apple

iBought an iPhone

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Wonder if I can buy an iPhone from here

On Wednesday I finally got myself an iPhone. (No, I didn’t buy it from the shop pictured above)

I’ve been holding out on buying one for a while, partly because I didn’t have enough job security to justify a long contract, and partly because I couldn’t afford it. Those two issues no longer apply, however over the past few weeks I’ve been waiting for my current network, Tesco Mobile, to have any in stock. As well as it being less faff changing networks, Tesco also had probably the best deal; a 12 month contract only costing £20/month, but with a £349 upfront charge for the handset. Anyhow, Tesco haven’t had any iPhone 4s in stock for weeks at my local store, so I gave up and went with Three.

Three’s deal isn’t quite so good – £30/month for 24 months, but the upfront fee for the handset was only £99. Over two years, it only works out a little more expensive (after 12 months on Tesco I’d have probably gone on a £15/month rolling monthly contract). But it’s still not bad and cheaper than other networks. Plus, my local Three Store in Bradford had them in stock.

I’ve had some chance to play with it, and installed a few apps, but I’m still waiting for my mobile number to be transferred to my new contract which won’t happen until later today, so I have to use my present handset (a Samsung ‘dumbphone’, i.e. not a smartphone) as well until that happens.

Thoughts on the Apple TV

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So now the Apple TV only costs £99, am I about to buy one? Afraid not.

Long-time readers will know about my various abortive attempts to turn my spare Mac Mini into a media centre (which I’ve given up on – I just have Boxee running on my main desktop). The Apple TV was always interesting but the price tag meant I wasn’t so interested.

The new Apple TV is much cheaper, but it’s also a simpler device with no hard drive – or the means to connect an external hard drive (there’s a Micro-USB socket but it’s for ‘service and support’ only). So rather than being a media centre, it’s more a ‘media extender’ – it lets you view media stored elsewhere (on your computer or on a streaming service) on your television. If you want to watch a film you own, that film must be on another computer and that computer must be turned on and running iTunes.

Like the previous model, it does support HD but only at the lower rate of 720p, not 1080p which is what most decent HD televisions use; consequently any 1080p television will have to do some upscaling which may effect the sharpness of the picture; thus negating some of the benefits of HD. I suppose streaming 720p video requires less bandwidth than 1080p video but a 1080p option for content on your own network would be nice. HDMI support is welcome though.

One of the biggest new features is Netflix streaming. Alas, Netflix doesn’t yet operate in the UK, and Apple hasn’t signed up any similar services like Lovefilm, so we have to buy all of our content from the iTunes Store.

In fact, there’s no other region-specific services, despite the Apple TV now running on a similar operating system as the iPhone. An App Store for the Apple TV would be great, potentially allowing users to install apps specific to their country; Brits could install applications for the BBC iPlayer, 4oD and SeeSaw for example. In the US, Hulu could launch an app as well.

Then there’s the price. It’s certainly cheaper than the its predecessor, but £99 and €119 are much more than its $99 price tag in the US (who also get the Netflix features). While all Apple products cost a little more in Europe – even after sales taxes are taken into account – the new Apple TV costs 30% more. To give some perspective, the iPad Nano is only 15% more expensive after tax and is at a similar price point, and most of Apple’s desktop computers are under 10% more expensive. So European customers pay more than their US cousins, and get less.

And one final reason why I wouldn’t buy an Apple TV is that the Boxee Box is coming to Europe in November with pre-orders starting in the US now. The Boxee Box is twice as expensive as an Apple TV in the US – $199 – but it has a very large application library (including BBC iPlayer), 1080p HD, support for a wide range of codecs, USB ports, and and SD card slot. Still no internal hard drive but at least you can connect one. Of course, I’ll be a bit peeved if it goes on sale for £199…

My new Mac Mini

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During the host move I mentioned that I had purchased a new Mac Mini. I currently own an original PowerPC Mac Mini, which as well as not being able to run Snow Leopard is also feeling very lacklustre performance-wise, and a MacBook, which is starting to die a slow death due to overuse and abuse (it really wasn’t designed for long World of Warcraft sessions).

I settled for the Mac Mini as it provided the best compromise between power and price. As much as I’d love a Mac Pro, I’m not at a stage where I can spare over a grand for a computer. The iMacs are nice but I already have a relatively new 23″ screen (the LG Flatron I wrote about in September), and don’t have the desk space for a second monitor.

The model I picked was the 2.53Ghz Intel Core 2 Duo model, with 4 GB of RAM and a 320 GB hard drive. Like all Mac Minis it packs a nVidia GeForce 9400M graphics chip, which isn’t amazing but is significantly better than the Intel GMA 950 chip in my MacBook. All in all, it made a £600 dent on my credit card.

