Wednesday, January 12, 2005
iPod Shuffle
Flash-Based iPod Shuffle Debuts
The digital music player is Apple's first to use flash memory to store files on instead of a hard drive, and starts at US$99.
iPod Shuffle Sparks Stampede
Steve Jobs' Macworld keynote speech — and a lack of Wi-Fi — set off a rush among iPod fans to see who can get to the nearby Apple Store before the newfangled devices sell out.
iPod Shuffle: Even More Like The Original Sony Walkman
iPod Shuffle — Great Software Makes It Possible
How can Apple get away with a Flash music player that doesn't even have an LCD screen? The answer: iTunes.
Apple iPod Shuffle Poised To Sideswipe Portable Music Market
The disadvantage of flash memory has traditionally been the cost, but Apple has chosen an impressive and surprising strategy of undercutting the competition on price.
Mac Mini
Apple Introduces Mac Mini
Measuring 6.5 inches wide and long and 2 inches tall, Mac mini weighs 2.9 pounds. The Mac mini starts at US$499, the lowest-priced computer Apple has sold.
A Mac For The Masses
Cheap, small and beautiful: The Mac Mini that premiered this week at Macworld is a computer for the cost-conscious techno-aesthete.
Don't Mention The C-Word
The Mac mini has all the Cube's virtues — it's small, quiet and stylish — without the sticker shock.
Changing Course, Apple Offers Low-Priced Mac For The Home
While computers have long been sold as machines that can turn a home into an office, most Americans now use them in their bedrooms and kitchens as e-mail terminals; as hubs for playing music, storing and editing photos; and as stations for navigating the Web. The new Mac Mini is aimed squared at the needs of this new digital household.
Mac Mini Demand Downs Apple's Store Briefly
Minutes after Apple announced its $499 mini Macintosh, the company's Web store was inaccessible to some visitors and slowed to a crawl for others.
Mac mini: Flat Cube, Or Honey! I Shrunk The Power Mac!
The Mac mini essentially cuts the lungs out of the PC world's (and many columnists') argument about Macs costing too much.
Apple Lowers Pricing Floor With 'Mini' Mac
Apple plans to release two models of a low-priced, bring-your-own-display Mac mini later this month. The Mac mini is priced between $499 and $599 and is scheduled to hit stores Jan. 22.
New Apple Mini Looks Good On Paper
I have to wonder exactly how the new computer will handle the number one problem with today's high performance computers: heat dissipation... [But] the machine in every other sense is close to perfect.
iWork '05
iWork '05 Contains Keynote 2, Pages
Designated as the successor to AppleWorks, iWork features Keynote 2 and the new word processing application Pages and integrates, via a media browser, with the iLife suite.
iWork Or Not, Microsoft Will Continue With Mac Office
As Apple introduced its own productivity software Tuesday, Microsoft reiterated its commitment to the Mac market and said sales of its Mac Office package are growing.
iWork: I, PageMaker?
If there's one application that Page seems primed to take out, it's a basic page-layout program along the lines of PageMaker.
iLife '05
Apple Brings Out iLife '05
iTunes 4.7.1 come swith a single addition — the AutoFill option — but the other applications offer a slate of new features.
iPhoto 5
The most exciting feature of iPhoto 5 has to be hierachical folders!
Macworld
Apple Crashing The Party
Proving that demo crashes / problems are not just a Microsoft-thang, Jobs crashed during his demo today at Macworld.
Made For iPod: The Safety Badge We've Hoped For?
Apple today introduced the "Made for iPod" certification, a badge that iPod accessory developers can display to differentiate their Apple-authorized accessory products from unauthorized ones.
Apple Centers Spotlight On Desktop Search
Not to msis the search beat reverberating throughout the PC market, Apple Computer chief Steve Jobs touted the company's innovations in desktop search coming with its next Mac OS X upgrade.
Steve Jobs' Expo Keynote Now Available In QuickTime
Final Cut Express HD Announced At MWSF
Apple And Mercedes-Benz Unveil iPod Integration Kit
Apple Releases iTunes, iPod Software Updates
The new version of iTunes includes support for the new iPod shuffle and other performance improvements.
MSN Messenger, Tiger Support From Microsoft
Microsoft has been working closely with Apple to ensure compatibility with technologies that will be released in the next version of Mac OS X.
Bare Bones Software Ships TextWrangler 2.0
Version 2.0 introduces syntax coloring and function navigation for eight new languages, plus a rich assortment of feature additions and improvements. And it's free.
News
Marthon Freeware Reelased
Mac users should note, however, that the titles won't run natively under OS X.
Opinion
Apple's Down-Market Gamble
By launching a much cheaper Mac and iPod, Steve Jobs is appealing to hordes of price-conscious consumers. The risk: Cannibalization.
The Age Of Egocasting
TiVos and iPods will never destroy us. But our romance with technologies of personalization has partially fulfilled Krutch's prediction. We haven't become more like machines. We've made the machines more like us. In the process we are encouraging the flourishing of some of our less attractive human tendencies: for passive spectacle; for constant, escapist fantasy; for excesses of consumption.
Macintosh: It's A Madison Avenue Thing
Mac people seem to want you to go into advertising. PC people don't give nearly as much career guidance.
Review
Sidetrack
Random Thoughts On Apple's New Stuff
I would like an upgrade to Appleworks... Unfortunately, the major part of what I use Appleworks is the spreadsheet module, which is not in iWork '05. Well... maybe next year.
I wonder if Tiger will include iLife '05. I can definitely wait, as the new features are really not that impressive to me, and I'm definitely going to get Tiger anyway.
If the Mac mini is really aimed for the switchers, maybe Apple should include a "keyboard switcher" application in Mac mini that will switch Windows-based keyboards to Mac-based keyboards.
Gizmodo has a simple 1-2-3 guide to hacking your iPod into an iPod shuffle.
:-)
