WWDC Steve Jobs Keynote

So, no MacBook Air refresh :( for now anyway...

hey, new iPhone 4 though :)

Keynote is now available on Apple website.

WWDC and MacBook Air

I am sooo hoping for update of MacBook Air during WWDC! After spending some time with my iPad I realized that it's not for me. I also realized, that MacBook Pro 13" isn't either - it's just too heavy.

I went through videos, reviews, etc. etc. of Air over the last few weeks and decided - I want one :) Now, I may be one of those with more money then sense (not much of either though ;) but still won't throw €1700 on what basically is a 2 year old machine with 2 GB RAM.

I would assume after 2 years of feedback Apple should spice up their machine quite significantly. Here's few things I would like to see in the new MacBook Air, which I do believe are reasonable...

- 4 GB RAM (a must!)
- option of 256 GB SSD
- black bazel and glass all around the screen
- GeForce 320M graphic
- Core 2 Duo 2.4 Ghz
- New battery (7 hrs+)
- Memory card reader (i know it's a long shot, but I do use it a lot, and that would do for me more than extra USB port)

THe way I see it - there's only one "must" on my list, and that would indicate to me, that MacBook Air already, as it is, would be a machine for me :)

First Apple Store in Dublin, Ireland!

We heard rumors about Apple planning to open an Apple Store in Ireland for almost a year now. We heard about possible locations - Grafton Street, Henry Street.

Looks like Apple considered those as too expensive, as I spotted new, quite large, not yet opened shop just off the Usher's Island. Large, taking up two buildings store, with large glass displays has two large Apple logos outside, and through the blinds you can just about to see insides. It appears that shelves are still empty.

Interesting however, it still lacks it's mistery we know from US - there's no large curtain covering the store, waiting for a grand opening...

When will we see the store open? Time will tell...

Snow Leopard 10.6 released! August 28th, 2009

And here we are :)

Apple Online Stores are down :)

Exciting :) Bit too early for Snow Leopard, no? :)

Snow Leopard aka "Golden Master" first impressions ...

I couldn't help and had to try the rumored Golden Master - almighty 10A432 build. Now - don't judge me - I am going to go to my local store the first thing when Snow Leopard is released - but i'm not a patient person :)

Installation went nice and smooth - much faster than the first Developers preview (10A380, was it?). Great move. Hard not to notice, that License Agreement doesn't read "Developers' preview" anymore.

"It really could be the real thing" I thought.

After installation, quick look around, installing few Apps, I am somewhat ... disappointed. Not much changed since last developers preview (then again, it shouldn't really, should it?). No WOW factor. Then again "wow factor" sort of lost it's meaning after Vista launch campaign called same... :P

I'm going to go straight to negatives ;) not because I would like to slag operating system altogether, but there's like a million reasons to upgrade it straight away on Apple website, so we all know those. I would like to mention few cons of upgrading...

Now, I know, Safari 4 is great :) and it is, but it's 64-bit version has this "feature" called sandboxing (I believe?). Idea is somehow taken out of Google Chrome, which lets 3rd party plugins (like Adobe Flash) run as a separate process, and as a result if that one fails, it won't take our entire browser with it. And that works. I noticed however two issues with this feature. First - and I am not sure whether is this related to the sandboxing or not - but Flash seems to be slower than in 32 bit Safari. Not much, but I'd say frame rates are about 10 - 15 % lower than in 32 bit. I am guessing I can survive, although my Facebook Restaurant just doesn't look the same (it's a 100% flash based game, which isn't as smooth as used to be :( ). I got similar results running several Flash 3d demos (like this one). Interestingly, even though the demo reports pretty much the same FPS, the graphic is clearly much less smooth when Safari is running in 64 bit... according to atMonitor, about 30% slower in frame rate...

Now here's a real killer. In 32 bit Safari, as it is in most browsers - when running my Flash Game, my CPU is working hard, at average of 160% - 170% of a core power (according to Activity Monitor, with 2 core of course). What I often do is - opening another browser tab. My flash game can be running in background, CPU goes down to about 20%, but game is still playing, and I can hear it's music :) I am guessing Flash simply doesn't render graphic anymore, as there is no need for it. This not only let me save some CPU resources, but also slows down my laptops fan, let it cool, and - what's most important - SAVES MY BATTERY.

