Archived Links for December 2007

12.18	MacDailyNews	Add-on GPS for Apple iPhone coming in February 2008 for US$89 (with video), Staff: The Part Foundry plans to begin shipping "locoGPS for the iPhone" a GPS module for Apple iPhone which allows jail broken iPhones to gain GPS functionality.
12.17	Low End Mac	Vintage Mac Video and Monitor Mania, Adam Rosen: I deal with older (pre-G3) systems regularly, both through my consulting work and my personal collection, the Vintage Mac Museum. Here are some tips I’ve found for keeping the old beasts running and working with modern monitors.
12.17	Apple Matters	This Old PowerMac, Tanner Godarzi: Macs are known to last a long time when taken care of, but I had the pleasure of receiving a new Mac, well, new in the sense that I have never owned a PowerMac before.
12.17	Mac Night Owl	Is Leopard a Failure?, Gene Steinberg: After long months of anticipation, Leopard went on sale in late October, and I’m sure many of you succumbed to the lust for eye-candy and the promise of over 300 nifty new features and placed your orders early on. I know I did. Well, in 1995, Microsoft got a similar reception to the introduction of Windows 95. How times have changed!
12.17	MacDailyNews	PC World names Biggest Tech Disappointment of 2007: Microsoft’s Windows Vista, Staff: PC World takes a look at fifteen of 2007’s much-ballyhooed products, sites, and services that, it turned out, left much to be desired.
12.16	Apple Matters	I’ve Given Up Arguing with Windows Users, James R. Stoup: I realized last night that I no longer feel the need to argue with people over the Mac’s superiority.
12.14	Low End Mac	Getting Inside Vintage Macs and Swapping Out Bad Parts, Adam Rosen: It’s handy that old Macs are usually dirt cheap, since they may have hardware problems or failed components and be in need of some spare parts.
12.14	MacDailyNews	Popular Mechanics names Microsoft Zune, Apple TV among Top 10 Worst Gadgets of 2007, Staff: There is nothing wrong with Apple TV. Unfortunately, there’s nothing overwhelmingly right about it, either.
12.13	Low End Mac	Wishes for 2008, Ed Eubanks Jr: Well, it’s time for the annual recap of my wishes for the past year, and a declaration of what I hope to see from Apple and others in the coming year.
12.13	Mac Night Owl	Forget the Apple Death Watch! How About a Microsoft Death Watch?, Gene Steinberg: Over the years, some eager-beaver would-be tech writers have been busy proclaiming the imminent death of Apple. Now it’s fair to say that they came close to being correct a time or two, because Apple did some pretty foolish things during the late 1980s and early 1990s that nearly did the company in.
12.13	KESQ.com	Troubled Palm pares staff to cut expenses, Associated Press: Palm, the troubled maker of Treo smart phones laid off about 10% of its work force this week to cut expenses.
12.11	Apple Matters	Why Apple Would Be Crazy to Introduce a Sub-Notebook, Tanner Godarzi: Rumors have popped up about Apple introducing a sub-notebook to compliment the MacBook Pro line some time at Macworld. However, Apple would be foolish to sell such a Mac when they can focus on more portable priorities.
12.10	Mac Night Owl	Apple’s Success: The Vultures Are Circling, Gene Steinberg: Let me lay my cards on the table: First and foremost, I am not an Apple apologist, nor do I play one on the radio or TV. Those of you who have kept up to date on my commentaries over the years know full well that I am not averse to criticizing Apple when it has bad products or bad policies. My ongoing Mac OS X wish lists, for example, are designed to show where the operating system needs to be improved.
12.09	Mac Night Owl	CompUSA Self-Destructs, Gene Steinberg: I used to joke how few people knew anything over at CompUSA, except, perhaps, how to overcharge. This isn’t to say that the Apple "store-within-a-store" was necessarily bad, though. As it was, some of the CompUSA outlets actually had Mac fans on their staff who made a game effort to understand the products they were selling. More recently, they even had Apple reps on board to make sure that the sales environment met corporate standards.
12.07	MacNN	Apple expands refurb Aluminum iMac offering, Staff: Apple’s supply of refurbished current-generation Aluminum iMacs has grown to include three versions.
12.07	MacNN	iPhone encroaching into corporate space, Staff: The iPhone is gaining popularity with businessmen and corporations in spite of its focus, Reuters writes.
12.07	CNN Money.com	Apple’s $15 billion cash hoard, Jon Fortt: Apple’s $15.4 billion stash is indeed the biggest of the group, putting the iPod maker in the elite ranks of well-heeled Fortune 500 tech companies.
