Lo-Fi Music
With Eckhart Köppens great MAD player for Newton, you can enjoy MP3 audio at 64kbit/s - 22khz enconding. Other bitrates work as long as the sample rate is either 22 or 44.1khz.

Take parts of your MP3 collection for a spin
Sure, you can't have it all, but there is a good chance you can grab at least parts of your collection and go nomad!

We assume that this possibility will open up for other Newton products and create a new market for ATA drivers, memory cards, USB dongle killers, interconnect-to-earplug adaptors and many more.

Goes with you anywhere

There is nowhere your music can't go, really.

The iTunes plug-in reveals a new dimension of music sharing with your friends. Since the Newton has no hardware or software lock, you can now take your favourite music between different computers without hacking the applications.

Frankly speaking, we haven't tested anything except for our own Newton MessagePads, and we all happen to work on 2x00 Newtons.

Even though some users reported that the eMate has successfully managed to play lower bit rates without skipping - it is a non-supported device until further notice. Eckart is currently trying to optimise the code for the player so that also the weaker eMate processor will be able to playback. Great considering the eMate has a built-in headphone jack!

If you want to see more content on this compatibility page, test the iTunes plug-in and the MAD player with your setup and send us a note. If you are a hardware hacker, please inform us of your success with modified units. Your feedback can be posted at the Developers Bulletin Board:

Also, please report any hardware or software issues on the Macintosh side, there seems to be some compatibility problems with certain models.

You can find more information on Newton and eMate hardware and software compatibility issues at the Newton FAQ:

http://www.chuma.org/newton/faq/

Ethernet Connectivity
If you want a fast lane into the music heaven, get yourself an Ethernet card. With a compatible Ethernet card, you will be able to access your Macintosh via EtherTalk from the Dock application.


Slow transfer...
Good or bad, depending on how you see it, the Newton was created well before modern standards were around. Hence, neither FireWire nor USB are supported.

Instead, the Newton MessagePad 2000/2100 sports a unique InterConnect port which can transfer your MP3's at a blazingly fast 38kbps. If you value your time, leave the transfer overnight.

...fast storage
The Newton does not carry any fragile hard drives, instead you can store up to 64Mb of music thanks to the two full-size PCMCIA expansion slots. The Newton uses Linear Flash, expensive and rare, but damn quick!

As soon as Paul Gyot's ATA driver will be released to the public, your Newton will

carry up to 10GB of music equalling countless hours of blockbuster beats. ATA memory chips are cheap and come in many flavours. You can find as much as 5GB of PCMCIA ATA memory for considerably less money than Linear Flash. With its two expansion slots, your MP can carry up to 10GB of media files.

The largest Compact Flash ATA cards today are available in sizes up to 512MB.

The necessary ATA drivers for using Compact Flash memory are currently under development. If you want to give Paul Gyot's beta drivers a try, the ATA project pages can be found here. In order to use Compact Flash, you will need a CF adapter.