Snow Days

As the weather warms and the sun comes out here in SF, it finally Snows for Mac users everywhere. That is to say that Apple has released their latest big cat named operating system, Snow Leopard (OS X 10.6). With it Apple has picked up Leopard (OS X 10.5), cleaned it out, dusted it off, and sped it up greatly for all Intel Mac users. Plus, they have dramatically reduced the price for us too! ($29 for a single user and $49 for a family pack (5 users).) Sorry to say that anyone with a non-intel Mac (iBooks, PowerBooks, PowerMacs and G4 Mac Minis) will not be able to upgrade to Snow Leopard. However, now is a great time to upgrade your old hardware and go Intel.

One problem that may affect users though is software compatibility. Some of your third party (non-Apple) software may not work with the latest release of OS X. Generally speaking, a good majority of your higher end software (ie, Adobe, Microsoft…etc) will work without a hitch. It’s more along the lines of the little pieces of software that will fail to work. I, for example, loved a little piece of software called Letterbox (As it stands the developer of Letterbox has a 4th beta version posted, which seems to be working rather well for me.) which allows you to have your emails preview pain show to the right of your email list. Unfortunately it was rejected by Snow Leopard. To be fair to developers, Apple did really jump the gun on the release date of Snow Leopard. That move undoubtedly left developers dangling in the wind by cutting off roughly a month of further testing on their software.

Overall though, Snow Leopard is a gorgeous piece of work. It truly is what Leopard should have been from the get go. The developers at Apple redesigned 90% of Leopard’s internals. Which means Snow Leopard is heavily streamlined and even more visually gorgeous then its predecessor. Snow Leopard is not at all an entirely behind the scenes redesign, there are quite a few little tweaks to what you and I see and use everyday. I have been using Snow Leopard on my MacBook since the early Beta release back in June and I am still finding nice enhancements constantly. Some of my favorites are:

-Dock Expose allowing users to click and hold on an applications icon in the dock to get a view of all windows open for that app, and thereby get to the window you are after with ease.

-I am also a huge fan of the ability to resize items in the finder with a handy slider at the bottom right of the finder window.

-Another nice enhancement comes to Stacks (Stacks is a Leopard-introduced feature of the dock which allows quick access to folders placed next to the trash can icon). You finally have the ability to scroll through a folder’s contents and click into folders within a folder to get to its contents. Also a nice touch is a back button so you can go back to the previous folder you were in.

- Quicktime X has a fantastic, albeit simple, feature that allows you to record a video of actions you make on the Mac real time. Which is a great way to help out family and friends with their most vexing Mac problems.

There are many more little tweaks and improvements that make Snow Leopard wonderful experience, but I won’t be going through them all.

By far I believe that the number one thing you will notice from the get go is speed. I have, of course, installed it on all the machines that are active in my house: a Mac Mini 1.66 core duo, a MacBook 2 gHz core 2 duo and my girlfriend’s MacBook Pro 2.4 gHz core 2 duo. The MacBook Pro was the last machine to receive the upgrade. That being said, my MacBook, after the upgrade was equal in speed if not faster than the MacBook Pro, prior to upgrading the MacBook Pro. Needless to say I was rather pleased with this factor. Next to get the upgrade was the Mini, that bumped it up to equal or slightly greater than my MacBook, prior to upgrading the MacBook. The last computer to get the upgrade was the MacBook Pro, that computer is now SCREAMING fast, incomparably so. The speed bump is worth the price of admission alone.

How did Apple developers achieve such performance, you might ask? Well I will tell you. WARNING: this part is gonna get techie. The main speed boost comes from switching from 32 bit processing to 64 bit processing. To be fair not all Intel Macs can benefit from this as they cannot all handle 64 bit processing. What does 64 bit processing mean? That means that the processors can do the math of processing at almost double the speed of 32 bit processing. Also 64 bit processing means that your computer can handle a nearly infinite amount of RAM. RAM is responsible for allowing you to run more applications at once, aka multitasking, plus it does give a bit of a speed boost as well.

The next reason I am about to give for the speed boost in Snow Leopard is a debatable, yet I believe it to be true. What I am referring to is the slimming down of the system software installed to roughly 7 GB, as opposed to an 11 GB Leopard install. They pulled this feat off by removing any code for Apple’s pre-Intel computers (Power PC Macs, aka PPC), hence the reason older Macs are not supported by Snow Leopard. It is in my belief that without all of the code for the PPC computers, Snow Leopard has to shuffle through less code and thereby improving speed as well. As I said though, this is debatable. One thing I do know for a fact is that when you install Snow Leopard over a Leopard install you gain up to 15 GB of storage on your internal hard drive, which is always a lovely thing in itself!

If you couldn’t tell from reading this post, I am a HUGE fan of Apple’s latest operating system (OS), Snow Leopard. It is, in my opinion, the best OS Apple has released to date. At $29, it is by far their cheapest offering as well. So, what are you waiting for? Go on out and grab yourself a copy today! If you need help with the install, don’t hesitate to call DandyMac if you are in the SF Bay Area!

Why, AT&T?

Yes, that is indeed the question. Why, AT&T? Why do they treat iPhone owners as second class customers? Why do they offer such horrific internet service? Why do they make setting up such horrific internet services so difficult? Why do we, as their bread and butter, allow them to continue operating in these ways?

