Archive for Report
MacBook Experience
Yesterday I attended a large meeting at Apple where they introduced the MacBook for their mayor accounts in the Netherlands.
Yes, I actually got my hands on a white MacBook. So after seeing this nice piece of hardware I could give a little review about my experience. This is purely based on the exterior of the machine; I did not have the time to actually play with it and do some performance tests.
The first thing I noticed was the new “glossy screen.” I really don’t like it! Click to Read the Full Post »
Yes, the screen is very bright and the pixels are displayed very clearly. But there is a big annoyance. The lights in the room were reflecting on the screen which, I think, was very annoying.
Firefox Univeral So Close to Making LogMeIn Work
In hopes of that the Mac Intel version of Firefox 1.5.0.2 would tap better into LogMeIn, SvenOnTech gave it a good college try today.
Logging into our account has never been an issue, only when we click on that “Remote Control” link is when all hell breaks loose. Well, when we clicked on it this time, we saw something new (after accepting the certificate); a Sun Java animation. Glory! Could it be that this would work? Ooooh man, is that the log in window? Yes it is!! Ooh, ooh, it’s logging in, it’s passing password info and — Doh! — failure. We were finally given the unfortunate message “Connection refused: Session ID cannot be resolved.” A quick Google search brought up nothing. Ugh.
Well, it looks like LogMeIn remote control via a Mac is getting close but still isn’t quite there. It is known (you have to really search hard in LogMeIn’s [LMI] forums to find this info) that Tiger doesn’t play nicely with LMI and thus this may be the reason we still did not get in. Buy hey, at least we have Parallel’s Workstation if we’re in a bind that works fine in the end for us. But still, native support for LMI would be great.
Tags: firefox, universal, logmein, still no go
High iPod Sales Means Low Profit Margins for Apple
Everyone has been giving praises to Apple for its amazing success on the iPod line. However, all this talk about Apple turning into a multimedia company may actually be a death wish for it. According to Forbes, Apple"s profit margins are declining, not fattening as one would expect. Why? While Apple will not discuss how much it makes on the various iPods, it is estimated that Apple gains about 20% profit from each DAP sold. With 33% of total earnings coming from the music player, the 45% number from the computer side of Apple is shrinking which is not good since that"s where the bulk of the profits come from for Apple.
Now it"s not all the iPod"s fault, either. iTunes Music Store gives even a slimmer return for Apple. Eugene Munster of Piper Jaffray says that Apple is only making 4 cents per music download. Ya, 4 cents! It"s about the same for the video side as well.
So what"s an apple to do? I would caution those suggesting Apple shed its computer line to rethink this suicidal plan. While Apple has taken the audio market by storm with its iPod, it hasn"t been able to make much money from it. Good companies continue to innovate but they also keep the bread and butter on the table. With its new Intel line of Mac"s coming, I think the butter will just become richer and the bread more tastier for Apple. The iPod will continue to be used to brand Apple"s name more stronger then ever and entice people to purchase an Apple computer. At this point, it"s the only way Apple can survive.
Adobe Takes on Apple’s Aperture
Adobe hopes to squish Apple’s photo software, Aperture, with a light boom next week on the floor of Moscone Center when it shows off an early version of the San Jose-based company’s offering. Not known for taking things lightly in the professional market of video and graphics, Adobe will come out swinging with LightBoom next week at Macworld attempting to woo photographers to commit to Adobe’s offering before plunking money down for Apple’s piece of photo software.
So, interesting, no? I mean Apple went to Adobe back in 1983 asking Adobe to make the Macintosh compelling with its software. Adobe was glad to help and was known for nearly two decades as a Mac-first software company. Now Adobe goes to porting all its software from Windows code to Apple and Apple steps in with its software offering in the Adobe space. Adobe fights back. I like that. :)
It sounds like Adobe will be bringing in a ground-up application to San Francisco and not something it out right bought (like it did for its audio editor…can anyone say CoolEdit2000?) I’m sure we’ll see Photoshop technology in this but I’m interested to see if Adobe takes on a different approach as Apple did for Aperture.
