My Ride Chicago Experience: Part III - Range Day One

Saturday’s Class 9/18/2004: Riding Day One
Location: 185 S Damen (Damen & Monroe)

Friday during the day I had sore throat, stuffy nose and a fever. If I didn't go to the range.... I wouldn't get my money back so it was important that I felt better.... so Friday at work I took Dayquil, cough drops, drank lots of orange juice and had chicken soup from Panera Bread for lunch. By early afternoon, my fever was gone but the sore throat remained.

After work, I skipped dinner and went to bed at like 6pm. I slept 12 hours to 6am... like I said… I did NOT feel good!

I woke up feeling better than Friday but still a super bad sore throat.

I got ready and headed downtown.

The drive there was pretty simple. I took the Tri-State Tollway to the Kennedy and got off on Madison Street heading West. From there Damen was about a mile and a half up. At Damen, I turned left and the lot is on the right side just past the United Center.

I got there like an hour early (first one there)... they said when we took the classroom part to.... BE ON TIME.... NO EXCEPTIONS! So I listened to some shit on my iPod and waited for people to get there.

I don’t know who this is but the pic shows the sheds the bikes are kept in and note the Porta-Potty on the right, It’ll come into play later.

The class started with 13 people.... 10 of them were older than me (I'm 32) and the other 2 were right around my age. The class included 2 women (one in her 40's and one probably 35)

When Chris & Brad (the 2 guys that run the school) got there they pulled out a bike for everyone. It looked like they had a total of 14 bikes.



There were 2 Dirt Bikes... this is a pic of an actual one... (both looked pretty much identical)



There were about 5 Honda Rebels...



…and about 6 Modified Kawasaki Eliminators....


The 14th bike was a Honda Nighthawk but it wasn't used because the key is missing.

Everyone geared up. I noticed that all the helmets that they provide are now full-face, that's another reason I was glad I brought my own. The majority of the class used RC's helmets and gloves.

When it came time to assign everyone a bike, Brad assigned them…. You... take that one... you take this one. Before I knew it, all of the Honda Rebels (the one I planned on using) WERE GONE! When it came to me, he pointed me to a Dirt Bike. I said... "Is this the bike I'm gonna have to ride?" He replied, "Yes." So I asked... "Can I ride this one (Kawasaki cruiser) instead? This is just like the kind of bike I'm going to buy." He said "No problem." and I got to use the Kawasaki Eliminator.... just like this guy here....



Finally we were down to business!

At the beginning, it was easy....

• Proper way to mount a bike
• Proper way to dismount a bike
• The pre-ride inspection
• Start up procedure

Finally.... we got to turn them on!

After that it was straddle walking the bike to get a feel for its weight.

Then we could play with first gear and the clutch.... These are called Friction Zone exercises. Release the clutch slowly till it just starts to move then squeeze the clutch back in. That taught us where the clutch starts to engage the engine.

After a while we learned the basic skills of balancing and braking.

Then we brought up our feet so we could begin riding on the pegs.

Once we all were okay with riding on the pegs we learned about acceleration and deceleration and we got to ride in first gear for a bit until they said stop then straddle walk the bike around the curve and do it again....

Within 2 hours, one guy who was having a difficult time.... left and went home! Now there were 12 people....

At noon it was time for lunch... as I mentioned in Part II, they ordered all of us pizza (Domino's) because we agreed to allow them to merge the classes to 9am-2pm. Because I felt like crap and I didn't want to risk any lactose issues due to the cheese... not to mention the fact that I fucking hate Domino's pizza anyway... I didn't eat. I drank TONS of water. My throat still hurt a lot and the cold water helped it.

Then we began an exercise that I dreaded. It's the Counter-Steering exercise. After it was demonstrated to us, this guy Lou and I looked at each other and said.... "This isn't going to be good!"

The concept of Counter Steering is really scary because it's not natural…. to me anyway.

