62 blog posts tagged Apple
Mac OS System 9 on Windows
I'm often digging into old bitmap font and UX design out of curiosity - and someday hope to revive a lot of these fonts in more modern formats using a pipeline similar to that for ZX Origins so we can get all the usable fonts, screenshots etc. out of them.
Make Home & End keys behave like Windows on Mac OS X
I’ve been using Mac OS X daily since 2001 when I purchased my Titanium PowerBook. I still can’t get used the Home and End key behaviour.
What to do before your iTunes Match subscription expires
At $25 a year the iTunes Match service can be a little tough to swallow given all it does is synchronize your music across iTunes especially when other file-sharing services are cheaper and more general purpose (OneDrive, Mega, DropBox etc).
MacBook Pro 256GB SSD upgrade experience
I wanted an SSD for some time and finally caved in. Armed with credit card, screwdriver and trusty MacBook Pro I fitted a sweet SSD and decided to document the experience.
First impressions of Snow Leopard
I came home from work today to find my family pack upgrade version of Snow Leopard. It’s been a few hours, so here are impressions so far.
Disappointing new MacBook Pros
Like many other MacBook Pro owners I’ve been waiting for the October 14th event with some excitement. The highlights include:
MobileMe up and down at me.com
Me.com was up, briefly, just long enough for me to grab my usual handle and get the confirmation message in fact.
What I would like to see in Snow Leopard
The word is out that Snow Leopard will be about trimming down Leopard – likely Apple’s effort to switch to lower-capacity solid-storage such as found in the MacBook Air and perhaps future iPhones and maybe a tablet.
Apple Store Vancouver opens tomorrow
Apple are opening an Apple Store here in Vancouver, BC tomorrow at 10:00am.
Boot Camp 2.1, VMware Fusion 1.1.2 and MacBook Pro firmware
Apple have released [Boot Camp 2.1](https://www.apple.com/bootcamp) which finally includes official 64-bit support on Vista and support for Windows XP Service Pack 3.
Four Windows apps for home-sick Mac users
Delicious Library is a DVD, game and book organization tool I’ve been using since my PowerBook G4 and a 2.0 version has been dangling from Wil Shipley’s mouth longer than I care to remember.
Windows users however will find Libra a very interesting clone and it features some of the same great features such as bar-code scanning via a web cam, tracking loans, a rendered virtual shelf and fast queries.
Windows 2008 Server on my MacBook Pro
A troublesome disk (a story for another time) has forced me to reinstall my MacBook Pro and review my Windows partition.
What’s in your laptop bag?
Since my new laptop arrived I’ve been fine tuning my accessories in search of the developer-on-the-move setup. Here is my current contents complete with shameless Amazon Affiliate product links where applicable ;-)
Mac freebies for Christmas
Spaces is new in Leopard bringing virtual desktops to the masses. Leopard gives you a number of ways to switch between spaces including a menu-item drop down and configurable keyboard shortcuts.
To move a window to another space you drag it to the edge of the screen and wait a moment but curiously you can’t use this great technique without a window to switch!
One week with a MacBook Pro 17″
It has been one week since I picked up my new MacBook Pro 17″ to replace my aging first-generation 15″ model.
More free Mac software picks
Wake up every morning to your iTunes playlist without the danger of an app launching it and having a problem/update pending that prevents you getting to work on time.
Alarm Clock 2 also includes Timers (great for a quick 20 minute power nap) and Stopwatches alongside the normal one-off or regular scheduled alarm that will bring both you and your machine out of sleep ready for that early-morning email check.
Windows Experience Index on MacBook Pro 2GHz compared
I just got the opportunity to try out the latest version of VMware and thought I’d do a quick Windows Experience Index on Boot Camp, Parallels and VMware to see what the performance is like before my new MacBook Pro 17″ arrives (hopefully on Friday!)
Show Package Contents in Mac OS X
Bundles are a concept in Mac OS X whereby a specially named folder becomes what appears to casual users to simply be a file that can be copied as usual and often launched by double-clicking on it.
MacBook Pro 17″ 2.6GHz ordered
Since moving house I have been using my MacBook Pro 15″ 2.0GHz at home, for contracting and even for the odd diagnostics and organization in the office.
Freeing up disk space on Mac OS X
Space was a little tight (5GB) after my upgrade to Leopard and so I went on the hunt to free up space and ended up freeing almost 20GB of my 100GB disk – enough to let me set-up a new 20GB Boot Camp partition that will host Vista and take over from my XP Pro Parallels image with any luck.