ISP

These questions haunt me everyday as an iPhone owner, and as an Apple Consultant & Technician who installs their services for unsuspecting clients. I mean first off, DSL? Really? For almost the exact same price, an individual or small business would do much better in speed, strength and reliability by simply choosing cable internet. The one and only argument I constantly hear from people about choosing AT&T over, say Comcast for example, is “Oh well, Comcast is evil!”.

While I know from experience that actually dealing with Comcast can be a bit daunting, I know that I am, at the very least, getting a far superior end product than with AT&T. Plus, if you want to really talk about ‘evil’ companies, can you honestly state that AT&T is a better company than Comcast? Is AT&T really less evil than Comcast? My friends I am here to tell you that I see very little difference, as companies, between the two gigantic corporate monsters that we have to choose between here in San Francisco. The main, and most important part for me is the end product they each produce. And as far as speed, strength, reliability and ease of use are concerned, the true winner here in the battle of the evil corporate overlords is clearly Comcast cable internet!

Cell Service

So, let’s get specific here. What does AT&T provide for us? The most obvious thing these days is iPhone service and support. One would think “well that’s cool.”, I assure you it is barely cool at all. First off, let’s discuss the basic function of the iPhone, the phone itself. AT&T cell phone service is spotty at best, on any given journey here in San Francisco one could expect at least 2 dropped calls. Often times you will see far more than 2. Plus, the signal, when you can get it, is very poor and usually to crackly and quite to actually understand the conversation you are having. I find myself asking, “I am sorry, could you repeat that?” much more then I ever should have to. So the actual phone service is subpar to say the least.

Now, let us talk about the data spectrum we are so graciously provided by AT&T. AT&T is supposed to be providing iPhone users with top notch 3G data coverage, unlimited for $30/ month. Matter of fact, you do not even have a choice in using the data plan or not. If you have an iPhone in the US, you are required to have this coverage by AT&T. In theory it is a very reasonable price for what should be a strong, fast, reliable and unlimted data service. In practice, however, it is not strong, fast or reliable. It is especially unreliable in actuality. A very odd thing for a resident of San Francisco to be saying, considering the proximity to the birthplace of the iPhone, Apple Inc. On my average bus commute downtown, more than half of the journey is spent on the Edge network. (For those that do not know, the Edge network is AT&T’s old and slow data service. If you are using an original iPhone then you are more than familiar with the edge network.) This fact of spending more than half my ride on the Edge network is simply unacceptable! When you factor in the that I am on the edge network through some of the more expensive neighborhoods in town, and downtown even, it is just pathetic. Just goes to show that money cannot buy happiness.

The Big MMS Scandal

When I ask the question at the beginning of this post, “Why do they treat iPhone owners as second class customers?”, I am referring to the fact that basic cell phones on AT&T’s network are allowed features that the iPhone is not. The main feature that sticks out would be MMS service. MMS stands for Multi-media Messaging Service, meaning that  you can send audio, video and image files along with a text message. This is available for almost all AT&T phones, except for the iPhone. To be fair to AT&T for just a second,  at Apple’s WWDC Keynote address back in June, they announced this functionality for the iPhone for the first time. They also presented a list of all the companies that will support MMS (not to mention tethering, for using the iPhone to supply your computer with high speed internet while on the go). Guess who was obviously missing from that list? Yep, it was AT&T,

Why, I ask again, AT&T? Why do you keep  a choke-hold on your most lucrative phone offering? Why do you hold down all of the people that continue to use your service, let alone the hordes of people who have switched to your services from other cell service providers, just to have an iPhone? It really is very sad that Apple had to go with AT&T to get the iPhone out there, now we are all suffering from that forced decision. What has become even more sad about the whole deal is that Apple’s reputation is getting smeared by AT&T’s short comings. (Hence 2 recent lawsuits filed against AT&T AND Apple over the MMS promise and lack of delivery from AT&T. Here is a post in reference to one such lawsuit at TG Daily. People just do not seem to understand that the one and only true culprit behind the lack of MMS on the iPhone in the US is, but of course, AT&T.)

Unjust

What are we to do about this corporate overlord running our communications? Well, I wrote this post in reaction to many things I have experienced, heard about, and read about over the past few months. One article caught my eye in particular lately, a posting on a site called macdailynews.com. That posting led me to the original one on the wsj.com (The Wall Street Journal). At the bottom of the original posting is a bullet list of possible solutions that I fully agree with. It’s far past time for us to take control of the way AT&T, and all other corporations for that matter, operate in this country.

After all, we pay them, so it’s high time we should make them provide top quality service, or pay for not doing so!

Palm Pre-meditated

Pre-amble

Oh my, Apple finally up and did it! With the release of the iTunes update today, as expected, the Palm Pre is no longer able to sync with iTunes. At the very same time they managed to unleash yet another round of free press! Not to mention a torrent of very upset Pre owners brash, and often completely unsubstantiated comments. It’s a truly bizarre thing to me that we seem to lose a part of our rational minds when things that are expected to occur actually happen. Such is the case with the Palm Pre and iTunes syncing break.

I mean honestly, what freaks me out the most when I read the comments to articles about the break in syncing the Pre with iTunes, is that Palm has somehow become “the Victim” in this scenario?! Well let’s just have a look at the plain facts in this case.

