The Juggle Zone: Bargain Blog

I recently caved and finally got a cell phone. (For years I resisted the societal pressure.) I wanted something more interesting than one of the standard Treo ringtones, but I wasn't about to pay for one!

After a little research, I've discovered the process, and present it here for your edification (based on instructions from kdallen at everythingtreo:

1. Get source material. If you have an audio file, skip to step 2. If you don't (e.g. you have a movie file), you'll need to create an audio file. I've used Free Video to MP3 Converter 2.6.
2. Convert to WAV. If the format is already *.WAV, skip to Step 9. To covert, download and run Audacity.
3. Open up your source material. If the song starts playing, press Stop.
4. Optional: Select a section of the song to excerpt. Highlight the selection with the mouse (click and drag) in the display window. It will highlight that portion. (Tip: Pressing play at this point will play just your selection so that you can confirm you like your selection.)
5. With it still highlighted, go to "Edit | Trim."
6. Go to "Edit | Preferences...." Under the "Quality" tab, change the sample rate to 11025Hz.
7. Still in "Audacity Preferences," switch to the "File Format" tab, then select "WAV (Microsoft 4 bit IMA ADPCM)" and click OK.
8. Go to "File | Export Selection As WAV...." Choose a filename (use no periods) and location, then click OK.
9. Email the file to an account you access with VersaMail (or another Palm email application - web-based mail will NOT work).
10. Open the email on the Treo (ensure the entire email is downloaded). At the bottom of the email (in VersaMail), there is a little icon next to the filename. Click the icon then choose "Select viewer...." The viewer you should select is "Sounds" then click "View." Confirm the name (click OK). The file will then be transferred to Sounds (this process can take a few minutes).
11. Once the file is done transferring, click "Done."
12. Go to the Home screen and click on "Sounds." Make sure "Ring Tones" is selected as the Application, then pick your ring tones for the various choices (e.g. Known Caller, Unknown Caller, Roaming).

Posted by dwallach at 9:10 AM | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBacks (0)

Credit card companies are always there ... to protect themselves. Two annoying incidents I experienced recently:

1) An attempt to make a >$100 purchase at a grocery store was unauthorized. The CC's excuse was that they suspected the card of having been stolen. Then give me a call! Don't block my card, embarrassing me and delaying my purchase. (Not to mention the only reason they bother doing this kind of thing is because THEY are responsible for any charges made on a stolen card!)

2) We just got new credit cards from Citibank in the mail. Apparently "[our] account number may have been illegally obtained as a result of a merchant database compromise at TJX (T.J. Maxx, Marshalls, etc.) This was handled fairly smoothly, except that in order to activate the new cards I was supposed to have the old cards handy. I wasn't told this until I had to punch in the old card number. When I didn't do it fast enough (because I didn't have the cards handy), I had to wait on hold for a CSR!

Posted by dwallach at 11:28 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)