Let me try to explain a second.... When you're riding your bicycle and you want to turn LEFT you steer your bike to the LEFT... You basically push the RIGHT handle bar away (and pull the LEFT handle bar towards you) to force the tire to turn left. Ya with me so far?

Well in Counter Steering on a motorcycle, it's just the opposite. If I want to turn RIGHT, I need to push the RIGHT side away from me! That forces the motorcycle into a lean to the RIGHT and away you turn. The phenomenon is called Gyroscopic Precession. This is what happens when a lateral force is applied to the axis of a spinning gyroscope. Fucking hard to understand.

Okay.... so we all get back on our bikes... the demo is over... it's our turn.... he asks me if I want to go first.... I said NO!!.... he picked someone else. (Thank god) So I get all ready... I make sure that my helmet is on extra tight, I make sure my gloves are on tight... I button up my long sleeve shirt all the way..... basically I'm preparing myself for hitting the ground.... I'm positive that I'm gonna fall while attempting this exercise.

I felt a bit better after watching the first few people do the exercise with out wiping out. Before I knew it, it was my turn. I got the “go” from Chris and raced down the range. As soon as I got to the cones I pressed on the left handlebar… sure as shit, the bike leaned (and turned) to the left. Well... fuckin-a, I guess counter-steering DOES work!

The rest of the day soon became a blur with proper way to slow before corners, cone swerves, gear shifting, downshifting and the like.

When the class ended I was tired, sweaty, achy and thirsty. But ya know what? I had also ridden a motorcycle for my first time ever!

I said my goodbyes to the Chris & Brad and headed home. I still felt like shit so I ended up going to bed early…. I kept wondering what Sunday had in store!

On to Part IV

My Ride Chicago Experience: Part II - Classroom

Wednesday’s Class 9/15/2004: Classroom
Location: 5215 N Ravenswood (Ravenswood and Foster)

I left work at 3:30pm, went home and got my stuff ready for class. The drive took me a while (near and hour and a half) due to the weather (thunderstorms). Class started at 6PM but my goal was to get there by 5:30PM. Thank god for my trusty GPS because the directions I printed out sucked! I made it there right at 5:30.

I walked to the door of the office building and tried to open it… in typical Chicago fashion, it was locked. So I looked around and found an apartment style button system which would buzz the proper suite. Within seconds of hitting the button for Ride-Chicago the door began to buzz and in I went.

I noted that their suite began with a “2” so I headed right up the stairs and looked for an office. I saw the Ride-Chicago office but my focus was on the men’s bathroom because after 90 minutes in the car, I needed to take a piss! I checked the door and it was locked. I assumed it was occupied. I walked into the Ride-Chicago office and the second student to arrive was talking to a man at a desk. I asked him about the bathroom and of course... you need a key to use it. So… finally after emptying my bladder of the 20 ounces Sierra Mist I drank on the ride in I was set to talk with the man at the desk. He introduced himself as Brad and asked for my Driver’s License and Motorcycle Permit. He made copies of both and asked me how I wanted to pay. The choices were Cash or Credit Card. I handed him $300 in cash and he returned a $5.

He then pointed me in the direction of the classroom, which was about 10 feet away from the office.

Once the class started filling up our classroom instructor introduced himself as Chris. He had us go around the room and introduce ourselves, list any prior experience on a motorcycle and the reason you were taking the class. I’m pretty sure there were 13 people in the class.

I was picked to go first. What I basically said was… “I’m Craig, the only thing I’ve ridden is a Honda scooter about 10 years ago. Riding a motorcycle is something I’ve wanted to do for about the past 10 years. My daughter just turned 10… so I bet you can figure out why it didn’t happen.” The class laughed.

Some of the other reasons the other students brought up were “I just bought a bike and want to learn how to ride.” A woman in her mid 40’s said “I’ve always ridden on the back of a motorcycle… I think it’s time to move to the front seat.”

Each of us had to fill out some paperwork. Included were like 3 liability forms which basically said that if we got hurt in the range, we couldn't sue Ride-Chicago, its agents, the United Center, etc... pretty standard stuff, and quite expected.