64 bit Safari DOESN'T DO THAT. Or at least not at the same scale... Regardless, is my game active, in background, in different browser window or not - it's still using 170% CPU :(

I know what you're going to say - I don't play your game. Maybe you're not. But imagine, if you have 5 tabs of Safari open at the same time, with different websites. Each website has one - two flash ad. And all of them are being rendered. I'd say that can put strain on any system, not only my poor laptop running on battery, and trying to keep itself cool with a fan...

It's not too bad though - remember, you can always run your application in 32 bits if you wish, by changing it's preference in Get Info window. When switched to 32 bit, Safari doesn't use sandboxing, but it does solve the problem...

I also noticed Safari in Snow Leopard is also not compatible with LogMeIn plugin :( now, in 64 bit it's just not working, in 32 bits it's running it's Java based client :( I know that's not really Apple's fault, but then again, if you use LogMeIn, I would suggest to hold on couple of months, until LogMeIn releases compatible plugin...

Speaking of compatibility, I also have a problem with my favorite photo editing tool (no, not Photoshop :) ) - PhotoLine 32. I use this since around 1998 and love it. Latest version is a 64 bit app, and works great in Leopard. Unfortunately crashes shortly after start in Snow Leopard (one may wonder why...). Turns our running it in 32-bit doesn't solve the issue. I made it work however, slowly but surely (although not very steady ;) with Rosetta (yes, you can still run apps with Rosetta in Snow Leopard).

This brings me to conclusion. Remember over two years ago when Vista was criticized for it's compatibility issues? Even though it not necessarily was Microsoft fault? I have a feeling this time Apple make similar mistake. I really don't use many apps, but already found two that are having problems with SL, and worked seamlessly with it's predecessor. In the mean time, since I've started using Windows 7, haven't had a single compatibility problem...

Now, something that Apple was always great at. Look. I love pretty things, love pretty looking software. I love MacOS for what it looks like. But here we are. Windows 7 again. I think, it is beautiful. Now saying that I know it still has often this "computer" feel, as opposite to Mac, where experience is more seamless, and fonts are more print-like. But I must admit that I loved aero since VIsta, and now, in WIndows 7, there's even more of it. What I am trying to say is first of all, I am disappointed, that Apple haven't upgraded it's UI almost at all in years now. I do feel that application windows are bit outdated at this stage. But what I am really trying to say is that Apple forgot ... about wallpapers :( yes, there is a few, including well known picture of Snow Leopard, which appears to be a theme for the box as well as installation DVD itself (it's not default wallpaper in 10A432 however!), but I must say they are very average... especcialy when compared with absolutely gorgeous wallpapers which are now coming along with Windows 7... Call me shallow, but I am using them for my Mac OS desktop and they look great!

All that makes me wonder - have Steve Jobs seen Snow Leopard at all???

Apple-Nokia Morph vs Prada...

I love what Apple does. And that includes the latest discovered patent for ipod nano-like device, but exacted as a multi-touch screen device, instead of touch wheel.... i love the whole idea of finger being new mouse, screen being new keyboard, and device itself being... a new screen. just a step away from Nokia ideas from couple of years back, with having entire device (Nokia Morph, was it?) a one, big, flexible screen..,

It's actually quite interesting, then again nothing knew, that one giant came up with an idea, but another one got to actually execute it...

Very soon we won't be limited to choice of one (HP), five (from Dell) or even like a thousand (from Apple) of colors for our everyday use device. We will be able to change color, pattern, design as often, as we wish. And I am not talking of plastic, tacky clip-ons... I'm talking about complete transformation of our glossy-like, touch sensitive, flexible and totally adjustable computer... We make it go with anything we wear... Isn't that where it's all going anyway? more and more gorgeous gadgets (hint: Apple ;) which we could show off. Time to take them out of our pockets, and wear them... on us. on our clothing...

After all, didn't white iPod headphones, became the very first recognizable, actually usable, fashion statement? (with a bit of clever marketing behind of course...)

What's going to be next?

new all-screen iPod nano? Apple Tablet ? Maybe. HP Pavilon XYZ5000+ ? Dell (for people-renting-a-) Studio (-apartment...) 21(for inches)21(for price)? Doubly...

