Crasymaker

Thanks for all the advice. I did not use the financing they offer. Good advice, ya’ll.

We were kinda in a bind for getting a computer as soon as possible so we quickly decided on one of the new iMacs. The choices were pretty simple. We couldn’t get a laptop for two reasons: 1) We already have a Powerbook and 2) We could only afford a MacBook and I’m tech-spoiled and won’t take anything but a MacBook Pro. That leaves us only two choices. Either we get a Mac mini or an iMac (the Mac Pro is to die for but it’s like a million dollars). Once you beef up the Mac mini, it’s about the same price as the baseline iMac so the choice was fairly easy.

Our local Apple retailer was out of iMacs and there was even a waiting list so I drove to the Tulsa Apple Store where there were Macs-a-plenty. There’s a nifty camera built into this thing so I held up a mirror for you. So far, so awesome.

We’re back from Miami and the honeymoon was great. Mostly it was filled with tons of forced relaxation which I didn’t even realize how much I needed. I feel pretty good. Overall, the wedding was a tremendous success, thanks to my wife (that’s the first time I’ve used that word either typed, written or spoken) and all my wonderful friends/family.

What I am not excited about is the fact that I need a new computer…pronto. I have been pretty spoiled over the last few years. The company I used to work for provided me with computers (good ones) and before that, my Dad bought me a Powerbook (good one). When I left my last job, I turned in my computer and since then I have pieced together (literally) a bunch of parts and have been hobbling along with this awful feeling of knowing that the junkheap in my room will soon give out.

And last night it did. So the money that Sarah and I were so excited to put towards our new bathroom and ChillZone (different story) shall now go to straight into the hands of the nearest Apple Store…unless someone can convince me to finance it using the little “Or as low as $29/month!” option underneath the price on their website.

So here’s my question: Have any of you ever done that and how did it work out? Was it worth it? Seth? Tim? Anyone? Thanks.

Well, we knew it was coming but I don’t think anyone expected it to be this cool. The iPhone arrived this morning and as a result, Apple’s stock has already risen 7% in just a few hours.

I’ve only given the site a quick once-over but I cannot believe how groundbreaking this new device is. There isn’t a single phone on the marked that even begins to compare to the iPhone and I wish like hell that I owned some Apple stock when the rest of the world takes notice.

I would highly suggest heading over to the iPhone page and taking a few minutes to see how your new phone works because there are just way too many cool features for me to list. I’m still trying to wrap my head around a few of them.

It will set you back $499 (4GB) and $599 (8GB) which may sound steep but then again, you’re getting 1) the most advanced cell phone on the market, 2) a wide-screen iPod which also happens to be the most advanced MP3 player on the market and 3) a Wi-Fi/EDGE/Bluetooth device that not only features true internet browsing (not some dumbed-down cell phone browser) but will also handle all of your e-mail.

The catch? It’s only available through Cingular. Good thing I switched from Sprint a couple of years ago…

In case you missed all the Apple excitement today or you’re just plain confused about all the new announcements, I figured I’d take a few minutes to fill ya’ll in (show you how much time I had on my hands tonight) on some of the latest buzz.

There weren’t any major changes to the regular iPod but it did get a few enhancements and the prices were lowered by 50 bucks. New features include a 60% brighter display and a 75% longer battery life. They now play really cool games, sport a new search feature, include new headphones and for the first time in digital music player history, they support gapless playback which should resolve that annoying gap of silence between “The Great Gig in the Sky” and “Money” when listening to Pink Floyd’s “Dark Side of the Moon”. Of course, it still supports video playback and can store and display your entire iPhoto collection (unless you’re a photo freak and have more than 25,000 photos). Prices are $249 (30GB) and $349 (80GB).

The new iPod nano is now made of aluminum and comes in 5 cool colors. Like it’s older brother, it also received more storage, a brighter screen, longer battery life (24 hrs), the search feature, new headphones and gapless playback. Plus, Apple somehow managed to make it even thinner which, if you’re ever seen one in person, you’ll know is quite extraordinary. Still no video playback for the iPod nano (you’d need very little eyes to watch if it did) but it does hold up to 25,000 photos. Prices are $149 (2GB, silver), $199 (4GB, 4 colors) and $249 (8GB, black).