The class started with a 50 minute video. Before Chris left the room he told us that there were two errors in the video and wanted us to look for them.

The video was pretty pathetic. It looked like it was produced by and for surfer dudes in California. I’m pretty sure we ALL noticed both errors… the video clearly tells us to only use the front brake and never the rear and how to safely ride between lanes of traffic in stop-and-go rush hour (a practice that’s legal in California but not here in Illinois) My advice to Brad & Chris... get a NEW video.

After the video we went through a binder containing a standard Motorcycle Operator’s Manual, which was very similar to the State of Illinois one. For $295 I kind of expected to be able to keep the binder but they apparently reuse them after every class.

Also included were over 100 questions on 4 pages. Chris had us divide up by table to find the answers. “You guys find answers to 1-5”, “You two 6-10” etc.

Then we went around and answered them aloud. We read the question and the answer we found. When we were done with Page 1 we moved on to pages 2, 3 & 4.

Since there were only 2 of us at the table I was at, and because I was seated to the left side, I ended up with the odd #’s and the European dude next to me got one question less on each page with the even numbers.

All the questions I answered were correct…. I can’t say the same about some of the other answers given but Chris was helpful and didn’t embarrass anybody. He also explained each answer and tried to make sure everyone understood. In some cases even using a model motorcycle so we could visualize exactly what was meant.

That process took over 3 hours. After a break Chris asked us who was signed up for the 7:00am-12:00pm class and who was signed up for the 12:30pm-5:30pm class for the range. Since there was only 14 of us he wanted to merge the two classes together to a 9:00am-2:00pm class. At first there were scheduling problems with others and it sounded like the two classes would remain separate.

After another break he offered to buy us all pizza on Saturday if we agreed to merge the two classes. As it turned out, there was only one remaining student who couldn't do it. They asked him if he could do the range portion the next weekend. He agreed. It didn't matter to me, in fact I was happy because it was 2 hours later.... but if I were one of the people who it did matter to... I would have been pissed!

After that it was test time… That‘s right… a test. I wasn’t aware there was going to be a test. I mean shit… we already had to pass the State test in order to get the Motorcycle permit! No big deal but it WAS 50 questions!

Chris assured us that any passing grade would do. Meaning even a “D” will pass. That meant we could get 20 wrong out of the 50. A piece of cake!

The questions were easy anyway. There were like 40 Multiple choice and 10 “Match the Motorcycle part to its correct name”

I was the second one done with the test. I turned it in to Chris and he told me to go to the office to pick out a free T-Shirt. (It's not really free... you get a shirt with your paid tuition.) He said we could leave if we wanted or come back into the classroom if we wanted to see our grade on it. I grabbed a shirt and headed back to the class.

He said “Way to go” and showed me the test. I got 3 wrong. It was an “A”. He asked me if I wanted to see which ones I got wrong… I said sure and looked at the 3 questions… one was a percentage of alcohol related accidents (I think I said 45% and the answer was 50%), another was about covering the clutch when stopped at an intersection and I don’t remember what the last one was. I handed the test back to Chris, shook his hand and said… “See ya on Saturday!” I was on the road home at about 10:30pm.

On to Part III

My Ride Chicago Experience: Part I - Preparation

In Illinois if one wants to learn how to ride a motorcycle and acquire the skills needed to pass the state's M test you have the choice of the free Illinois Cycle Rider Safety Training Program or now in the past few years, a couple private schools.

But why would someone pay $300 or even more to take private classes when there is a free option available?

Good question! It's all about supply and demand. It's hard as hell to get into the free program. If you don't sign up on the very DAY registration opens (mid-March) you will NOT be able to snag a spot in the class because the ENTIRE program for the ENTIRE year is booked up for the ENTIRE state of Illinois within 24 hours!! Then you have to waste every weekend by going up to a class location to see if someone doesn't show up so you can get in as a stand by. This might take several weekends to do since the people who were lucky enough to get a spot in the class know EXACTLY how hard it is to get into it... so.... unless they're dead or they've moved you're pretty much screwed!