12.07	Low End Mac	Bringing G3 iMacs and Other G3 Macs into the Tiger Age, Dan Knight: Dan Knight discusses how to get Tiger running on your old G3 Mac.
12.07	Low End Mac	Why I Can’t Buy an iPhone, and What I Did About It, John Hatchett: But I can’t buy an iPhone? That deal Jobs made with AT&T.
12.07	Macworld	CompUSA closing shop, Agam Shah: Computer and electronics retailer CompUSA announced on Friday that it would start winding down its retail operations after being acquired by an investment firm, which is looking to sell the company’s business and assets.
12.07	Macworld	Analyst: Apple TV sales below expectations, Jim Dalrymple: Apple may have had high hopes for its first generation Apple TV, but analyst sales estimates indicate the product is not as successful as once thought. Blaming the iTunes video revolution that never happened, market research firm, Forrester said the Apple TV failed to catch on with consumers.
12.07	Macworld	Report: Apple threatens shops selling iPhone in Singapore, Sumner Lemon: Apple recently threatened retailers in a Singapore mall with legal action if they continue to sell unlocked iPhones, prompting many to stop selling the handsets, The Straits Times newspaper reported Friday.
12.06	Low End Mac	Faking Out the Leopard Installer with Open Firmware, Dylan McDermond: I have found that, by far, the easiest way to install Leopard on unsupported G4s is to spoof the clock speed in Open Firmware before installing.
12.06	Low End Mac	The Swiss Army Knife of Notebook Macs, John Hatchett: The Apple PowerBook G3 2000 (FireWire) was the culmination of Apple’s PowerBook models. The WallStreet, Lombard, and Pismo ended Apple’s use of the curve and the color black in it’s design of notebook computers.
12.06	Mac Night Owl	The Leopard Report: Does the Finder Make the Grade?, Gene Steinberg: For years, Mac users and tech pundits were repeatedly begging Apple to do something to fix the Mac OS X Finder. The arguments were all over the place, using such obtuse references as "spatial".
12.05	Low End Mac	Info-Mac Reloaded, Richard Lawson: Here’s a bit of trivia for old time Mac users. When was the first online Mac community launched? Give up? It was over 20 years ago that the first Info-Mac posting appeared in June of 1984 - just six months after the release of the Mac 128K.
12.05	Mac Night Owl	So Is Leopard Really Slower?, Gene Steinberg: Up till now, Mac users have been spoiled. Each and every release of Mac OS X has been shown to be demonstrably faster than its predecessor, whereas with Microsoft Windows it’s usually the reverse. However, Leopard includes a huge amount of under-the-hood changes that tax the graphics processors fiercely, particularly on slower Macs. On the other hand, with less work for the CPU to handle, shouldn’t that signal speedier performance for most of you?
12.05	Apple Matters	Is It Time for Apple to "Do an iPhone" on the Apple TV?, Chris Howard : After Apple’s revolutionary redefinition of the mobile phone, is it time to do the same to the Apple TV-plus a few other devices?
12.04	InfoWorld	Survey: Apple users more likely to be green-minded, Ted Samson: Apple users are proportionally more eco-friendly than users of other vendors’ PCs. Moreover, they’re more willing to plunk down extra cash for "green" products.
12.04	Reuters	SAP unveils Google-inspired software, iPhone program, Jim Finkle: SAP unveiled on Tuesday the first in a new generation of business software products that focus on ease of use, borrowing tools that have drawn hundreds of millions of users to Google .
12.04	TUAW	Follow-up: Recording Voice on the iPod Touch, Erica Sadun: As iPod touch enthusiast Marian continues working on his pre-amped dock-connector Mic for the iPod touch, my Amazon Marketplace MicroMemo (i.e. clearance and cheap) showed up this morning. I loaded the latest Voice Notes onto my iPod touch, hooked in the MicroMemo and gave it a try.
12.04	Mac Night Owl	So Is All Quiet on the iPhone Front?, Gene Steinberg: After this past summer’s iPhone frenzy, I suppose if you don’t see a story about this hot- selling gadget for more than a few days, you can speculate that the fever has died down. Or, perhaps more accurately, that people are too busy enjoying them to complain about them.
