Old iPods left behind again
As rumored, Apple unleashed a new iPod
Monday, July 19, 2004, 12:17 PM
Apple has released a new fourth-generation iPod into the world. Lower price, bigger hard drive and a revised design. Sounds like a winning combo to me...
Related links:
Apple's Cheaper, Juicier iPod - Wired News
Good question: How long is the useful life of a laptop?
Saturday, July 17, 2004, 8:05 AM
Low End Mac: How long can you expect to keep using a laptop before it is obsolete or worn out?
In my case, I use a PowerBook as my main and often as my only computer for three or more years before retiring it to other uses. My current 12-inch PowerBook G4 is about 18 months old, but my previous Pismo PowerBook is still being used by Natalie as her only computer at home, meaning its useful life so far is more than four years. |
Speeding up your aging Mac
Saturday, July 17, 2004, 7:58 AM
MacDevCenter: 12 steps to improving your Mac's performance
Mark Bernstein: DiskWarrior just saved my laptop
Thursday, July 15, 2004, 10:22 PM
Mark Bernstein writes about the reasons he is a happy owner of DiskWarrior. A very happy owner, from the sounds of it.
A year of no hardware upgrades
Wednesday, July 14, 2004, 12:20 PM
Low End Mac has an interesting piece today about a writer who plans to freeze his spending on new hardware for the next year - Tech junkie swears off new hardware for one year.
AirPort Express ships
Wednesday, July 14, 2004, 12:17 PM
AirPort Express Officially Shipping - Apple says it's shipping the AirPort Express. You can order it from Amazon.com for $124.99, five bucks below its retail price. If you choose the slowest shipping method, you don't pay for shipping, either, in the U.S.... [Apple AirPort Weblog]
Still weighing options for keyboard repairs
Monday, July 12, 2004, 1:22 PM
I am still working with my 12-inch PowerBook G4, even though the N key is missing. I can't stand to do this too long though, and, as many people pointed out over the weekend, AppleCare is not going to cover the damage caused to my machine. Instead today I have been checking around the Web for replacement keyboards for my PowerBook. PBParts.com offers a wealth of PowerBook parts, including a replacement keyboard for the 12-inch PowerBook G4 at a cost of $169. Another option is one of the TouchSteam MacNTouch keyboards, which would offer some funky new functionality over the standard keyboard. That keyboard sells for $250.
Despite the higher cost, I am tempted to think more about the MacNTouch keyboard. But I haven't read much about them or heard from folks who are using one in their PowerBook. My main concerns are how it feels to type on the keyboard and whether the keyboard will cut down on the airflow and heat dissipation capabilities as compared to the standard keyboard. Anyone have any insight? |
Journalist seeks comments of OS 9 holdouts
Monday, July 12, 2004, 1:12 PM
I received an e-mail this morning from Giles Turnbull. He is working on an article about Mac users who are still using Mac OS 9.x. If you are interested in talking to Giles for his upcoming article, respond to his post on the luvly mailing list.
Time to call AppleCare
Friday, July 9, 2004, 2:33 PM
One slip of the cell phone was all it took. I stood up from my desk at work today and took my phone out of its holster and it slipped from my hand and landed squarely on the keyboard of my 12-inch PowerBook G4, dislodging the "N" key along the way. Unfortunately it broke the little plastic clips that hold the key in place, so now the key floats freely - a serious problem for typing. It looks like it's time to call AppleCare and go through the hassle of sending this never-before-repaired PowerBook back to the Mother Ship for repairs. Sigh... |
A new ebook about running an AirPort network
Thursday, July 8, 2004, 10:50 PM
Take Control of Your AirPort Network is a new $5 ebook by Glenn Fleishman.
On blogger burnout
Thursday, July 8, 2004, 5:56 PM
It is interesting to see today's story on bloggers suffering from burnout on Wired News. Despite the way it looks, I'm not really suffering from burnout these days. Rather I am having a hard time making time for daily updates to MNJ. My new job has me busy creating brochures, setting up press events, creating an online newsroom for the City of Tacoma and more. And this week things are even more crazy as Natalie and I rush to finish our final read-through of our Birding Washington book before it goes to press. That is consuming every "spare" moment between now and the end of the weekend.
We did manage to squeeze in a visit to the YMCA a couple of nights ago. It felt good to work out...
Creative Bits - a good new read
Thursday, July 8, 2004, 5:46 PM
Thanks to Damien Barrett for pointing out the relatively new Creative Bits site, with its interesting focus on creative applications for Mac OS X. I've subscribed to the RSS feed for the site.
