MacNoob

One of the first entries to this blog was about the original diNovo Edge I was using with my MacBook Pro.  At the time, I proclaimed it to be the world’s greatest keyboard.  I bought the new Mac Edition of the Edge about two months ago and my opinion hasn’t changed one bit.

Aside from being the sexiest looking keyboard on the market, the Mac Edition Edge now performs Mac-specific functions right out of the box while maintaining the same dreamy tactile response and perfect key placement I’ve come to love.  Other similarities with the Windows version include:

• Bluetooth connectivity
• Touch sensitive volume slider
• Built-in touchpad with scroll
• Left & right mouse buttons
• Mute button

What sets the Mac Edition apart (besides the normal placement of the control, option and command keys) are the several pre-configured Mac-specific functions built into the function keys and other custom buttons.  Additionally, the included Logitech Control Center application that installs in System Preferences allows you to completely customize all the function keys to your liking.  I’ve stuck with the defaults because each function key has a graphic indicating what it controls.  Located at the upper right is a Front Row button that does what it says and on the upper left there is a power button you can configure to log off, sleep or power down your Mac.

The black glass key surface and aluminum palm rest make for a beautiful addition to even the most style-conscious desktop and this color scheme goes particularly well with the new iMacs.  The included charging stand matches the keyboard exactly but battery life is so long I tend to forget where I’ve put the thing.

My only complaint about the Edge is its’ glass surface is a fingerprint magnet.  Logitech provides a cleaning cloth and if you’re like me you’ll keep it handy.  Without regular cleaning, the Edge quickly looks like someone typed on it using KFC drumsticks instead of fingers.

Asking someone about their favorite keyboard is almost like asking them about their favorite color.  There’s really no correct answer and it usually comes down to personal preference.  My preference is the diNovo Edge Mac Edition even with its’ $160 price tag.  I bought mine on Amazon for $112 and they’re pretty easy to find below $130 elsewhere.

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Apple’s recent hiring of Bob Drebin has sparked a tsunami of speculation as to Apple’s intentions regarding chip design and manufacture.  AppleInsider points to LinkedIn profiles of Drebin and Wei-han Lein to support their speculation about a new, home-grown mobile processor for Apple’s iPhone and iPod Touch successors.  With last year’s purchase of PA Semi, over $25 billion in the bank and all the new hardware hotshots including Mark Papermaster, Apple seems to have all the pieces in place to mount a serious effort to design and build its own chips.  The question is: For what?

Consensus among pundits points to the afore-mentioned mobile processor and that may be true, but I think they have something else up their sleeve.  Looking closely at Mr. Papermaster’s hardware group, one finds a ton of engineers (some say over 100) with graphic chip design and manufacturing backgrounds.  I’m starting to believe Apple has a desire to make its own graphics hardware.  Here’s why…

1. OpenCL technology (that leverages GPU capabilities) built into Snow Leopard promises to take OS X performance to the next level once application development catches up to the standard.  This just feels like something Apple would leverage by controlling the hardware and API completely.
2. Intel and Nvidia sue each other so frequently their lawyers have their own parking spots at the courthouse.  Apple has clearly staked its foreseeable [Mac]hardware designs on Intel and everyone seems to agree, that was the correct move.  If the squabbling gets nastier, Apple may have to distance itself from Nvidia to avoid getting caught in the middle.
3. AMD (owners of ATI) has to be reeling from the exodus en masse of their key engineering people.  I don’t think their graphics product pipeline has run empty yet, but with so many ex-employees now in Cupertino, ATI no longer seems like the kind of company Apple would need to partner with.
4. If ATI and NVidia are both undesirable, that leaves…NOBODY! (Yes, I know Intel makes graphics chipsets, but Apple’s last hardware refresh ditched them altogether.  The divorce is final.) Apple clearly hopes to make OpenCL a differentiator between OS X and Windows.  Given its history of tight (and closed) coupling of OS X to its hardware, Apple may not wish to bet the farm on any technology they don’t own outright.

Any of these reasons, taken separately, don’t amount to much, but together they make a strong argument for both the means and motive for Apple to build their own graphics hardware.  Couple that with a $25 billion bankroll and there’s no doubt they could if they wanted to.  Now it’s just a question of Apple’s desire and few ever seem to guess that right.

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Being a longtime IT professional and Microsoft Certified Systems Engineer, the last thing I expected to happen to me was to fall in love with a Mac.  As a matter of fact, I’ve been wrestling with computers for so long I didn’t think there was a machine in this world capable of stirring my emotions again.  If you’ve read this blog at all you’ll know that [as of 19 months ago] I’m a “switcher”.  I used to detest the term.  I really thought it was a none-too-flattering label that long-time Mac users pinned on us noobs.  Now I wear the moniker proudly.  To me it says that, even while I was late to the Apple party I at least had the good sense to show up.  After more than a year and a half I’m not sure it still applies, but whatever you call me I’m a Mac guy now.