Pre-conceived

First off there is Apple, a company who has been around for a long time in the underdog category of personal computing. They finally stumbled upon a great winning formula with the iPod and it’s software companion, iTunes. There had been other mp3 players before the iPod, and certainly after. The iPod then became a huge success for it’s ease of use, as well as for its fantastic sync manager iTunes. The formula worked so well that other companies wanted a piece. So Apple developed a means for third party MP3 players to sync with iTunes, called an API (Application Programming Interface) for software/hardware developers. The API is accessible via licensing from Apple. Since then Apple has been making improvements to iTunes, iPods and now iPhones. They make these improvements via software updates available for all, should you choose to do so.

Also as a huge bonus, Apple fought the recoding industry giants to sell music without DRM (Digital Rights Management) protection. They now sell all of their music without DRM, meaning that you as the consumer can now play the music through any device that supports the AAC format. (Which the iTunes Store sells all music as these days.)

Now let’s talk a bit about Palm. Palm had a huge success in the 90’s with their Palm Pilots, and have grown to provide high quality smartphones for business people. They have also typically provided their own proprietary software for Mac and PC users to manage syncing data between Palm Pilots/smartphones and your computer. As a consultant and technician I can safely say that this is an area where Palm did not do so well. The software was usually awkward, bloated and clunky, and often did not work anyway. Yet they have typically well designed hardware.

These days, Palm is not doing so well as a business. They needed a hit bad, as their smartphone sales have dropped steadily since the onslaught of RIM’s Blackberrys and of course the iPhone. So what did they do? They hired a guy, who worked with Apple for some 15 years, to help them design an “iPhone Killer”. The Pre was the device that Palm came up with. Now, the Pre has some great features in its OS that the iPhone is glaringly missing (multi-tasking, Synergy…etc.). They touted seamless syncing with iTunes right out of the box, which would have been a good move for them had they chosen to use the API that Apple licenses. The thing that struck me, and most anyone else who noticed, as a very odd choice, is that they chose to be incredibly sneaky about it. They made the decision to put in some software that would fool iTunes into believing that the Pre was an iPod. The Pre would actually show in iTunes as an iPod?!?! Really?? Yes, really.

Un-Pre-pared

Really, I am not writing a blog about whether Apple or Palm have a better product. Nor am I writing about which company is a bigger corporate monster. What I am actually compelled to write about is the comments on articles that I read, and how off point and uninformed most of the comments are. Today I read comments about the Pre no longer being able to sync with iTunes, so these commenters are fresh on my mind.

I am certain that it was an awful feeling to realize that they could no longer sync their iTunes with their beloved Pre. Matter of fact, had I not read a stitch about the Pre and iTunes when it was released –which, considering the amount of press coverage on the topic before the pre was released, is quite an accomplishment in itself– I would have been just as pissed and may have posted comments about it today too. The difference is that I would have maybe poked around, on the very same internet I am putting posts on, just a bit for some facts first.

Which, I am sad to say, is mostly just not the case for a great majority of the posts I read this afternoon. I believe that if the majority of posters today had just done a tiny bit of fact checking before posting, they would have realized that Palm is not the victim in this case. Palm is in fact the culprit behind promising you that your Pre would sync seamlessly with iTunes. It was not Apple saying that it would sync with iTunes. You should all be flooding Palm with complaints, not posting factually incorrect comments online. Also urge them to provide you with the means to sync your Pre with your music, LEGALLY! After all, by posting such ill-Pre-pared comments, you are not helping your cause at all. You are only serving to make yourself look bad.

R.I.F. (Reading Is Fundamental)

UPDATE!

So it seems that Palm is back at it again. Today they relased webOS 1.1 software for the Pre. Which, among many bug fixes, enable “seamless syncing with iTunes” once again. Do these guys really not think that Apple is already working on braking that hack too? Do they not believe that Apple’s legal team will pounce on them?

Well, I for one, believe that Apple HAS to sue them already. They are really starting to look soft by allowing yet another hack to enable third-party unauthorized syncing with iTunes. Seriously, Palm, get it together! why not simply build your own software for syncing with computers?

This is all just a bit silly, I must say.

iPhone Batteriness

Ok, so I grabbed a new 3GS iPhone on day one of its release, switching from a 4gb original iPhone. Obviously I am very pleased with the general speed of the 3GS. I love that the performance of my already owned apps has dramatically increased in speed. Having 3G has also been a more-than-welcome network speed increase as well. iPhone OS 3.0 has brought the phone up to par with all smart phones by adding a ton of great additions to functionality. (cut and paste is FANTASTICALLY implemented.) So what is my number one complaint about the 3GS?

Just like most of you out there, the number one complaint I have thus far is battery life. My original iPhone’s battery lasted me all day on moderate to heavy use. I wouldn’t have to charge the battery until I came home from my 8 to 10 hour work days, which seemed like a problem to me at the time. I was excited to think that my 3GS would outlast the original iPhone. I mean, Apple did indeed tout greater battery life at the WWDC Keynote address, right? Well I am here to state that they were so so very wrong as far as I am concerned. I now leave for work in the am, with the same amount of use and I have to recharge the battery at about 1pm, as it is half-way spent by then. I have noticed that after the half-way mark, the battery drains rapidly from then on. Half-way spent by 1pm?! That is better battery life? Even with location services, 3G and wifi turned off on my 3GS, my girlfriend’s 3G iPhone with all network and location services on, still outlasts my 3GS. This, my friends, is a sad statement about the new 3GS’ battery life.

