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December 2007
My history with the Mac OS is considerably shorter than my time with Windows, but it is no less interesting. Since I began to use the Apple Macintosh, there have two distinct releases: Mac OS X 10.3 Panther and 10.4 Tiger.
Before I describe my experiences with the Mac OS, I would first like to discuss the history of the Mac operating system and why it is important.The Mac OS is older than Microsoft Windows, and it’s seen considerably more releases than its counterpart. The first version, then simply called System 1.0, appeared in 1984. The […]
Of the two major computing platforms, the Windows PC was the first one I became accustomed to. Windows has gone through several incarnations since the first version was released in 1985. It wasn’t until Windows 3.1 was released in 1992 that the PC started to dominate over its competitors, these being the Mac and, to […]
I deal with older (pre-G3) systems regularly, both through my consulting work and my personal collection, the Vintage Mac Museum. Here are some tips I’ve found for keeping the old beasts running and exchanging data with current systems.
My first Apple computer was an Apple IIc. I really don’t recall very much about the IIc. I know that my wife was using Apple computers at work, since she was a special education teacher at the time. We had no children (children absorb any free money, trust me) at that time, and went to the […]
I deal with older (pre-G3) systems regularly, both through my consulting work and my personal collection, the Vintage Mac Museum. Here are some tips I’ve found for keeping the old beasts running and working with modern monitors.
I deal with older (pre-G3) systems regularly, both through my consulting work and my personal collection, the Vintage Mac Museum. Here are some tips I’ve found for keeping the old beasts running.
As readers of Low End Mac know, Macs are durable machines that can remain useable and useful a decade or more after they were manufactured. Whether in use to run legacy applications, old games, repurposed as systems for the kids, or acquired as collector’s items, many old Macs can (and do) see service long after […]
Last week, Gadgets Page’s Michael Moncur posted Alternatives to Apple’s Aluminum Keyboard, a column about his search for a replacement for his iMac’s original keyboard, which had bitten the dust – more specifically, too many food crumbs from meals eaten at his workstation.
I’ve been carrying on an extended email conversation with Bill Brown for months. Bill is more-or-less the IT guy for an intense volunteer Mac program at a senior center. Certainly a confirmed Mac lover, he has made some interesting discoveries and developed some interesting techniques for refurbishing, repairing, and updating older Macs, particularly G3 iMacs.
I have found that, by far, the easiest way to install Leopard on unsupported G4s is to spoof the clock speed in Open Firmware before installing. Spoofing will have Open Firmware tell OS X that your G4 is up-to-speed until you reboot. This will allow you to install without hacking an install disc or working in […]
2007 – It’s hard to believe, but the MacBook Pro has been around for almost two years now. I can still vividly remember watching the Macworld keynote in 2006 when Steve jobs used his trademark “one more thing” technique to surprise the audience with a final Mac revelation.
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November 2007
Thursday is Thanksgiving Day here in the States, our once-a-year day dedicated to looking back at all the good things that have happened. We’ll be spending the next week with family, so this is the last new column we’re posting until next Wednesday.
My track record with eMacs has not been the greatest. My first was a 700 MHz with a Combo drive. I purchased it refurbished after the second generation eMacs came out, which meant I got a great deal on it – and Apple’s one-year warranty. Good thing, as it ended up in the service department […]
I recently wrote some short articles on running Internet Explorer (IE) 5.1.7 in OS 7.6.1 (with the help of the Appearance Manager 1.0.4 SDK) and ResEditing OS 7.6.1 to believe it is OS 8.1. That is the way I am doing it myself, but the stuff here could help you, even if you’re running a different […]
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October 2007
Bong! . . . 🙂 . . . Welcome to Macintosh! All Hallows Eve has crept up on us yet again, and for me it means getting my Classic Macs ready for the occasion.