Mac OS X Leopard – my story so far
I couldn’t pick up a copy in the USA as the Seattle store was closed for remodeling and when they said October 26th, they meant at 5pm and not 9am, go figure! Thankfully IQ in Guernsey had them in-stock when I arrived back home Saturday.
Apple’s Boot Camp beyond the expiry date
Stories about Apple’s Boot Camp and the looming expiration of the 1.x beta versions to coincide with the release of Mac OS X Leopard and Boot Camp 2.0 are abound.
Pixelmator for Mac released
One of the things I love about Apple is the way they enhance Mac OS X with great features for other developers to leverage. Built-in spell-checking, incredibly rich edit controls, development environment and the recent Core frameworks are such additions. Core Image allows applications access to real-time hardware-accelerated graphic effects and is used within some of Apple’s own apps for various effects.
iPod refresh and ring-tones
New colors. Zzzz.
iPod nano really is just a smaller version of the iPod now, full video and games (Vortex and two others included plus others available to buy) on a full metal stubby device that has a large 200ppi 2.0″ display. Now available in $149 4GB and $199 8GB models. Yummy.
New iMac available only with glossy display
When I use a computer I want to view my email, pages and work and not watch a light-show of what’s going on behind me. Glossy displays are therefore rather unappealing and Apple’s latest iMac update has me suitably worried.
Great free system tools for Mac OS X
Deeper takes you further that System Preferences and provides access to a number of extra options such as Finders graphical effects, layout, spacing and menus, as well as some extra options for Dashboard, Dock, Expose, Login and more.
As an extra cool treat you can also select a screen-saver to be your desktop background just to show off how smooth, slick and system-deep the transparency, scaling and hardware acceleration go in OS X.
Hidden menu options on the Mac
Apple tends to hide away unusual functionality in order to keep the user interface easy to use.
Getting started with Ruby on Rails on Mac OS X
I have decided to get to grips with Ruby on Rails and get it set-up on my MacBook Pro. There seem to be a variety of options available:
As Scott Stevenson points out this is too many options for a system that is described as Convention over configuration.
Safari for Windows surprises: return of YellowBox?
Whilst Apple’s Safari appearing on Windows isn’t all that surprising given the number of Windows-related patches to WebKit/KHTML they committed back the actual release has a few surprises.
More free gems for the Mac
It must be that time again already… here we go!
So you believe Apple is more expensive than Dell…
Apple are often accused of being more expensive and that Dell are much cheaper.
Apple’s next enclosure material?
Olivier wonders about Apple’s next enclosure material and that got me pondering. Jobs has already utilized:
True cost of the iPhone
So you like the iPhone and think you’ll buy one?
Apple Macworld misfires
So the Apple TV and iPhone are finally announced and visually impressive with a very refined user interface – but some of the technical specifications aren’t quite there.
Parallels Desktop 3036 beta build out
Parallels have released a beta build of their excellent virtual machine for the Mac and it’s loaded with cool new features. Once out of beta it will be a free upgrade to existing owners.
Heat, fan, power and battery monitoring on the Mac
coconutBattery lets you see how much of a charge your battery currently has, how much it can still hold and how this compares to when it was manufactured. It’ll also show you how many times you battery has been charged.
SlimBatteryMonitor is a replacement for the Apple battery indicator in the menu bar with something more compact.
Switching from Boot Camp to Parallels
A few weeks ago I managed to screw up my Windows XP installation on my MacBook using some low-level tools and driver related stuff.
Inside Apple Software Update for Windows
I was wondering whether Apple Software Update might search for and upgrade the various Boot Camp supplied tools and possibly drivers.
Apple’s Showtime and the disappointing iTV
Today’s Apple Showtime event showed some great products, and some disappointing ones.
Supplementing Boot Camp 1.1
This article is now out of date. Check Apple’s Boot Camp page for up-to-date information.
Boot Camp, for those that don’t already know, is a set of tools and drivers for getting Windows XP up on your Mac. The various components are:
MacBook Pro whine fix in 3 hours
It’s been an odd couple of weeks for my MacBook Pro 15″.
Apple releases Boot Camp 1.1
This article is now out of date. Check Apple’s Boot Camp page for up-to-date information.
Apple have released Boot Camp 1.1 which, at a whopping 202MB, adds:
Disappointing Apple WWDC announcements
The Rumor mills were overflowing with ideas of what Apple might show at this year’s WWDC and so I like many other interested parties sat down through the hour long presentation albeit via a delayed stream.
Keeping an eye on the MacBook/Pro temperature
As most people know these things run quite warm but at last two applications are available for getting hold of those elusive CPU temperature figures.
