Archive for the 'Apple' category

Where The Hell Is Leopard?

Oct 15 2007 Published by under Apple, Craziness, Technology

Ok, I bought my Mac. I have to admit, I’m enjoying it. The lack of a right click on the touchpad, the constant struggle to remember whether I have to hold CTRL or the Apple Key with the button, and the fact that you can’t close a program by closing the window are still kind of annoying, but overall, my Mac experience has been good. I’m no longer radically opposed to all that is Mac.

However, I have a major beef with Apple.

I was told when I bought the Mac that the new OS (OS X Leopard) would be out in October and give me the ability to dual boot Windows without having to buy additional software. While I didn’t buy the Mac to be a PC, there are a couple of games I have on my Win machine that I like to kill time with in airports. It would be nice to have the flexibility.

Well, Apple says that Leopard will be released in October. Here we are on the 15th with no release date publicly announced.

Correct me if I’m wrong, but isn’t one of the big knocks against MS the constantly moving release dates and failure to deliver on their promises?

C’mon, Steve! Where the hell is Leopard?

2 responses so far

The Newest Citizen in Mac Nation

Aug 23 2007 Published by under Apple, Technology

Well, I fought it as long as I could. I was first exposed to Apple via an Apple ][ back in grade school (yes, I lived in a good neighborhood and we had computers in school during the stone age. I won't apologize for that, but it does explain why I am such a geek.) They moved us up to the Apple ][e in middle school. Since I was a small child, I have been in constant battle against the forces of Mac Nation that were trying to suck me in.

I began to abandon the fight when I made my iPod purchase. It was the beginning of the end. Once I conceded that fight, it was only a matter of time before I broke down.

Yesterday, I bought my first Mac. I'm entering the world slowly... I started with the MacBook (not the pro, and not the desktop). It's sort of a baby step into the world of the crazed zealots. It's sort of like buying a Prius to park next to my Hummer in the garage. I'll use it sparingly at first because it makes me feel sort of wimpy, but I'll get a lot of winks from the hot, pierced, tattooed, chick at the Starbucks when sees me with it.

I will admit, however, that so far I'm digging it. I find the lack of a right click and only having one solid button under the touchpad to be slightly annoying. I keep wanting to pull up the sub-menu. It does, however, boot fast and install applications faster. I find it fascinating that most of the applications I download and install are only a couple of dozen MBs in size. I'm now questioning why every Windows app requires so much hard drive space.

Anyway... If you're looking for me, I'll be hiding out in the darkest recesses of Mac Nation.

6 responses so far

Apple Needs To Rethink This

Jan 09 2007 Published by under Apple, Gadgets, Technology, Television

Apple today rolled out their new AppleTV appliance. It’s essentially the Microsoft Media Center PC without the PC – allowing you to beam all of your saved media from your PC to your TV. So that’s good, right?

I’m not so sure. It looks like Apple, in an effort to keep Jobs’ promise of sub-$300, has placed only a 40GB hard drive in the device. They say that will hold up to 50 hours of TV. I’m not so sure. Even the latest iteration of the video iPod comes with an 80GB hard drive.

I can’t imagine needing to carry twice as much content in my pocket as I have for my home entertainment. It seems a little underpowered for a home media device. You can argue that I connect to a PC to get more storage (I assume it will allow that), but that just puts me back in the Media Center mode. If I wanted to network my TV and my PC, I can do that. I’d rather not. I’d rather have space enough on my Apple TV.

The other concern I have is their storage assumptions. If you’re maintaining 50 hours on 40 GB, you are almost certainly not talking HD. HD takes up a lot of space compared to the Apple standard resolution of 320 x 240. I have converted a lot of my movies to mp4 at that resolution and I’m pushing anywhere between 600MB and a Gigabyte for a two hour movie. Storing at HD resolution, that 40 GB will likely yield about 25 hours.

It’s a neat idea, but I’ll wait until generation 2.0 or 3.0 when the hard drive space keeps up with media improvements.

No responses yet

Ghost In The iPod

Oct 13 2006 Published by under Apple, Craziness, Gadgets, Miscellany, Technology

I have had a 5g iPod for about 5 months now, and I have noticed an odd tendency that leads me to believe something is seriously flawed in their shuffle function. I have dumped and completely reloaded my iPod on about three different occasions, and noticed the same behavior with all three sets of music.

The behavior is this. For whatever reason, when I choose “Shuffle Songs” from the main menu, the same track will almost always appear within the first 10 percent of shuffled songs.

If I had a relatively small number of tracks on the device, I’d dismiss it. However, in all three loads, I had north of 3,000 songs. In almost every shuffle, the song appears within the first 30 songs. On only a couple of occasions have I seen it shuffle outside that, but it’s always within the first 20%.

In the case of my current song selections, that track is Steppenwolf’s Magic Carpet Ride. On the last load it was Teen Angst by Cracker. On the first go around it was I’m Money by Zebrahead.

I mentioned this to Mrs. Quip and she immediately said, “Forever Blue by Chris Isaak.” I took that as an indication that she had noticed the same behavior.

All of this leads me to conclude that Apple has an odd fluke in their randomizer that causes it to prioritize the same song every time you shuffle. I now refer to that song as the Ghost in the iPod. What’s your ghost?

5 responses so far

Cheap Downloads and Rankled Bureaucrats

Oct 05 2006 Published by under Apple, Craziness, Crime, Government, Marketing, Music, Pop Culture, Stuff That Sucks, Technology, The Internet

With all the problems facing the US today, and Russia wishing to join the World Trade Organization, clearly the most pressing issue before our government is the illegal download site AllOfMP3.com. That’s the word from ArsTechnica today. They’ve got a good write-up on the comments and complaints by our Trade Representative on the subject.

It strikes me as odd that the music industry hasn’t figured something out, yet. If AllOfMP3.com is offering songs for download (granted illegally); charging based on the length of the song (longer songs cost a few pennies more); and is currently the number one music download site in the world; why haven’t they realized how many more units they could move by charging less?

The music industry is so greedy that they set an arbitrary price of $1 per song, which makes downloads just about as expensive as the CDs that they been price-gouging on for years (despite the fact that unlike CDs, music downloads have zero distribution cost, zero packaging cost, and zero mark-up for record store middle men).

AllOfMP3.com, at 15 to 20 cents per song is kicking the shit out of Apple who is charging 99 cents. If you really want to put them out of business, work out an arrangement with iTunes and cut your price.

You will, based on AllOfMP3′s traffic and sales, move an assload more units, at no additional cost, and not have to worry about others.

The problem is marketing people.

Marketing people like to figure out the maximum amount that someone might possibly be expected to pay, so they can maximize profit. It’s not a function of costs and a “reasonable” profit. It’s a question of how much are your costs, and how much more can you possibly sell for. Unlike most other industries, however, the music industry has an effective monopoly.

The record (quaint little old pieces of vinyl that you may be too young to remember) companies have been in collusion on CD prices, and now are in collusion on Mp3 prices. It may be one of the few remaining industries where the government still turns a blind eye to predatory anti-consumer behavior. Why? Simply because the entertainment lobby throws around a lot of money and the geeks in Congress want to appear cool by having their pictures taken with celebs.

Honestly, AllOfMP3.com should be teaching the music industry the way to run their business. Instead, the greedy bastards in the music industry will continue to use their lapdogs in the federal government to do their bidding to guarantee obscene profits.

One response so far

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