The good news is that Mac OS X 10.5 Leopard seems to be able to run on any Mac with AGP graphics built around a G4 processor – and even on the 2000 Pismo PowerBook (the first PowerBook with AGP graphics) as long as it has a G4 upgrade. The bad news is that the […]
Blame it all on BBC, the British Broadcasting Company. I like BBC’s radio programs, but as my favorite operating system is Mac OS 7.6.1, there has been a problem called Real Player 8 (RP8). Regular OS 7.6.1 lets you use RP5, and the Appearance Manager brings RP6 (a.k.a. G2) in the game, but the BBC Radio […]
2007 – Primate Labs picked up a copy of OS X Leopard and posted the first Geekbench results for the iMac (2.0 GHz Core 2) and Power Mac G5 (single 1.6 GHz) on Saturday. Leopard was tested in both 32-bit and 64-bit modes and compared with OS X 10.4 Tiger, which is strictly a 32-bit operating […]
Mac OS X 10.5 Leopard, released on October 26, 2007, was the biggest change to Mac OS X since Apple first released OS X 10.0 in March 2001. For the first time, a version of OS X was certified as Unix, and the new unified appearance makes Leopard friendlier and less confusing for users. Leopard itself was also […]
2007 – Apple announced the system requirements for Mac OS X 10.5 Leopard last week: a drive that can read the DVD install disc, at least 512 MB of memory, and an 867 MHz G4 or better. Although 700-800 MHz eMacs aren’t officially supported, we have lots of tips on installing Mac OS X 10.5 on unsupported Macs […]
Yesterday (October 22, 2007) Oobject published a list of the 16 worst Apple products ever (since updated to 18) – and we just have to disagree with some of them.
2007 – Apple announced the system requirements for Mac OS X 10.5 Leopard last week: a drive that can read the DVD install disc, at least 512 MB of memory, and an 867 MHz G4 or better – and there’s only on G4 iBook that’s not officially supported. For that one, we have lots of tips […]
In 1993, I was 11 years old. My experience with Macs had amounted to whatever time I could get alone with the Mac Plus sitting in the back of the classroom. I didn’t do much then. Mostly I would just play games like Shufflepuck Café or Where in the World Is Carmen Sandiego? I had no […]
In October 1992, Apple introduced two updated PowerBooks, a new PowerBook Duo series, and the last members of the Macintosh II family. You couldn’t ask for a greater contrast.
2007 – Apple has announced the system requirements for Mac OS X 10.5 Leopard: a drive that can read the DVD install disc, at least 512 MB of memory, and an 867 MHz G4 or better. Several G4 iMacs aren’t officially supported, but we have lots of tips on installing Mac OS X 10.5 on unsupported Macs in […]
2007 – Apple has finally announced the system requirements for Mac OS X 10.5 Leopard: a drive that can read the DVD install disc, at least 512 MB of memory, and an 867 MHz G4 or better.
This is the fourth version of the consumer MacBook – and the first to use the Santa Rosa chipset that made its way into the MacBook Pro line in June. The entry-level MacBook remains at 2.0 GHz, while the faster models see a tiny speed bump from 2.16 GHz to 2.2 GHz. At the same […]
2007 – Apple introduced a new look to the Power Mac G4 in August 2002 with the first Mirrored Drive Doors (MDD) models. They also fully embraced dual processors, as the three models introduced then each had a pair of PowerPC 7455 CPUs. With Mac OS X 10.5 Leopard rumored to require an 867 MHz G4 CPU, […]
2007 – In January 2001, Apple moved the Power Mac to a 133 MHz system bus and adopted AGP 4x for video cards while retaining the look of the original G4 Power Mac. Seven months later, Apple introduced a new look: Quicksilver.
2007 – The earliest G4 Power Macs had a 100 MHz system bus and ATI Rage 128 graphics on a 66 MHz PCI bus or an AGP 2x bus. The following generation of Power Macs adopted a 133 MHz system bus and included AGP 4x graphics. The Digital Audio models were the first Macs to offer […]
2007 – In November 1997, Apple made the leap to the G3, the first PowerPC CPU optimized for the kind of software Macs ran. Less than two years later, Apple abandoned the 300-450 MHz G3 in its Power Mac line when it introduced the first Power Mac G4 models.