12.04	ars technica	Apple ordering LED-backlit displays ahead of rumored subnotebook launch, Justin Berka: By now, most of us are pretty sure that some some form of Apple subnotebook is coming, probably at Macworld. Although the rumors have been floating around for a while, more corroborating evidence is always helpful. As it turns out, new information from DigiTimes hits both points by providing information on recent Apple orders for LCD displays, some of which may be used on Apple’s new subnotebook.
12.04	MacMegasite	Apple’s market share reaches record high, Staff: Apple’s share of the operating system market grew 3.34% in November to hit a record 6.81%, compared to 5.39% for November 2006, according to the results of a Net Applications survey.
12.03	MacNN	Macs near 7% online market share, Staff: In aggregate, Mac OS X has achieved nearly 7% of the online market share according to statistics from Net Applications. The "MacIntel" platform garnered 3.59 percent, while the "Mac OS" platform garnered 3.22 percent, for a total of 6.81 percent.
12.03	MacDailyNews	Apple, AT&T sued over iPhone visual voicemail, Staff: Klausner Technologies, Inc. announced today that it has filed a patent lawsuit under its visual voicemail patents against Apple Inc. and AT&T Wireless regarding the iPhone, with damages and future royalties estimated at US$360 million (according to Klausner’s press release).
12.03	MacDailyNews	Do Democrats prefer Apple Macs?, Staff: As MacDailyNews reported this weekend Aliso Viejo, CA-based Net Applications announced November 2007 Operating System (and Browser) usage stats. With a new, enhanced marketshare site, Net Applications is now able to analyze global marketshare trends in much greater depth.
12.03	Low End Mac	Switching to Mac Tripled My Productivity, Ted Bragg: This nine-year Windows user finally got fed up losing work and time to Win98/XP plus countless hours on tech support. I was a freelance graphic designer at the time and knew every "serious" artist used Mac.
12.03	TechCrunch	Google Announces Fastest Growing Search Terms, Michael Arrington: The iPhone tops the list. Surprisingly, "vectronic" is not listed.
12.01	Laptop	The Way It Woz: Steve Wozniak on All Things Apple, Joanna Stern: It’s been more than three decades since Steve Wozniak and Steve Jobs formed Apple Computer, where "the Woz" brought the Apple I and II to life, and where he played a critical role in bringing the original Macintosh to market.
12.01	EETimes	iPhone delays to impact NAND in ’08, Mark LaPedus: Apple Computer Inc. could push out the introduction of the next-generation iPhone, which may put a damper on the NAND flash market in 2008, according to an analyst.
12.01	ars technica	Uncovered: Evidence that Mac OS X could run Windows apps soon, David Chartier: Once Intel chips landed inside Macs and Boot Camp made its debut, it got a lot harder to blame rumor mongers for making a certain leap: Mac OS X could one day run Windows apps sans-Windows.
12.01	Low End Mac	I’m Never Going Back to Windows, Benjamin Zalutsky: It all started, I suppose, in the 4th grade at a Montessori school I was attending. Our school had recently acquired one of the brand spankin’ new iMac G4s, and it was sitting forlornly in a corner, unloved.
12.01	Apple Matters	Why Do I Use Apple’s Apps?, Chris Howard : What is it that makes Apple apps special enough that I use them even when I’ve tried and failed with similar third party apps?
12.01	Apple Matters	Using Leopard on Older Macs, Tanner Godarzi: Apple has raised the bar for using Leopard on a PowerPC based Mac: 867 MHz or faster. This makes older Macs obsolete to make way for Intel based machines to become the company’s main focus. However, you can get an older Mac running Leopard, it just won’t be so easy.
12.01	Mac Night Owl	Here’s One Reason Why Microsoft Can’t Sell Windows Vista, Gene Steinberg: One of the most telling jokes during the presentation of Leopard at Apple’s WWDC was that it was $129 for the "Basic" version and $129 for the "Ultimate" version. In stark contrast to Microsoft’s confusing lineup of Vista choices, Apple stayed with the program.
12.01	Low End Mac	Using Older Peripherals with Newer Macs, Adam Rosen: A recurring issue that users of all platforms face is how to use older peripherals with newer computers.
12.01	Low End Mac	Apple’s Pippin: Missing the Mark(et), Joshua Coventry: Pippin was a multimedia player developed by Apple Computer in the mid 90s. Apple decided to create and license the technology (named Pippin) due to their belief that home computers were becoming more and more important and popular with customers.
12.01	Apple Matters	Cool Things You Can Do with Old Macs, James R. Stoup: Imagine for a moment that you have more money than sense, plenty of time, and a burning desire for all things Mac. Well then, have I got a deal for you!