2000: One of the things I used to love about my Mac Plus back in the old days is that I could put a stripped-down version of System 6 and a text editor on a floppy disk, boot the machine from that, and work in blessed silence with the (external) hard drive shut down, disturbed […]
Category Archives: Miscellaneous Ramblings
2000: The Mac Observer’s Michael Munger has written another interesting and provocative piece entitled The Deplorable State of Mac Software, in which he argues that “the condition of Mac software is as pathetic as it could be.”
2000: The Pew Internet & American Life Project has released results of its Internet Tracking Report on MP3 music traffic.
2000: The innovative, leaning joystick-shaped, Animax Dr. Mouse/Anir Mouse from Norway is a simple idea: a pistol-grip on top of a conventional, albeit flattened, mouse base, with a thumb-button for clicking.
2000: Last week’s article about cheap Power Macs for G3 and G4 upgrading was the most popular Miscellaneous Ramblings article that Low End Mac has published, beating out my previous champ – a piece on the economics of processor upgrades. Apparently, upgrades are a popular topic. They also generate a lot of reader feedback: From […]
2000: Dan Knight tells me that my column last week about cheap Power Macs for G3 and G4 upgrading was the most popular Miscellaneous Ramblings article that Low End Mac has published, beating out my previous champ – a piece on the economics of processor upgrades. Apparently, upgrades are a popular topic. Thanks for reading.
2000: How would you like a Power Mac G3 for less than $500? Or perhaps a G4 Power Mac for less than $750? Both deals are currently available from Web sources with a little mixing and matching.
2000: I received a ton of mail in response to the tragic Power Mac 9500 saga posted last week. The letters were so good that Dan Knight suggested we publish them, so here they are with some replies from me where appropriate.
2000: This is a story with a sad ending, and I’m not sure that it has any moral, but you may find it interesting. Our tale begins when my son was given the carcass of a Power Mac 9500 – the six-slot minitower that was Apple’s flagship desktop model back in 1996.
2000: Project AppleSeed is one website you really must check out. A team at the UCLA Department of Physics and Astronomy has established that a cluster of four Blue & White Power Mac G3s now has the same computational power (and twice the memory) as one of the best supercomputers of eight years ago, a […]
2000: In Bryan Chaffin’s latest The Back Page column on The Mac Observer, he argues that Apple was brilliant for showing Mac OS X’s new “lickable” Aqua user interface now, and he sharply chides the foot-draggers (your humble servant included) who have expressed misgivings about the GUI course that Apple has chosen to follow in […]
An all too common annoyance to users of computers with Active Matrix Thin Film Transistor (TFT) Liquid Crystal Display (LCD) screens is the dreaded “dead pixel” phenomenon.
2000: Rolleiflex, a name from photography’s golden era, embraces the digital camera revolution
2000: Last fall I predicted that used PowerBook prices would fall significantly once the iBook began shipping in quantity. I was inspired to revisit the topic by a note last week from reader Jeff Danick, who reports that his father just got a sweetheart deal on a Lombard 333 demo from a local dealer.
2000: Last week a reader named Mike Donahue asked if I would do an in-depth investigation into Apple’s CPU processor plans. I don’t know about in-depth – I don’t think I’m qualified – but this is a topic that I’m concerned about as well, so here is an overview at least. Others have been writing […]
2000: What Judge Thomas Penfield Jackson eventually decides regarding Microsoft’s fate in the U.S. government’s antitrust action against the software colossus may not be the biggest problem on Bill Gates and Steve Ballmer’s plates.
2000: With the proper wired infrastructure in place, there is no reason why e-businesses can’t operate virtually anywhere in the world. My own experience is a case in point. I live in an unlikely spot – the Eastern Shore of Nova Scotia, Canada, which is the extreme boonies even in a rural Nova Scotian context. […]
2000: Apple Computer has revamped and enhanced it’s AppleCare Protection Plan extended warranty, which now provides two extra years of service and support for your Mac at a flat rate price, including telephone support, bundled third-party diagnostic tools, Apple-certified repairs, and 24-hour-a-day Internet support. But are extended warranties like AppleCare worth what they cost?
2000: Last week Newer Technology announced its new iMAXpowr G3 466 processor upgrade for Revision A through D iMac computers. Reportedly, a similar upgrade product is on the way for PowerBook G3 Series computers as well.
2000 – In my Backup Basics article published this past November, I mentioned the imminent revival of Redux, a personal backup system for Macintosh computers.
2000: A New York Times article last week by Lisa Guernsey reported on new research from Cornell University that reinforces critics’ claim that the little hockey-puck shaped Apple USB mouse is just too small for comfort.
2000: As it approaches its first birthday, I am sorry to report that my PowerBook G3 Series 233’s 2 GB hard drive is beginning to get noisier, not as bad yet as my son’s identical machine became before it was stolen three days before Christmas, but it’s not the whisperingly quiet ‘Book it originally was […]
1999: Dan Knight has already weighed in on this issue with The Next PowerBooks. I guess great minds think alike. I enjoyed reading Dan’s article, and I agree with most of what he said, finding his speculation about a possible thin and compact “MyBook” Apple portable (personally, I prefer the name “eBook” – for “executive” […]
1999: A topic of enduring fascination for me is trying to analyze why people form polarized opinions and affinities about things. Why are some people liberals and others conservative? Why do some people like Chevies and others prefer Fords? Why do some like the toilet paper to unroll from the top while others adamantly insist […]
MacUnderground has announced that its new Mac USB Wireless Keyboard and USB/ADB Wireless Mice will be available after Dec. 15, 1999 and may be pre-ordered now from the MacUnderground.
1999 – I don’t back up my files nearly often enough. Theoretically, one should do it at least once a week. I do well to get to it once a month. It’s just a matter of the squeaky wheel getting the grease, and there always seems to be something more urgent to do than hooking […]
1999: This week Apple released the final version of its Mac OS 9 compatible version of MacsBug app, version 6.6. MacsBug also finally has its own, dedicated web page on the Apple Website, where you can go to get information on or download the latest MacsBug version.
1999: Adobe Type Reunion and Apple’s Font Manager turn out to be the culprits.
1999: This week, Britannica.com Inc. announced that the entire 32-volume Encyclopedia Britannica, which sells for $1,250 in its traditional book form, will now be available on the Internet free of charge.
1999: A couple of years ago, Time magazine was in the vanguard of mainstream media publications predicting Apple’s imminent demise. This week (Oct 18 issue) Steve Jobs is on the cover of Time, which features a spread of four Jobs/Apple related stories.
