Mentol Blog's

Motorola Xoom?

I really want .mac, but it's just not compelling enough.

I keep my bookmarks sync'd between my Mac at home and my PC at work in Firefox with Foxmarks. Free extension.

I use gmail and yahoo for webmail. 2+gb of storage each. I'm debating which to stick with for calendar. I can use gmail and sync ical to it right now. However someone is already starting a service (http://groups-beta.google.com/group/spanningsync/browse_thread/thread/33374a59c38cbe15)which will let you completely sync Google cal and ical by being able to make changes to both (effectively duplicating what .mac gives you)

I could convert another gmail account into storage space with a plug in. Right now I use mediamax (http://www.mediamax.com/) for 25gb of FREE storage.

Flickr offers ways to publish right from iphoto for a very easy and free way to share photos online.

So for me to cough up the dough, .mac needs more, much more.

It seems these ads are almost a carbon copy of US versions which are translated into Japanese.

Except for the first one, which is a play on words with "Mac" and "work," which when pronounced in katakana Japanese rhymes with "Mac."

In that US version ad, the Japanese chick says the PC guy looks like a "otaku." I think "Otaku" is roughly translated to homeboy (stay-at-home guy or geek).

Homeboy? Not where I grew up.

But is the iPad the "recommended" purchase?

The iPhone was also their highest rated smart phone and yet not recommended.

Nice of CR to pick the #1 selling tablet by a million miles over the competitors, but I still have little respect for them and take it with a grain of salt.

I have been over to the website and I can't find where to download the beta. Can you send me a link to where it is?
Do you have a beta key and a battle.net account? If so, under manage games, go to "Add Game", and paste in your beta key. Then under manage games, select SC 2 beta, and then it gives you an option to download the windows or mac client.

ahhh,ok.misunderstood..You bring up a good point..I think if more Windows users realize that you can run XP natively on Macs now,they may be more likely to switch knowing that they still have their "security" blanket..

ok. than its due to location. :) thanks!

Purchased: Aug '07
Model No: A1186
EMC No: 2138
Mac Pro/3.0_8CX/4x1/2x7300GT/500/2xSD/AP/BT

Logic board:
Part number: 630-7951
Serial Number: J5*****X7QB

Upgrades:
Added: 8gb Kingston memory (total 12gb)
Added: 3x1tb drives (total 3.5tb)

Couple weeks back, system blinked off. The machines powers on, but there's no chime and the system doesn't boot at all. Done the SMC reset, reseated RAM, drives, video cards etc. Suspected the logic board.

Troubleshooting (from Frys, Apple authorized) confirms it's the logic board.

Now, going through the process of pulling the old board to trade in for a replacement "X7Q" board. Probably this one:

http://www.galaxyhp.com/Mac-Pro-Early-2007-8-core-Logic-Board-ver2-new-wexchange_p_177.html

I got the machine disassembled but I am unable to remove the heat sinks/CPUs. The 4 captive screws loosen, even took them all the way out of the machine, but the sinks seem to be stuck. It doesn't just lift out as most of the online info I've found indicates that it should.

Unsure of how hard to pull on this thing. It wobbles very slightly, but feels firmly stuck on...enough that the board will flex if I pull it any harder.

More reading makes me think it might be the thermal paste is just really sticking? This is really stuck though...almost as though there's another screw I can't see. I thought if I pulled hard enough the CPU might come out along with the sink.

Also I ran across an article (after the fact) that states the order of screw removal from the heat sinks needs to be in a specific crossing pattern. Can't imagine how that matters.

Of course, I paid through the nose for this machine back in late '07. Bought Apple Care even. All long since expired...now that I need it. Getting desperate. This machine is a workhorse and I see no value in replacing it if I can fix it for 700 to 800 bucks.

Any one have ideas?

It doesn't at the moment. The biggest capacities are 64GB. The standard allows for cards up to 2TB, when they eventually arrive (maybe in 5-10 years).

I'm thinking your ETA is off.

Way off.

http://i214.photobucket.com/albums/cc198/buuuudy/fakie.jpg?t=1302033020

Can't be 100%, but square pixel path around the home button makes it look pretty fake to me.

It's a pretty shyte rez pic though. Could just be artifacting.

Got my copy of Leopard and t-shirt! Start queuing about half four, maybe a little after.

I didn't expect that amount of people� I mean, I figured there'd be a lot of people, but :D. Also, congrats to the Apple store security people for blocking off the fools who started their own alternate queue from the opposite side of the store entrance. The organisation was crappy though. I don't know how many t-shirts there really were, but if anyone from Apple is reading this, next time someone should probably walk down the queue while it's not frantic and hand out numbered tickets for people to show as they go in.

I can't wait to get home and install it though! The front is so shiny� :O

I bought a Verizon iPad because I have an AT&T iPhone. I figured that if one doesn't work, the other will. I saw no need to get two devices on the same network.

But go ahead, explain to me why that's stupid, since I clearly don't get it and I'm ignorant. :rolleyes:

Could be they made many more Verizon models. Could also be that ATT models are being bought for resale overseas. Nothing wrong with that, which is what the OP was implying, I think. Could also be a combination of the two, of course.

Thankfully, there's no moral, ethical, or legal responsibility saying what you should do with your legally obtained, publicly available tech item. You can use it, blend it, sell it to your neighbor, use it as a frisbee, or even carry it on a plane and once you land, you can do all those same things EVEN if your plane landed near a bunch of Asians instead of near a bunch of white people. Crazy, huh?