However, my girlfriend’s 3G is getting less battery time then it did before updating it to 3.0. Does this suggest that Apple failed to optimize the performance of the new iPhone OS? At first I was convinced I had a malfunctioning iPhone, it just seemed wrong how fast the battery would run dry. All posted specs on the 3GS seemed to point to a longer battery life. Those who have cracked open the phone have reported that the battery is 6% larger physically than the 3G’s battery. Which would suggest that it would have a greater life span. I was convinced that my 3GS was a lemon, not an Apple. Matter of fact I am still uncertain what the real case is. Another oddity is that the performance of my girlfriend’s 3G, with iPhone 3.0 running, has become more sluggish then before the software update. Which may be a signal that the culprit is indeed iPhone OS 3.0 not being properly optimized.

Now, I fully understand that it is a new OS and a new piece of hardware, and they have bugs to work out. Apple, more than most computer companies, is very fast at releasing updates and bug fixes. As I understand iPhone OS 3.1 has been seeded to developers already, which backs my belief that they are working on fixes. I am pinning much hope that they are indeed going to address this battery catastrophe in OS 3.1. I do hope that I am not let down by the mothership.

So, my questions to you are:

Do you have a 3GS? Are you experiencing horrifying battery life? Do you think it’s the phone or the OS? Are you hoping for a remedy with OS 3.1 too? What are us rabid iPhone owners to do??

Let me know your thoughts please…

Thank you in advance! DandyMac is off to save Mac users from their troubles.

iFoniness

Ok, let me start this off by stating that this is a BLOG, meaning that this is article of opinion with facts. That is to say that this is not reporting in any way. Which is really what I am writing about here. This article, or post rather, is about a couple of different thoughts regarding the state of journalism in today’s ever increasing online society. Being that I am a huge Apple fan, consultant and technician I am focusing on the current barrage of rumors, ‘reports’ and comparisons surrounding the iPhone.

Obviously I am a gigantic fan of the iPhone, and an avid user of it as well. I am still using an original 4gb version of the phone, and I have been holding off upgrading until the next generation of the device is released. I seriously hope that the rumors out there about the release hitting during next week’s WWDC. I mean I REALLY want it to happen, as my screen has been cracked for nearly a year now. On a positive note about he crack, it hasn’t affected the performance or sensitivity of the phone. Which is a testament to the quality of the build!

The Hype Machines:

Now, let’s talk a bit about the rumor mill and ‘analysts’ predictions. I will first admit that I do enjoy speculating about the features, changes, and release date of desired Apple products. However since the release of ‘the Jesus phone’, things have just escalated FAR out of control. Seriously, I am half expecting to hear that the next phone will make me breakfast, cure cancer and promote world peace. As I said though, I enjoy a fair amount of the rumors, but can we give it a rest already? Nobody REALLY knows what will or will not be released except for Apple themselves, or anyone that Apple has legally bound by full NDA.

Next, and definitely far more annoying, are the analysts out there. Can you even believe that they get paid to make predictions?? I certainly cannot. I can only liken their type to that of your garden variety Palm Reader. Normally I would have no problem with what they do as analysts. The main problem I have is how their BS affects the general population, the companies who’s products they are analyzing, and the overall economy! These guys are sincerely screwing up the country in general, let alone technology.

The rumor mills and the analysts aside, what has been under my skin lately is the so called Press and the bloggers that work for them. This to me is the number one problem in our country today: The press is supposed to be comprised of people that have been educated in the art of journalism, people that are impartial and non-biased, people who’s only desire is to inform the public of actual facts without slant. To me, anything less should only be considered opinion, and should be treated as nothing more. This is so very very far from the kind of ‘reporting’ that we are all exposed to in these online times. ( Speaking of the times, a prime example of the misleading and wrongful reporting I am writing about here can be found in today’s New York Times web site here. It’s not so much the full article that I have an issue with as much as the title itself. The title is contradicted several times on the first page alone.)

Blogging… what can be said, as I am (reluctantly) one myself? My blogging is primarily about Mac tips, thoughts and opinions based on personal experience as a consultant and technician. I would in no way consider myself to be a reporter in anyway, shape or form. This is where my problem comes in with blogging, it is not reporting. Knowing that it not reporting, why is it that bloggers are picked up by major journalistic institutions? Why do blogs make the headlines of the NY times?? This practice is incredibly misleading and wrong. I am not opposed to people making a living off of blogging, matter of fact I am all for it. But let’s keep blogs in their own section of the newspapers, as newspapers would for articles about food: in a specific section of your preferred news source. If I want to read articles about technology, I will go to the technology section of my preferred source. Can we stop putting blogs in with the headlines already??

Devise-ive

What I really want to write about is the iPhone and it’s competition, which is dominating almost every technology news source I rely on. More specifically I want to write a bit about the upcoming release of the Palm Pre. I am not trying to say here that the Pre is an inadequate device at all. But the press’ hype machine is in FULL gear over this thing. Some of the major players in technology review and reporting are absolutely making themselves look ridiculous out there over this thing. For example, David Pogue’s review of the Pre is almost silly, and unfortunately not fully factual (not his fault really). I find his review of the Pre to be a bit too gushing, just as I felt his review of the original iPhone was. Almost as though he were slipped and extra grand to get the positive word out. It’s sad because I really dig his style in general.

