Leander Kahney's Blog, page 1511

Apple's Just A Twitch Away From Killing The Mac Pro Line Forever

Last week's three-month minimum delay to their Xeon-class Sandy Bridge processors may be the final nail in the Mac Pros coffin, inside sources are now reporting.

It's obvious that Apple's heart isn't exactly in the Mac Pro these days. There hasn't been an update to the line since 2010, which is significantly longer than most Apple product upgrade cycles.

According to Apple Insider, though, Apple's pretty close to killing the line off once and for all.

Apparently, the consensus amongst Apple sales executives is that the Mac Pro us a dying product, with sales of the Pro having dropped so significantly that it is no longer even profitable for Apple to make them.

In addition, Thunderbolt obviates a lot of the need for an expandable Mac to begin with, because Thunderbolt provides the same signals as PCI Express slots, just through a cable. Why bother with a Mac Pro when your laptop's Thunderbolt can handle the same thing?

Seems like a no-brainer to me: the Mac Pro is toast. There are no sales to support the product, and the niche the Mac Pro fills is now something regular Macs can handle. And if what is needed is simply raw CPU speed, AppleInsider speculates that future iMacs will be sold with new high-end options to appease upgrading Mac Pro owners.

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Published on October 31, 2011 14:21

Apple's Seamless Glass Cube on Fifth Avenue is Launching Friday [Report]

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before the redesign

Apple is finally unveiling its seamless glass cube entrance to the Fifth Avenue store on Friday, according to MacRumors. Apple's Fifth Avenue retail store is one of the most recognized Apple stores in the world and a main tourist attraction in New York City.

$6.6. million in renovations to the Fifth Avenue store will finally be showed to the public on Friday, November 4th. Since June, there has been a series of temporary walls hiding the work that has now been done to the glass cube entrance of the store.

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after the redesign

The amount of glass panels has been reduced from 90 to only 15. The fine details of the cube's design have also been improved, and the surrounding architecture, including the water drain system, has been simplified.

Steve Jobs himself reportedly took a very hands-on role in creating the new cube. It's a staple of Apple's design and architectural ingenuity.

It's also expected that Apple will introduce the ability to perform customer self-checkouts for certain in-store products via an update to the Apple Store App Store app, with the update possibly dropping on Thursday.

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Published on October 31, 2011 13:50

Lion Introduces New Privacy And Location Services To Mac OS X [OS X Tips]

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Lion has introduced some new yet basic privacy settings. The new settings control how you share your location and collect usage data to send to Apple. Although now it seems to be fairly basic I think it is still important to know what if any apps on your Mac are accessing location services on Mac OS X.

I'll show you how to find out if they are or not in this tip.

Open System Preferences and open Security & Privacy.

Look for the Privacy tab and select it. You'll see a basic preferences panel that looks like this:

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As you can see, Safari is the only app today that asked Mac OS X for my location information. I don't know of any other apps which I own that would use these services. By applying the check mark next to Safari, I've told Mac OS X to always provide Safari with location access whenever it asks for it. If you don't check that box, then each time Safari needs location information Mac OS X asks for permission:

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You can choose to give apps 24 hours of access to location services versus the permanent check mark via this dialog box.

These new settings in System Preferences are handy, but they seem to be an initial offering, since some of the system help documentation didn't seem to be complete when I tried to view it.

The most important thing to take away from this tip is the fact that location services exist and you may want to take control of them to protect your privacy.

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Published on October 31, 2011 12:20

Lion Introduces New Privacy And Location Services to Mac OS X [OS X Tips]

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Lion has introduced some new yet basic privacy settings. The new settings control how you share your location and collect usage data to send to Apple. Although now it seems to be fairly basic I think it is still important to know what if any apps on your Mac are accessing location services on Mac OS X.

I'll show you how to find out if they are or not in this tip.

Open System Preferences and open Security & Privacy.

Look for the Privacy tab and select it. You'll see a basic preferences panel that looks like this:

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As you can see in this example Safari is the only app today that asked Mac OS X for my location information. I don't know of any other apps which I own that would use these services. By applying the check mark next to Safari I've told Mac OS X to always give Safari with location access when ever it asks for it. If you don't check that box then each time Safari needs location information Mac OS X asks for permission:

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You can choose to give apps 24 hours of access to location services versus the permanent check mark if you choose to do so via this dialog box.