Thanks to Time Machine, setting the machine was so easy it almost felt disappointing – it took all the fun out of playing with new settings as everything was copied over from my MacBook. But it did mean I could use it as I’d used my MacBook straight-away, with only a few programs needing re-installing for 64-bit compatibility. World of Warcraft is a much nicer experience – rather than struggling with every performance setting to minimum, I can set it to ‘Fair’ and have a smooth 30fps almost everywhere in the game. It’s nice to be able to see further into the distance and have spells at a higher level of detail.

Compared to the older Mac Mini model, this is an improvement – 5 USB ports rather than 2, thus negating the need for a USB hub, and the use of mini-DVI (with an included DVI adaptor) means there’s also room for a Mini DisplayPort as well, which presumably means dual monitors is a possibility when I get more money and a bigger desk.

I’ll keep the old Mac Mini for, um, something, but the MacBook will be finding itself a new home once I’ve bought a netbook to replace it. Or an iPad, I haven’t decided yet.

And now it’s the Mac Mini’s turn

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As many of you will know, as well as my MacBook, which I use as my main computer, I have a Mac Mini as well – this was my first Mac which I bought in 2005. It has spent the past year or so searching for a purpose – I was, and still am, hoping to turn it into a media centre but I’ve neither had the time or money to go ahead with it, and to be honest, I don’t really need to either.

Anyway, after yesterday’s shenanigans with my MacBook, it’s the turn of the Mac Mini to refuse to work. It’s actually not a problem that developed today – I noticed it wasn’t working last week, but as I run it headless I didn’t have a computer monitor to plug it into. All I knew was that it wasn’t registering itself on the network.
Today I had chance to use it with an external monitor. I heard the startup sound, saw the Apple logo on the screen, and then, nothing. No status indicator, just the Apple logo.

So, I zapped the PRAM – Command+Option+P+R. This time, the status indicator appeared for about 10 seconds before the Grey Screen of Death appeared, showing a kernel panic. This happened with subsequent boots.

So, I tried booting from the OS X CDs. Same problem. In fact, after a while, all I could do was access the Open Firmware command prompt.

This therefore means that there’s something wrong with the RAM or another component. Over the Christmas period, I took my Mac Mini with me to my parents in York, rather than leaving it in Bradford as I figured it would be safer. I’m guessing that it may have got jolted in transit and one or more of the components is out of place. It could also be bad RAM, but the RAM was only replaced in November 2006 and it was good-quality Crucial RAM. Plus, it’s a faff trying to get the damn thing apart and will probably require the purchase of another putty knife seeing as my existing one has gone missing.

In the meantime, I have a nice iOrnament.

How to: fix your MacBook screen

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Had a bit of a panic this morning when I let my MacBook go to sleep, and upon re-awaking the screen’s backlight would not come on. The screen itself was working, as I could see a small portion of the desktop in the middle where the Apple logo is, but the rest was un-viewable.

It’s working now, but not after trying almost every trick in the book. I’ve listed all of the methods here, mostly for my own reference in case it happens again but also for anyone having a similar problem.

Diagnostics

First of all, make sure that the rest of the computer is working. If you have an external display handy, plug that in and use Fn+F7 to activate it (you may not need to hold down the Fn key depending on your Mac’s settings). If you can see your desktop on the external display then the problem is with the display – if not, you computer may have deeper problems. If you have VNC set up, you could try this too.

1. Set your brightness

Sometimes it’s the basic things – your brightness might be set to minimum. Use Fn+F2 to turn up the brightness (you may not need to hold down the Fn key depending on your Mac’s settings).

2. Zap your PRAM

One trick to deal with minor hardware problems is to reset your PRAM and NVRAM. To do this, power down your Mac, then, turn it on and hold down Command+Option+P+R at the same time, until your Mac makes the ‘ding’ noise again. Command is the Apple key, Option may be labelled as ‘alt’ on your computer.

3. Reset your Energy Saver settings

You may need to use an external monitor or VNC for this. While you Mac is booted, open System Preferences and choose Energy Saver. Under ‘Put the displays to sleep’, set the timer to 1 minute, and then wait 1 minute for your machine to go to sleep. Wake it up, and hopefully your screen will spring back to life.

4. Take out the battery

If your Mac is a portable, turn the computer off, unplug the AC power cord, and take the battery out. Next, hold down the power button for 5 seconds, and the re-insert the battery. Then boot up again. In my case, this is what worked.

Here’s what you could have bought…

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Apple has updated the MacBook range again, this being the third revision since they were launched last year. Mine is a first revision, and while there’s nothing wrong with it, had I waited 9 months I could have got (for the same price that I paid):

  • A 2 GHz Intel Core 2 Duo processor, instead of a 1.83GHz Intel Core Duo processor
  • 80 GB hard drive, instead of 60 GB
  • 802.11n Wi-fi, instead of 802.11g (108 Mbps instead of 54 Mbps)
  • Faster writing of CD-RW discs (16x instead of 10x)

But never mind. It’s had 9 months of very heavy use and yet doesn’t seem to be suffering – the battery is still at well over 90% of its original capacity and everyone else seems to work fine. I guess I’m just envious.

