The Low End Mac Link Archive, January 2001
External news links are listed below by the date of publication
with the most recent articles listed at the top, older ones below
them. Other monthly archive indexes are linked on the right. Links
were correct when originally posted. However, we cannot guarantee
that these links are still active.
- Opinion: Laptops
the logical computers for more and more folks, Charles W.
Moore, Applelinks, 1/31. Preach it, brother!
- Resource: FireWire
removable media drives, FireWireWorld, 1/31. DVD, MO, Zip,
CD-RW, etc.
- Opinion:
Beyond AirPort: Looking forward to easier computing, Ed Curran,
CNN.com, 1/31. You can't beat Macs and AirPort. :-)
- Free your
mind, Rodney O. Lain. This is Rodney's personal site.
- Opinion: A shiny new
PowerBook comes home, Andrew Gore, Macworld.
- Opinion: Mac creator Raskin
comes down hard on OS X, osOpinion, 2/1.
- News: Cube
has found its niche, MacCentral, 1/31. "Though admitting that
the small supercomputer hasn't sold as well as hoped, it has a
'definite market.'"
- News: SuperDrive
in consumer Macs in 2002, MacCentral, 1/31. Pioneer's
revolutionary (and expensive, $995 retail) drive to reach consumer
models next year.
- Advice: Mac
games for the winter blahs, Nancy Carroll Gravley, Mac
Observer, 1/31.
- TiBook: PowerBook Titaniums
confirmed shipping!, PowerBook Zone, 1/31.
- Opinion: The OS X
Police, John Holmes, osOpinion, 1/31. "The OS X Police are here
and their motto is 'Stop Whining,' a motto that infects nearly
every Mac site on the Web."
- Consumer:
Online Mac resellers' return policies compared, Mac Junkie,
1/30.
- Opinion:
Dependable PowerBooks, new iBook, and sub-$1,000 PowerBooks,
Charles W. Moore, Road Warrior, 1/30. "Having spent the past two
years working with a 12.1-inch display, I am now convinced that it
is not really large enough for workhorse service...."
- MacInSchool: iBooks
flourish in Maine school system, Dennis Sellers, MacCentral,
1/30. "...every eighth-grader at Piscataquis Community Middle
School in Guilford has a laptop computer."
- TiBook: Titanium G4 now
shipping?, Go2Mac.com, 1/30. My dealer says mine is en route
from Taiwan via FedEx - no ETA yet.
- Peripherals: BookEndz
announces dock for PowerBook G4. Dock expected to ship in
April.
- Consumer: 256
MB for TiBook as low as US$105 shipped, ramseeker, 1/30. I may
buy two at that price and sell the original 128 MB module.
- Analysis: Portable
PC growth leaves desktops standing still, cNet, 1/29. "...after
years of being stalled at about 20 percent of the overall PC
market, notebooks are widening their share at the expense of
desktop systems."
- AAPL: AAPL up
over 10%, closes over 21, Bryan Chaffin, Mac Observer, 1/29.
Also, the New York Stock Exchange has officially "gone
decimal."
- News: Early
PowerBook G4 orders begin shipping, MacNN, 1/29.
- Review: SmoothType,
John F. Braun, Mac Observer, 1/29. We find SmoothType provides
better screen displays than Apple's font smoothing.
- Opinion: Thinking
different from analysts, Wes George, MacWeek, 1/29.
- Advice: The
one-minute system install, Charles Downs, Arizona Central,
1/22. A little preparation can make replacing a damaged System or
Finder a snap.
- How To: Video CD on Mac
FAQ (pdf), Criza Design [MovieMac]. Ten-page guide to burning
VideoCDs on the Mac.
- Humor: Zap the PRAM,
Macboy.com. This week's cartoon is a bit on the odd side, but it
does say something positive about Mac installer software.
- Deal: Power Mac G4 Cube (demo)
with AppleCare, $1,299, DealMac exclusive through Jan. 31.