The one common piece that all smartphones seem to share at this moment is the design factor. Almost every single phone manufacturer now has a rectangular, large touch-surface, large screened phone. Where did this design factor come into play? From a company that had no previous experience in developing phones at all, Apple. Since the iPhone was released it has completely flipped the game on a stale industry. To date, there has not been one company out there that has managed to even come close to having the strong impact on the phone industry that Apple has had. We all know that copying is the most sincere form of flattery, right? So that makes Apple one seemingly endlessly flattered company by all of the phone industry. I personally would have hoped that Apple would have spurned innovation more than it did copying.

As far as the Pre is concerned, from what I can tell it may be the closest thing to competition that the iPhone has out there. I am certain that Palm has a quality piece of software on their hands with the Pre. They have been in the phone game for quite some time and most people that use their phones love them. I think, once again, that the design of the phone itself is yet another iPhone wannabe, aside from the slide out physical keyboard that is. (what’s up with no on-screen keyboard? You have to slide out a cramped keyboard every-time you want to type anything?)

I believe that the real star of the Pre is it’s webOS. From all of the reviews out there I have read it sounds like they have a winner on their hands, for about three more days that is. No seriously though, I do like the ‘cards’ idea. ‘Cards’ give you the ability to run several apps at once and flip through them with a swipe of your finger, which enables more efficient multi-tasking. Definitely a great idea. however, sadly, they are just too late. I have read several (too many) reviews of the Pre and all of them are touting this feature as “unparalleled”. Yes, it is currently unparalleled. Again, for only three more days, which is when iPhone OS 3.0 is due on the scene.

One thing about all of the reviews that baffles me is that not one of them mentions the fact that, a few months ago, Apple had a special developer’s event where they announced iPhone OS 3.0. During this special event they talked about these “unparalleled” features (enhanced multi-tasking and smart notifications) that reviewers are saying the Pre has, plus another 98 new features the iPhone will have. Apple has addressed making multi-tasking much more efficient by allowing apps to run in the “background” from servers instead of using up all the resources of the iPhone itself. Meaning that the iPhone will have more ram and processor power available to the task at hand, thereby making the iPhone more powerful and business friendly. Finally we will even see push notifications as promised at last years WWDC.

The absolute most suspicious thing I have heard thus far about the Pre is it’s “integration” with iTunes. We have all come to find out, which should really have palm worried, that this “integration” is nothing more then a hack of iTunes code that makes iTunes see the Pre as an iPod. This is so very sketchy. Has Palm not heard of licensing??? I do believe that they will hear a lot about licensing from Apple’s legal team in the near future. They will also, doubtless, hear about changing code to block any Palm device from syncing with iTunes in the very near future. To me this is the move that may ultimately sync, oops I mean sink a company that is very close to going under as it stands. One would think that a company facing bankruptcy might have been much more careful in making certain that they were completely legit.

Finishing touch

I am not one to condemn people for using their own judgement and choosing to buy any of the other smartphones out there over the iPhone. Matter of fact I give people who go against the grain huge respect for doing so. (I mean isn’t that how Apple came to be?) I would just hope that you are making your decisions based on facts and research and not from the great Hype Machine that is ever so ingrained in our daily lives.

Congrats for making it all the way to the end of this LONG blog!

Back it up!

It would be safe to say that you most likely treasure a good majority of what you keep on your Mac’s hard drive. What is a hard drive, you ask? The simplest answer I can give you is that a hard drive is where your pictures, movies, music, and documents are stored in your computer. The slightly more complex version is that a hard drive consists of a thick, CD like disc, a circuit board and an arm with a laser. From the moment you start up your computer it begins working; the disc spins, the arm passes back and forth from the outer edge to the inner edge and back, at precisely the same time the laser scans the disc while it reads and writes data to and from the disc.

You probably now have hundreds, maybe thousands of precious photographs, music and even movies stored on the hard drive. Maybe you even have invaluable documents and other personal and business information on it too. Increasingly more everyday we do things with our computers and save things as we go.

What’s the worst that can happen? Well, in an instant, without notification, it can all be lost to the mechanical failure of the hard drive. At best case you can have it recovered via software tricks, however at worst case you will not be able to get any of your cherished data back from the dead hard drive.

What can you do to prevent this from happening? First thing I will tell you is that it is not a question of if the hard drive fails, it is a matter of when it fails. The only thing you can really do to prevent losing all of your pictures, movies, music, and documents when a hard drive fails is to have your computer’s hard drive backed up. Meaning, make copies of the contents of your hard drive on to an external hard drive, perhaps on multiple DVDs, and/or having it backed up off-site (using an online backup storage website).

How do you go about doing this? The easiest thing to do is, if you have Apple’s latest operating system (OS X 10.5, Leopard), to get ahold of an external hard drive (preferably one with a Firewire connection if your computer can handle it), get one as big as you can afford. ( I recommend Western Digital (although their portables are not so great), or OWC for excellent quality and reasonable prices.) Then hook the hard drive up to your Mac,  almost instantly Apple’s built in back up software, Time Machine, will ask if you would like to use the hard drive to back it up, to which you will answer, yes. Then Time Machine will take over and make one initial full backup from your hard drive, from then on it will make hourly backups of any changes that you have made on your computer. Recovery from this method is usually very simple, however Time Machine is not 100% reliable. The backups have a tendency to become corrupt leaving you out of luck when you need to recover your data.