MacBook Pro the ultimate developer machine?
I’ve been using my MacBook Pro now for about a month and think it’s the ultimate developer machine. You really are spoiled for choice and everything you might want is at your fingertips.
Hardware hacking the MacBook movement sensor
Developers keep finding new and unexpected uses for hardware and software – seemingly never more so than on the Mac and OS X.
Apple MacBook released – cheaper than comparable Dell
Apple have released their MacBook to compete on the low-end with similar PC laptops. I thought I’d compare it to a very similar Dell offering by using the Apple and Dell web sites…
Mac software picks – Parallels, Gmail+Growl, Uno & TheftSensor
Another round-up of the best Mac OS X software I can find.
Apple introduces 17″ MacBook Pro
Apple have announced the 17″ MacBook Pro at their US Store that should be shipping within the next 7-10 days (early May).
What are the unknown devices in XP on the MacBook Pro?
This article was written when Boot Camp had limited device driver support and is now therefore out of date.
Apple’s Boot Camp provides the majority of drivers required including the elusive ATI Mobility Radeon X1600 driver however there are a few devices without official drivers. These are;
Fixing MacBook Pro keyboard annoyances under Windows
This article was written when Boot Camp had limited device driver support and is now therefore out of date.
There are a few annoyances with the MacBook Pro keyboard when in use under Windows XP via Boot Camp. The lack of back lighting and the swapped WindowsWindowsAltAlt keys I can’t help with but the getting the Fn key operational, replacing Alt GrAlt Gr and switching misplaced symbols I can.
MacBook Pro round-up
Just a few quickies regarding my favorite laptop…
Life with Windows & Boot Camp on the MacBook Pro…
The performance is quite amazing.
World of Warcraft runs nicely under Windows giving an acceptable 20 fps at 1440×900 24-bit color 24-bit depth 1xmultisample1440×900 24-bit color 24-bit depth 1xmultisample with everything turned up high or on. Dropping down the anisotropic to mid-point and turning off the full-screen glow effect and smooth shading bumps that up to 30 fps.
Apple’s Boot Camp and my new MacBook Pro
Apple announced their Boot Camp technology – basically a set of drivers for Windows XP, a wizard to help resize your existing disk partition and the necessary magic to load XP from the EFI BIOS.
Gloomy long-term future for Apple?
Steve Jobs’ vision and leadership has turned Apple around from a great-promise but minimal market share in the computer business into a media and fashion darling envied by the likes of Sony, Dell and Microsoft.
Mac Mini Intel isn’t my digital life
This week Apple unveiled their new Mac Mini powered by the Intel Core Duo processor and using Intel’s core graphics, effectively giving it a significant boost whilst still retaining the attractive £400 price point.
Why I haven’t yet ordered a MacBook Pro
My aging Dell 8100 is struggling with the recent demands of Visual Studio 2005 and SQL Server 2005 mostly due to the fact it only supports 512MB RAM. Paging is bad enough on a desktop but on a laptop with slower drives and battery drain…
What next for Mac OS X?
Well obviously the hot item for the next major release of Mac OS X will be Intel compatibility but I’m hoping they’ll get a chance to squeeze some new features in too. Here what I’d like to see next:
Apple announcements and a little fumbling
Apple have announced the fifth generation of iPod. Improvements include better battery life, a thinner enclose, better screen and now in both black and white.
But not everything is peachy. Gone is the FireWire support, the remote socket and there is still no sign of Bluetooth. Quite how you are supposed to switch tracks without pulling your iPod out your pocket I’m not sure.
iTunes 5, iPod Nano & audio-book pricing
Apple hosted a media event yesterday, here’s my usual opinionated commentary.
More iPod fillers and Mac apps
Check out podiobooks who have put up a number of free audio-books from various authors. Neil Gaiman has managed to get the first chapter of his new Anansi Boys book read by Lenny Henry up too.
Fluid is a screen saver that gives you, well fluid visual effects. It has a whole bunch of preset effects and a mixing desk to mix up your own. Works okay on my PowerBook but ideally needs something more powerful! Mac Mini owners need not apply.
The future of Mac Mini
I’m sure you’ve read all about Apple's latest Mac Mini, a stripped-down machine for those wanting to try Mac OS X (according to Steve Jobs in his recent keynote). It also appears to be a good way to get mum-and-dad off your back with it’s practically non-existent rate of viruses and spyware. It even makes a reasonable server being that it comes with Apache, a firewall and can share your Internet connection – even wirelessly.