These new settings in System Preferences are handy, but they seem to be an initial offering since some of the system help documentation didn't seem to be complete when I tried to view it.

The most important thing to take away from this tip is the fact that location services exist and you may want to take control of them to protect your privacy.

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Published on October 31, 2011 12:20

Shake Things Up By Making Your Own Custom Vibration Alerts in iOS 5 [iOS Tips]

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If you find yourself in a quiet environment like a meeting or at the doctor's office you'll usually silence the ringer on your iPhone. The iPhone will then vibrate when you get incoming calls.

Although that sounds great the only problem is that the iPhone will vibrate the same way for every caller, but it doesn't have to do that. You can actually create a customized vibration pattern for every contact in your address book.

Access to creating customizable vibration alerts isn't available by default. First you have to turn it on following these steps:

Launch the Settings App. Tap General. Tap Accessibility. Locate Custom Vibrations and tap to turn it On. [image error]

Once it is on you can customize the vibration alert for every contact in your address book using the following steps:

Launch the Contacts app. Tap a Contact to Select it. Tap Edit. [image error] Locate Vibration and tap it.You can now select from five standard options by tapping any one of the following: alert, heartbeat, rapid, S.O.S. or Symphony. If you don't want one of those then tap Create New Vibration and then follow the next steps below. [image error] Tap out the new vibration pattern on your iPhone screen. [image error] Tap Stop when you are finished. Press Play to test it. If you are satisfied tap Save or press cancel if you aren't and try again.

Once you have all your favorite contacts set up with customer vibration alerts just let your iPhone dance across your desk to the beat of each one. Just pick it up quick before it jumps off your desk or wakes everyone up in the meeting you are attending.

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Published on October 31, 2011 11:40

Chinese Knockoff Makers Almost Perfectly Clone The Unibody MacBook Air

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What's this? Looks like a unibody MacBook Air, right? Don't bet a kidney on it: Shenzhen's Evil Confederacy of Mad Scientist Cloners have managed to almost perfectly rip off the feel of Apple's bestselling MacBook Air, including unibody enclosure, for under half the price of Apple's ultraportable.

And you know what? For a piece-of-$%@! netbook dumped into a MacBook-Air-like shell, it's not a bad machine for the sub-$500 price.

Here's the specs we're looking at: a 1.86GHz Intel Atom N2800 CPU with a GMA3600 integrated GPU, 13.3-inch 1366×768 LED display, 2GB of RAM, 32GB SSD, two USB 2.0 ports, a 3-in-1 card reader, mini-HDMI output and a non-removable 4100mAh battery that gives you up to 3.5 hours of battery life.

The MacBook Air knockoff only weights a few grams more than the real MacBook Air, and is only 0.1 centimeter thicker than the real one to boot. The battery life isn't all that great, but otherwise, I'm pretty impressed by the specs they managed to get in this thing, especially in the form factor: without turning it on, about the only way to tell this apart from a real MacBook Air is the missing Apple logo!

If you happen to be prowling around the bartering alleys of Shenzhen, you should see this Air clone netbook sometime in November, for a few bucks less than $500. If you still aren't convinced that netbooks are total crap, that's a pretty good price for such a pretty netbook. I bet you could Hackintosh Snow Leopard on it too.

[via MIC Gadget]

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Published on October 31, 2011 11:33

Bill Gates On Steve Jobs: We Created The Mac Together [Video]

Last night, former Microsoft CEO Bill Gates was on ABC News to discuss continuing foreign aid as well as his philanthropy work. During the interview, he was asked about Steve Jobs's less-than-kind words about him in Walter Isaacson's bio: specifically, the part where Jobs (unfairly) says that Bill Gates had no original ideas and got rich just by ripping other people off.

Gates's response is gracious enough. He says that Steve Jobs and he had a long history with each other, and that their relationship as colleagues turned competitors was complicated, but that he doesn't fault Steve for anything he said about him.

For me, though, the weird part is when Bill Gates says that he helped create the original Mac. Maybe Gates doesn't spend all his time ripping off other people's ideas, but he sure seems to like ripping off posthumous credit for them.

Here's Gate's full quote on Steve Jobs:

"Well, Steve and I worked together, creating the Mac. We had more people on it, did the key software for it."