Snow Leopard less and less fancy...

I found it very intriguing, that while Windows 7 with it's release scheduled for late October just hit RTM (or did it? :> ) at the same time, when Apple is still straggling with yet another Snow Leopard builds, after promise that it's going to be completed a month before Microsoft...

And to be very honest, I am still not sure weather Snow Leopard will be able to compete with Windows 7... I never realized, that majority of most useful "new" features, like Mail support for Exchange, CalDAV etc. are already available in MacOS 10.5... I also noticed, that in the latest build of Snow Leopard, 10A411, QuickTime playing HD movie is using much more (about 40% (!!!), up from about 6%) CPU... boooooo!

I decided to switch back to 10.5.8 for now. The day Snow Leopard appears in store, I'll be first one there. But I won't hesitate to visit shop next door a month later, when Windows 7 hits the shelves either.... And to be very honest, watching the way both OS's are going at the moment, more and more often I am considering choice of PC for my next laptop... (no, not $400 model :) time will tell!

Somewhere, deep deep in my heart, but far away from my head, there's hope that Apple will pull out a big surprise from their sleeve (or should I say Steve? ;) which will be sooo big, that we all forget about new Windows :D

In the meantime I visited local PC World store (there's no dedicated Apple stores in Ireland :( ) and here's what I found. Must be the only MacBook Pro 13" with GeForce 9600 in the world :) and that's for just €0.99 more than the 9400 model from Apple themselves :)

Snow Leopard is messing up with bluetooth

It looks like new Snow Leopard, and that after installing latests build, which was pushed via Software Update, seems to have problems with bluetooth...

Everything works perfect when computer is switched on, or woken up from the sleep state. However, when "safe sleep" is used (known as "hibernation" in Windows), where computer's memory is saved on the hard disk, and computer effectively switched off, it looks like our bluetooth isn't being revoked , and becomes unavailable, at least from the icon in the menu bar...

in order to switch bluetooth on again, I need to either reboot Macbook, or enable it in bluetooth preferences panel.

Weird...

iPhone 3G S and Adobe Flash...

I couldn't help but wonder, does the "S" in iPhone 3G S (apparently "S" stands for speed) is "S"-enough to run Flash?

I remember processing power being a main reason for lack of support for Flash standard in iPhone. Which is a shame - being definitely one of the best web browsing devices (within mobile phone market at least) lack of support for one of the most popular standard was bit disappointing.

One would hope, that with brand new brain, and extra battery life, Apple would put their game together with Adobe, and at last release support for Flash within Safari. I wouldn't expect however this to be application available within AppStore, it's more likely another iPhone OS which would come with new Safari. Then again I dare to say, that introduction of Flash technology would deserve something more than just 3.1 ... Is it not more of a 4.0 revolution?

Will we have to wait?

iPhone 4G then...?

New iPhone 3G S released!

So, the big day have finally come. iPhone 3G S has been released. At least in US, UK and few other places around the globe. Internet is pumping with reviews, videos, demos and pictures of and made with new toy. People waiting from early hours outside of Apple stores waiting to sign their soul and wallet for next two years, over new mobile phone. I would say the feeling, the atmosphere of the entire event must be amazing. Bunch of fans standing outside the gorgeous cube on 5th Avenue, in the shadow of The New York Plaza... would love to be there, not for the phone itself, but for the experience...

In Ireland we not only have to wait till next week for new iPhone. There are no Apple stores here. Sitting outside O2 store on Grafton Street at early hour, along with drunks and smell of piss all over town is hardly something people are looking forward to...

Maybe next year...

Apple Inc.

What I love about Apple is that every time they improve their product, they add the only thing I was missing in it's predecessor. What I hate about Apple however is that every time they improve their product, they add the only thing I was missing in it's predecessor which I purchased just couple of months ago. And now as a reasonable person with limited disposable income, I can't justifying spending €1500 for SD slot. And no firewire, brighter screen or digital compass will change that...

The problem is, that I told exactly the same to myself just before i upgraded my white MacBook to unibody one, and iPhone to it's 3G version... sometimes you just can't say no to the little half eaten fruit :)