CORRECTION: Adobe’s program is named LightRoom, not LightBoom. Excuse the error as my cold laddened head didn’t catch the typo. Thanks to reader Igor for pointing that out.
Linux to Get a Dashboard
I guess since Apple borrowed some Linux technology in the form of Safari, it’s only fair that Linux borrows something from Apple, right? Well looks like the next version of KDE will be getting a dashboard of its own as it will be integrating a near copy of OS X’s Dashboard. Because of Safari’s KHTML use, it will make most Dashboard widgets on OS X compatible with KDE. The same may most likely hold true for KDE widgets back to OS X as well. There may be a widget or two that will not work on both systems due to system specific code; however, the ability to share the wealth on both platforms will be a nice addition for KDE and hopefully for Apple as coders on the KDE side start contributing to the widget community.
Will this mean a spread to other operating systems? Can’t say, but since Windows95 was a rip off of the original Mac OS, maybe. :)
Apple Store Needed Microsoft to Help with Holiday Sales
Easy, now! I’m just reporting what I saw and nothing more. Do not shoot the messenger.
Friday night while shopping at the Apple Store in San Jose at the Valley Fair shopping center, I noticed a young Apple employee in fatigue shorts, black Apple shirt, and Elvis Costello-like glasses asking customers if they were paying for their purchases via credit card. When he came up to me and took my product and credit card, I watched closely. He was using a Symbol PPT8800 to perform my transaction. I mean it makes sense, the Apple Stores use the PD8500 at the cash registers for credit and debit transactions, so why not stick with Symbol for roaming transactions? But while the PD8500 is a mere slave and doesn’t require a full out operating system, the PPT8800 does. And while the program used to make the transaction completely covers up what lays beneath it, I knew what was there. Microsoft!
Folks, sad to say, the PPT8800 portable unit uses, as does all Symbol units, Windows CE or Windows Mobile. Yup, what the Pocket PC is made of. In fact, most Symbol units just run the plain-Jane Pocket PC 2003 SE (or now Windows Mobile 5.0) with its specific software running on top of it as a mere application. Shocking enough, the main Apple Store, just 10 minutes away from the Cupertino headquarters of Apple, is using a Microsoft product to help the holiday traffic get through. Stunning, no?
You know, in all fairness, I think this shows Apple’s pretty big that it can overlook this fact to get customers out of the store faster. It really takes a “big man” to do something like this and I respect them for it. But still, a bit surprising.
I bet the Elvis dude had no clue what he was scanning my Visa on. ;)
Tags: windows, microsoft, mobile, apple store, credit card, ce
ESPN Coming To iTunes Music Store?
After NBC, the Sci-Fi Channel, and USA Networks offered up some choice programming to be downloaded to lucky elves all over the North Pole and kiddies around the (selected) world, it seems Apple and the sports authority, ESPN, may be stirring the coals in the Christmas fire to make things a bit hotter on iTMS.
Reuters is reporting that ESPN, while not yet directly speaking to Apple, could be next to jump onto the iPod video band wagon via the iTunes Music Store. Seemingly, the iPod’s screen isn’t small enough to watch Tiger Woods nail a birdie or watch a quarterback get nailed by Jerome Woods. ESPN may want in on this new craze Apple is encouraging and this may happen really soon, heck soon enough to possibly put the Super Bowl and any game malfunction that may occur on your 5G iPod. Click to Read the Full Post »
Intel Macs Coming in January June
Rumors. You can’t trust ‘em and you can’t get enough of ‘em. Mac fans are frantic to know when the Intel Mac’s are coming. Enough of this monkey business, just give us our x86 based Tiger and unleash us! Let us show the Windows community a real operating system on an Intel chip (…with a beautiful GUI — to head off you Linux fans.)