I researched two private options. Ride-Chicago (RC) and Motorcycle Riding School (MRS) Both have classrooms in Chicago and both of their ranges use a United Center parking lot. Ride Chicago costs $295 + $40 for the first "M" test ($20 for any more attempts) while Motorcycle Riding School costs $375 with the first two "M" test attempts included.

MRS has been around since 2001 and has trained over 1,500 students. RC has been around since 2003 and has taught over 1,000.

I can't say that money wasn't a factor in this but it wasn't the deciding factor. I looked and looked for a review of either of the schools online but came up empty. That's part of the reason I'm writing this detailed account of my experience. Now... thanks to the power of the internet, a simple google search of Ride-Chicago or Ride Chicago pulls up my review on the very first results page!

Since I found no reviews, I based my choice mainly on the websites and the information they provided...

• The price was cheaper.

• I liked the fact that RC offered 1 on 1 instruction if needed, whereas MRS didn't. I figured there was a chance I'd need it.

• I liked that RC included pictures so I had some idea of what bikes they used and what the class looked like. After all, I did go to the local Honda dealership to play with the Rebel.

• Before I decided to buy my own helmet I liked the fact that RC's pics showed people in open face helmets while MRS said they provided all students with a full-face helmet. I wasn't sure if I'd be comfortable in a full-face helmet.

After some consideration, I decided to enroll in RC on their website and I picked the next open class which was one week later.

The Preparation: Things you need to know
Website: www.ride-chicago.com

Class Price: $295.00 (Using their facility & motorcycle. To take the State test is an additional $40)

Students must attend all classes. Missing or being late will automatically disqualify you.

Items you need to bring…

For the Classroom
• Your Driver's License
• Your Motorcycle Permit

For the Range
• Long denim pants
• Long sleeve shirt or jacket
• Over the ankle boots
• Sunglasses/glasses

To get the Illinois State Motorcycle Permit, download the study guide here and go to your local Illinois DMV to take the written test for it. The test was 15 questions and you can get up to 3 wrong and still pass. For the record…. I got 100%

My Preparation: Things I did to get ready before the class…

Gloves: Ride-Chicago provides gloves for those that don't have them but I decided to buy my own. Gloves was the easiest of the three items I wanted to buy for the class. While up in Harvard visiting Dave & Kay I stopped in at Harvard Motorsports. You can visit their very crappy website here.

I looked through their selection of gloves. It ranged from a really cheap $10 pair to over $100 for racing gloves, which I suspect were made to match the color & design of ones helmet. I decided on a $30 pair of Olympia’s. They’ve got reflective things on the knuckles and gel padding. I tried Medium which fit well but they were too tight in the pinky, so I decided on Large which was perfect on all fingers and just a tad too long in the thumb. I guess I’m right between sizes.

Boots: So… what the hell do I do about Boots? The last time I bought boots I was…. You know… come to think of it… I’ve NEVER bought myself a pair of boots! That must mean that the last time I had boots they were snow boots and I was in school! I forced Valerie to accompany me to Payless Shoes to buy a pair of work boots that would do the job until I find myself (and can afford) REAL motorcycle boots. We bought Stanley Steel Toe Work Boot - $29.99

In order to get used to boots again after a LOOOOONG hiatus, I wore them to work and on errands n shit and decided that they were too heavy for me. While Valerie & I were checking out the new Wal-Mart in Palatine (Dundee Road) a pair of Brahma Boots caught my eye. They were lighter and somewhat gym shoe like… even though they DO have steel toes. Anyway… they were like $21 so we bought them. The next day Valerie was able to return the ones from Payless, so all worked out in the end.

Helmet: Based on the pictures at Ride-Chicago’s website (all open-face) and the fact that I thought a full face helmet might be somewhat claustrophobic as a first helmet, I decided to look for an open-face helmet. Since going up to Harvard on Friday’s was becoming a routine on, Sept 10th, I decided to check out Harvard Motorsports for their selection.


