July 18, 2008 at 9:59 AM · Filed under Apple / Mac
Gartner and IDC both confirmed what we all thought would happen with more and more Microsoft users running away from Vista and scooping up brand new hassle-free Macs at their local Best Buy. Apple is now officailly the third largest computer manufactor in the United States! And that doesn’t take into consideration the fact that a lot of Windows users are surfing the web with their iPods and iPhones. If you want to count those into the equasion, you’ve got a serious market share for surfing the web.
I’m very surprised to see them beat out Acer for the #3 spot. If you remember all the buying that went on last year, you’ll know that Acer owns the Gateway and eMachines brands as well as selling computers under their own name. There’s still a lot of headway to make if Steve Jobs expects Apple, Inc. to climb to the ranks of #2 considering how far ahead HP is. We’ll see what happens!
July 18, 2008 at 7:42 AM · Filed under Apple / Mac
I bought another laptop at Best Buy after giving my garnet red Gateway to the (idiot) Geek Squad. Want to return a computer to Best Buy? Just say the screen flickers. They’re not going to spend an hour waiting for the momentious occacioun that your laptop actually has an issue. They’re too busy collecting huge fees to run virus scans. I ended up going with a reduced price Dell Inspiron 1525. While the specs are very similar to my Gateway, the CPU is a Pentium Dual Core (Not to be confused with Pentium D) which runs on a slower FSB than my previous Core2 Duo, allowing it to be overclocked nicely.
I’m going to be posting a tutorial on how I got my Inspiron turned into a HackBook Pro, and I’ll also be sharing drivers, files, etc. so you can buy this inexpensive $499.99 laptop at your local electronics store and in about an hour transform it into a portable beast running Mac OS X Leopard 10.5.4! Stay tuned.
Updated! Click here to read the tutorial.
July 13, 2008 at 4:46 PM · Filed under Apple / Mac
UPDATE!
It appears there is a fix for the pesky keyboard error which ended up being the reason why I sold this machine. Now I really wish I hadn’t since it lays waste to my current Dell Inspiron 1525. Read the comments below for more information. I’ve included Danny’s screenshot — looks sweet, thanks!
July 8, 2008 at 4:43 PM · Filed under Personal Rants
One of my favorite media players when I hooked up my first computer to the Internet was RealPlayer. From streaming radio stations to movies, Real was where it was at. The first version of RealPlayer was introduced in April of 1995 as RealAudio Player which was one of the first media players capable of streaming media over the Internet. But where’s RealPlayer now? In the age of iTunes and iPods, it appears struggling RealPlayer is barely on the radar.
Briefly known also as RealOne Player, this once sophisticated application has been blasted with bad press over the years for its resource hogging ways, feature lack support and poor interface. Dominating Windows Media Player and extremely popular iTunes has all but sealed the fate of this media giant in recent years. I wouldn’t be surprised to see the name bought out by someone just to take it off the map entirely.
The only thing RealPlayer has going for it is its scalability. Unlike iTunes or Windows Media Player, you’ll find Real readily available across the board on platforms such as Windows, Mac, Palm, Symbian, Linux/Unix, etc. Real portable but real horrible. Apple should buy them out and re-name it iRealBigPlayer.
June 29, 2008 at 9:55 PM · Filed under Apple / Mac, Miscellaneous
Back in the days of Windows 95 and “MMX” technology, you could purchase music from your favorite store that came on a disc (or tape). These mediums allowed you to play them in just about any device. From Sony to RCA, you could enjoy your music anywhere. It was, after all, your music. Play it anywhere!
Forward 13 years and enter a different kind of store: The iTunes Store. Now you can purchase music from your computer and play it on, well… that’s the thing. You can’t play your music anywhere you want. You might have purchased it, but that doesn’t mean you “own” it. It’s encrypted and only works on select devices.
While iTunes offers the ability to buy every song as a “single” for a discounted rate, and also has some rather low prices on full albums, you just don’t get the kind of control you do with buying a CD or DVD from the real “Store.” Me? I’ll never buy a song from iTunes. I still support the artists, not the recording industry.