We keep hearing about how it’s coming in January and how the Mac mini will be the first to show off the Santa Clara based chips of gold in them and you’ll be able to do everything from docking your iPod to flipping the bird to Microsoft with the new Mac’s. But now new information is coming from the Far East telling us that we’re getting our Samurai bandannas all bunched up in front our eyes and we’re not seeing clearly. Nope, these famed Mac’s ain’t coming until June, just like Stevie boy told us last summer. So there!
Apparently there are some insiders over in Taiwan saying they have a ship date of June 6th for not just the Mac mini but also for the iMac and iBook…with Intel chips in them. Now why an export release date would have any bearing on the good ‘ol U.S. of A., I’m not sure. In times past, Apple doesn’t release hardware world-wide simultaneously. But, it also doesn’t wait months for the rest of the world to enjoy in the fun, either.
So what does this all mean? What I’ve been saying for months: new Intel stuff coming to Macworld this January. Look, Apple rarely has any of it’s new stuff on sale the day of release. Even software like Safari was a “put your pants back on” and wait thing. Remember when the aluminum PowerBooks were all over Moscone center a couple of years ago? Ya, it was a few months before anyone in masses got those. It’ll be the same here with the Intel stuff, too. I still stand behind by prediction of PowerBook’s being released, too. These babies are hurting in speed and the iBook is just fine where it’s at for an entry model. PowerBook’s need speed!
So what should you look for early next year? New Mac mini’s and new PowerBook’s. No doubts on my end. Maybe an iPod with 120GB drive(s), t0o. That’s a bit of a stretch, but I’m thinking if Apple got the 5G 60GB so thin, adding a second drive into the guts of it all shouldn’t be too hard with little fat added.
Bookmark this entry to see if I’m wrong…or right! :)
TechTool Deluxe and AppleCare
If you remember, I had my new iMac’s hard drive trashed after running TechTool Deluxe that came with my Applecare. I reported it to Apple and thought it was a freak accident, but obviously it wasn’t. I received this email today from a listener and wanted to pass it along as a FYI. Also, the listener did not leave an email address and I’d like to ask him/her a questions or two. So please, if you’re reading this, send me your email address to surfbits at gmail dot com.
Read the entire article at Surf-Bits.com
Hackers Choosing Macs
The term “hackers” can conjure images of teenager misfits, breaking into your credit card account in order to get into porn sites on the web. But these days when you talk about hackers your talking about those programmers that can make software sing. They take open source code and turn it into main-stream applications.
So what are hackers using for their “weapon of choice”? Well according to Tim O’Reilly from O’Reilly Books, and Paul Graham, author and programmer, it’s the Mac OSX. Why you may ask? Well according to Paul Graham in his essay “Return of the Mac”.
All the best hackers I know are gradually switching to Macs. My friend Robert said his whole research group at MIT recently bought themselves Powerbooks. These guys are not the graphic designers and grandmas who were buying Macs at Apple’s low point in the mid 1990s. They’re about as hardcore OS hackers as you can get.
The reason, of course, is OS X. Powerbooks are beautifully designed and run FreeBSD. What more do you need to know? For most of us, it’s not a switch to Apple, but a return. Hard as this was to believe in the mid 90s, the Mac was in its time the canonical hacker’s computer.
Read the rest of the article at Surf-bits.com
Volume 3 of Ten For X Utilities
Allume Systems knows when it’s got a good idea. They just introduced the third volume of Mac OSX Utilities they call Ten For X. This time they give us 14 utilities in the package. I think it’s because several of the programs in the package are freeware, open source or donationware. The one thing that all 14 programs share is that they all are solid, award winning utilities.
Allume says this about how they decided on the 14 programs in this package, “We asked dozens of Macintosh Gurus and Power Users what utilities they can’t live without, the ones they use everyday, or those that help them out of a bind time and time again. Many of the titles we have included in Ten for X are on many of these “Ten Best” lists.” Allume is only charging $39.99 for the package which if you bought retail would have cost you over $150.00. Listed below in the “Read More” section are all the programs and a short description of each. If you think that 3 or 4 of the programs below are ones you want, you really need to do yourself a favor and purchase this package. 14 programs for $39.99 is a great deal.