The only open face helmet they sell is Bell’s Tourlite SC It's both DOT and SNELL approved. After trying it on in the store for a bit I decided to spend the $99 and buy it.

After wearing it a little more on Friday night and a bit on Saturday I learned to regret my buying decision. This wasn’t the helmet for me. I wanted to return the helmet the next day but they were closed Sunday & Monday.

As the new week started and time was drawing short, I had to make a decision. Buy a new helmet or wait to see if I can return the Bell helmet first?

First I had to find a helmet that I liked based strictly on style. Basically a 3/4 Helmet without the Bell’s cheek smushers.

Based on research on the internet I quickly found the HJC CS-5 which is also both DOT and SNELL approved. Also available in Wine.

Monday during lunch from work I called about 10 places locally to find out who had it in stock so I can try it on and buy it. No luck… call after call they either didn’t carry the HJC line or they didn’t have any of the CS-5’s in stock.

Since the CS-5 only cost $62.99, I decided to order it at http://www.helmetshop.com and hope for the best.

Now I know that it’s not really a good idea to buy a helmet without trying it on first but based on my size for the Bell helmet and comparing Bell’s & HJC’s sizing charts I decided to take the chance… time was short anyway. They told me I should get it by Wednesday.
After work Tuesday, again, I headed up to Harvard (I should have bought it locally dammit!) After a 90 minute drive up I headed to the store. They weren’t originally going to give me a refund for the helmet… they gave me some crap about returning a “used” helmet, but in the end… they decided that it was better to take it back than it was to piss off a new motorcycle rider.

The HJC helmet arrived the next day and it fit perfectly! So I was all set for class!

You should also note that Ride-Chicago does supply helmets (and gloves) but I didn't want to stick my head (and hands) into something that others have sweated heavily into.

Okay… Class Time!! On to Part II

3 years later...

This whole blog thing...

... was easier when I was unemployed!

I've been keeping busy. I've been at my new job for about 3 1/2 months now.

Alyssa is beginning phase one of braces and just began 5th grade. Nicholas is now in 2nd grade and hasn't been feeling to well the last couple days. (fever n shit)

For the past several Fridays I've been driving up to Harvard to visit Dave & Kay. It's nice to be able to get away from it all and head up into the country. They live in a subdivision called Shadow Creek. The neighborhood isn't complete yet... they've still got construction going on... but I expect them to be done by spring.

Since the evenings have been nice and cool, we've sat on their patio and Dave & I have enjoyed a few cigars. No, I haven't started smoking again... but when I'm up there I do have a few stogies while enjoying the evening.

Because the kids aren't in the car and I don't have to listen to my nagging wife... on the way back home I've always tried to beat my previous time. Last night.... I wasn't able to break my previous record of 53 minutes because I got pulled over by a McHenry County Sheriff. 74 in a 55. I've never been pulled over by a teenie-bopper before... I'm telling you... this girl "Deputy" looked like she was on a "Take your daughter to work day!"

I consider myself lucky because had she driven my way about 2 minutes earlier.... the ticket would have been much worse... I was driving around 90 mph. And before you start giving me crap about speeding let me point out that at 1:30am on Route 14 heading south Between Harvard & Crystal Lake is COMPLETELY dead. I wasn't putting anyone at risk except myself. I wasn't driving reckless.. just quickly. Anyway... the ticket will cost me $75... but it will really cost me $105 to opt for the supervision & traffic school. It's the first ticket I've gotten since 1994!!!! It's been 10 years! I gave this little girl playing cop my AAA card (doubles as a bond card) so I could keep my license. I'll be needing to keep that for Wednesday.