The software I tend to recommend for most home and small business users is called SuperDuper. This creates what is known as a “bootable” clone of your hard drive. Which basically means that you can run your computer from the clone that SuperDuper makes on your external hard drive. A very powerful option for times when disaster strikes and you need your computer immediately. Not only can it produce bootable clones of your hard drive, you can also schedule it to do so as often as you need. It also does a much better job at creating a backup that does not take up too much room than, say, Time Machine does on your external hard drive. All this and more for a mere $27.95!? It’s an absolute steal for the peace of mind you gain!

I could go on and on about backup strategies, but the most important thing I want to convey is that you get a backup strategy and use it. This will prevent you from the horrid pain of losing your most valuable data. I spend mornings as a Mac Technician in a Mac repair shop called PowerBook Guy, where the #1 thing we deal with is hard drive failure and replacement. I cannot tell you how many tears I have seen from clients who lost all of their data because they failed to backup their data. It’s always a painful loss. So prevent it and BACK IT UP!

One last thing I will state about hard drive failure and replacement is that, you should not panic and run out to buy a whole new computer if it happens. Hard drive replacement is a fairly inexpensive repair for a computer. I am talking under a couple hundred bucks in most cases, which is a lot cheaper than a new Mac. So, especially if you were wise enough to back up your computer, there is no reason to panic when your hard drive starts clicking and making grinding noises. When that happens, just give DandyMac a call, or send us an email and we will get your Mac back for you!

Old video to your Mac

It may seem as though it should be easy to get the videos off of your old video camera or vhs recorder and put it right into your Mac. Well, it is providing you have an old dv tape camcorder that has firewire. You can import the video straight to iMovie and then do with it as you please. But what if you want to digitize some old vhs tapes? or get video off of a camcorder that uses mini dvds? Not an easy, or all that cheap thing to get done. But there are definitely affordable methods of doing so.

The first solution you could come up with would be a simple conversion box that converts, analog (rgb and s video) and USB inputs to firewire. This is a decent solution, although not very cheap, the quality is great, and you can import directly to iMovie with it. The price tag is around $250 for such a device.

The second and preferable choice is Elgato’s EyeTV 250 plus. This is not only a converter but also a tv tuner. The TV tuner enables you to watch and record analog or even high definition cable directly on your Mac. Which you can then export to any iLife application, Quicktime, iPod, iPhone, Apple TV or a host of other destinations. The software that Elgato ships it’s products with is called EyeTV. Currently in version 3, you will find this a rather intuitive, powerful and flexible piece of software. The price tag is not all that much less then a simple converter box,  however it is far from just a converter box. Right now it is available directly from Elgato at a tidy sum of 199.00.

So how does one use the EyeTV? You will need either an s-video or RGB cables to connect your analog source to the EyeTV box with it’s included adapter cable. The EyeTV box connects to your Mac with USB 2.0. (Unfortunately you cannot use the box if you do not have USB 2.0 ports on your computer.) First thing you need to do is install the software by dragging and dropping it’s icon, from the included CD, into your Application folder’s icon in the same window. Then navigate to your Application folder and double click the EyeTV icon to launch the program. Plug the EyeTV’s USB cable directly into your Mac (a non-powered USB hub will not work.) You will be prompted to accept the end user license agreement, then tell the software what Elgato hardware you have from their drop-down menu. It will ask you how you want to use the product, make your choice then click next. Another prompt will ask you for your Titan TV username and password (Titan TV is an online service that grabs programming schedules based on your local cable company. Which you then use to schedule TV show recording with EyeTV’s software.). After all of the prompts you are given a window for live tv, and another window which is called EyeTV programs. This is the center of the EyeTV software, where your Titan TV schedule and recorded programs library lives.

For the purpose of this blog, I am focusing on getting old video from older media types imported. So for this to happen you need to go to the controls menu at the top of the screen on the menu bar. From there, select ‘composite video’ from the bottom of the menu. This changes the input on the EyeTV hardware from cable to RGB mode (select s-video from the controls menu if your video device has that option.). Then press play on your device to see if the video is coming through ok. Once the video signal looks, and sounds good,  simply go to the controller window which by default sits at the top right of your screen and click the EyeTV button to begin recording. Finally push play on your video device once again (rewind to the beginning if necessary). EyeTV is now pulling the audio and video into it’s program windows ‘Recordings’ library. The software does not automatically stop when your video does, so when the video is done playing click the EyeTV button on the controller again to stop the software from recording.

Once you get the video fully recorded you have many options available to you, which is where it’s power and flexibility comes in. From here you select a video and you can have the software export into all iLife application formats, several different video formats, iPod/iPhone formats and Quicktime formats. You can also burn the recordings directly to DVD or CD from Toast which is included in the software. Exporting for use on the web in various popular formats is supported as well. When all of that’s done you can plug in your cable tv to the box or watch over the air HDTV shows and record them as well.

