Low End Mac Editorial Archive

October 2004

Low End Designer survey results and feedback, Jason Walsh, The Low End Designer, 10.29. Results of the Low End Designer Survey and feedback from our readers.
New G4 CPU PowerBook bound?, $50 'Book repairs, AppleCare musings, Seagate pocket hard drive, and more, Charles W Moore, The 'Book Review, 10.29. Also Sky Captain and G5s, burning hot 'Books, SystemLoad freeware, Rollei MiniDigi, Dell 17-inch Inspiron, bargain 'Books from $179 to $2,588, and more.
iPod photo and U2 iPod: Is Apple resting on its laurels?, Adam Robert Guha, Apple Archive, 10.29. Do the new iPods really offer anything important for the extra price, or is Apple simply assuming anything with the iPod brand will sell well?
Hopeless iMac, cause of iBook board failures, legacy Macs and OS X, info managers, and more, Charles Moore, Miscellaneous Ramblings, 10.27. Toyviewer redux, AirPort Express incompatibility, FireWire enclosures, legacy Microsoft apps under OS X, why Linux, and more.
iBook updates, 100 GB upgrade, wireless mice, portable power source, PB battery source, and more, Charles Moore, The 'Book Review, 10.22. Also the Notebook ChillHub, Metacorder, TunePower and TuneBase for iPod, NEC's fuel cell laptop, bargain 'Books from $340 to $1,895, and more.
Firefox, a better browser for OS X and Windows, Adam Robert Guha, Apple Archive, 10.22. Firefox is fast, compatible, more secure than Internet Explorer on Windows, and prettier than Safari.
The October 2004 iBook and Power Mac value equation, Dan Knight, Mac Musings, 10.20. Faster iBooks and a single processor Power Mac G5. How does the value compare with the rest of the line?
Text and Typography: Leading, kerning, tracking, and justification, Jason Walsh, The Low End Designer, 10.20. How line spacing, kerning, tracking, and justification impact the appearance and fit of text on the page.
October one of Apple's favorite months for new products: What next?, Dan Knight, Mac Musings, 10.18. Apple has new product almost every October, but will it be a color 60 GB iPod, a flat-panel eMac, an Apple-branded PDA, a digital video recorder, or something else?
ImageJ: Advanced image editing at a low-end price (free), Charles W Moore, Miscellaneous Ramblings, 10.18. Free image editing tool good for working with bitmap images.
October 1990: Apple unveils the first low-end Macs, Dan Knight, Mac Musings, 10.15. Fourteen years ago, Apple introduced the first sub-$4,000 Mac II, first sub-$2,500 color Mac, and first sub-$1,000 all-in-one Mac.
Dual core 'Books; cooler, quieter laptop drives; beverage spills; iMac G5 for almost all; and more, Charles Moore, The 'Book Review, 10.15. Also a lighter car/air power adapter, new USB Bluetooth adapter, 17" PowerBook touchscreen, Griffin's PodPod, Sharp's ultralight, bargain 'Books from $100 to $1,699, and more.
Image previews, one more place where Windows trumps Macs, Adam Robert Guha, Apple Archive, 10.15. Windows may have more viruses, spyware, and crashes, but it also does some things better than Macs. Image preview is one of them.
Virtual PC 7 puts a (sluggish) Windows PC on your Mac, Alan Zisman, Mac2Windows, 10.11. If you're already running Virtual PC on your Mac, there may not be enough new and improved features to justify the cost of this upgrade.
Modem Magic, AirPort, Base Station repair, ToyViewer vs. GraphicConverter, and why Linux, Charles Moore, Miscellaneous Ramblings, 10.11. MacaRa Modem Magic kudos and questions, the ColorIt! OS X beta, ToyViewer speed, PowerBook 5300 troubleshooting, repairing an AirPort base station, extending WiFi with AirPort Express, and how Linux differs from OS X.
Highest capacity TiBook battery, digital TV comes to PowerBooks, tri-band PC Card, and more, Charles Moore, The 'Book Review, 10.08. Also WiebeTech's new TrayBox, iCover2 'Book covers, IBM's biometric ThinkPad, and bargain 'Books from $150 to $2,588.
Adware, spyware, and security updates: Isn't it fun, Adam Robert Guha, Apple Archive, 10.08. Windows users have it bad, but Mac users aren't completely safe from privacy-prying on the Internet.
Text and typography: Serifs and dashes, Jason Walsh, The Low End Designer, 10.08. For designers, typography is the crucial art of choosing and arranging text on the page to create a readable, attractive display.
AirPort Express: more versatile than your average access point, Alan Zisman, Low End Mac Reviews, 10.06. AirPort Express is much more than just another wireless access point.
ToyViewer, a cool free graphics tool for OS X, Charles W Moore, Miscellaneous Ramblings, 10.04. "...ToyViewer has won me over, and it's now one of the applications that I keep running all the time, even when I'm using Photoshop Elements or Color It!"
15" AlBook display repair extension, PowerBook G3 backup battery, 100 GB notebook drive, Kill-a-Watt, and more, Charles W Moore, The 'Book Review, 10.01. Also new PBFixIt guides, dual-core G4s, $17 USB 2.0 drive enclosure, spinach power, bargain 'Books from $488 to $1,880, and more.
Laptop keyboards fragile, hard to clean, prone to fail, Adam Robert Guha, Apple Archive, 10.01. Laptop keyboard use smaller, more fragile parts than desktop keyboards. They can also be much harder to keep clean.
Kill Bill: Twelve alternatives to Microsoft Word, Jason Walsh, The Low End Designer, 10.01. A dozen low-cost, no-cost, and specialized alternatives to Microsoft Word for Mac users.