shibbyonline

Where is the price drop Apple?

Let’s be honest, since its launch back in March 2007 it has not exactly been as big as can be expected.
Yet I have always had a little flame for the media box that is AppleTV and often found myself stopping by the Apple store with my mouse hovering over the ‘Add To Basket’ button.

Earlier this month Uncle Steve decided to have another go at the AppleTV market with Take Two. A software update to the AppleTV that would allow better streaming (no PC required) improved online photo’s with the addition of Flickr but also the ability to take advantage of iTunes new movie rental service. All of this with a reduced price ticket.
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Sans iPhone

You have read that right, I am without iPhone.
My beloved little gadget; the third arm I have learnt to live with; the grail of all Apple products has broken.

It all started with a bike ride. The phone was in my pocket, as I do nearly every day, yet this time when I went to retrieve my phone I noticed it was turned off.
I hit the ‘home’ button to check and sure enough nothing. So I tried the power button, still nothing.
Did I not charge it?
Was it flat?
Not convinced by this I connected it too my G5 to check. For once I was not greeted by the little two-tone connection noise, instead I got more of the same; nothing!

No idea what has happened, the phone was not knocked, dropped or abused in any other way. There are no visible signs of damage or malfunction, just a dead phone. So back to Apple we go.

The only problem I have now is learning to live without it. I can manage a lack of text messages and phone calls but I miss the extra bits the most. Checking my emails on the fly, updating my Twitter status on the move, checking my feeds on the toilet. How will I cope!

Finally Getting My Money’s Worth

When I look in System Preferences it now tells me I’ve been a .Mac member since 2004.
Since I purchased my first Mac I have signed up to Apple’s own web service but until the last few weeks I have only ever used a .mac email address. Now armed with Leopard and an iPhone I can finally see the point in the service and have changed my work to use it more.

Mail

First off I’m now using .Mac mail as it should be, using the magic that is IMAP I’ve moved all my mail over to Apple. Since my first attempt at using .Mac webmail they have made some improvements and it is now usable and my perfect ‘out of office’ doorway. Plus with an iPhone I am now totally connected at any time, yep Edge is not great but just being able to sit in the garden and check your mail is worth it.

iDisc

No more box.net for me, I’m a fully fledged iDisc user now. This is only because of having a Mac at work now and the better support for iDisc in Leopard. Before then I found it flakey; dropping connections, refusing to sync and just being a pain! Now I have a local copy on both work and home machines and auto sync to keep everything where it should be.
There are still a few things I would prefer but the positive point out weigh the negative.
Ease people, it’s just about making things easier.

The iLife Extras

Now you might think I will take this further with all the iLife/.Mac goodies.
Sorry but no joy, I have no reason for sharing my iPhoto library; I’m Flickr’ed and that does everything I need for online photos.
I do not use my camcorder nearly enough to want to share movies, I’ve not even fired up iMovie since installing iLife.
iWeb is just nasty, besides why would I want to mess with that when I have my own domain and one of the most powerful web editors out there.
So I will not be investing in Apple’s wholesome family fun filled sharing adventure idea. That said though for what it is worth I will gladly continue to pay for the service; now I can see the full picture. It has taken a few years but I’m glad I kept forgetting to cancel the ‘auto renew’ option.

Leopard, A Week Later

As any Mac user worth his salts will know that the latest version of OSX was released on October 26th October.
Due to a bit of a mess up with a new hard drive I did not get round to installing Leopard until the following Friday. Since then I have had a little over a week to try out some of the claimed 300 new features and give it a bit of an airing.
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