I do still own a bevy of Windows machines and am quite proficient with them, but I’ve sworn they will be the last.  Why, you ask?  Well, I just happen to have compiled a list…

1. OS X and the MACH/BSD kernel beneath it make for one hell of a fine operating system. It is stable, secure, responsive and a real pleasure to work with.  Its ease-of-use is well touted, and all the problems I had with it early on were mostly my fault.  You see, the biggest hurdles I had to overcome to be proficient with it were in my head.  I was continually over-thinking it.  Once I realized the engineering behind OS X is largely focused on ease-of-use then the UI became natural and fluid.  In short, I had to quit thinking like a Windows dope.
2. Sometimes, less is better. Because Windows has been so dominant for so long, there are literally thousands of applications available for any given task.  Finding the right one for me was often an exercise in searching for the proverbial needle in a haystack.  On the Mac, most everything you need is included or available for less than a hundred bucks.  Simply adding iWork to the standard offerings is all most people will ever need (I write this blog using Pages).  Unlike Apple, Microsoft doesn’t include much “out of the box” functionality with Windows and most of their consumer productivity offerings are total crap.  If you need quality applications from Mr. Softie prepare to spend $200+.
3. The creeps haven’t targeted us yet. Maybe it’s because Macs comprise less than five percent of personal computers worldwide, but so far the very organized world of bug writers have mostly ignored our platform.  I’d like to credit OS X’s superior security model but the reality is [as this year’s Pwn2Own competition exemplified] all platforms are exploitable.  For now though, I’m really enjoying the absence of antivirus and anti-spyware apps bogging down my system with never-ending sweeps and updates.
4. All my “i” gadgets work better with my Mac. My iPod, iPod Touch and iPhone are all designed to work with OS X and Windows.  It’s pretty apparent the iPod never really took off until Apple released the Windows version of iTunes thus multiplying the available user base fifty fold.  That’s how I got started with Apple as did countless thousands of others.  When I moved my iPod from my Windows machine to my Mac I discovered how seamless the original integrated environment could be.  The “halo effect” generated by my first iPod has expanded to the extent that I have completely abandoned the Windows world and publicly declared that I will no longer purchase anything but Macs.
5. Apple design is second to none. I currently own a 17” Macbook Pro that I purchased from Apple in October 2007, just as soon as I could get one with Leopard (OS X 10.5).  Although it’s a previous generation model, it is the most beautiful piece of hardware I’ve ever owned.  My first iPod was a fifth-gen 30 GB video model (Q4 2006) and I’ve expanded my collection to include both first and second-gen iPod Touches and a 3G iPhone.  Each is an example of first class industrial design and tower above their competition in both physical design as well as user experience.  Of course, they’re not perfect, but they absolutely blow away everything in their respective categories.  In short, Jonathan Ive is the man.  I am absolutely drooling over the new “unibody” 17” Macbook Pro, but I have decided to wait for Intel’s “Nehalem” processor which will be a step change up in performance.  If things go according to script, that should happen sometime this year.

Mainly because of reason #3 (above), I’m hesitant to be too loud with my Mac evangelism but sometimes it’s just too irresistible (and Windows bigots often make it very easy).  Some of my co-workers have caught on and preempt me.  I’ll walk in on a conversation about the latest worm, spyware threat or BSOD incident and get told to, “…get that smirk off your face!”  I’m really not trying to be a smart-ass most of the time, but often the best answer to someone’s computer problem truly is “Get a Mac.”

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I know Apple knows what I want and need better than I do.  Let me rephrase that.  I know Apple thinks it knows what I want and need better than I do.  In their infinite wisdom, the decision-makers in Cupertino have decided video of any kind won’t be allowed on the iPhone.  Maybe they think the toll on precious battery life will be too great.  Maybe it’s because they know the tiny ARM processor can’t process more than 15 frames per second and they don’t want people to gripe about poor quality…and you know they would!  Maybe it’s a combination of the two, who knows?  In any case, Apple makes its product decisions based on what they think will make the largest group of consumers pleased enough to shell out [usually a premium] for their goods.  For the more geeky of us, that usually means some features we’d like get left out for the greater good.  One can’t argue with Apple’s success.  They’re obviously doing something a lot of things right.

Everybody knows cell phone video is basically crap, right?  The old LG 8100 I bought four years ago recorded video and it was crap, but I’m not Steven Speilberg either.  I just enjoyed having the feature to capture small, impromptu clips of my kids doing silly things or of my drunken friends making asses out of themselves.  The point is, the iPhone’s lack of video is what sent me down the jailbreak path in the first place.  Having a phone that does so many other things well, yet can’t capture even crappy video seems like a huge omission on Apple’s part, but then I’m one of the “more geeky” outliers.  Enter the iPhone dev team.  Within an hour of downloading QuickPwn, my iPhone 3G was jailbroken, synced and loaded with the Cycorder app.  Viola!  Crappy video!  That’s all I wanted and all I expected.

