MacNewsBlog

Fake Steve Jobs on CES 2008 Keynote:

As you probably know, the Consumer Electronics Show begins tomorrow in Las Vegas, kicking off with a big keynote by the Beastmaster where I'm guessing he will talk about all the new ways in which Microsoft hopes to add extra layers of frustration to people's lives by turning ordinary everyday experiences like making phone calls and watching television into annoying, confusing processes that require you to integrate multiple unreliable and incompatible digital devices into a Frankenstein system that needs a dozen different remote conrols (each one bigger and uglier than the others, with a zillion tiny buttons) and which freezes, hangs and crashes without warning. Or something.

We couldn't agree more! Check out more on what Fake Steve thinks about CES 2008 here.

Almost an entire week ahead of the MacWorld Keynote, Apple today introduced the new MacPro 8-core. Featuring Intel's new 45 nanometer Quad-Core "Harpertown" Xeon processors running up to 3.2 GHz the new MacPro is the fastest Mac ever. Throw in the powerful new graphics and up to 4TB of internal storage and you've got one fantastic work horse!

They all come standard with 8 cores, starting from 2.8 Ghz and going all the way up to 3.2 Ghz. Other than the CPU which is a "Harpertown" processor most of the other features seem to be the same. Also interesting to note is that the front side bus clocks in at 1600 Mhz with 64-bit dual independent frontside buses.

In the graphics department, the Mac Pros don't fail to innovate with a Double-wide, 16-lane PCI Express 2.0 graphics slot and one of the following installed:

• ATI Radeon HD 2600 XT with 256MB of GDDR3 memory and two dual-link DVI ports
• NVIDIA GeForce 8800 GT with 512MB of GDDR3 memory and two dual-link DVI ports
• NVIDIA GeForce 8800 GT with 512MB of GDDR3 memory and two dual-link DVI ports
• NVIDIA Quadro FX 5600 with 1.5GB of GDDR3 memory, two dual-link DVI ports, and one stereo 3D port

For those of you who have been waiting for the new machines to come out, this looks to be the machine to get. More news as it comes

Philip Schiller, Apple’s senior vice president of Worldwide Product Marketing says:
“The new Mac Pro is the fastest Mac we’ve ever made. With 3.2 GHz 8-core Xeon processing, a 1600 MHz front side bus and 800 MHz memory, the new Mac Pro uses the fastest Intel Xeon architecture on the market.”

Standard MacPro 8-core configuration:
retail price of $2,799 (US)

• two 2.8 GHz Quad-Core Intel Xeon processors with dual-independent 1600 MHz front side buses
• 2GB of 800 MHz DDR2 ECC fully-buffered DIMM memory, expandable up to 32GB
• ATI Radeon HD 2600 XT with 256MB of GDDR3 memory
• 320GB Serial ATA 3Gb/s hard drive running at 7200 rpm
• 16x SuperDrive™ with double-layer support (DVD±R DL/DVD±RW/CD-RW)
• two PCI Express 2.0 slots and two PCI Express slots
• Bluetooth 2.0+EDR; and
• Apple Keyboard and Mighty Mouse.

Of course you have a ton of build to order options as well at the Apple Store!

The new Xserve which is a 1U rack-optimized server that Apple claims is up to twice as fast as its predecessor and includes an unlimited client license for Mac OS X Leopard Server software.

Philip Schiller, Apple’s senior vice president of Worldwide Product Marketing:
“With the latest Intel processors and no client access licenses, Xserve offers unbeatable server performance and value for under $3,000. Xserve’s power, storage and Leopard Server make it ideal for supporting Mac clients and mixed platform workgroups.”

Xserve standard configuration
retail price of $2,999 (US)

• single 64-bit 2.8 GHz Quad-Core Xeon processor with 12MB of L2 cache and a 1600 Mhz front side bus
• 2GB of 800 MHz DDR2 ECC FB-DIMM RAM, expandable up to 32GB
• single 80GB SATA Apple Drive Module
• dual Gigabit Ethernet on-board
• internal graphics
• two FireWire 800 and three USB 2.0 ports; and
• an unlimited client license for Mac OS X Server version 10.5 Leopard.

Read more about the new Apple Xserve here.

No, I'm don't have short pants with an Apple logo on it... but here's the news heard round the world!

