Recycled Computing

Adventures in Intel Mac Land, Part 1

- 2012.01.05

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Now that I've replaced my old, dead 867 MHz 12" PowerBook G4 with a black MacBook, what do I really notice about the Intel experience on the Mac platform?

black MacBook
My 13.3" "Blackbird" MacBook.

The Internet is a happier place for me! I can now run embedded videos on sites, where in the past I was greeted with blank spaces and broken Legos. Things happen a lot faster now, and I find myself approving the OS X 10.6 Snow Leopard experience. I don't find that much difference in features from the OS X 10.5 Leopard edition, so I'm thinking that I'm just going to play around with it for a while.

I do have some record albums that I'd like to rip to digital files with Final Vinyl, an application that I could not find in Universal.

Snow Leopard still allows me to run PowerPC applications, so I suppose I should make hay while the sun shines. I should also look into finding an application that would allow me to rip records into AAC files if I move to Lion. My heart is not really into to this, as buying a used CD is much easier to rip to my iTunes Library. Better hi-fi as well. I still favor buying CDs, since it means that I own the tracks and can put them on any device (no limit to the number of devices) and share them with my friends.

As far as DVDs go, this is still my policy as well. But now that I have Intel speed on my side, I have been ripping movies to my iTunes Library and moving them to my iPad. The iPad was made for viewing movies, and I like having ownership of my movies for the same reasons that I like owning my music.

Now that I have an Intel Mac, the application I use for ripping DVDs to disk is so fast it isn't funny. I am referring to Handbrake, the marvelous application that now adds movies to my iTunes Library in record time. Usually it took overnight for my PowerPC Mac to make a digital copy of your average movie, but it's just a couple of hours with the Intel MacBook.

However, what do I do with Blu-ray discs? Yes, the picture is really good on my vintage Sony HD television, but I am being forced into buying a digital copy or a regular DVD copy with the Blu-ray disc. I don't know how the technology will work out, but Apple favors downloading video from the iTunes Store, so I can't see it doing anything to aid Blu-ray technology. Alarmingly, when I bought the Blu-ray copy of Thor, I discovered that instead of a separate section of a DVD disc with a digital copy of the movie, I had to go to iTunes and download my copy of the movie from there.

Now I like Apple a lot, but I don't like having to authorize a computer every time I want to share media. They only let you authorize five computers, and I have three computers with copies of my iTunes libraries. Well, we'll have to see what happens with the new Avengers movie (directed by Joss Whedon).

I am also thinking of buying Pages from Apple to see if I like it on a laptop. It's already on my iPad, and I like it there. This is all sort of sad to leave AppleWorks behind, but we'll see what Pages is like.

I'm liking the Blackbird MacBook, but I know I have to update the 1 GB of RAM. Fortunately, this is easy. You just remove the battery, take off one panel, and there you are! The hard drive is right there as well. I like to be able to upgrade my computer ,and that's one of the reasons I bought the MacBook.

Back to more exploring the Intel Mac world.

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Recent Recycled Computing Columns

Mountain Lion Obsoletes the MacBook I Just Bought, 2012.02.24. John Hatchett just got his first Intel Mac, a preowned MacBook, in December, and now it looks like it won't be able to run OS X 10.8 Mountain Lion.
Improving Tablets: Why Not a Slider Keyboard?, 2012.02.20. Perhaps the biggest drawback of the iPad and other tablets is lack of a buil-in physical keyboard. Many phones have slider keyboards....
Which Apple TV Is Right for You?, 2012.02.15. If you own an older TV set, the original Apple TV may be a better choice than Apple's current unit.
More in the Recycled Computing index.

Links for the Day

Mac of the Day: PowerBook 500 Series, introduced 1994.05.16. 'Blackbird' includes a 25 to 33 MHz 68040 along with smart batteries and grayscale or color displays.
May 16 in LEM history: 98: iMac reconsidered - 01: The exclusivist Mac - Cubed - Troubleshooting - 02: SE/30 catharsis - Microsoft free - 03: SCSI and OS X on a beige G3 - 05: Failures: Apple III and Lisa - Bigger, faster, more - 06: MacBook - PowerBook 3400 still useful - 07: 3 GB in a MacBook - 08: Mac Pro beats HP and Dell - Limited USB power in Santa Rosa Macs
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