Category Archives: Mac

Apple Approves iTether App

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For one reason or another, Apple has officially approved an app that lets users bypass monthly carrier tethering plans in order to share your iPhone’s wireless connection with your computer.

The name of this app is iTether. It connects to Mac and Windows software to share the iPhone’s web connection for a one-time $14.99 fee. In comparison to the app, AT&T and Verizon offer iPhone tethering functionality for an additional $20-a-month. It’s moves like this that shows the power that Apple truly has on the mobile industry.

Apple has previously banned apps that ran similarly to this one. According to Tether.com, the Canadian company that developed the app, Apple knew exactly what the app was trying to do. “We were very clear with Apple what our app did. They asked us a bunch of questions and then approved us,” the company stated on Twitter last night.

This app only works over USB, so Wi-Fi or Bluetooth tethering are not available. Apple may have thought that since iTether doesn’t allow any sort of wireless tethering, it wouldn’t be much of a threat to the plans given by mobile carriers.

Despite the thoughts, iTether’s homepage has been overloaded with traffic since the app went live last night. As MacRumors pointed out, the app seems to authenticate with iTether.com whenever you launch it, so the actual tethering service has been facing issues as well. Tether.com says it has had to add 20 additional web servers because of the “insane demand.”

Even though Apple approved iTether, that doesn’t mean AT&T and Verizon will take it lightly. While the carriers cannot stop the app from working, they can scrutinize users who use lots of mobile data without purchasing a tethering plan. Data used via the app will count against your monthly allotment of mobile data, so keep an eye on your bandwidth limits.

Make sure you check if you have an unlimited data plan as well, for some that are named “unlimited” can have caps of 10GB or 20GB.

Source: VentureBeat

New Features from Blizzard at BlizzCon 2011

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While there were technically two days to the BlizzCon event, most of the gaming releases and announcements came on the first day. The second day was filled with mostly tournaments, demos and Foo Fighters. The opening ceremony was great, with Chris Metzen keeping us entertained and being an excellent spokesperson for Blizzard.

Now that the event has come to an end, we can look back at all of the new features that Blizzard released to us, all of it coming from the first day of BlizzCon 2011.

World of Warcraft: Mists of Pandaria


The fourth World of Warcraft expansion set, Mists of Pandaria, has been revealed. Basically, this will introduce a new race (pandaren), class (monk), continent (Pandaria), talent system, pet battle system, as well as raising the experience cap from 85, which was set from Cataclysm, to 90.

World of Warcraft Annual Pass : Get Diablo III Free

If you commit to a 12-year subscription to World of Warcraft, you will receive the full digital version of Diablo III when it is released in early 2012. Furthermore, you will be invited to the World of Warcraft: Mists of Pandaria beta when that is ready.

15-Years for Diablo III

Blizzard celebrated their 20th year of operation this year. They also are celebrating the Diablo franchise’s 15-year anniversary. Chris Metzen went over the past, present and future of the Diablo franchise, where he gave out some key details about Diablo III.

Here is the cinematic they gave about the game. Basically, Deckard Cain’s niece, Leah, is trying to uncover the secrets that Cain had left for her. Here, she is trying to figure out what the Black Soulstone is.

Diablo III Collector’s Edition

Chris Metzen announced and showed some images of the Diablo III Collector’s Edition, which will come with all kinds of different things. The box is white and looks amazing in detail. On the left is the Collector’s Edition, while the right is the original version.

Blizzard DOTA Trailer

Blizzard also featured the first official trailer for Blizzard DOTA, which takes heros from all of their franchises and lets users control them.

They were really excited about this upcoming release, as they should be. They obviously stuck a lot of time into Blizzard DOTA.

StarCraft II: Heart of the Swarm Teaser

Not only did they show the Diablo III and Blizzard DOTA trailers, but they also showed a teaser for the upcoming Starcraft II: Heart of the Swarm.

Starcraft II: Heart of the Swarm was unveiled in May, but Blizzard has continued to work on the game in “secret.” This teaser was, as Blizzard stated, rendered entirely within the StarCraft II game engine. That being said, everything that you see is possible inside the game.

Summary

BlizzCon 2011 was a huge success. We got major updates and official announcements on Blizzard’s three biggest titles as well as information about Blizzard DOTA. Chris Metzen had tons of fun and was very entertaining. While speaking of World of Warcraft, he would occasionally yell out “For the Horde!” or “For the Alliance!” to get the audience pumped up. He seemed to sway more towards the Horde-side, as it seems more of the hardcore WoW players do.

Source: BlizzCon 2011

MobileMe Users Get 25GB of Storage in iCloud Transition

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Apple is no stranger to releasing information about iCloud as developers start to gain access to more and more features during the beta testing period. Now, as part of the migration to iCloud, paid MobileMe subscribers will get an extra 20GB of storage, as the current MobileMe storage includes 20GB, at no charge for the first year of using iCloud. Apple will automatically add this 20GB to the free 5GB of iCloud storage space. Users migrating from MobileMe will be set up to automatically renew the extra 20GB of storage on June 30, 2012 for $40 per year. They can, however, downgrade to the free 5GB before next year and avoid the automatic billing.