I haven't mentioned it yet on the blog but for those of you who want an update on my Bell's Palsy... it's getting better... slowly but surely. My right eyebrow is moving quite a bit now and I have some more movement of the right side of my face. I'm in no pain now but back 2 months ago I had a very localized pain in the back of my head. It hurt extremely bad... to the point that the pain woke me up in the middle of the night and I had a hard time sleeping for a couple weeks. It concerned me so I went back to the ER and had a Cat Scan of my head. The doctors found no problems. The pain was the pinched nerve which caused the issue in the first place.

Valerie's birthday is coming up on the 21st. Which is the same day that the Star Wars Trilogy FINALLY comes out on DVD!

More later...

Pup shoots man, saves litter mates

I told this story to Kay and she thought I was joking!

Read the whole article here.

Apple announces the new iMac...

It looks pretty cool... Check it out here.

Nikon to increase digital production, exit film

"Kimura said Nikon had no plans to stop producing film SLRs, but that it may next year start considering pulling out of the film compact camera business due to a sharp plunge in demand."

"There is still the matter of timing, but eventually we will have to dissolve this business," Kimura said. "There really is no region in the world where you can do good business in compact film cameras anymore."

Article here.

Yes... I'm still alive...

Between spending time with my friend Kay researching, inspecting, purchasing, and closing on her new townhouse and getting a job, I've been busy of late.

Busy, busy, busy... I still haven't seen "The Day After Tomorrow" or even "Harry Potter 3" yet! Which is very unlike me since I took a half day from work to catch HP2 when it came out.

I'll update more later... for now I'm gonna post about this new product Apple announced today.

Apple Announces "Airport Express"

Website link here. Press Release here. MacWorld article here.

I'm going to post the MacWorld articles here just in case they move...

A First Take on AirPort Express
Today Apple announced AirPort Express, a product that manages in true Apple fashion to be about a half-dozen ideas rolled together into one small white plastic box.

Looking weirdly like an Apple power brick (it measures less than 4-by-3-by 1 inches, and weighs less than 7 ounces) , the $129 AirPort Express is an AirPort Base Station, a wireless relay, a wireless bridge, a music streamer for stereos and powered speakers, a wireless print server, and an answer to the prayers of PowerBook-toting business travelers.

Let's start with the basics. Due to arrive in users' hands in July, the AirPort Express is an AirPort Base Station that fits in the palm of your hand. It doesn't offer all the niceties of the UFO-shaped AirPort models, such as support for up to 50 users, separate LAN and WAN ports, an external antenna connector, or a built-in modem. This means that Apple has finally released an AirPort Extreme base station that's more reasonably priced for casual home users.

But I suspect AirPort Express will really shine as an additional wireless product. For example, you can use it as a relay point in concert with an AirPort Extreme Base Station to extend the range of your wireless network and help you bring Internet connectivity to dead spots in your home, office, or school.

For business travelers who've gotten used to working wirelessly, being tethered to a short (and often inconveniently placed) network cable in a hotel room can be infuriating. But I imagine a whole bunch of those road warriors will soon be including an AirPort Express in their travel kit; once you get to the hotel, we'll plug an AirPort Express into the wall and the broadband cable. From there on out, we'll be able to surf wirelessly from the desk, the bed, the couch, heck, even the bathroom sink!

AirPort Express also has a USB port and the same USB printer-sharing features as its AirPort Extreme cousins. So if you've got a shared printer in your family, office, or classroom, you can place it in a central location and attach it to an AirPort Express, making it available to everyone on your network.

If you're using AirPort Express as a base station, you'd plug your Internet connection into it via its included Ethernet port. But if your main base station is an AirPort Extreme or AirPort Express, you can also use the AirPort Express as a wireless bridge -- just plug it in somewhere else in your house, and attach any Ethernet-based device to it. That device will now be on your network, even though it's nowhere near the rest of your stuff.

So, sounds great, right? A $129 mini AirPort Base Station. What else could you ask for?

But I haven't even mentioned the most radical part of the AirPort Express, the part that will probably sell more AirPort Expresses than any of the features I've mentioned up to now:

It's got an audio-out jack on it.