The past two weeks have been quite busy with musical rehearsals at church and some design projects – creating postcards, water bottle labels, tickets, and programs for Rishalina and the River, a musical our church’s music and arts director cowrote in 1976.
It was 1995, and I was heading off to college. We had never owned in a computer. In fact, my parents just told me they had bought one.
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September 2007
In recent online discussions (circa August 2004), it is apparent that there is some confusion in some circles regarding the interchangeability of different versions of what Apple calls the “SuperDrive” – the standard 3.5″ floppy drive built into most Macintosh models since just after the original Mac II.
2007: The notebook computer is a sublime invention. I prefer working on notebooks even though mine are mostly used as desktop substitute machines, but road trips make you even more profoundly appreciate the genius of the laptop.
Everyone knows they need to backup their data, but most people don’t do so regularly (if at all). Backups are confusing and annoying. Besides, who has the time? Well, your perspective may change during a post-crash enlightenment: Most people become religious about backups after their first catastrophic loss of data.
The disk directory is the table of contents for your hard drive. Directory errors build up slowly over time – or quickly after a crash. Such errors can cause problems opening or saving files, and if severe enough they can prevent your Mac from starting up, instead displaying the flashing question mark. Fixing the disk […]
I find myself once again in the deserts of the Middle East. I have been here a long time and am almost ready to go home. One of my best friends (other than my wife, who I talk to through emails and Skype) is my Newton. I have both my PowerBook G4 and my black […]
As part of its huge September 2007 iPod event, Apple introduced the first iPod touch, essentially the original iPhone with its phone circuitry removed. Better yet, the iPod touch was a bit smaller, significantly thinner, and also lighter than the iPhone. Best of all, it didn’t tie you to a two-year AT&T wireless plan. You […]
The hard-drive based iPod got a new name in September 2007. Henceforth it would be called the iPod classic. This was the 6th generation of the classic iPod design – and the first with an aluminum front. The iPod classic had dramatically better battery life than the 5.5G iPod it replaced – up to 40 hours […]
In September 2006, Apple completely changed the configuration of the iPod nano, giving it a wider, larger screen so it could display video content. The iPod nano also got a new range of colors. The low-end 4 GB version was available only in silver, and the 8 GB in silver, turquois blue, mint green, and black. There […]
2007 – With all the rumors and speculation about a new subcompact MacBook Pro, which some have even suggested might be called the MacBook Pro Duo (I’m exceedingly doubtful about that), I thought it would be timely to take a retrospective look at the original subcompact Mac notebooks (aside from the PowerBook 100, which was […]
When we think of ethernet today, we think of wired networking with RJ-45 ports and plugs. These connectors look like an oversized phone jack. But that was only one of several competing connectors in the early days of networking.
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August 2007
Bong! . . . 🙂 . . . Welcome to Macintosh! In the first installment of In House with Low End Mac, I interviewed Dan Knight, who founded and runs Low End Mac. Next up to bat is a man whose writing speaks for itself. He has written for Low End Mac since 1999 and […]
It was early 1995, and I was a young graduate student in the Environmental Engineering department at Clemson University. I was finishing up my research and desperately needed a computer to produce my thesis on. There were quite a few Macs at the University, but the trend towards switching to Wintel was already picking up […]
Sometimes your Mac just doesn’t seem as peppy as it used to, particularly if it’s been running for a long time. Memory and disk problems are the most common causes of routine glitches and sluggishness, especially the dreaded “Spinning Pizza of Death” (a.k.a. beachball cursor) that never seems to go away. Sometimes RAM and disk […]
I’m lucky enough to get to check out a fair number of technology gadgets. Most of them turn out to be just that, gadgets. They’re fun for a little while, but not really useful enough for me to care much about. But lately one has managed to insinuate itself into my life. I think it’s […]
Apple’s new aluminum keyboards have received mixed reviews, and some of our readers share their opinions of the new style keyboard. Also the reliability of Dual USB iBooks and adding USB to the Beige Power Mac G3.
