Episode 50: A high-tech music venue plus the Lumia 1020
We visit Bob Weir of the Grateful Dead and his musician's paradise. Plus we take the Lumia 1020 to a music festival and bust out the Galaxy Mega 6.3.
It's taken a little over a year for us to deliver 50 episodes. Through half a hundred episodes, we've BlackBerry'd the streets of Barcelona, dropped a boulder on a MacBook Pro, and dueled fitness bands in a high-altitude mud run. Not to mention the dozens of other unboxings, future techs, and road tests that have taken us to the techiest corners of the world. This episode continues our tradition and celebrates our golden anniversary with style.
First up, we head to Marin County to TRI Studios. This high-tech musician's playpen is the stomping grounds of Grateful Dead founding member Bob Weir. His state-of-the-art music and video-streaming studio boasts just about every top-of-the-line toy available, both new and old. Not only that, but Bob jams with Lukas Nelson (son of Willie) and Jay Lane (of Primus) to really showcase his take on the future of live music.
To keep with the music theme, we wander over to Golden Gate Park for the Outside Lands 2013 music festival. With names like Paul McCartney, Nine Inch Nails, and Hall & Oates, you need a good camera to capture your experience. Since music festivals tend to draw about 100,000 people intent on blocking your view, why not bust out a phone with a 41-megapixel camera? Seeming like the perfect environment, the Nokia Lumia 1020 gets a road test at San Francisco's biggest summer concert series.
One note on the Nokia Lumia 1020: the 6tag app, available as of Aug. 21, is the first API-compliant Instagram app for Windows Phone, and is a worthwhile add-on. It was not available at the time we tested the Lumia 1020. In addition, an update to the official Facebook app released Aug. 29 apparently adds more integrated photo sharing.
For this week's unboxing, we get back in the phablet game and bust out the Samsung Galaxy Mega 6.3. The last two seasons have seen a slew of products from the new Galaxy line, and this one in particular seems like a keeper, if you have somewhere to carry it. It's big. And pretty.
In the mailbag, Molly answers a question regarding forever-dead batteries and the ancient Nexus S. That's all for this week! As always, thanks for watching, and see you next Tuesday!