Once the part numbers were revealed in the Mac rumor community, it was inevitable. On Tuesday morning, Apple announced the expected refresh to its ever-popular notebook line. The main improvements for both model lines include the newest 45 nanometer Intel Core 2 Duo processors known as “Penryn,” which promises better performance and longer battery life. MacBook Pros also receive spiffier NVIDIA GeForce 8600M GT graphics processors with up to 512MB of RAM and the Multi-Touch trackpad that first made its debut on the MacBook Air. Apple also claims the MacBook Pro is up to 74% faster than the original version, which came out two years ago. Otherwise, they look the same as the models they replace, and they are reportedly shipping now. Indeed, not too shabby, but, you’ll have to wait for the reviewers to get their hands on these babies to determine how well they operate in the real world.

Related Articles:

• Apple’s Notebook Update Mostly Ignores 17-inch MacBook Pro
• The MacBook Pro: Two Years On
• Don’t Tell Anyone: Apple Quietly Updates iMac!
• So Much for Apple Abandoning the Mac!
• After the WWDC II: Did I Say Cheaper?

Imagine this scene: You set up your new Mac and, like millions of your fellow Mac users, everything works fine, or the problems that you do have are easily solved. Now would you post a message to a troubleshooting site or one of Apple’s forums and say everything is just peachy?

Not likely. You are probably too busy getting on with your life, doing real work on your computer, and perhaps having some fun doing it.

On the other hand, if something goes terribly wrong, as it sometimes does with almost any tech product, you will be upset, particularly if a solution isn’t quickly found. You may complain to your friends, a tech support person, or go to the most convenient Mac troubleshooting site to voice your frustration. More than likely, you’ll do all three plus anything else that you feel necessary to find help or vent your spleen.

Continue Reading...

Related Articles:

• Newsletter #490 Preview: Mac Support = Good; PC Support = Bad
• Newsletter #422 Preview: Are Chronic Leopard Bugs Getting a Fair Hearing?
• The Leopard Report: Another Look at 10.5 Bugs
• Please Be Nice to Customer Support People
• So Maybe Apple Didn’t Cave on Pricing

It’s clear that trust is hard to earn, and extremely easy to lose. Here in the U.S., we don’t trust government, and we certainly wonder about those lavish promises the presidential candidates are making that will be promptly forgotten the day after the election.

With the endless battle between Apple and Microsoft taking on new directions, it’s important to consider just how much of their PR chatter can be believed.

Back in the 1990s, for example, Apple made all sorts of promises, but few came to pass, and where they did, the products were often something less-than-spectacular. Most of you remember Copland, for example, the vision of a world-class operating system that was killed during the fitful start of its initial beta stage.

When Steve Jobs returned and took control of the company, he also made promises that were difficult to deliver, such as the first iteration of Mac OS X, known as Rhapsody. It’s not that Apple couldn’t produce what was essentially an updated version of its NeXT operating system, but Apple’s key software developers balked. They didn’t want to undergo the time and expense to do major rejiggering of their applications.

Continue Reading...

Related Articles:

• Newsletter 412 Preview: Waiting for Leopard Book III: Just a Point-One Upgrade?
• The Leopard Report: Is it Time for a Subscription Program?
• Newsletter #445 Preview: Can Apple Update the OS Too Quickly?
• The Leopard Era Report: The Tiger Disconnect Persists
• Newsletter #355 Preview: The Leopard Report: How About a Fair Upgrade Policy?

Night Owl Rating:
Pros: Smooth, comfortable keyboard action; easy setup, good Mac compatibility.
Cons: So where’s the caps lock indicator?

As most of you know, I’ve been hugely impressed with two keyboards that sort of mimic the ergonomic style. What I mean is that the bottom portion of the keyboard spreads sideways. Logitech expanded on this approach with its Wave keyboard, which does what the name implies, and that is to eschew the typically flat style and have the keys rise higher in the center and lower at the sides, a sort of wavy approach.

All this is, in theory at least, supposed to allow you to type more comfortably for hours on end. Now I cannot say that this scheme necessarily works for all people, but after typing for long hours each day over a period of well over four decades (I started real young by the way), I find that my wrists seldom ache at the end of a busy session. I might be lucky, it may be because I exercise six days a week, but perhaps using these specialty keyboards has helped in recent years.

Continue Reading...

Related Articles:

• Newsletter #383 Preview: Despite Everything I Still Like Microsoft
• Newsletter Issue #486 Preview: The Internet Explorer 8 Failure
• Newsletter #431 Preview: So Apple is Succeeding or Failing or Something
• Newsletter #428 Preview: The iPhone and An Owner’s Disconnect
• Newsletter #420 Preview: Apple and Microsoft Deserve Hardball Questions