Apple gave the iMac a fresher look in August 2007, the first change from the stark white face introduced with the first G5 iMac three years earlier. The new look puts a black border around a glossy display, has an aluminum finish, and is thinner than its predecessors. The 2007 iMac has gone aluminum. The new […]
Apple “refreshed” the Mac mini the same day it unveiled new iMacs, iLife ’08, and iWork ’08. The updated model finally moves the Mini from the outdated Core Duo to a Core 2 Duo processor, giving it 64-bit capabilities along with faster CPU speeds. Between the newer, more efficient CPU and 8-10% higher clock speeds, […]
2007 – For writing at your computer, the ideal tool is word processing software. It lets you play with fonts, type size, boldface and italic – all the tools you need to write a short story, a novel, an essay, a review, whatever. For creating code, the ideal tool is a text editor. It doesn’t […]
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July 2007
I’m sitting in bed using my six-month-old MacBook Pro, and I have to tell you that I used to really love this computer. Used to.
In this modern age of computing, it’s easy to become overwhelmed. There are so many things you can do on a computer that you can easily become lost for focus. I spoke of this very thing in an early Welcome to Macintosh article, The Good Old Days of Computing.
We hate to say it, but it appears that the Mac mini is dead.
Mr. T is famous for his bad man attitude, as seen in Rocky III and The A-Team (which are among my favorite movies and TV shows respectively). However, in his infinite wisdom, Mr. T produced a series of self-help videos in 1984 that were intended to help young kids as well as show his softer […]
This column began as an email exchange with Sonic Purity in relation to Why Does a Mac Die, Why Macs Die, More About Why Macs Die, Why Some Mac Die: Bad Capacitors, and Aging Capacitors and Tin Whiskers. It has been adapted with his permission.
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June 2007
Steve Jobs announced the original iPhone in January 2007, putting an end to years of rumors about Apple combining an iPod and a mobile phone. The iPhone would be a touch-based smartphone without a physical keyboard. And unlike competing touch-based devices, the iPhone was designed to be controlled with a finger and did not need a […]
Cluck-cluck-cluck-cluck . . . Welcome to Apple II!
Every few years some publication decides to have a variation on a top ten computing failure list. Invariably both the Lisa and the Newton make it on that list with many guffaws about the Lisa’s US$10,000 price.
If you only took a quick glance at CPU speed, you might wonder why Apple even bothered to introduced new MacBook Pro models yesterday. Going from 2.16 GHz to 2.2 GHz is a 2% speed gain, and jumping from 2.33 GHz to 2.4 GHz isn’t much better – a gain of 3%. A New […]
The 15″ MacBook Pro became Apple’s first notebook computer with LED backlighting when it was introduced on June 5, 2007. Other than that, the specs don’t seem much different than it’s predecessor. The real changes are under the hood. The Mid 2007 MacBook Pro models (15″ and 17″) use Intel’s new Santa Rosa chipset and […]
Here at Restorations HQ, we really like System 7.5.5. It has the right balance of vintage feel, hardware compatibility, and modern data exchange capabilities. It runs on almost everything* from the Mac Plus to the Power Mac 9500/180MP, a range that includes most of the models we’re interested in – and it’s free.
The June 2007 17″ MacBook Pro is the first Apple notebook to offer an even higher resolution 17″ display. If 1680 x 1050 isn’t enough for you, you can upgrade to a 1920 x 1200 screen for just US$100 more. The big changes are under the hood. The Mid 2007 MacBook Pro models use Intel’s […]
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May 2007
Ever since Apple released the first MacBook one year ago, the company has sold the MacBook with matched pairs of memory, recommended that users only upgrade with matched pairs, and stated that the MacBook has a 2 GB memory ceiling.
Silence is golden, and you haven’t experienced silent computing until you use a laptop computer with no hard drive at all. That’s the promise of flash drives.
Internet Explorer 5.1.7 works in OS 7.6.1!