• Overheard at CES: BestBuy is planning to expand their Mac sales to 500 stores, which is up from its current 270 outlets.
• Adobe releases Photoshop Elements 6 for Mac. Finally we say.
• Warner Brothers is rumored to be onboard for the iTunes movie rental deal according to this report.
• Brent Simmons says RSS feed reader, NetNewsWire, FeedDemon, NewsGator Inbox and NewsGator Go! are now free. Go get um!

So that hard drive in your Mac Book's been making some funny noises for the last few weeks. Then suddenly one morning, you turn on your MacBook and nothing works! You take it into the Apple Store, speak to a genius and discover that the drive is dead. They'll replace the drive but wait! What about my data?! The genius tells you in a soft and gentle voice, "Sorry, we don't do drive data recovery." Now what to do?

If you decide to send your drive off to a data rescue specialist, be careful who you send it to!

In a recent Apple Knowledge Base Document, Apple states explicitly that they will only accept warranty claims for drives that have been worked on by OnTrack or DriveSavers. These are the only two that Apple has worked with and approve of their methods to recover data. Using any other service will most likely void your warranty on your drive!

From the Apple Knowledge Base Document:

"Apple has worked with both of these companies to ensure that their data recovery methods meet Apple's standards, and will fulfill its warranty obligations if the returned drive has a DriveSavers or OnTrack label indicating that the respective company worked with the drive for data recovery purposes. Typically, if the factory seal on the hard drive is broken or removed, the hard drive will be excluded from coverage, however, if an authorized DriveSavers or OnTrack label is on such a hard drive, Apple will not exclude coverage on that basis."

So before you send it out to "Uncles Discount Drive Service"... think twice!

Read Apple Knowledge Base Document: Hard Drive Data Recovery & Warranty Implications

Here are a few blogs that will have live coverage of the Macworld Keynote since you're like me and couldn't get away from work to make it.

MacRumors
Engadget
MacUsers
Apple Matters

MacDailyNews is reporting about a reader who did a little digging through some WHOIS domain name info:

They looked into the domain name macbookair.com and found....

Admin Street1: 303 Second Street
Admin Street2: Suite 800N
Admin City: San Francisco
Admin State/Province: CA

Interestingly, doing a bit more digging, they found macbookair.us, macbookair.biz, and macbookair.info show the same address and this tiny tid bit:

Billing Street1: 1 Infinite Loop
Billing Street2: Mail Stop 3-TM
Billing City: Cupertino
Billing State/Province: CA
Domain Registration Date: Fri Jan 11 22:49:59 GMT 2008

Does it mean anything? Who knows! Maybe tomorrow during the Steve Jobs keynote at Macworld we'll all find out what it means. Of course, it could be nothing.

The biggest announcement today is MacBook Air, the worlds thinnest notebook ever and... it's running OS X! For years now, I've longed for a ultra-portable Mac. The last great one was the 12" PowerMac but it's been discontinued now for over a year. Today is the day that my dreams have come true!

Sporting a 13.3" TFT LED display, Full sized backlit keyboard with ambient light sensor, Intel Core2Duo 1.6 GHz or 1.8 GHz optional, 2Gig standard RAM, 80 Gig HD or 64Gig SSD drive, multi-gesture trackpad, 5 hour battery life (with airport on), audio out, USB 2.0, Micro-DVI, 802.11n wireless networking and Bluetooth 2.1+EDR.

No firewire port, no ethernet port and no optical drive!

Starts at $1799 preorder! Go get one today!

Various folks were nice enough to email in their hands on observations about some of the new Apple products on display at MacWorld. Here's a checklist of tidbits:

• MacBook Air - the thing is solid and looks like theres no way to open it to do any installs of your own. Almost like one solid piece of aluminum.
• Time Capsule works with PC's and Macs and shows up as a shared network drive.
• MacBook Air battery is servicable by the Apple Store and will cost the same as a replacement MacBook battery.
• The MacBook Air Optical drive software is read only, so no, you can't burn info from it to the drive. No word on if you'd be able to stream a DVD to it either.
• No 1080p from the Apple TV since the hardware hasn't been updated.

More as we get it! Keep those emails coming!

Apple Discussion Forum is reporting of an Unknown error (-2) while accessing iTunes Store. No one is sure if this happened before or after iTunes 7.6 was released, but many people are being affected by this error, including yours truely.

