Along with the refreshed iMac and Mac Pro lines, today apple also revealed their new Magic Trackpad. The trackpad found on the Macbook Pro provides two-finger scrolling, pinch to zoom, finger tip rotation, and three and four finger swipe functionality. The Magic Trackpad has all of these capabilities as well as 80% more surface area than the trackpad found on the Macbook Pro.
This is a perfect upgrade for iMac and Mac Pro users who want the multitouch functionality that Macbook Pro users experience. You can purchase the Magic Trackpad for $69.
Months ago, the Macbook Pro received an upgrade to Intel’s i3, i5, and i7 processors. Today, the iMac line was finally given an upgrade to the i3 and i5 processors as well as receiving improved graphics cards.
The new iMacs also support dual internal hard drives. Which means you can now have an SSD as your boot drive with a secondary drive of up to 2TB for storage.
iMac
The Mac Pro also received an upgrade to a single Quad Core Intel Xeon 2.66GHz processor ($2,499) and the dual Quad Core Intel Xeon 2.66GHz processor ($3,299).
Apple held a press conference this morning to discuss signal issues with the iPhone 4. While many people were hoping for a recall, Apple gave its own “solution”. Steve Jobs announced that current iPhone 4 users will receive a free case from Apple. And those who already bought a Bumper can take their receipt back to the nearest Apple store for a full refund.
Steve Jobs spent majority of the press conference defending the signal issues on the new iPhone and stated that “every smart phone has this issue.” He even went as far to say that replicating the “death grip” on the Blackberry Bold, Droid Eris, and Samsung Omnia II causes the same signal issues. As expected, RIM and Nokia have responded to these careless statements.
It’s a bit ridiculous that Steve would make this statement since it’s not a wide scale problem on all of the above mentioned phones like it is on the iPhone 4. And it’s even more absurd that Apple is now comparing the performance of their most “revolutionary phone” to other smartphones that they have previously labeled as lesser quality.
I think it’s safe to say that Apple has lost a lot of credibility with consumers thanks to the way they’ve handled the issues with their latest phone.
Today’s computers have plenty of RAM, video graphics, and processing power to complete even the most demanding tasks. However, there is one component that continues to create a large bottleneck in the performance of even the most high end machines. This component is the standard, platter driven hard drive. But thanks to Sold State Drives (SSD’s), platter driven hard drives are quickly becoming obsolete.
Standard hard drives are built with a “platter” that stores information. In most standard hard drives, the platter spins at either 4200RPM, 5400RPM, or 7200RPM. While the platter is spinning, the “head” scans the platter to retrieve data from the drive as well as write data to it. As you can imagine, the slower the rotational speed the longer it takes to read/write from the drive. The decreased read/write speed can drastically slow the performance of your computer.
Solid State Drives, on the other hand, utilize Flash memory to store data. Since Flash memory does not require a constantly moving platter or a head to read/write the data, the speed at which data can be read from or written to the drive is increased dramatically. Also, unlike platter driven hard drives, SSD’s require a lot less power consumption. In turn, SSD’s allow your computer to run cooler and use less power (increasing battery life in laptops).
After installing an 80GB Intel X25-M SSD in my Macbook Pro I instantly noticed many benefits such as:
- Boot time decreased from ~35 seconds to ~10 seconds
- Photoshop CS5 now launches in ~2 seconds as apposed to ~5 seconds with the standard hard drive
- Absolutely no lag when opening, editing, and saving projects in Photoshop, InDesign, and Illustrator
- Internal temperature decreased by ~10C on average
- Battery life increased by 30-40 minutes under standard working conditions
While the price per GB on SSD’s remain a bit high, they have already began decreasing quite a bit since their initial release. If you are looking to upgrade your current computer or plan on buying a new computer in the near future, I highly recommend an SSD as a priority upgrade.
Apple just released it’s first update for iOS 4 which “improves” the accuracy of the signal strength displayed on your iPhone. *Also part of update 3.2.1 for iPad users*
Don’t be misinformed, this does NOT correct the actual signal strength issue that has the entire iPhone 4 community up in arms.
On that note – AppleInsider just posted a public letter sent to Steve Jobs from US Senator Charles Schumer, criticizing the iPhone 4′s signal issue and the way Steve Jobs has handled the situation thus far. Schumer strongly encourages Steve Jobs to publicly acknowledge the issue and offer a remedy to current iPhone 4 owners, free of charge.
UPDATE: According to Gizmodo, Apple is holding a press conference tomorrow (July, 16th) at 1PM EST to make an announcement regarding the iPhone 4.
- This freeware allows you to increase the internal fan speeds on your mac. Increasing your fan speed from the standard 2,000rpm to 3,500rpm can decrease your computer’s internal temperature by over 30 degrees Celsius. I’ve used this software on all three of my previous Macbook/Macbook Pro’s and recommend it to everyone I know.