- How To:
Build your own PowerBook NadPad for less than $10, Charles
Sorgie, Applelust, 1/26. Keep your lap and laptop cool.
- Advocacy: A Mac on
every desk, Apple. "How big of a support staff does it take to
manage and integrate 115 processor-intensive computers in three
different time zones for a high profile branding and design
consultancy?"
- Reminder: SuperDrive petition, PowerBook Source. If you'd like
to see the SuperDrive available for PowerBooks, please read and
sign this petition.
- Consumer: Week's
best PowerBook, iBook deals, PowerBook Central, 1/26.
- Advice: As Pismos near end of
warranty, coverage can be extended, PowerBook Zone, 1/26.
AppleCare is a bargain compared with the cost of a single
repair.
- Review: PowerLogix
BlueChip G3/500 PowerBook upgrade, Mike Breeden, Accelerate
Your Mac, 1/26. Updates G3 Series (WallStreet) and Lombard (Bronze
Keyboard).
Opinion:
Hosed (again) by UPS, Charles W. Moore, Moore's Machine, Mac
Junkie, 1/26. UPS brokerage fee for Canada has author seeing
red.- Review: Que
FireWire CD-RW drive, David Ozab, ATPM, 2/01. "...easy to set
up, and easy to use, and when I had problems (the extension
conflict I mentioned above) technical support was very
helpful."
- Opinion: Should you upgrade to Mac OS 9.1?, The iMac.com, 1/25. It
depends....
- Opinion: Why
upgrade?, Charles W. Moore, Applelinks, 1/25. "...for vast
numbers of users there is simply no compelling reason to upgrade
from their present hardware."
- Virus: Linux worm
nobbles NASA Web site, The Register, 1/25. "...en is the first
malicious code for Linux to be detected in the wild."
- Opinion: Will Cyberspace
look like France or America?, James K. Glassman, osOpinion,
1/25. "Whose laws should apply on the Net?"
- Review: The Silencer,
ScienceMan.com, 1/25. Making the G3
All-in-One quieter with a new fan.
- Opinion:
Dialogue on the Ti PowerBook: Are you kidding me?, Ceolaf,
MacinThoughts, Applelust, 1/24. Laptops are about compromise, but
the PowerBook G4 makes very few.
- Opinion: Apple
retail stores could work, Dennis Sellers, Back Seat Driver,
MacCentral, 1/24. Sound advice - let's hope Apple is
listening.
- Opinion: No
middle ground, Marc Zeedar, Mac Opinion, 1/24. What about users
who need more than an iBook, less than a PowerBook G4?
- News: Exploratorium
uses 200 Macs, Dennis Sellers, MacCentral, 1/24. From SEs
running Hypercard to G4s, Macs are all over San Francisco's
hands-on science museum.
- AAPL: AAPL
stays above $20, Bryan Chaffin, Mac Observer, 1/24. Apple stock
closed at 20-1/2 for the second day.
- AAPL: Continued
tech warnings help push Apple to 20-1/2, Bryan Chaffin, Mac
Observer, 1/23.
- Opinion:
Simply the coolest piece of hardware Apple has ever built, part
2, Charles W. Moore, Road Warrior, Mac Opinion, 1/23. A second
article on the PowerBook G4.
- Review: PowerLogix
G3/466 PowerBook upgrade, Don Engstrom, MacSpeedZone, 1/23.
Boosts the old WallStreets to today's speeds.
- Humor:
Letter W goes missing from White House keyboards, Yahoo/Reuter,
1/23 [Daily iMac]. "Call it
the strange case of the missing Ws."
- Advice:
How to run the PowerBook G4 with the lid down, Apple TIL, 1/18.
Yes, you can run the TiBook closed with an external keyboard,
mouse, and monitor.
- Opinion: Big Mac
attack, Jason Tanz, Teacher Magazine, 2/01. "The Mac allows you
to focus more on the projects and less on the actual
technology."