I am not usually one to pimp products, but this one is all too worthy of my praise. Not to mention the fact that it provided me the means to help out a client by getting old wedding videos off of one of those, unbelievable disasters of a recording medium, mini dv camcorders. The project was a huge success, so much so that I now have my girlfriend digitizing old video tapes in the same exact manor. Nice job Elgato, you have the rare DandyMac seal of approval.

Maconomics

As it stands in our current economic climate here in the good `ol US of A, we are almost all strapped for cash. I would guess that there are a bunch of us out there that would really like to get a new Mac with a bigger hard drive that might even be faster, I mean really who wouldn’t? Trouble with that is that a new Mac is pretty expensive, which is not easy to swing these days. What is one to do?

Well, I will tell you exactly what you can do, and I do this all day every day for people just like you. The most affordable way of achieving the bigger hard drive and more speed is to upgrade what you already have. This can be done for a fraction of the cost of a new computer. In many cases it will run about $300-400. Most people I talk to are surprised that it can even be done, let alone how much cheaper it is than buying a new Mac.

So what can be done to an older Mac? The first thing you most likely want is the bigger hard drive. Having more room for all of your files, music, movies, photos, applications and everything you download is always a good thing. Depending on what type of Mac you have, you can go as high as 1 terabyte, which is a LARGE amount of storage space. To give you an idea of how much it would cost to upgrade the hard drive in your older (or even newer) Mac, it would cost about $50 for an 80-gigabyte drive and up to $100 for a 500-gigabyte drive for a Mac laptop, depending on the model. If you have a desktop Mac it can be an even cheaper upgrade and you can add much more space: up to 1 terabyte for as little as $119. Installation should run about $100 or less depending on what kind of Mac you own. So for less than around $200 you can have a much larger hard drive for storage. (prices gathered from http://www.otherworldcomputing.com )

The next thing you can do to give that old Mac some new life is upgrade your RAM. RAM stands for random access memory and it serves two basic functions. The first is it allows you to open more applications at the same time without bogging down your workflow. The second thing it does is add more speed to the Mac. The two in conjunction really makes a huge difference in your Mac’s performance. Again, this is a rather cheap investment that really pays off. For example if you have an iBook G4 (purchased in late 2004) you can max out your RAM to 1.25 gigabytes for $50 (OWC), if you have a 2.4ghz MacBook Pro (late 2007-early 2008) you can max our your RAM to 4 gigabytes for $60 (OWC). Installation on most Macs is very simple and you can find instructions at otherworldcomputing.com as well. I cannot recommend this upgrade strongly enough, you will love your old Mac all over again!

The final thing I can recommend to spruce up the old Mac is to upgrade the system software. The system software is how your computer runs, it’s also what gives your computer more functionality and features.  This upgrade can be a bit more of a challenge because not all Macs can be upgraded to the latest operating system from Apple (OSX 10.5 Leopard). To make things more challenging it is rather difficult to find the operating systems prior to the latest. If your Mac is under ten years old, odds are you can run up to OSX 10.4 Tiger. (Because this is an older operating system it is more costly than the latest operating system. I ran a Google search for it and found this to be the cheapest: (OS X 10.4), although I do not know about the reliability of the source.) If you have a Mac that has an 867 mhz processor or greater and at least 512mb of RAM ( you can find out what processor speed and how mach RAM you have by clicking the little Apple menu in the upper left corner of your desktop, then click ‘About This Mac’) you can upgrade to the latest from Apple OS X 10.5 Leopard for about $129. I do not recommend doing this yourself unless you really know what you are doing,  have done it before, and have backed up your data.

Before you go running out and buying these products it is essential that you know what kind of Mac you have and how far it can be upgraded. There are many variables involved in picking the right parts to upgrade to. That said, I recommend talking to someone like DandyMac (shameless self-plug!) who is a certified Apple Technician and Consultant before making purchases. Buying the wrong parts and trying to install them can be disappointing and even dangerous.

So for now save yourself some cash in these hard times and upgrade that older Mac. You will make you and it much happier by doing so. In these trying Maconomic times you can extend the life of your older Mac with very little expense and start saving for your next new mac at the same time. As a small hint to those of you who can actually afford to get a new Mac, I would strongly suggest that you hold off until the next round of hardware updates are released before you buy a laptop. The desktops are the way to go right now if you are considering buying new.

UPDATE: During my nromal morning scouring of my favorite mac news sites I stumbled upon this article from Macworld .com:    Opinon: Which is better for your business, a Mac or a PC? This guy has his own take on the economic times we are in and how his choice of computer helped his company. Perhaps a bit off the topic but it’s still great!

Virtualization

When it comes to running Microsoft Windows on a Mac, there has never been a better time to do so. Ever since Apple switched to the Intel architecture the desire for running Windows on a Mac has come to full (virtual) reality. Now more then ever this happens with great ease, speed and power. This is not to say that it comes without issues and growing pains, it simply means that it actually finally works. Which enables people to only buy one computer and have the best of both worlds, the PC for business and the Mac for everything else.

Back in ‘06, when Apple made the switch in processors to Intel, people were very excited that running Windows on a Mac could happen. So much so that there was a contest launched by OnMac.net to see who could come up with a way to do it. By March 26th, 2006 the contest was over, and we all were the winners. It was through this win that Apple unleashed Boot Camp which allows you to restart your Mac into either OSX or WIndows. This was fantastic although limited as you had to chose which operating system you wanted to use and you could only choose Windows as your second operating system.