"So, over the course of the 30 years we worked together, you know, he said a lot of very nice things about me and he said a lot of tough things. I mean, he faced several times at Apple the fact that their products were so premium priced they literally might not say in the marketplace. So, the fact that we were succeeding with high-volume products, including a range of prices, because of the way we worked with multiple companies, its tough.

"At various times, he felt beleaguered. He felt like he was the good guy and we were the bad guys. You know, very understandable. I respect Steve, we got to work together. We spurred each other on, even as competitors. None of that bothers me at all."

It's weird wording. It can be argued that Jobs and Gates worked together popularizing the Mac, specifically thanks to Apple's exclusive deal with Microsoft for Excel early on, but Gates and Jobs hardly "worked together, creating the Mac."

I like Bill Gates a lot, but this sort of comment isn't exactly proving Steve wrong.

[via 9to5Mac]

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Published on October 31, 2011 10:52

These Three New iPhone 4S Ads Are Some Of Apple's Best Yet [Video Gallery]

Over the weekend, Apple launched three new iPhone 4S ads: one for the iPhone 4S's incredible new 8MP camera and iOS 5′s Photo Editing abilities, one for iCloud and one for Siri. They all really speak for themselves, but even so, this is Apple advertising at its finest.

You can find the other two ads embedded below.

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Published on October 31, 2011 09:51

iCloud Solar Farm And Spaceship HQ Could Push Apple Costs To $8B

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Photo: Chandra Marsono

Apple's massive new solar farm and their next-gen spaceship campus will boost the tech giant's 2012 expense to $8 billion — a 73% hike over this year, one analyst told investors Monday.

Apple's capital expenditures are expected to jump by $3.4 billion in 2012, according to the company's annual 10-K report with the Securities and Exchange Commission. Part of the reason why is the bevy of massive new infrastructure projects. For example, a 171-acre North Carolina solar farm to power its nearby iCloud and iTunes data center and a 13,000-employee Cupertino headquarters that late co-founder Steve Jobs once called the "spaceship." The office should break ground in 2012 with a ribbon cut in 2015.

The $8 billion figure is markedly higher than the $1.2 billion Apple forecast spending in 2009 and about twice what Apple spent this year.

In addition, some analysts view the jump in project spending as yet another signal Apple will continue to ship increasingly more iOS devices. As Asymco blogger Horace Deidu notes, there is a strong correlation between Apple's spending forecasts for 2012 and how many iOS devices they sold, implying that Apple foresees another 100% year-over-year growth in their iOS division in 2012.

Along with the costs associated with major construction, Apple also plans to build 40 new retail locations – 75 percent of which will be international. The hike in stores should push retail capital expenses to $900 million, up from $614 million.

It's shaping up to be a pricey year for Cupertino. But you know what they say. You have to spend money to make money.

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Published on October 31, 2011 09:40

iCloud Solar Farm and Spaceship HQ Could Push Apple Costs to $8B

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Photo: Chandra Marsono

Apple's massive new solar farm and their next-gen spaceship campus will boost the tech giant's 2012 expense to $8 billion — a 73% hike over this year, one analyst told investors Monday.

Apple's capital expenditures are expected to jump by $3.4 billion in 2012, according to the company's annual 10-K report with the Securities and Exchange Commission. Part of the reason why is because of Apple's massive new infrastructure projects. For example, Apple is preparing several projects, such as a 171-acre North Carolina solar farm to power its nearby iCloud and iTunes data center and a 13,000-employee Cupertino, Calif. headquarters late co-founder Steve Jobs once called the "spaceship." The office should break ground in 2012 with a ribbon cut in 2015.

The $8 billion figure is markedly higher than the $1.2 billion Apple forecast spending in 2009 and about twice what Apple spent this year.

In addition, some analysts view the jump in project spending as yet another signal that Apple will continue to ship increasingly more iOS devices. As Asymco blogger Horace Deidu notes, there is a strong correlation between Apple's spending forecasts for 2012 and how many iOS devices they sold, implying that Apple foresees another 100% year-over-year growth in their iOS division in 2012.

Along with the costs associated major construction, Apple also plans to build 40 new retail locations – 75 percent of which will be international. The hike in stores should push retail capital expenses to $900 million, up from $614 million.

So it's shaping up to be a pricy year for Cupertino. But you know what they say. You have to spend money to make money.

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Published on October 31, 2011 09:40