Let’s face it: High voltages are scary. When someone says “kilovolts”, you usually hear “killovolts”, right? And if you fire off a quick search on the Web, you find dire warnings everywhere that reinforce your natural fears. The warnings are so numerous and frightening, in fact, that it’s easy to believe that a CRT can […]
Yesterday Kirk Edwards asked, “Where are the Mirrored Drive Doors processor upgrades?” I replied that I didn’t know of any – and then did a little investigation.
2007: Has Apple been shortchanging MacBook and MacBook Pro buyers ever since the first Intel ‘Books shipped? That’s what Fred Greaves and Dave Gatley think.
Apple did it again. Like clockwork, they upgraded the MacBook six months after its last update. The Mid 2007 models are a bit faster, have larger hard drives, include 802.11n wireless, and the top models use a faster SuperDrive. Prices remain the same.
Six months after moving the Macbook to Intel’s Core 2 Duo CPU, Apple upgraded the MacBook again. The improved model is faster, has twice as much RAM on the low end, includes a faster SuperDrive (2.16 GHz models), and has bigger hard drives. All MacBooks now include 1 GB of RAM, and speeds have been […]
2007 – During my time as a Mac fan and user, I have accumulated a suite of free applications that all serve a purpose for me. I use the ones that I list here on regular basis, and theyare perfect at performing the jobs they are designed to do.
2007 – Just before the Intel transition began, Apple was having a problem with their notebooks. No, I’m not referring to the lack of a G5-equipped PowerBook, but to the parity that was shared between the consumer and professional models.
We’ve been having quite a discussion about G3 support in Mac OS X 10.5 Leopard in the Low End Mac Mailbag, but I think this exchange merits a bit more attention. Kris Finkenbinder has some important things to say about the need for Apple to continue support of G3 Macs in the next version of the […]
Models G5/1.6-2.0 GHz (2003) . G5/1.8-2.5 GHz (2004) . G5/1.8 Single . G5/2.0-2.7 GHz (2005) . G5/2.0-2.3 GHz Dual . G5/2.5 GHz Quad . Apple made a big shift when it moved from the G4 to the G5 processor. Based on IBM’s POWER architecture, the newer G5 CPU cried out for a fast, wide system […]
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April 2007
2007 – There have been a number of rumours and columns on various Mac websites suggesting that Apple could be preparing to release a “true” replacement for the 12″ PowerBook G4.
With these patches and tips, you’ll never again need to use an unreliable, inconvenient third-party hard disk driver to format a hard drive for your Mac.
2007: When Steve Jobs left Apple in 1985, there were only two Macintosh computers: the original 128K and the 512K “Fat Mac”. When he returned in 1997, there were PowerBooks, Power Macs, and Performas – each model name followed by a four-digit number. Jobs decided to simplify and focus the product line with four quadrants: […]
2007 – This week we’ve asked Low End Mac’s writers to share some of the software tools they use that aren’t as well known as the standard set of Mac apps – Safari, Mail, Photoshop, Microsoft Word, etc. Today Michel Munger tells us why he loves the Thunderbird email client. dk
Sometimes it takes a while to put one and one together to make two. In this case, the iPhone plus Apple TV equals the future of computing.
Welcome to Different Branches. For my first entry, I’m providing an introduction and what to expect from this column in the future.
How do the Intel Core Solo, Core Duo, Core 2, and new quad-core CPUs compare? That’s the question Primate Labs addresses in their latest Geekbench Comparison.
2007 – There’s no feeling like putting your foot down on home soil when returning from a trip abroad. I have the impression that this is what I’m doing by returning to Low End Mac on its 10th anniversary.
2007: One of the more frustrating aspects that still plagues me with computing is the amount of time spent trying to get from A to B before actually getting to the task at hand.
2007: Ten years? Has it been that long? Well, not necessarily for me. Dan Knight, Low End Mac’s publisher, dropped me an email back in 2000 asking if I’d like to contribute to this fine website. Young enough to have the time, I figured why not? A column every two weeks seemed easy enough, and […]
Apple introduced the Mac Pro as a fully customizable quad-core computer in 2006 and updated it to eight cores in April 2007. The buyer could choose as little as 1 GB of RAM or as much as 16 GB. 160, 250, or 500 GB in drive bay one, and optionally 500 GB in bays 2-4. WARNING: If […]
Ever since I can remember, I have loved computers. For the last ten years I’ve loved the Mac OS, but now I seem to have found something better – the Lisa Office System (LOS).
