Turn that old Smart phone into a decent MP3 player

Recently I lost my Ipod Touch (4^th Gen). Rather than buy a new one, I decided to wait and see what apple announces in September/October.  I did however still want to listen to tunes and podcasts. So I opted to use an old Palm Pre, that was no longer in use and was collecting dust in the bottom of a drawer. And it occurred to me that a lot of old smart phones could easily be turned into fairly decent MP3 players if not fair PMPs. Most Smart Phones of the last 2 years use standard 1/8” headphones  (unlike some of the weird standards of the past), and have a fair amount of storage, or could be easily expandable via memory cards, which have come severely down in cost.

How to turn that old smart phone into a really nice MP3 player.

1)      The assumption is that you are using an old phone that no longer has service. So turn off any services that may run in the background that aren’t needed for this device to be a media player:

1. Email accounts
2. Calendars
3. Notification applications that require web services (ebay, twitter, etc…)
4. Contacts

2)      Download any additional applications: like Podcast apps, or Video players. Or even alternative music players.

3)      Disable Radios you don’t need as they are just a drain on the battery.  Bluetooth is a given unless you are using a BT stereo headphones. But most importantly is the Cellular Radio. One Method is air plane mode, but that will turn off Wi-Fi and Bluetooth as well. 

On the Palm Pre, I found a code you can use in the phone dialer that disables only the phone radio (##633#) Different phone have different methods of doing this, so Google search it.

Also, I found that I still use Wi-Fi on occasion for the Podcast app, so I have a shortcut in the launcher so I can quickly turn on/off the Wi-Fi when I need it, so that way I’m not just draining the battery.

4)      Setup your launcher/Desktop for media centric controls. Remember this isn’t a phone anymore so Shortcuts to email, phone and messaging really don’t need to be at the forefront. I personally setup my launcher with Music And Video front and center (and the previously mentioned Wi-Fi control.

5)      Set setting to turn off the display.

Unless you are flipping through the music, or choosing a video to watch, you really don’t need the screen on for a prolonged amount of time, so setting the display to shut off after 10-30 seconds of nonuse is probably a good move and will also help to conserve battery power.

I can easily go a week without needing to recharge the battery (I listen to tunes for about an hour a day in my car). So far I’ve been impressed. My only real disappointment has been the lack of Podcast apps for WebOS. Android has a ton including Google’s own “Listen” app. I personally use Acast myself on my Evo.