screen. Thanks

Lew
 
I’ve been looking at this item for a while. It looks to be a computer program that adapts the already useful Stokes Bird Songs CDs to an iPod, allowing you to use the iPod’s easy controls and photo and video capabilities. It cuts off the words announcing the name of the singing bird from the tracks and displays a photo, common and scientific names. It looks like they will sell you an iPod already loaded and ready to use if you are intimidated by using the iTunes program. The Stokes CDs seem to be largely for North America.

It looks like a great way to learn bird songs. You can scroll through a list of names on the iPod to get right to the song you are interested in. I think if you heard a song in the field and wanted to check your ID, it would make it easy.

While it is certainly possible to misuse the recordings to harass birds, that would be the fault of the person not the product.
 
ipod birdjam

Hi,

Just recently bought a Ipod Nano locally and Bjam-Eastern North America
from their site.I think it is great!

Darrell
 
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I am thinking of getting a BirdJam ipod. I have nver used an ipod before. Was considering either the regular ipod, or the i-touch ipod, since the i-touch has a bigger screen. Any one out there using Birdjam? Comments on the different ipods? Thanks for any help.

Lew

Hi Lew,

I have an Apple nano iPod (the least expensive one Apple sells now that has a screen -- but certainly not cheap at $150), coupled with the imaingo speaker. I do not know of anything better for my needs, but I do not consider it a perfect arrangement. Here are a few things to consider from my experience:

1. Birdjam is rather pricey. I paid considerably less by simply buying my iPod and speaker separately. I use Thayer birding software, and it has a quick utility that converts all North American Bird songs into a format for loading on an iPod or similar device. All this was much cheaper than birdjam.

2. When everything is going well, this configuration does pretty much everything I want. I can quickly locate any song, and it takes very little memory on the iPod. If all you want is bird songs, get the minimum amount of memory you can buy.

3. But I have encountered several problems. First, the iTunes software, which is what you typically use to load audio files on the iPod, has a well-known glitch in it that disabled the DVD/CD-ROM drive on my computer. After loading the files, I had to completely uninstall all the Apple software on my computer to get the functionality of my DVD drive back. Second, the plastic window on the iMainGo speaker was so thick that it made it almost impossible to access the touch controls on the iPod, so I had to cut a window in the plastic so I can actually control the iPod. Third, since simply touching the front of the iPod can activate it, you have to use the difficult to access switch on the bottom of the iPod to turn it completely off if you want to preserve enough battery power to use it when you need it. Unfortunately, this switch can be very difficult to reach when the iPod is installed in the iMainGo speaker. Finally, charging the iPod never seems to work properly on my computer. I have to reboot the computer in order for charging to begin.

4. I do not know of a better solution, unfortunately. I have definitely been unimpressed with Apple technology and ease-of-use, but my configuration is compact and powerful.

5. An iPod touch might be better in some respects (I never tried one). But I believe it has a much less robust speaker than the iMainGo, so it would be pretty useless if you want to try to draw a bird in. (I know this is controversial but believe it is fine in appropriate circumstances, which are spelled out under the ethical code of the American Birding Association).

My two cents,
Jim
 
iPod Touch-compatible software

I am very interested in everyone's comments; I think that the Touch could make an excellent platform for a full-fledged field guide - the screen is really high-quality, and a reasonable size.
(I'm not sure so much about its utility for playback through a speaker - I've never used a speaker with it, but I imagine it would drain the battery fairly quickly; or do these things have their own power source?).

What I want to know about is, is there a guide (like the Thayer's and iDentify mentioned above) for Neotropical countries (any of them?). I had a quick look at the BirdJam site, and saw that they do have extension packs for Costa Rica and Mexico (just a part of the latter?). But I don't really understand what their software gives you - it looks like you still have to obtain the audio guides separately.

Peter C.
 
The BirdJam software is pretty limited in what it does. It renames the tracks. It adds pictures of the bird to the tracks. It adds playlists that you scroll through to get to the bird you want, and finally it cuts off the human voice announcing the name of the bird from the tracks.

As J. Moore says above, the software is a bit pricy. You could get a lot out of the Stokes CDs on your iPod without the software. If you were willing to put in the time you could make your own playlists.

The speakers do indeed have their own batteries, so they don’t drain the power from the iPod to an abnormal degree.

I think BirdJam is probably most useful to someone who doesn’t wish to spend the time to learn how to use iTunes and an iPod. If you already know how to use them, I’m not really sure if the software is worth the $100.
 
slej (etc), its software or ipod + software with sounds (song) of birds and their pic, North American only I believe - but also it seems primarily to be used to attract birds. Highly unethical in UK and indeed illegal in some cases.

Probably because of "here little birdie" - bang, bang!

Mike

you know, I always wonder about the "unethical" aspect of using a recording in the field.
Seems to me it's not much different that pishing.
I ran into a UK birder the other day while out looking for a reported Blackpoll Warbler here and we spent the whole time pish-pishing here and pish-pishing there.
No luck, at one point a couple of hours in, a suggested that I could try to call it in (if it was still indeed around) with my Ipod (with Birdjam installed).
He never even answered me and the dirty look I got was something else and I left it at that.
We never found the bird by the way.
:-O
 
If you have an IPhone or Ipod Touch, the eBird Explorer is a good value at $19.99 at the ITunes store. It is basically an electronic field guide with pictures and bird songs. I like it and it was easier to install and use than the Bird Jam.
 
I have been browsing Itunes, and have found something of interest. it is called iBird Explorer plus, and is £12. it looks very good and comprehensive, but it is for north america only. it apparently lists all the birds to be found there, and is a third of a gig in size.
 
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