Macadventures: Simple but wonderful Address Book

The first thing I needed to get working was iSync for my Sony Ericsson P1i. Now I love my PDA phone. It's the first gadget I've acquired in years which I could emphatically say enhances my life. I resisted the PDA-phone and QWERTY keyboard for ages. While I fossilised and the world moved on, my pockets bulged with machines and I was dropping them on the stairs shuffling from one to another (I didn't drop them on purpose you see..)

Finally, when my Tungsten T2 (my 4th PDA since 1997) went into irreversible brain death; I got an O2. It was year of misery, and most of that time spent resetting and waiting between apps. Finally I ditched it for the Sony. It was a big leap of faith, what with QWERTY keyboard with button-sharing alphabets (rock to left - Q, rock to right - W) and software-estranged Symbian OS! But it was wonderful leap, and I haven't looked back since. In fact, sprinting forward, I've gone 3G unlimited access, navigate with Google maps, facebook, do Excel sheets and listen to music with a Sony Bluetooth stereo headset that can control the phone. Not to mention I've hacked it and implanted the Sony's Walkman GUI into it! Well, you get the picture - if my Sony doesn't talk to my Mac.. I'm in trouble. It's like if my wife doesn't talk to my mother? Bad analogy.

Make things worse, the forums are filled with angry and frustrated SEP1i users. All cursing Sony or Mac or both for not looking into this compatibility issue. Well, to be fair,.. come on.. the world doesn't exactly revolve around us Sony-Mac users, ok? Give them a break.

Thankfully, my experience has been a good one. Did Mac follow up the issue or did Sony? I think both.

Firtsly, my Mac detected the P1i on bluetooth instantly and made it its preferred 3G modem in a few clicks.

Secondly, when I tried iSync, it recognised my phone but advised me on its incompatibility. No pretenses. No century-long sync attempts and system hangs.

Thirdly, it directed me to Sony! The Mac directed me to Sony's website, and straight to the page where the plug-in is situated. I downloaded that, ran the patch. And wah lahh.. iSync was syncing.

Now comes the best part. No, the best TWO parts.

1- The synchronising of 2500 contacts took less than 5 minutes. I kid you not.

2- Address Book on the Mac detected the duplicates accumulated over 10 years of mal-syncing between devices and fixed those! In a matter of seconds, my address book was cleaned up. Where the same person had several records - eg. one for email, one for mobile, etc. - these were merged!

What MS Outlook couldn't do (I understand that you have to BUY the patch to resolve duplicates) - the Mac did intuitively in seconds. No fuss.

My leap of faith from PC to Mac has proven to be the best computing decision I ever made. And I'm never looking back.