Qik and Ustream have taken cell phone video to the next level by providing the infrastructure for live streaming, and it’s FREE!  Qik was the first and when I heard of them I thought it was cool, but didn’t immediately get why someone would want to stream crappy video to the internet.  A few days later, I was watching the news on TV and there it was!  A reporter in some war zone streaming crappy video.  Not via a cell phone, but crap none the less.  The whole point of this capability is the same as any other phone application, portability.  Now, anywhere I can get a 3G or wi-fi connection, I have the capability to stream.  Robert Scoble was one of the first tech notables to utilize the Qik technology when he shoved his Nokia in the faces of numerous dignitaries at last year’s G8 conference.  I watched a couple of his “interviews” on YouTube and while I admired the technology, the interviewees looked at Robert like he had a screw loose which gave the whole activity a comical flavor.  I think the idea was far too “leading edge” for the old codgers who make up the dignitaries attending the G8.  My uses for this tech aren’t nearly so ambitious.

Downloading the Qik and USTREAM apps from Cydia was a snap, and both let you sign up for their free service right on the phone, even though I didn’t.  Both sites also provide the embed code for your stream, so adding them to the MacNoob.net web site TV page was a snap.  On the iPhone, both apps automatically log you in, so streaming is as simple as launching the app and touching the “broadcast” button.  You can tell Qik is the more mature of the two apps.  It provides quite a few more setup options than USTREAM and even lets you monitor real-time stream data like frame rate and resolution.  One really neat feature of the USTREAM app is its’ ability to conduct a simple YES/NO poll while you stream and then their web service e-mails you the results.  I haven’t done any sort of deep analysis of the video for either app, but I’m guessing the [320 x 240] frame rate is somewhere around 10 and the sound is surprisingly good on both.  It seems to be the same on wi-fi and 3G.  Neither app will let you stream with an EDGE connection.  I’ve streamed (and recorded) a couple of videos of our daughter and me while the wife watched on her laptop some 2500 miles away on a business trip.  For her it was much more enjoyable than the usual phone call, even though the quality was less than great.  I also plan to live stream from some upcoming events I’m planning to attend.  WWDC will probably be the first.  I may use it to augment the MacNoob podcast once it’s launched.  One thing is for sure: My iPhone will stay jailbroken as long as Apple rejects video apps like Qik and USTREAM.  But I’m a geek.

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I was listening to the Windows Weekly podcast a couple of days ago and Paul Thurrott’s pick of the week was a web service called Pixlr. According to Paul, Pixlr is a near-replacement for Adobe Photoshop that works through a web browser. At the time I thought, “Yeah right!” Since it sounded too good to be true, I went straight to my Mac as soon as I got home and tried it out. After a minimum sign-in, Pixlr was up and running in Safari (4 beta) and I was completely astonished! I’ve never found it necessary to dole out a grand for Photoshop. My editing needs just aren’t that great. I have, however, spent fifty or sixty bucks a few times on applications like Pixelmator that offer 75% of the functionality for 10% of the cost. I’ve also tried the free Picasa, Flickr and Windows Live editors and came away feeling like I’d gotten just what I’d paid for. Pixlr, on the other hand is quite full-featured and runs like a native app on my Mac. I think Safari has something to do with that. The experience on Internet Explorer on my newest Vista machine was a bit more sluggish (more like what I had expected).
I’m not going to do a full review here. First, I barely know enough about photo editing to get done what I need. Second, Pixlr is free, what does it cost to try for yourself? You don’t even have to install anything, just click here. Leave a comment. Let me know if I’m all wet.

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Apple just released Safari 4 as a public beta and I predict it will make Safari a force to reckon with in the browser wars.  Safari has always been a solid, fast browser in OS X.  Last year’s release of the first Windows version was an ipso-facto announcement by Cupertino that they can compete with any browser.  Safari 3, while a very good browser, didn’t offer a real differentiator to the two leading market share holders despite Apple’s claims of speed, safety and reliability.  It really was a “me too” entrance into the mainstream browser market.

No more.  Safari 4 is a true game-changer.  With it’s cover flow and “Top Sites” views, this browser will give Windows users a glimpse into the beautiful world of Apple core animation.  People who’ve never experienced OS X will get an eye-popping introduction to the most visually pleasing UI on the planet.  I downloaded the beta this morning and installed it on my Mac and Vista machines.  I opened it on the 24″ monitor of the Vista PC that faces my office door.  Within an hour, nearly a half-dozen people (PC users) stuck their head in asking, “What’s that?!”  Safari 4 is that stunning.

Of course, it’s too early to tell how robust, stable, etc. this new Safari version is, but if it’s just functionally “good enough” many will use it just because it’s so pretty.  Apple’s tag line for their new offering is “…the world’s fastest and most innovative browser.”  I’ll leave the speed tests for others, but I will attest to its innovation.  Putting the tabs across the top of the browser was genius, especially on smaller screens where real estate (room on the screen) is at a premium.  That, coupled with the views I mentioned are reason enough for most people to switch.  For me, I’ll wait and see just how much I miss my Firefox add-ins.

Let’s face it, the reason Internet Explorer enjoys a 70+% share of the browser market is because it is the default on the most popular operating system.  Firefox has continued to whittle away at IE’s share with its huge assortment of add-ins.  I have no doubt this will make Safari a real player in the browser market.  The interesting question is, at who’s expense?

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