iPod Touch not an organizer for now

[jayducharme]

I bought a new iPod Touch to use as a personal organizer that also had multimedia capability, something I thought would be no big deal. The calendar feature allows you to set event alarms like a standard organizer. And the Touch has a transducer that can emit clear alarm signals. It works great with the Touch's alarm feature.

I was surprised to discover that setting an event in the calendar produces no sound. The Touch will wake up and flash a visual warning. But it won't be accompanied by an alarm. That makes the Touch fairly useless as an organizer. After all, I don't have the screen dangling in front of my face all day....

I first took the Touch to the Genius Bar at my local Apple store. The geniuses there were mystified. I called Apple's phone tech support at the guy there was equally puzzled but finally got me an answer: the Touch does not support event sounds. It could, but it doesn't. And the tech support guy had no idea whether the feature would be activated in a future update. His only suggestion was to additionally set the alarm clock for every event I scheduled. If I knew a fix was coming up shortly, that might be an acceptable stopgap. But it's certainly no substitute.

So for those of you who are considering getting a Touch to use as a personal organizer, be aware: it doesn't function that way at present.

 

[zirkle2007]

I don't know that it ever will...I think when they slap that iPod on the front of it, its another device. Probably to them its a marketing strategy to sell more iPhones.

 

[jayducharme]

I don't know that it ever will.

Well, it just did. Today, for some inexplicable reason, my calendar alarm went off every time it was supposed to. (This was after unsuccessful attempts yesterday with the Genius Bar at the Apple store, and also calling Apple's tech support and being told that it doesn't work.) The sound it makes is rather faint, but definitely audible. I have no idea why it suddenly began functioning.

I hope Apple creates a simple software update so that I can choose a sound for the calendar the same way I can choose a sound for the alarm clock.