It’s here

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The MacBook is here, and currently downloading about 10 system updates. Unfortunately, I have an exam in 3 hours so I can’t play with it much, but for now I can say the following:

  • Wow, it’s so small and light
  • The battery seems to be charging up really quickly
  • I really wish my Mac Mini had an Apple Remote

More later (including photos), after I’ve spent 2 hours sat in a room writing about internet security and encryption protocols.

Mac Stuff, again

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I think this will be the last post of this series for at least a few days now, since I’ve pretty much explored the OS now.

  • Managed to get 10.4.2 to install. It turns out I needed the ‘Combo’ update and not the standard one, which is presumably only for US English users or something. It would have been nice for the non-Combo installer to tell me this though.
  • I also managed to finally sort out the keyboard mapping problems using this UK keyboard map. It’s a shame I had to resort to third-party software to fix the problem – Apple should really have addressed this in the operating system, especially as one of the selling points of the Mac Mini is that you can bring your own keyboard and mouse.
  • Now my next keyboard problem: getting the Home and End keys to do as they do in Windows. In OS X, they do nothing. Any ideas?
  • One of the flaws I heard about the Mac Mini was its headphone socket and poor quality output. This is something I’ve noticed as well; there’s not nearly the same depth of sound as on my laptop. It sounds very muffled when hooked up to my stereo, for example. Sure, it’s only supposed to be a headphone socket but it is the only built-in audio output, and when you consider it comes with software like GarageBand and iMovie you would expect something a bit better. I may have to consider the Griffin iMic (£30 or $40), especially as the Mini has no way of inputting sound (no microphone or line in).
  • The network tools applet in Utilities is awesome! Whois, DNS lookups and allsorts, all in a nice interface. Nice one, Apple.
  • I gave in and downloaded StuffIt Expander for the Mac. Even though the StuffIt web site uses browser sniffing and will only let Windows users download the Windows version. Thankfully I have Chris Pederick’s User Agent Switcher installed so I pretended I was actually a Mac user and it was okay.
  • The main reason for this is so that I could install Windows Media Player 9 for OS X since I imagine I’ll need it to view some movies. Alas VLC doesn’t yet support many of Microsoft’s proprietary media formats (or at least not on its non-Windows builds) so I’d better get it just in case. And you need StuffIt to be able to open WMP since it doesn’t use a disk image like, um, just about every other piece of Mac software I’ve downloaded recently.
  • I also have a feeling that I’ll need to get a copy of RealPlayer for OS X. Unless, of course, anyone can suggest another program that plays RealMedia files?

It’s here!

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All booted up

So, it’s here. Actually, it would have been here yesterday but no-one was in when the delivery guy called.

First impressions

Setting up was pretty easy – not much more than a case of plugging everything in and pressing the On button. Which, confusingly, is on the back.

It picked up my mouse and keyboard fine, although it did ask me to press the key next to my left Shift key just to verify the layout. Even then, it’s on the US layout and not the UK one, despite saying I was in the UK the whole way through the setup. Will have to adjust that later on.

Network settings were picked up no problem and it detected the wireless network in the house too. It couldn’t actually connect to it but then neither can my laptop so I’m guessing it’s an issue with the base station. It probably needs a firmware update but we’ve not been able to get on the internet to do it.

The first-run installation looks very nice, with the revolving dialog animation. All in all it took under 5 minutes, after which I was looking at the OS X desktop in all its white and silver glory. Work commitments have meant I haven’t been able to explore much though.

Since my monitor has DVI inputs as well as VGA I’m using a DVI cable to connect the two together and this seems to work fine. OS X even defaulted to the 1280×1024 resolution, which is the highest the screen can take. Using DVI has the added bonus of not needing a KVM switch when switching back to my laptop; I’m hoping to use Synergy to share the keyboard and mouse between the two machines.

So yeah, I’m pretty happy right now 🙂 . Unfortunately we still have no broadband, and now the phone line itself doesn’t seem to want us to make calls, so I’ll have to keep using my laptop in the library for now. Small though the Mac Mini may be, when you include the keyboard, mouse and screen the package gets somewhat bigger, and not exactly portable.

Here’s a Flickr photoset of the unpacking.

iPod Recycling Programme

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At the risk of annoying Dave, who’s just bought a iPod Mini to replace his 2G iPod, Apple have announced an iPod recycling programme, whereby if you take your old iPod to an Apple Store in the US, Apple will recycle it free of charge and give you 10% off a new model (if you buy one on the same day). The old iPod will then be dismantled and recycled within the US, so that no hazardous chemicals, such as lead, are shipped overseas.

It’s a good move by Apple. On the one hand, they’re ensuring that unwanted iPods are disposed of and recycled properly, instead of being dumped on landfill sites. And at the same time, they’re encouraging users of old iPods to upgrade to newer models, thus bringing the company more revenue.

Let’s just hope that Apple extends this to other countries and that other manufacturers take a hint and adopt similar policies.

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