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October 16th through 23rd Archives

Wednesday, October 22nd 2002 10:17 CDT

Mac Sightings

Eagle-eyed readers sent in several new Mac sightings:

I was channel surfing last night, and Oprah was doing a show on On-Line Dating. The segment about 'match.com' showed Oprah's staff person sitting behind a 17'' screen iMac, with Mac Apple shining bright!!!

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Macs sighted on the programs John Doe,andRobbery Homicide Division and Charmed!!

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Unfortunately, Fox killed the series, but the rich guy (Logan) on Fox's Dark Angel had a Cinema display hooked up to a Cube. After they destroyed his apartment, he was using a TiBook with a hacked up Cinema display.

There were also often Macs on Home Improvement (I remember a Duo Dock, old Duo's, etc).

For a recent series, Dr. Carey on ER was using a TiBook (with the Apple uncovered!) in an airport last season.

Monday, October 21st 2002 13:17 CDT

IDG Can Play Hardball Too

Now it looks like IDG will hold its power to allow Apple to attend other Macworld shows as a bargaining chip to force Apple to attend the Boston show in 2004, according to this article in the Boston Globe:

''We still have a few arrows in our quiver,'' he said. And the sharpest may be a possible threat: If Apple won't participate in the Boston Macworld show, maybe Greco won't let the company display its wares at Macworld in Tokyo or Paris, or at the San Francisco show in Apple's backyard. ''You know how badly they want to do San Francisco,'' he said. ''We don't have to let them. We might not let you cherry-pick which Macworld events you do ... that's currently under discussion here.''

Cheap Wireless Cable/DSL Router

Amazon offers the NetGear MR314 Wireless 4 Port Cable/DSL router for $89.99 with free shipping, but a $30 mail-in rebate cuts that to $59.99. The rebate expires at the end of this month. It's amazing how cheap wireless gear is these days. The router can be found here.

Bluetooth Adapter for $40

Outpost.com has the Epox BT-DG02 Bluetooth Wireless USB Adapter for $39.99. It's Mac compatible.

.Mac Auto-Renewal Warning

We saw over at Accelerate Your Mac! that .Mac has a setting for "auto-renewal" of charges for the account, using the credit card information stored from the original purchase. If you'd like to review your use of .Mac before renewing, make sure this option is unchecked. It's under "billing and subscription" in the .Mac "Account" area.

Another Mac Sighting

Reader Steven sent in this sighting:

There are Macs in current versions of the Pottery Barn and Crate & Barrel catalogs, including iBooks, PB Tis and flatscreen iMacs.

Friday, October 18th 2002 15:19 CDT

IDG Says Macworld Will Go On

After Apple's surprise announcement yesterday that it's pulling out of the East Coast Macworld shows, IDG says it had no idea the decision was coming.

We'll see how this plays out. Apple may be seriously unhappy with the costs associated with the East Coast show, or it just wants to force IDG to move MW back to NY for '04.

SlimSCSI Works with Mac OS X 10.2.1

Reader Ashton sends this note in on his SlimSCSI 1480:

I have this product and it works under Mac OS 10.2.1 for me. I was able to backup and restore and external FireWire bootable Mac OS 10.2.1 disk to a DAT (DDS3) drive connected to the SlimSCSI 1480 card.

Cheap PB 1400 Upgrades at MegaMacs

The guys at MegaMacs sent word of a deal they're offering on PB1400 upgrades:

Hey I thought you might wanna pass along to your readers that we have some Powerbook 1400 Sonnet Upgrades to G3/466MHz for only $289.99

That is the best price around on these upgrades! Check it out here: http://www.megamacs.com/v1/?action=view&pid=1353912

Wednesday, October 16th 2002 12:34 CDT

Update: 16:00 PM CDT--Apple Posts $45M Loss

The earnings are out. And they're not stellar. Apple lost $45 million in the fourth quarter of 2002.

There were $53 million of "one time" charges, attributed to investment losses and writedowns on capital. Excluding those, Apple would've had a 2 cent/share profit, or roughly $8 million.