That’s when things really took off. The next big thing to happen was the ability to run Windows on a Mac right from your Mac’s desktop, which treats Windows (or any other operating system you might want to use) as another application without having to restart into your chosen second operating system. This was a GIGANTIC breakthrough. Thanks to companies like Parallels or VMware you can now have two operating systems running at the same time on one Mac.

My preferred choice in software makers ended up being Parallels. Their product was very strong and worked very well. They also managed to bring great updates to their software to allow for some truly remarkable features, such as “coherence mode” which allows you to have the Windows Task Bar and Mac’s Menu Bar running on the same desktop seamlessly. I have sworn up and down on how great the company is and has been to all of my consultancy clients. I am not saying here that there is anything wrong with VMware’s Fusion which essentially is the same thing, I just have preferred Parallels.

Unfortunately I do believe that I am changing my preferences. Parallels just released version 4 of their Desktop For Mac software a few months back. I must say that at first I was very excited about it, they made the interface very Mac-ish, finally, and it is beautiful to look at. The problem comes when you actually run the software. It was so highly unstable that it froze every hour and interupted one of my best client’s work so often that I had to roll it back to version 3. Not that there is anything wrong with version 3, I was just extremely disappointed that Parallels released version 4 in such an awful state. It was simply not ready for prime time and they should have waited to release it until it was.

So for now I will have to recommend Fusion’s VMware for people who are looking to get started running Windows on your Mac.I do believe that Fusion has a very nicely designed piece of software, and it has always had a more Mac-ish look and feel. The one thing that really makes it stand out for me is that Fusion has support for split screen work, in other words across two monitors. It does appear to at least be more stable than Parallels version 4, yet I am not thoroughly convinced that Fusion is more stable than Parallels version 3.  As I said before though, Fusion and Parallels are very similar products and do essentially the same thing: enable you to run Windows (or any other operating system) on your Mac as though it were another application.

The next great leap for me in this multiple operating system on one computer idea would be if both Apple and Microsoft could somehow see past their egos and do what would be best for all of us, combine forces. This would enable the fine grained control one gets with Windows and the ease of use and fun of OS X. I may be far from reality on that thought, but it certainly would be dream of a computer platform. Imagine being able to install any application you want on one computer without the hassle of restarting into a different operating system or running virtualization software to make it happen. Ahhh to dream.

UPDATE: During my nromal morning scouring of my favorite mac news sites I stumbled upon this article from Macworld .com:    Opinon: Which is better for your business, a Mac or a PC? This guy has his own take on the economic times we are in and how his choice of computer helped his company.

iWebbiness

As it stands, I have designed my business’ website (www.dandymac.com) with Apple’s iLife web building app, iWeb. For the most part I feel that it’s a beautifully designed, easy to use piece of software. Apple does a fantastic job making it simple to create a basic website for “the rest of us.”

If you do not need anything terribly complex or have a blog that is at all customized, it is great. I, however, do want to have a customized blog that fits the rest of my customized site (i.e. I did not use an iWeb template). Unfortunately, I had such a woefully difficult time doing so that I had to create my blog here in WordPress. I must admit that WordPress has made it very easy to get it going quickly.

The main problem being that since I created my site from a blank page in iWeb, I cannot just save it as a “theme.” Therefore, each time I wanted to create a new blog entry I had to completely redesign the page before I could even type into it. This could get tedious quick and be a huge time-waster. The other problems I found with blogging in iWeb were the text color options for titles and date could not be changed, and the inspector leaves a lot to be desired for editing the blog page.

Otherwise I found that iWeb was a breeze to work with and fully customize a web site. It takes very little understanding of web design or any sort of coding to get a great site up and running. With the use of their built-in “themes” it really is a basic no-brainer. All you really need to do is drag your own media into the pre-built pages, put in your own text and you are all set. Thanks to iWeb 09, publishing is now a breeze as well, even if you have your own domain name and host already. The best method yet, in my opinion, is to have a mobileme account and publish right to it with no setup.

For those who may want to really get down to the fine details of the look and feel of your web site, the inspector is your best friend. With it you can change the page layout sizes and colors, you can change the text as though it were a mini word processor, you can add graphic effect, change the size of your page elements (pictures, video, sound…), create hyperlinks and their rollover colors, play with Quicktime file settings and much more. They really did a nice job with it for the most part, yet as I mentioned before the blog controls could be better.

One of the things that I have found immensely useful is the widgets and media side panel they have added in the 09 version. Here you have easy access to all of your movies, pictures and audio always there or hidden if you desire. Also you have a widgets tab where you will find a Google maps widget for adding maps to your page,  a Google AdSense widget for putting adds on your site you get paid for if people click on them, an iSight widget that lets you use your built-in iSight camera for immediate pictures or films and a couple others. The most useful one is for adding html snippets to your page: you can check this out by looking at the form on my website (www.dandymac.com). I added that with some html code with great ease and I think it looks and works fantastic.

Overall, I would say that iWeb is a very solid, stable, easy to use, feature-rich application. Especially if you are not a web designer and just want to put together a highly functional and visually appealing site in a very short period of time. I find it falls right between the likes of Sandbox and Freeway. The added ease of media access, full iLfe/iWork integration, widgets at your side, and publishing to your own domain with a single click make iLife 09 worth the price alone.