The ruggedness of the palmOne Zire 72
Thursday, July 8, 2004, 4:42 PM
I've had my Zire 72 for about a month, and already it is showing signs of wear that I have never seen with my trusty Palm Vx. The blue rubbery coating on the surface of the Zire 72 has started peeling away where the stylus slides into the side of the PDA, and the bottom corner is showing the same kind of wear. Otherwise the Zire 72 is working flawlessly and allowing me to stay in sync with my Windows XP machine and its Outlook-based organizing scheme at the office as well as with Palm Desktop on my 12-inch PowerBook G4.
Editing MP3s within iTunes
Thursday, July 8, 2004, 4:15 PM
My story over the weekend about editing a song for a friend's wedding using my Mac drew some interesting e-mail responses, including the following directions for doing the entire job within the confines of iTunes. Alain Toutant wrote:
iTunes can be used to create a subset of a song all on its own. Here's the procedure :
Go in the info window for the song, under the options section, select a start and end time corresponding to the subset you need (the times can easily be found on the progress bar when playing the song);
Close the info window and use the "convert selection to MP3" item of the "advanced" menu. You may need to change your preferences to select MP3 rather than AAC depending on the format you want.
This will create a second copy of the song with only the selected subset in it. You can then drag it to you desktop or to a folder to export it.
After that, you will simply need to delete the new song in iTunes and uncheck the start and end options of the original song.
No freeware needed. It's all part of the Apple free software.
On iTunes and sound quality
Thursday, July 8, 2004, 4:08 PM
An article over the weekend in the New York Times pointed out that the songs sold through iTunes and loaded onto millions of iPods are not the same sound quality as the originals - duh - has stirred up a little controversy on the Net this week. Scott Rosenberg cuts to the chase and points out the shortcomings in the Times' lousy article.
palmOne reaches out to Mac users
Thursday, July 8, 2004, 4:02 PM
Ed Hardy writes on Brighthand that palmOne has rolled out a new section of its Web site to cater to Mac users. The move follows stories earlier this year that led many to believe that the PDA vendor was phasing out support for Macs.
Back to Birding Washington
Saturday, July 3, 2004, 9:41 PM
Our long book project is one step away from publication. A couple of days ago we received the galley copies for Birding Washington, our book that profiles bird watching sites in Washington state. Over the next week we will be reading through the roughly 400-page manuscript and making final corrections before sending the pages back to the East Coast. With luck the book will hit bookshelves within the next month or two...
Apple's mistimed jabs at Microsoft
Saturday, July 3, 2004, 9:00 PM
One other quick observation regarding Apple's attitude at the recently finished Worldwide Developer Conference - did anyone else find it ironic that Apple took jabs at Microsoft and Longhorn while at the same time announcing it would be at least six months before another major release of Mac OS X? Add the fact that Apple then announced a two-month delay in the release of new iMacs and it sounds a bit like the folks in Cupertino are specializing in vaporware these days.
Yet another time when a Mac comes in handy
Saturday, July 3, 2004, 8:49 PM
One of my co-workers at my new job is getting married next weekend, and on her last day at work yesterday she was trying to figure out an easy way to remove a few seconds of audio from a song that she wants to use as part of a PowerPoint presentation she will play at the wedding. I offered an easy answer and offered to do the job for her on my Mac. I played her song on CD through iTunes and recorded the song using the free WireTap application. Then I transferred the resulting aiff format file to CD along with an MP3 version that I created by importing the song and ripping it in iTunes. All done with free software on a Mac. Excellent!
By the way, WireTap is about to turn one year old.
Update: As a follow up, at least one MNJ reader has asked why I didn't just edit the file with QuickTime rather than going through the trouble of using WireTap. The answer is simple. I don't have a license for QuickTime Pro and I wanted to use free tools at hand to get the job done. There is more than one way to do things.
Tiger may not appeal to average users
Saturday, July 3, 2004, 8:39 PM
That's the arguement that Glenn Fleishman makes today in the Seattle Times:
Average User Not Likely To Pounce On Tiger - While Tiger claims 150 new features, just as Panther did, an average user won't notice or care about most of them. By Glenn Fleishman, Seattle Times (via MyAppleMenu) [myapplemenu]
Glenn also added: "Like previous Mac OS X releases, Tiger will cost $129. It includes virtually none of the features readers of this column favored most strongly a few weeks ago."
I agree, but ouch...