Read the Full Article at Surf-Bits
MacWorld Expo Best Of Show: TextWrangler 2
One of the big surprises of the Expo was the naming of Bare Bones Software’s TextWrangler 2 as a Best of Show.
This product has always been a little brother to BBedit and was an inexpensive and great alternative for most folks that did not need the power or the expense of BBedit. Click to Read the Full Post »
My Great MacWorld Adventure Day 3: Photos
The Third Day at MacWorld Expo brought me more conversations and information. I’ll put them together in the next few days, until then, here are the Expo photos I took yesterday while on the floor. Please Click here for the photos.
My Great MacWorld Adventure Day 2: The Keynote
I am certain that you have all heard of the top Apple news from the Steve Jobs Keynote. I wanted to go over the details of the announcements and give you my take on them. The press pass I had was not a guarantee to get into the Keynote; we were placed in a press overflow room with closed circuit feeds.
I am going to start with the big announcement and that was the iPod Shuffle. It has two modes: shuffle and playlist. With no screen, the playlist mode allows you to go through a CD or list of pre-arranged music. The iPod Shuffle has a USB 2 connection and software built into iTunes which allows you to create a space on the iPod to act like a flashdrive. You can store files and play your music. It comes with a 12 hour rechargeable battery and has built in auto-fill in iTunes to allow you to pick the songs you need to fill the iPod. The size options are 512 meg for $99 and 1 gig for $149.
But the most exciting piece of news was the Mac mini. Think of the possibilities. This is the first Mac sold at this low of a price point, but the real news is the size. It’s no larger than a box of cigars and weighs only 2.9 pounds! It comes with a slot loading Combo Drive, (CD, CD-R, DVD) FireWire, USB 2, Modem, ethernet and the option to add up to 1 gig of RAM and an Airport card or Bluetooth. The pricing is $499 for the 1.25 GHz, G4 with a 40 gig hard drive, and $599 for the 1.42 GHz G4 with an 80 gig Hard drive. Until you have one in your hand, it’s hard to imagine the size. It will be available in stores and online on Jan 22nd and come with Mac OS X and the new iLife 05.
My Great MacWorld Adventure Day 1: (With Pics)
I registered early for my media pass and took a trip to see the Apple Campus in Cupertino with the folks from Your Mac Life. I took some pictures and will be up early in the morning to get in the Moscone in time to see the Keynote by Steve Jobs. I will report tomorrow night on what I saw and have many more pictures available then. Here is the link for the Day 1 Pics.
Production Suite
Apple has introduced Product Suite, which consists of Final Cut Pro HD, Motion, and DVD Studio Pro 3, all in one integrated package. Suggested retail prices of US$1299.
Apple releases iSync 1.5
Via MacMinute:
Apple on Tuesday released iSync 1.5, which adds support for more devices such as the latest Sony Ericsson and Motorola phones.
>> iSync
iTunes Music Store Catalog tops 1 Million Songs
MacMinute is reporting that Apple has officially announced that the iTunes Music Store now has over one millions songs available for download in the US. Apple is saying that its “the first and only online digital music service to offer consumers a million song catalog.”
Little Snitch Updated
One of my favorite apps, Little Snitch has been updated for better security.
New Features
- Voice alerts for applications running in full screen mode like games. For connections initiated by applications running in full screen we can’t show the Little Snitch alert panel. Therefor you will informed by an voice alert over the connection attempt and the connection will be automatically denied. You can manually add a rule to allow network from your full screen applications from within the Little Snitch preference pane.
- Improved “local network” detection especially on systems connected over Airport. You will not longer pestered by Little Snitch alerts after changing your location.
- Improved durability against modified permissions by adding an automatic permission check for all Little Snitch components.
- Improved Installer.
Bugfixes
- Rules containing relative paths aren’t longer marked as red (invalid).
- Some other minor bug fixes.
Steve Jobs & Cancer
Related Articles to Steve Jobs’ cancer:
Apple CEO Jobs undergoes surgery for cancer
Jobs begins cancer recovery; prognosis excellent
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