- SETI@home: SETI sucks
power, Adam C. Engst, TidBITS #564, 1/22/01. Advice to
SETI@home users in California: shutting down at night is a socially
responsible response to the state's energy problems.
- Analysis: The light
at tunnel's end?, Wes George, MacWeek, 1/22. "The PC industry
is experiencing its biggest crisis since its dawn in the early
1980s."
- Opinion: Content,
the challenge of the 21st century, Michael Munger, On the Flip
Side, Mac Observer, 1/22.
- Humor: Zap the PRAM,
Macboy. Time to rebuild the desktop.
- Benchmarks: Titanium G4/500 vs. Pismo
G3/500, Bare Feats, 1/19. PB G4 at least 10% faster on all but
one test.
- Opinion:
Beyond the digital hub, Bryan Chaffin, The Back Page, Mac
Observer, 1/19. "Certainly a change in the way we use computers is
in the process of occurring...."
- Analysis: Homebrewed
solutions on vintage Macs, Michael Gemar, Macs in Business, Mac
Edition, 1/19. "...the simplicity of the MacOS means lower
cost-of-ownership."
- AAPL: AAPL
closes above 19 for first time since Nov. 2000, Bryan Chaffin,
Mac Observer, 1/19.
- Low End: Apple has discontinued support for the following
models: Classic, Classic II, IIvx, IIvi,
LC, LC
II, Performa 200, and
Performa 600. Outside of California,
support has also been dropped for the Quadra 900 and 950, Power
Mac 6100, and PowerBook 150.
- Advocacy: Petition to get SuperDrives for PowerBooks, PowerBook
Sours, 1/19. I'd like to see an external FireWire SuperDrive for
PowerBooks and other FireWire-equipped Macs.
- Consumer: Week's
best PowerBook, iBook deals, PowerBook Central, 1/19.
- Virus: Mac users hit
by Melissa macro virus, The Register, 1/19. "The likely suspect
in this case is not Office but Outlook. Microsoft released a public
Outlook for Mac beta at MacWorld Expo last week, and we wonder
whether it's that that has provided long-infected documents with a
path to other systems."
- Virus: Melissa-X
disguised as Mac doc, ZDNet, 1/18. "The virus . . .
can be spread on either a PC or a Macintosh. Like other Melissa
variants, though, only Windows PCs will send mass email copies of
the infected file."
- Virus: Melissa comes to
the Mac, Macworld, 1/18. New Melissa variant can infect Macs
running Office 2001 and Word 98.
- See McAfee
and
Symantec reports on Melissa (also see The Melissa Virus).
- OS:
Apple revs Mac OS Server update, ZDNet/Yahoo, 1/18. OS X Server
2.0 will inherit Aqua interface, other OS X features.
- Dark Side: Windows curses fast
computers, MSNBC, 1/18 [Win98 Central]. "When further
supercharged with 800 MHZ Pentium III microprocessors, Windows 98
and Me outran the hardware at times, powering off the computer
before the hard drive's on-board drive cache could finish writing
out the buffered data."
- Oops:
Hotmail spam filters block outgoing email, Cnet, 1/18.
Microsoft service has been trashing mail to certain domains without
ever telling the sender.
- AAPL: AAPL
rockets up more than 11%, Bryan Chaffin, Mac Observer,
1/18.
- Advice: Encoding
true CD quality MP3s on your Mac, Dave Barker, Mac Digital
Audio. The MP3 encoder you choose really does make a
difference.
- OS: Jobs' compromise
completes Mac OS X, John Holmes, osOpinion, 1/18. "It looks
like my daddy's Mac OS, only it's much better."
- Opinion: The
PowerBook G4, John Siracusa, arstechnica. "...the PowerBook G4
is all that you could ask for in a portable Macintosh."
- Consumer: Apple Store
still has last year's G4s, Pismos, Mac Observer, 1/18.
- Web: Much ado
about tables, Rob Stevenson, Simply Web, Mac OS Journal, 1/01.