The iPod shuffle got a complete redesign. It’s now less than half the size as before making it the world’s smallest MP3 player. It’s got an aluminum case with a built-in clip making it more durable and wearable than ever along with 1GB of storage, a dock and of course, new headphones. What else? It’s only $79.

For more information or if you happen to be in the mood to drool all over your keyboard, head over to Apple.com and start making your Christmas wish list.

You may or may not know about tomorrow’s highly anticipated Apple press event but it sure has got the rumors stirring like crazy.

Basically, if you’re not aware of it, there are a few possible announcements coming tomorrow morning which if the rumors hold up, will certainly have all the internets a buzzin’.

The biggest and most probable is the iTunes Movie Store which some think will offer $9.99 movie downloads. If this happens, I wouldn’t be surprised to see it combined with the iTunes Music Store (which already offers TV shows) under a new name.

If the movie store is announced, it would be a prime opportunity to unveil an updated iPod, possibly a completely new widescreen version but probably just one with a larger hard drive for holding all that movie goodness.

There are plenty of other rumors but the one I’d be most excited about is a new Airport Express that handles video instead of just audio. That would rule because then you could play all those movies and tv shows you’ve downloaded on your TV without the need for any wires.

I know a few people whose iPods are seriously outdated and are anxiously awaiting a new version before upgrading. Maybe tomorrow your wait will be over?

Cory Doctorow’s latest article for Information Week is filled with excellent points about how the iTunes Music Store is changing (in his opinion, in a bad way) the music business. You might be interested in reading it if you’ve been following any of my posts about the iTMS.

I’ve gone on and on about how people don’t understand that all you have to do to get iTMS songs onto another music player is to burn them to a CD and then re-import them. Cory doesn’t see this as a good solution, though, because he says that you have to re-enter all that metadata like song title, album title and artist.

I almost wrote a post about how this isn’t true because every time I re-import songs that I’ve bought from the iTMS, all of the metadata comes in with it. However, I only buy full albums whereas most people buy individual songs, and iTunes can recognize a full album but not a CD with all sorts of random songs on it so Cory is actually right. If you’ve bought a ton of songs from the iTMS and you decided to switch to a different music player other than an iPod, it would definitely be a tedious process to re-import and re-enter all of that metadata.

But in my opinion, the point still stands that if you don’t want to run the risk of not being able to quickly transfer your songs onto a non-Apple iPod, then maybe you shouldn’t be buying music from a store that only sells songs that play on an Apple iPod.

Have you ever bought polaroid film? If so, did you get upset because it didn’t fit into a 35mm Kodak camera?

How about this one: If you had a Schick Mach III razor and you used all of the blades up, would you consider purchasing a pack of Gillette Fusion blades and crossing your fingers in hopes that they would fit even though they’re Gillettes and not Schicks?

Finally, let’s say you are a Cingular customer and you want a cool new ringtone for your Cingular phone. Would you entertain the idea of heading over to the Sprint website and trying to download one of their songs to your phone even though you’re not a Sprint customer?

I would be very surprised if any of you answered “yes” to any one of these questions. Therefore I can’t understand why people are so pissed off over the fact that songs purchased from the iTunes Music Store cannot be played on a non-iPod music player, especially since it isn’t even entirely true.

The iTunes Music Store is specifically designed to give iPod owners a way to easily purchase, download and play music on their iPods. ON THEIR iPODS! Not on their Creative Zen nano players. Not on their Phillips portable MP3 players. Not on their SanDisk digital audio players and certainly not on their Oregon Scientific 256MB MP120 Waterproof MP3 Player with up to 8 hours of playback time players.

These kinds of walled gardens have been around for years. Whether they are good practice or not is another discussion but whether they work or not and whether or not we have been used to them for a long time is a completely ridiculous argument.

Besides, there are plenty of possible reasons behind this kind of restriction. It is fairly common knowledge (or should be) that the record labels have a big hand in defining the terms of the DRM that is attached to music purchased on online music stores.