That's because AirPort Express is also an audio streamer, letting you connect any set of powered speakers or any stereo with a mini-jack- or optical-audio-input to your iTunes library and play music remotely. Stick one next to your home theater receiver, and you can listen to your iTunes music collection. Thanks to an update to iTunes (version 4.6, due later this week), iTunes will now be able to play music either through your computer's speakers or through speakers attached to any AirPort Express -- you choose where the music goes via a pop-up menu at the bottom of your iTunes window. (Find out more about how it works in my "How AirTunes Works" blog entry.)

It's encouraging to see Apple embracing digital music in places away from the Mac or the iPod. Of course, you must still use have iTunes open and running on a computer in order to play music to AirPort Express... but a lot of iTunes users want exactly what AirPort Express will give them: an easy way to play their tunes through their home stereo, or to a small set of speakers on the back porch, or into a child's bedroom.

With its simplicity and iTunes integration, I suspect that AirPort Express will be a big hit. I can't wait to get my hands on one.

(Updated 6/7 at 1:09 PM PT: Added information about the Wireless Bridge capabilities, per Greg Joswiak.)
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article two...
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How AirTunes Works
I spent a little bit of time with Greg Joswiak, Apple's Vice President of Hardware Product Marketing, talking about how the new AirPort Express works, especially the new AirTunes audio features.

Essentially, AirTunes is a method of creating remote speakers for a copy of iTunes, and sending data to those remote speakers via a wireless network. That network can be formed by connecting an AirPort Express to another AirPort Express, to an AirPort Extreme Base Station, or even to a non-apple 802.11b or 802.11g access point.

When you select an AirPort Express device in the new pop-up menu at the bottom of the iTunes 4.6 interface, that device essentially replaces your Mac's speakers as the audio-output source for whatever you do in iTunes. At that point you can do anything you'd normally do in iTunes -- play music from your Library, from someone else's library, or from your iPod; play an Internet radio stream; even play an audiobook. The sound won't come out of your Mac -- it'll come out of the speakers attached to the AirPort Express.

For those wondering if AirPort Express supports MP3, AAC, or any other specific file formats, the answer is no. AirPort Express supports Apple's Lossless Compression technology -- and everything that your iTunes streams across the network to Airport Express is compressed using that technology.

iTunes does the heavy lifting. When iTunes plays back standard audio content (AAC, MP3, audiobooks, music streams), it decompresses those file formats and creates what's essentially a raw, uncompressed audio stream. That stream is compressed on the fly using Apple's Lossless Compression, encrypted, and sent to the AirPort Express. AirPort Express decrypts the stream, decodes it, and outputs it in either analog format (if you plug in a standard analog mini jack) or as a digital PCM stream (if you plug in a mini-sized optical cable, which you can get from most major cable suppliers or straight from Apple for $39).

If iTunes is playing back a digital multichannel file format like AC3 (Dolby Digital) or DTS, those bitstreams are wrapped in Apple's compression and encryption, and then decoded at the other end. In those cases, AirPort Express would end up streaming the raw AC3 or DTS stream via an optical cable to your home theater receiver for decoding.

This means that if you're currently listening to music on speakers attached to your Mac, AirPort Express doesn't change the Mac side of the experience at all: you're still using iTunes as your musical interface, and you've got to keep that Mac on and iTunes open in order to keep the music playing. (As opposed to a device like Slim Devices' Squeezebox, [4 mice, April 2004], which is operated by an infrared remote control and has its own display to show you what's playing and let you change what you're listening to.) You can also only play one thing at a time, and to only one set of speakers. But now those speakers can be just about anywhere.

Apple's not ruling out taking those sorts of approaches -- Joswiak himself agreed that some sort of remote-control device would be a cool addition to AirPort Express. But as Joswiak put it to me, this is a first step for Apple in getting iTunes music into another part of your life -- in this case, into places where there are no computers or iPods.
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This certainly sounds like good news! I'm going to rush out and buy one in July... I'll let you know how well it works.