liz_marcs: (Mithras)
liz_marcs ([personal profile] liz_marcs) wrote2007-12-20 01:34 pm

Either this works, or it's one hell of a placebo...

Soooooooooo...

Regarding my seasonal affective disorder (SAD), which some people think is in all in the head and not actually, y'know, real.

It appears that very little (and very expensive) light gadgets actually do work.

Hunh.

Either that, or this is the most massive case of mind-over-matter I've ever experienced.

So, anyway, meet the insanely expensive goLITE P2 from Apollo Health (I was able to pick it up for $120 less from Costco's Web site), my new best buddy for the next two months:



Have I mentioned that it's a teeny tiny thing? 'Cause it is. I basically can hold this puppy in the palm of my hand, which is a good thing because I can just sling it into my purse and bring it to work with me so I can receive my morning treatment while at my desk.

Strangely enough, the blue LED lites don't radiate light (which is why no one knows I'm using it unless they walk right into my cube and see it), nor is there anything on the UV wavelength (no winter-time tan). But just try looking directly at the screen. Even at 50% strength it's a big ol' "ow" on the retinas.

So, I've been using this thing for a couple of days now (30 minutes in the morning, 15 minutes after sundown), and I'm completely stunned at just how well this is working.

The first time I used it (nighttime, 15 minutes), I was pretty convinced that I had bought myself a placebo because I honestly didn't feel anything. As soon as my 15 minutes were up, I shut it down and put it away. Then I called up the 'Rents. Within 5 minutes, I started giggling like I was stoned. (Hell, I felt kind of stoned.)

Again, could be placebo effect, I figured.

But it's been 3 days and I legitimately do feel like I'm back to my normal self. Seriously. With the added benefit that it seems the body goes from 60 mph to 0 mph right around 11:15 p.m. How fast is the deceleration? It's either go to bed now or consider sleeping on the floor right where you're standing, and after 7 hours, you're up and ready to go.

Compare to last week where getting from point A to point B required me to crawl across the floor with my fingernails. Then, having trouble falling asleep, sleeping for 10 hours, and wanting to sleep more.

I've always had chronic sleep problems (insomnia and hypersomnia both at different times), so this is a miracle that's akin to the miracle worked by a 3-month course of treatment with Wellbutrin for my chronic insomnia that went on for nearly 5 years. With less side effects. And it's faster-working, too.

Plus, have I mentioned that I'm now wide-awake during the day? As in wide-awake with too much energy? For serious.

So, yeah. Maybe this thing is a placebo and it's all in head. Could be.

Placebo or not, this puppy is worth Every. Single. Penny. I'm actually awake and accomplishing things. Plus, I'm in a good mood instead of going through my usual Holiday Bitch-I-Tude.

Good heavens! There's a light at the end of the tunnel for my chronic sleep problems. And it's a blue LED light. That makes me insanely chipper.

[identity profile] sps.livejournal.com 2007-12-21 08:11 pm (UTC)(link)
They have recently demo'd colour versions, I am told (by someone who actually knows some people on the team). The problem with the technology is the refresh time; a page paint takes a substantial fraction of a second, and there are issues with local updates, since the pixels actually overlap slightly, so that un-drawing leaves fringes (the iLiad's UI largely just avoids doing this).

I don't agree with the comment about the manufacturer being stupid, however; the unit as shipped is running Linux, and the unlocking process, although it uses the same field upgrade conduit as the remote reflashing mechanism (viz: hit a button the website, hold a button on the device), doesn't do much more than add a mechanism to start a console. They're very supportive - I'd even say enthusiastic - about people doing this. The reason they ask you to sign off on a warranty waiver is because the hardware is very much software controlled: the display, the power management, the stylus-based input, and the field upgrade mechanism are all quite 'soft', so if you don't know what you're doing and tinker anyway the risk of 'bricking' the device is substantial. Since what warranty warrants is the experience of the device as an ebook reader and notepad, I don't think their policy at all unreasonable.

Perhaps it would be nice if there were severable hardware and software warranties, but that would change the engineering space a lot - they'd have to provide low level drivers for an external keyboard and (somehow) monitor, or a network-oriented boot monitor, or something.

[identity profile] arkaycee.livejournal.com 2008-01-05 04:36 pm (UTC)(link)
What I'd like to see in the future with devices that are reasonably mod-friendly is a piece of ROM inside the thing storing the original software for the device, or maybe a minimal bootloader that would be able to grab the latest software from a local computer after you download it from the manufacturer's website. That way, if you brick it, you have a last resort. ROM's down to pretty cheap and pretty small. Also, it could help those blessfully-rare but annoying points where a flash upgrade fails and leaves something bricked.

'course the user sequence for reload-from-ROM should be non-trivial, both so you don't do it accidentally. The warranty (assuming the user doesn't do any hardware mods) could then only warrant it works under the "official" software/firmware, and there's a path back to that.

[identity profile] sps.livejournal.com 2008-01-07 12:36 am (UTC)(link)
Yes. In fact, it would make sense to make a single chip with a low power CPU, an wireless ethernet implementation, and such a monitor as a commodity part, since the applications for this kind of thing are endless.