Table's are probably the most useful and most used design feature
in HTML.
- News: Sonnet
absorbs Newer engineering team, Mac Observer, 1/18. Probably
the best thing to come out of Newer's failure.
- AAPL: Apple
reports first quarter results, Apple, 1/17. Net loss of $195
million on $1 billion in revenues. Apple sold 659,000 Macs during
the quarter.
- Consumer: Titanium G4
email list, The Macintosh Guy. New list for PowerBook G4 users
- count me in!
- OS: A new OS X,
Stephen Beale, MacWeek, 1/16. A look at changes between the beta
and the final release.
- Analysis:
Apple SuperDrive and iDVD, Paulo de Andrade, Digital Post
Production [Applesurf]. "Combining
the power of nonlinear editing, the affordable quality of DV and
the high-quality, low-cost delivery format of DVD . . .
should place the Mac in a very special position with video
professionals."
- News: Macworld
San Francisco draws record crowd, Apple, 1/16. Attendance was
over 93,000 at last week's Expo.
- Opinion: SuperDrive: The gem
inside the Power Mac G4, Robert Aldridge, The G4, 1/10. "In
most computing situations, though, DVD serves little purpose, but
in walks the SuperDrive from Pioneer, and now the DVD has
purpose."
- Opinion:
Titanium PowerBook: Simply the coolest piece of hardware Apple has
ever built, Charles W. Moore, Road Warrior, Mac Opinion,
1/16.
- Opinion: Apple's
business strategy, Wes George, MacWeek, 1/16. "...Apple seems
to have pushed the notebook envelope to the limit in all the right
places...."
- Lists: G4 list welcomes
users of new G4s, The Macintosh Guy, 1/16.
- Opinion: About time Steve
cussed out those "sorry butt" Mac retailers, Rodney O. Lain,
MacSpirit, Applelinks, 1/16. "Computer retailers can't afford those
of us who know one whit about computers."
- Consumer: Memory prices for PowerBook G4, new
five-slot Power
Mac, ramseeker.
- Rights: France
to tax computers, disks, phones, TechWeb, 1/15 [
Slashdot]. Hard drives, media to be taxed because they
may be used to infringe copyright.
- Analysis: Apple's
secret software updates: OS 9.1 and Disk Burner, iBook Zone,
1/15.
- Opinion:
My problem with the titanium PowerBook, David Schultz,
Applelust, 1/15. "...the Titanium 'Book takes technological
monogamy a step too far for my tastes."
- Opinion: The
PowerBook titanium's Achilles heel, Joud Kous, Right On Mac,
1/15. "...I think one critical mistake was putting a DVD drive
where a CD-RW ought to have gone."
- Consumer: How to
tell when and where your Mac was made, Moldy Creations
[
Applelinks].
- Hands on: Acard IDE to SCSI
adapter, Rick Pepper [Accelerate Your Mac].
- Opinion: Three good reasons not to buy a PowerBook G4, Steve
Cotrell, PowerBook Source, 1/15. Why an older PowerBook is better
for some users.
- AAPL: Apple to
announce first quarter loss this week, Bryan Chaffin, Mac
Observer, 1/15. How big? We'll know on Wednesday.
- Consumer: iMacs at
"end of life," MacCentral, 1/15. Rebates on DV+, DV SE; new
models expected in February. (Our guess: CD-RW iMacs.)
- Software: iCab 2.4
released, iCab.de.
- Consumer:
New iMac prices, MacSlash, 1/14. Over the weekend, Apple
dropped the iMac DV+ to $1,099 and the SE to $1,299.
- Consumer: Week's
best PowerBook, iBook deals, PowerBook Central.
- Humor: Zap the PRAM,
Macboy.com. Stickies.
- Analysis: Inside the G4
desktops, David Read, MacWeek, 1/11. There's more to them than
faster CPUs.
- Analysis: Nvidia comes
to the Mac, David Read, MacWeek, 1/10.