- Say goodbye to carrying flash drives and/or having to VPN into your work computer to access important files remotely. Dropbox is an excellent web based hosting service that allows you to store your files online so you can view, download, and upload them from any Windows, OSX or Linux based computer. There are apps available for the iPhone and Android phones that allow you to use this service on your phone as well. You can utilize Dropbox to store up to 2GB of your files for free. You also have the option of purchasing 50GB of storage for $10/month or 100GB for $20/month.
- Network monitoring software that runs in the background and allows you to monitor, track, screen, and block unwanted information from getting in and out of your computer. This can be useful if you dislike websites or software trying to collect your information and sending out behind your back. After you start running Little Snitch you’ll be amazed at how many hidden connections are made without you knowing. It’s especially useful for those who may not necessarily pay for all of their software, if you catch my drift.
- This software is pretty simple, yet much needed. The downside to having an iPod or iPhone is the inability to plug it into your computer and explore it’s contents like an external drive. Phone Disk allows you to plug any iPhone/iPod into your mac and drag pictures, movies, and music from it and drop them directly to your computer’s harddrive without the use of iTunes. Thanks to Phone Disk, It’s now possible to copy all your friends’ music from their iPhone/iPod just by plugging it into your mac.
Over at MacRumors, a discussion is unfolding over new images of an Apple branded touch screen that only measures 3x3cm in size. Some believe it could be for a new iPod Nano, others speculate it could be for a touch screen iPod Shuffle. Some even think it could be for a new “iWatch”:
Believe it or not, Consumer Reports does not recommend Apple’s latest iPhone. This is due to the iPhone 4 having major reception issues caused by the antenna being located around the side of the phone. When you cup your hand around the side of the phone, just as you would with any cell phone, the reception drops from 5 bars to 1 bar or “no signal”. Many iPhone 4 owners are plagued with this problem.
I recently took it upon myself to go into my nearest Apple store to do some of my own testing and to my amazement, within just a couple seconds of covering the antenna with the palm of my hand, 3 out of the 4 phones experienced a signal drop from 5 bars to no signal at all. Cnet recently ran a similar signal test as well.
I guess I can’t be surprised that the first of many class action lawsuits are stirring up against Apple.
After almost 3 years of owning 3 generations of iPhones, I recently decided it was time for a change. The release of the Nexus One finally put me over the edge. I received my Nexus One in the mail a couple days ago and was able to compare it head to head with my iPhone 3GS. The iPhone does have features I will miss, but overall I am much more impressed with the Nexus One.
Benefits of the Nexus One:
When connecting both phones to the same WiFi network and visiting the same sites at the same time it is clear that the Nexus One is typically loads web pages 1-5 seconds faster than the iPhone 3GS.
Despite having more powerful hardware, the Nexus One is actually thinner and lighter than the iPhone 3GS.
The clarity of the AMOLED screen on the Nexus One makes the iPhone’s LCD screen look washed out and cheap.
The Nexus One’s casing and screen is MUCH more scratch resistant than the iPhone. Click HEREfor a demo.
The built in “Voice To Text” feature is extremely accurate and translates your speach into text allowing you to text without actually typing.
The Android operating system is much more customizable than the iPhone’s operating system.
Like many others, I have all my contacts, calendars and e-mail synced with Google through Gmail. Since this phone was made by Google, constant syncing of all of this information is much more fluid and easier to setup on the Nexus One than it was with the iPhone.
T-Mobile offers $6/month insurance for the Nexus One which covers losing the phone, theft, and physical damage. Neither Apple or AT&T offer any sort of insurance like this for the iPhone so if you lose or break your phone you are “S.O.L”.
Benefits of the iPhone:
Built in “Visual Voicemail” enabling you to see your voicemails on the screen and listen to the ones you choose while ignoring others. ** T-Mobile offers this feature for the Nexus One but they make you jump through hoops to get it activated.
The speaker is located on the bottom of the phone allowing you to hear when someone is calling or texting even with the phone laying on its back. The Nexus One’s ringer is on the back of the phone and while laying on it’s back, the ringer is impossible to hear. This design flaw has forced me to miss a few calls already. ** The simple fix is to lay the phone on it’s face when you set it down.
There are over 90,000 apps available for the iPhone. There are only 20,000 available for the Nexus One.
Steve Jobs announced Apple’s latest technology this morning. Their newest release is a tablet that they’ve named the ‘iPad’. Apple designed the device in hopes that users would utilize the iPad to…
Check E-mail
Search the web
Manage and edit photos
Watch HD movies or TV shows
Listen to music
Electronically purchase and read books and magazines
Electronically purchase and listen to music
Take notes
Use Google Maps to navigate your way to your destination
Manage your personal calendar
Manage your contacts
The iPad starts at $499 and has an LED backlit screen with built in WiFi in all models. 3G is also available in the $629 – $829 models. It’s available with three flash memory storage capacities – 16GB, 32GB, and 64GB.
The iPad does lack a few things that might be deal breakers:
No multitasking
No camera
No Flash compatibility so it will not display Flash videos or images that are found on many webpages
It is not compatible with T-Mobiles 3G network
Adapters are necessary if you want to plug your iPod, iPhone or SD cards directly into the device