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March 2007
In the world of personal computing, you can never have too much speed, too much RAM, too much drive space, or too many USB ports.
As you all may know, several weeks ago I found the Lisa Emulator (LisaEm) at lisa.sunder.net. After I downloaded it, I installed the ROMs and installed the Lisa Office System (LOS). After I played around with the emulator for a while, I wrote a review of LisaEm. The review contained several screen shots of LisaEm in […]
2007: One of the biggest hassles of the vintage Macintosh hobby is loading software onto your first older Mac. To get that vintage Mac up-and-running, you need to be able to write downloaded software onto disks that an older Mac can read. And that’s what we’ll talk about: Free tools for writing Mac floppy disks […]
I had the great honor of interviewing an important person the other day. His name is Ray Arachelian, and he’s the creator of the Apple Lisa Emulator. Without him, there may have never been a way for anyone without a Lisa to see the LOS in action.
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February 2007
Eight years ago, when I was 11, I came across the Lisa Emulator Project. I had heard about Apple’s Lisa, but I had never had a chance to use the Lisa Office System (LOS). The reason was that the emulator project didn’t have a working Lisa emulator, and neither did anyone else – until now.
In the US, the Apple II was considered the gold standard in the education market. The machine was more expensive than its contemporaries, such as the Commodore 64 and TI-99, but it had a very large software library and was heavily discounted to educators. Its position in the market was augmented by Apple’s Kids Can’t […]
Many of the greatest legends of our time have at one point or another brought their artistic abilities and creative genius back to the forefront of society.
Although After Dark got its start on the Macintosh, this wonderful screen saver also found its way to the Windows side through the help of two equally talented, artistic souls, Bill Stewart and Ian MacDonald. I recently interviewed Bill Stewart.
2007 – Steve Jobs spoke to the world last Tuesday about his outlook on digital music and what, if any, continued role DRM would have in the marketplace of digital music. While carefully worded – indeed no talk of DRM as it relates to video was broached – the written statement linked from the Apple […]
It’s nothing short of spectacular to interview the legends behind an artistic creation. Just to know through every freeze frame that came to their minds, every idea that became born of creativity beyond wildest imaginations, the magic, the bewilderment, the stories behind the culmination of it all – it gives you a feeling of awe […]
Ever bought a piece of software back in the day that made you go Wow!? Not being able to wait to open it? Just sensing true greatness lying within the box? Something on that disk you knew without a doubt you’d never forget?
Tommy Thomas managed to snag interviews with three of the men behind the After Dark screen saver.
It isn’t easy being green, but one California legislator wants to make it the law. Lloyd Levine thinks traditional incandescent light bulbs and CRTs are bad for the environment and should be outlawed in California. Levine, who on Tuesday announced the “How Many Legislators Does it Take to Change a Light Bulb Act” that would ban incandescent […]
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January 2007
2007 – “What’s happened to Low End Mac lately?” It’s a question I hear from readers and staff members. “What’s with the spate of pro-Windows articles? Why do you let your writers advocate for Windows?”
There are many different illustration programs for Mac OS X, including both high- and low-end choices. Freeverse launched Lineform last year, a powerful illustration tool with a simple user interface that bears a familiar resemblance to both Apple’s and Omni Group’s applications, meaning there is little to learn.
2007 – The unveiling of the iPhone blew me away, as it did most people in the technology community. The device had been rumored for months, with all kinds of patents filed that had everyone guessing what features such a device might contain.
Love him or hate him, Steve Jobs will always be Apple. A visionary? A marketing genius? A control freak? What will happen to Apple in the future without him? Whether you read the countless books or watch the numerous films on the early days of Apple, they all point to Steve Wozniak being the technical […]