In the quarter, Apple sold 114,000 iMacs, 180,000 iBooks, 140,000 iPods (of which 54,000 were Windows units), and 280,000 copies of Jaguar.

Over 200,000 subscribed to .mac, and there was $102 million in sales at Apple Stores this quarter compared to $63 million in Q3. 40% of buyers in Apple Stores nationwide were not previously Mac customers.

LapCop Tracks Stolen PowerBooks

LapCop, a $15 shareware application, monitors your Mac's network parameters and emails you from its location when it determines from changing parameters that the machine may have been stolen. Full details can be found on its page.

PowerBook G4 Wireless Hack

Today Wired reports on a hack to increase the wireless performance of the PowerBook G4 cheaper than the $100 AirPort card. The hack involves using a 802.11b-capable PC card and specialized open source drivers. The upside? The best priced card costs $90 and pumps out 200 milliwatts of wireless fun energy, whereas many of the other cards are only in the 30-100mw range, according to Wired. All the information you need is included in the article.

Speaking of PBG4 Signal Quality...

We also noticed this bulletin board posting on Ars Technica that describes a method to try to "fix" poor PBG4 signal quality when using AirPort. This is the relevant part, if you don't feel like clicking the link:

I just got off the phone with Apple tech support. I called to ask if there's anything I can do to improve my Ti's Airport range. After some questions about distance and interference like microwaves, cordless phones, and walls, the tech told me to shut down my powerbook and flip it over.

I was next instructed to eject the battery and look at the right side wall of the battery compartment where I was supposed to find an approximately 5 cm long plastic strip. (My particular powerbook doesn't have this visible -- instead, there is a plate with the serial number, etc...) Still, he told me to firmly press the side wall of the powerbook against the frame, just slowly and firmly pressing along its length several times for about 10 seconds. Next, he told me to replace the battery and start her back up.

I can't believe it, but my Airport's range is now like my iBook's!! I never could have done this from out here by the pool before, but here I am.

The reason for this as he explained it is, where I was told to press is where the antenna runs alongside the framework of the Powerbook. Sometimes it isn't situated just right, or gets out of whack from having been shipped or something. Pressing it puts it back into proper contact with whatever needs to be touching. Now it works like a dream!

Q4 Earnings Conference Call

This afternoon after the close of the stock market, Apple will hold a conference call at 5 PM Eastern regarding the company's fourth quarter earnings. You can listen in via QuickTime. QT6 is required.

PowerBook Sightings

A couple of readers chimed in:

There are have been several episodes that show Macs on the Simpson's:

The one where homer starts a webpage (mainly gossip on the innocent people in Springfield) the operating system is clearly Mac OS.

The other one was the whole News radio show

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Last Sunday's Six Feet Under had Brenda Chenwith, played by Rachel Griffiths, working on a new book. She is using a Ti PB with the Apple shown proudly!

.mac Buddy Central Launches

We thought this was a novel concept so we're posting their press release:

Tired of staring at an empty iChat list? Visit http://www.14K4.com to find other .mac users.

We would like to announce the launch of 14K4 .mac buddy central.

14K4 .mac buddy central is a free service for .mac subscribers to create a personal profile and to find or be found by .mac users around the world. Subscribers to Apple's .mac service can create a profile-page on 14K4 to share information about their hobbies, favorite movies and musical interests and other information. Doing so, .mac users can find other .mac users through 14K4's search feature and make contact with likeminded people to exchange information, files or technical assistance, to name but a few possibilities.

14K4 .mac buddy central is available on http://www.14K4.com

PBG4 Conversion Question

Reader GL has an interesting question:

I have a g4 Titanium 400 which I want to disassemble and turn into something rather iMac'ish... The display hinges are broken as is the firewire port and CD ROM

I inherited it from my mum-in-law as it was cheaper for her to buy a new iBook than to repair... I'd like to build it into an airstream motorhome I'm revamping with a two way satellite dish (check motosat.com for details.) Anyway, I wonder if anyone knows a good hack for the video cable which runs through the hinges? I've love to find/make a long one which I can use to mount the beautiful display on some sort of articulating arm.

Any ideas?