- Analysis: Inside
the PowerBook G4, David Read, MacWeek, 1/9.
- Hands on:
Spire USA Zoom backpack, Charles W. Moore, Road Warrior, Mac
Opinion, 1/9. Two years of use prove its worth.
- Web: The Mac
Observer turns 4 years old. Begun three months before LEM as
"Webintosh," TMO celebrates their birthday with a new logo and site
design.
- Consumer: Week's
best iBook, PowerBook deals, PowerBook Central, 1/5. Many
resellers sold out of 500 MHz PowerBook.
- Review: FaxElite
network fax server, Paul Shields, Business Mac, 1/4. "...one of
the more capable Mac fax server solutions."
- Analysis: New Macs
in the pipeline, Brad Gibson, 1/3. "Sources" confirm G4
PowerBook, OS 9.1, faster Power Mac G4s.
- Advice: Email
basics: A printable guide for new Mac users, Nancy Carrol
Gravley, Mac Observer, 1/3. An introduction to using Outlook
Express.
- Expo: Apple expected
to unveil speedier Power Macs, Joe Wilcox, Cnet, 1/3. Author
predicts 133 MHz motherboard, 733 MHz G4.
- News: Two jailed over
email scam, Ananova, 1/3 [
Slashdot]. Spammers jailed for two years, ordered to compensate
ISPs.
- MacInSchool: A final
blast for 2000, Steve Wood, View From the Classroom, 12/31.
"Our principal let it slip in August that an administrative
decision had been made to move to one platform - PC."
- Opinion: Apple's new prices:
Fire sale or trend?, Gene Steinberg, Mac Night Owl. The
PowerBook 500 at $2,199 and Power Mac G4 400 at $1,299 are steals -
but will new models be even better values? (We doubt it.)
- Software: FileMaker
will stop distributing Home Page, FileMaker. LEM is designed
completely in Home Page. We've been expecting this, but we see no
reason to change.
- Analysis: Last hands-on
report, Mac OS X Public Beta, Macs Only!, 1/3. Well informed
overview of the state of OS X.
- News: Apple cuts Mac
prices as inventory piles up, Cnet, 1/2. "Apple has 11.5 weeks
of systems sitting on dealers' shelves, up slightly from about 11
weeks...."
- Opinion:
Form and content: Mac and otherwise, David Schultz, Applelust,
1/2. A look at form and content as they impact the Web, the Mac
Web, and Mac OS X.
- Opinion:
And then there was one, Charles W. Moore, Road Warrior, Mac
Opinion, 1/2. "The bankruptcy of 16 year old Newer Technology
leaves just one player in the G3 PowerBook processor upgrade
market...."
- Tech: Inside SMP
(symmetric multiprocessing), Paul Shield, Business Mac, 1/2.
What SMP is, and why it matters.
- Deal: Apple
seriously slashes prices at the Apple Store, Bryan Chaffin, Mac
Observer, 1/2. Some prices slashed by US$1,000, G4/400 down to
$1,299, Cube to $1,499. BTO not currently available.
- Virus: Virus infection
rate soars, The Register, 1/2 [Win98 Central]. MessageLabs
claims 1 email of 700 is infected. Almost makes Mac users feel left
out. ;-)
- Deal: Silicon Graphics
1600SW display, $1,495, limited time offer includes video card
or MultiLink Adapter, SGI. We fell in love with this flat panel
display at the last Macworld Expo. Small Dog also has some excellent
deals on the 1600SW.
- Benchmarks:
How much difference does a faster backside cache make?,
MacSpeedZone.
- Benchmarks:
How much difference does a faster backside cache make?,
MacSpeedZone.
- Opinion:
Set your wire on fire, Mac Mind, 1/1. Best FireWire products of
2000.
- Advocacy: It's
up to consumers to derail the hard drive copy protection
scheme, Charles W. Moore, Applelinks, 1/1. Consumers urged to
boycott hardware with CPRM drives.
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