Since the dawn of Mac OS X, there have been major and minor versions. That is, versions that introduced major features and those that focus mainly on speed improvements and streamlining, bringing only small new features or additions.
2012 – Without change, there’s no indication time is passing. The sun rises and sets. The moon changes it phases. Flowers open and close. Some degree of change is inevitable. And some changes we don’t like.
This is a very simple and easy-to-build project that provides a sensor on the pedal crank of any exercise bike and generates keyboard output triggering Google Maps Street View to advance via the up arrow key.
On June 23, 2003, Apple introduced the first Power Mac G5, which represented some big changes from the G4. The Power Mac G5 was the first Power Mac with built-in USB 2.0, the first to use PCI-X expansion slots, and the first with onboard support for SATA drives. It was also the first Mac to […]
Back in February, my first generation 13″ MacBook Pro died of logic board failure, and I was forced to sell it due to the fact that I was starting dual credit courses at my local community college and needed a small, cheap, lightweight laptop that could follow me around and take a beating. I was […]
2012 – The proverbial bell is tolling louder for Mac OS X 10.4 Tiger and PowerPC Macs.
Sometimes the math geek – which can always be a bit anal about numbers and how they’re presented – wonders why a particular headline isn’t a bit better. For instance, Cult of Mac published The SSD in the New MacBook Air Is 217% Faster than Before on Tuesday, which makes it sound like SSD performance in the Mid 2012 MacBook […]
2012 – According to Horace Dediu in The Evolution of the Computing Value Chain, Microsoft has had the dominant operating system almost since that day in 1981 when the first IBM PC shipped with PC-DOS, Big Blue’s version of MS-DOS. From DOS through Windows, Microsoft has held the top spot – until now.
2012 – When it comes to competing with Apple, Microsoft and Google are between a rock and a hard place.
What does thermal compound do, and why should you be concerned about it? Call me simple, but I had no idea what thermal compound was until about a year ago when I decided to upgrade the factory-installed RAM on my iMac G4. Apparently there is a two-part heatsink in the good ol’ Luxo Mac that […]
After reading Thunderbolt vs. USB, HDMI, PCIe Cable: How Does It Compare? on Cnet, it looks like we’re going to have yet another port war in the PC world.
Here at Low End Mac, we not only use older Macs, but also older iDevices. Released in 2009, the iPhone 3GS is now Apple’s low-end phone.
2012 – Yesterday Apple overhauled its entire notebook line, and perhaps the biggest surprise was the 15″ MacBook Pro with Retina Display (quite the name!).
Yesterday Apple overhauled its entire notebook line, moving everything to Ivy Bridge CPUs with Intel HD Graphics 4000 and USB 3. Ivy Bridge means a bit more processing power and improved energy consumption. HD 4000 graphics has one-third more cores than 3000 (16 vs. 12), and Apple is claiming up to 60% improvement there.
Yesterday Apple overhauled its entire notebook line, moving everything to Ivy Bridge CPUs with Intel HD Graphics 4000 and USB 3. Ivy Bridge means a bit more processing power and improved energy consumption. HD 4000 graphics has one-third more cores than 3000 (16 vs. 12), and Apple is claiming up to 60% improvement there.
For the first time, Apple has Macs with built-in USB 3.0 support. The improved USB specification is over 10x as fast as USB 2.0 and has half the bandwidth of Thunderbolt. There are already a lot of USB 3.0 drives on the market, and they are far more affordable than Thunderbolt drives. Best of all, […]
For the first time, Apple has Macs with built-in USB 3.0 support. The improved USB specification is over 10x as fast as USB 2.0 and has half the bandwidth of Thunderbolt. There are already a lot of USB 3.0 drives on the market, and they are far more affordable than Thunderbolt drives. Best of all, […]
This was the last of the 13″ MacBook Pro models with a 1280 x 800 pixel display. After this, Apple only made 13″ models with Retina Displays. This model was on the market from June 2012 until it was discontinued in October 2016, by which time its base price had dropped to $1,099. That is […]
Apple surprised everyone by not introducing a 15″ MacBook Air, as the rumor mill widely expected, and instead added a premium version of the 15″ MacBook Pro – one with a super-high resolution 2880 x 1800 pixel 220 ppi Retina Display. The MacBook Pro with Retina Display (quite a mouthful) is the thinnest MacBook Pro […]
For the first time, Macs have built-in USB 3.0 support. The improved USB specification is over 10x as fast as USB 2.0 and has half the bandwidth of Thunderbolt. There are a lot of USB 3.0 drives on the market, and they are far more affordable than Thunderbolt drives. Best of all, Apple uses the […]
3D isn’t just for Hollywood blockbusters – at least that’s what Apple is hoping for with its next revision of the iPhone. The 3D Movie Craze of the 1950s 3D movies were not invented in the 1950s, but that was the era when they first became a cultural force. 3D movies exploded onto the scene […]
Swap space. Swap files. Page files. Virtual memory. It’s all pretty much the same thing: Extending your computer’s physical system memory (RAM) by swapping data to and from your hard drive or SSD.
There’s just something about a ThinkPad. Whether it’s the solid build quality that gets you or the strange charm of that boring black case, the ThinkPad line manages to capture that feeling of portable, professional power like none other (well, unless you’re from our sister site, Low End Mac, where the PowerBook G3 Pismo reigns […]
Steve Jobs unveils the iMac on May 6, 1998. There is so much to say about the original iMac: Not only is it iconic in the Apple world, but in the whole computing world. Apple was really struggling prior to the launch of the iMac, on the brink of going under.
Macs tend to be very reliable and make great servers, and now that Apple is phasing out OS X Server, we need to look at alternatives. For serving websites and web development, Macs can run Apache web server, MySQL database engine, along with PHP, Perl, and Python – thus the acronym MAMP for Mac, Apache, […]
For low-end Mac users, you can pick up older Macs for a lot less than a new one, and if you are looking for something very old, you might even be lucky enough to snag a free Mac.
After the Flashback malware made a mockery of Mac security, Eugene Kaspersky said of Apple and Mac OS X, “I think they are ten years behind Microsoft in terms of security.”
I am a low-end user mainly due to financial constraints, and therefore I am always on the look out for inexpensive accessories and cables. One of my favourite haunts is my local Poundland. People in the UK know what this is, a chain of stores where every item is £1. I am sure folks in […]
On May 1, 2001, Apple toned down its consumer portable range from the marvelous colourful and oversized Clamshell iBook to the sleek white “IceBook” (more officially called the “Dual USB iBook”). In 2009, I took a break from the Mac world, sold my Titanium PowerBook G4, and moved to Linux. Shortly after coming to my […]
Apple laptops have always run on the hot side, especially compared to Windows machines. but does adding more RAM add to the problem?
Prior to OS X, Apple had a rock solid operating system that was fast and stable, but by the time Mac OS 9 was released in 1999, it was looking very dull and dated, especially compared to what Microsoft was offering in the shape of Windows NT 4 (released July 1996), Windows 98 (released June 1998), and […]
As much as I love getting the most out of older Apple machines and devices and being a low-end user, sometimes I just want to be up there running the latest software and operating systems.
The next piece of Apple equipment to upgrade is my phone, but will that be an iPhone 3GS?
Ask what is the first thing in a computer to fail – especially in Macs – and the most likely answer you will hear is the optical drive. I have had countless internal optical drives fail or become so unreliable that they are practically useless, and this seems even more common in laptops (or machines […]
A big reason for Windows users to consider a move to Mac has been the virtual nonexistence of Mac malware. Computerworld reported the existence of a million different computer viruses at the end of 2008 – but that’s been almost entirely an issue for Windows users.