The fact that Apple offers a convenient way of purchasing music for their iPods is a luxury that we should not take for granted. But then again, so is the fact that you can burn that music to a CD and then re-import it which completely strips the song of all DRM (enabling you to put it on any MP3 player you want).

But most of us are too busy complaining to figure that one out…

Apple has released six new ads for the Mac. For a while now, they’ve concentrated solely on the iPod and iTunes but the new ads focus on things like ease of use, invulnerability to viruses and not having to restart all the time. They’re really funny but since they’re poking fun at PCs, I imagine there will be quite a bit of backlash.

Ironically, as I was watching the one about not having to restart all the time, my Powerbook locked up for the first time since November of last year. I figured out a few minutes later that it wasn’t actually locked up but that my mouse had wiggled its way out of the port but still, I had a good laugh this morning.

Watch the new ads here.

My first inclination was to buy Tiger on the first day since I’d been counting down the days until it was released. Then some of my friends convinced me to wait until the first update which is what most conservative computer people always recommend doing when a new OS version comes out. This is mainly because you never know what little bugs might get in your way and waiting for an update ensures that most of those bugs are taken care of.

However, it’s 2005 and Apple has come a long way in the last few years when it comes to getting things right the first time (yes I know I complained about GarageBand 2 recently but it turns out that the problem was me and not the software) and I’d been reading about the bugs that others have found in Tiger so far and they have been pretty damn minor. So instead of eating lunch at home yesterday, I made a impulsive left turn out of the office parking lot and headed straight to our janked-out version of an Apple store and purchased my copy of Tiger. Hell yes. It’s nice to know I still have it in me to be a little risky. With this new job and all, sometimes I feel like a real adult.

Anyway, I installed the software and not a single one of those “bugs” that people have been mentioning are present on my Powerbook. As a matter of fact, I’ve been playing with it non-stop and I haven’t come across any issues at all. Just totally badassness. Going into all the details about what’s new is pointless. If you are at all interested in Tiger, you already know what I’m talking about. I won’t waste your time or the time of those that don’t give a rat’s ass about my computer-geek alter ego.

The Constantines “Tiger & Crane”

I found a tutorial on how to hack into your iPod in this month’s issue of Mac Addict. Despit the fact that it said, “If you screw up this hack, you can turn your iPod into a lump as useless as a helping of your mom’s boiled cucuzza squash…Proceed at your (and your iPod’s) own risk,” I went ahead and tried it anyway. Fortunately, I follow directions pretty well and I was successful at replacing that “NO” symbol with my own handsome face. Phew…

Solex “Dork at 12 O’clock”

GarageBand is one of the coolest programs I’ve ever used. I’ve recorded lots of demos, song parts and even full songs with it. I was really excited to hear that iLife ‘05 included a new version of GarageBand (GarageBand 2). Among some of the many improvements include a built-in tuner, pitch adjustment, multiple simultaneous track recording, etc.
Well, it just so happens that the band I have been playing with lately is in the process of trying to get some recording done so I thought it would be the perfect time to upgrade to GarageBand 2. I ordered it and it arrived a few days later.
After sneaking into (read: walking into) the music building at the U of A the other night and finding an empty room with a piano, we set up my Powerbook and some mics. The idea was to record some piano parts for a song since none of us have a real piano. Anyway, about 3 tracks into the process, GarageBand 2 stops working and refuses to allow us to record more than 3 tracks. I followed all of the suggestions from the Help Menu but to no avail. I never had any problems like this with GarageBand 1. I’ve even tried all of the suggestions from the Apple Discusssions page (which, as it turns out, is full of complaints because I am not the only one experiencing this problem). No luck. Frustration. Now I’m considering dumping this program and re-installing GarageBand 1 until Apple releases a fix for this. Ughh…

Weezer “In The Garage”

Well if you’ve been considering making the switch, then now is the time. The new Mac mini which was revealed today is perfect for anyone who has been thinking about getting a Mac but doesn’t want to spend $1000. In fact, the Mac mini is only $499. You already have a monitor so what are you waiting for?

Travis Morrison “Change”