When trying to access my account via iTunes I get this error. Turns out my account (Apple ID) is one that was created long before iTunes came out . That means I had been using a user name and not my email address as the account login name. Now I cannot get into my account, even after resetting the password all I got was the -2 error.

To test if this was due to iTunes 7.6, I got on another computer with an older version of iTunes and no dice. Still couldn't log into my account.

I have a feeling that something happened to our accounts because of the new rental system employed at iTunes or perhaps because they changed something and I've been using a user name instead of an email address for so long.

I emailed iTunes support via this page and I'm waiting and hoping for a fix.

This past week saw the debut of Apple's lightest, thinest MacBook ever: the MacBook Air. It seemed like the world was talking about this new ultra portable Mac, even before anyone has gotten to touch or see it in person. A lot of Apple fans and non-Apple fans alike have kinda shunned the MacBook Air, calling it too expensive, too lacking in the memory and hard drive dept.

So who did Apple make this ultra portable for anyway?

Here's my take on this situation:

The MacBook Air is a special portable made for folks who need a really thin, light, ultra portable that is a Macintosh. If you're a windows user, there is definitely ultra-portables that are cheaper if that's all you plan to use. The MacBook Air is also, in my opinion, not meant to be your main workstation, although it can be. I would be hard pressed to store everything on an 80 gig HD (although I probably could if i HAD to), and running of of 2 GB RAM is no fun anymore. Further more, using any type of external storage will be slow since i've only got Airport wireless or USB 2.0 to get to my storage devices.

The MacBook Air, in my opinion, is made to be a satellite desktop or a temporary desktop. You do your work on it when you are away from your main workstation. When you are back near your main workstation, you sync the MacBook Air with your desktop.

Who would use the MacBook Air?
- Students could use the MacBook Air for taking notes, presentations and research during class. With 5 hours of battery life and the ultra portability, it would be very easy to take along in a backpack.
- Reporters, Advertising execs and Business people who do activities outside the office will have a wonderfully easy time taking the MacBook Air out in the field.
- Photographers who shoot tons of photographs can use the MacBook Air on site to edit and upload photos remotely.
- Teachers who work on lesson plans at home can take their work with them home.
- Business people who travel will love the MacBook Air due to the size and weight. They'll probably hate the battery though since there's no way to swap it out.

Who wouldn't use the MacBook Air? Just about everyone else. If you've already got a MacBook Pro or a Macintosh desktop powerhouse and never leave it at anytime, there is little or no reason for you to purchase a MacBook Air... although I'd probably lust after one once I've actually gotten to see and feel it in person.

Been hearing the rumors this week about NBC and Apple sitting in the tree again. Looks like both companies are realizing that they are both hurting without each other, but neither are anxious to sign any paperwork just yet.

Read more about this on and off relationship via AppleInsider.

Looks like Pink is back! Yep the color that folks love the most is back on your favorite iPod Nano and just in time for Valentine's Day...

"Customers are going to love the gorgeous new pink iPod nano," said Greg Joswiak, Apple’s vice president of Worldwide iPod Product Marketing. "The pink iPod nano is perfect for people who want a great new color this spring, or who are searching for a special Valentine’s Day gift."

Get out there and enjoy the new color! I wonder what color Apple will do next?

My eagle eyed wife pointed out to me that John Mayer already got his hands on a MacBook Air, a full week before it's even shipping! I guess it pays to be a celebrity. Even though John uses a Blackberry and not an iPhone, we do know for sure that he uses a Mac for everything else.

Check out John Mayer's MacBook Air here.

Just a bunch of quickies because I've been so swamped with other things. Very sorry for not posting more regularly!

Apple launches Video Tutorials website for Mac
File this one under "finally"! I don't know what took them so long to actually do this!

Motorola may leave the cellular market according to an analyst
While we think this is unlikely, never say never!

Apple delays Apple TV "Take 2" for about a week (maybe two)
Apple probably just wants to make things work the way it should. I don't think too many will be disappointed that it's been delayed. I want an Apple TV but I'm still on the fence about buying it right this minute.

MacBook Air arriving shortly
A few people have emailed to let me know that their MacBook Air has arrived. The ultraportable should be in Apple Stores shortly!