...too bad it doesnt work for Bob :(


Image (http://obamapacman.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/01/Bob-Mansfield-Senior-Vice-President-Hardware-Apple-iPad-mac-tablet-video.jpg)

imagine Hawaiian print

RFID is insecure. The british RFID passports have been cracked within less than 48 hours, the German test ones in less than a day. I wouldn't trust RFID for any important and sensible information like payment services. It's fine for stuff like tracking packages or my skiing card - but that's it.

RFID in passports is kind of another ball of wax. One of the issues with so-called e-Passports is that they store all of the information on the RFID tag (i.e. your personal information) rather than just a reference number to a database. This is so you don't have different countries accessing other countries' databases. However, the level of encryption used on these passports is very weak, so all of that data on the tag is potentially vulnerable.

It is generally considered best practice to put only reference numbers to a database on RFID tags. That way if you skim the tag all you have is jibberish without the accompanying database info.

Don't blame the technology... blame the incorrect use of the technology. I don't see how the above examples of Apple's potential usage could be a serious privacy threat like the passports are.

Really? that would be interesting

One biggie is an enhancement, as opposed to a fix. Outlook can now sync w/iCal. This was present in Entourage, but was dropped from the initial release of Outlook.

Too bad this wasn't released a couple of weeks ago. I could have saved some struggles for my boss who we moved from Windows/Outlook to OS X/Mail/iCal.

So many of the switchers are college kids. A few
months ago they had an article about how the
market share in college is really falling more toward
mac, more than ever before. Apple is getting them
young, and that will pay off in the long run. I got
my first Mac when I started college and now that
I finished, I got a new one. The new laptops have
made a huge dent in this age group, so that is what
a lot of this whole market share increase is caused by.

Harvard and Princeton have both recently reported that 50% of sales at their campus computer stores are Macs.

I like the mop behind him. Is he the janitor of the data center?

Quote of the week right here.

...I can't think of one person I've talked to who found the ads to be completely positive. The people I know who like Macs were all a bit uncomfortable like me, being stereotyped as smug and elitist.

If someone calls me smug or elitist because of these commercials I'll be forced to hurt them....Or at least sack their house with siege machines.

Apple Ads = Chiat Day/Apple Executives
Me != Chiat Day/Apple Executives

Therefore, Apple Ads != Me. I don't know why people cannot grasp this simple idea.

Wow, I expected PPC support to drop in a few years, not a few months. Sucks for anyone with the Quad G5s. Sucks for me with my dual G5. :(

I hope this won't be a common trend.

Amen! Why not just release it Universal and check the other box when compiling?

Exactly - enlighten us. How do you know why its marketshare has increased as of late? Neither me nor freeny claim that its SOLELY because of the ads - but how can you prove that the ads haven't convinced 1 single switcher...?


I'm not claiming to say that these ads have hurt or helped boost the market shares...I'm only saying that I have only heard negative things about them.

I feel embarrassed watching them.

I personally believe that the market share has risen because of the intel switch. The ads happened to come out at the same time so it's impossible to know how they've affected the market share, but either way I really don't like them. It's not the actors either... definitely the elitist script.

I like that Shaun White ad where he narrates what he does with his computer and this stunt guy (you can only see his torso) is reaching and grabbing at nothing that was edited later to appear as if what he was grabbing at were his folders/documents/songs/etc... Pretty clever. And no snobbishness (yeah that word rocks) either.

Did I mention I like Ellen Feiss?

In respect to the dedicated graphics card, I totally agree with you here. I keep saying it, but a dedicated gaming machine made in the Apple style would absolutely vault them 5% in share overnight. Maybe more.

However in my experience, fewer people are waiting on Vista for a new machine than you may think. I'm really surprised at how little buzz Vista is getting. I've got several friends with HIGH END hardware running Vista beta now, and the all think it works great except for Aero, which to a person they have all turned off. Every single one of them complains about the speed, but say it is very solid crash-wise, especially for a beta. But when I press them if they will actually buy Vista the day it comes out, all but one said no. The main reason is that there is just nothing all that compelling there. And what with significant evidence (http://media.grc.com/sn/SN-051.mp3) that they have completely re-written their networking stack, I think I'll be with them on the sidelines waiting for a while until they work the bugs out.

So at least in my limited experience, people who need new hardware are buying it now - and not really waiting for Vista, which may be 9-12 months off for them anyway. What this means to me is that Apple's marketshare increases can be written off as an anomaly all that easily.

Thanks for the interesting podcast link. I wasn't unaware of Vista's possible security problems, I just never realized how bad the worst case scenario could be...despite all the delayed launches. Yes, potentially a hackers paradise, but I'd still be surprised if the final version of Vista wasn't far more secure than previous versions of W$.

I think you're right that some people will be wary of becoming early adopters of Vista in light of all the cited beta-version problems. Many may wait for a Vista SP edition (some 12 months away). Also, there's bound to be some initial confusion for less savvy PC users when faced with 6 different versions of Vista. Despite this, I still expect many millions to be swayed by M$'s mass advertizing campaigns to take the plunge soon after launch.

But like you, I think none of this need greatly affect Apple's steady rise in marketshare. For sure, Mac OS X will remain the best & most secure OS there is. I just have growing doubts about whether Apple's lack of dedicated graphics in their consumer Macs, combined with the novelty of M$'s new baby, won't cost Apple dearly in the long term. - I very much hope I'll be proved wrong.

the patent was granted in 1997 and basically covers previewing the picture on the little LCD screen.

i remember around that time i saw some professional photographers with $10,000 kodak digital cameras that had that feature. very cool for that time when digital cameras were still new

I'm not too familiar with Ruby. What is it?
It's useful to add pronunciation to the text for different language speakers, or usually in JP language papers so someone can know how to speak a particular Chinese character.

It may be obscure but its very useful, especially if it was built in to Cocoa just like spelling...