Over the weekend, Apple released a new beta of iOS 5 to developers even though such updates are usually released during the week when both Apple’s engineers and most developers are actively working. To go along with the iOS update, Apple also enabled the ability for registered developers to migrate an existing MobileMe account, if a paid subscriber, to iCloud in order to test the account migration features.

There is some good news while people undergo the transitions from MobileMe to iCloud. Your me.com e-mail address, contacts, and calendars will all transfer over to the new servers. Users will be able to use existing Gallery, iDisk, and iWeb publishing features until MobileMe is shut down on June 30, 2012, even after they migrate an account to iCloud.

Apple has previously warned users of some known problems while transitioning. Dashboard widgets, Dock items, Keychains, Mail accounts—including rules, signatures, and Smart Mailboxes—and System Preferences will no longer sync between Macs. Private calendars may only be viewable by other iCloud users, while public calendars only have to be republished after moving to iCloud.

Though the features like Keychain and Preference syncing will be gone, some features could reappear if Apple updates apps like Mail or Keychain Access in order to use the new iCloud data storage API’s available in Mac OSx Lion.

As of right now, only registered developers can access the beta of iCloud. It is expected to launch sometime this fall around the same time that iOS 5 is released. iCloud users will be able to sync photos, videos, and other data among computers and mobile devices besides the already mentioned e-mail, contact, and calendar data. iCloud will also allow iTunes Store users to access previously purchased music, videos, and apps, with additional iTunes library syncing available separately as iTunes Match.

Source: Ars Technica

Improved Office Compatibility for Lion Coming in a Few Months

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Improved Office compatibility coming to Lion, but not for a few months

One of Microsoft’s biggest software products to date is the productivity suite Office. Well, Office for Mac will gain support for new Lion features, including auto save and fullscreen mode, in a future update that is being worked on. The features will be available in a few months.

Within Lion, the main Microsoft Office for Mac 2011 applications —Word, Excel, and PowerPoint—ran just as expected. All the files tested opened without any issues and there seems to be no bugs within the functionality of the applications. Right now, the suite is basically the same as Snow Leopard, but with its Lion-goodness.

Earlier today, Fox explained that a future update for Office for Mac 2011 will add support for new Lion features. This includes Lion’s new file management features including auto save and versions, as well as window management like fullscreen mode and auto resume. Adding these types of features obviously takes some hours behind a desk coding away, as well as testing, so this support will be added “in months, not days – just to set expectations.”

A wait like this may come with some complaints for users who are becoming attached to such features in Lion, especially since the developers have had access to the Lion OS for several months. Still, large applications like Office take quite a bit of time and effort to add features like this. Office has a lot of custom UI code in it which must be tested many times in order to prevent regressions.

When bugs are found, they will be addressed by regular updates, and Office 2008 will even benefit from such fixes. However, Office 2004 is pretty much useless, as it’s PowerPC app and Lion do not offer Rosetta compatibility.

Source: Ars Technica

White MacBook Discontinued, iBook Legacy Finished

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iBook legacy comes to an end with white MacBook cancellation

Apple has decided to discontinue its entry-level plastic MacBook. Apple will no longer be thought of as the company with the white plastic-covered laptops. With the MacBook Air selling so well, and starting at the same price of $999, they have decided to get rid of the MacBook entirely in order to keep going with the MacBook Air.

The white MacBook began as the iBook, a consumer-grade laptop, in 1999 that was the first Apple machine to be able to connect with WiFi wireless networking. The colorful laptop was revised in 2003 with an all-white polycarbonate shell, and Apple changed the name to MacBook in 2006 when they switched from PowerPC to Intel processors. The most recent Macbook design, which was updated in 2009, featured a white unibody shell. Apple has improved the specs slightly over the last couple years, but the performance still barely justified its $999 price tag.

Apple didn’t even mention the MacBook being discontinued while it introduced a bunch of new hardware updates on Wednesday morning. All they did was redirect the MacBook page on Apple’s website to the top-level “Mac” page.

The MacBook was popular with students, primary and secondary schools, and even quite a few consumers over the years, sales have likely dropped significantly over the last two years. Apple updated the MacBook Pro several times since 2009, nearly everything about the MacBook Pro is dramatically better than the white MacBook for only $200 more. Even the MacBook Air has better performance, a sharper screen resolution, and a much more compact and lightweight laptop for the same price, $999, as the original MacBook. It comes as no surprise, really, when you think about all of this. Nevertheless, it will be missed by many.

Apple has also confirmed that the MacBook does still exist, but it is only available to educational institutions.

Source: Ars Technica

64-bit Final Cut Pro X Available via Mac App Store

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Apple mentioned that they were going to overhaul Final Cut Pro in April. Well, the day has come. Apple has announced that Final Cut Pro X is now available via the Mac App Store. It comes with 64-bit, multi-core support and performance, along with a “radical new editing timeline.” This has definitely become a new step ahead in the game of video editing. Though, not everyone is so thrilled.

Basically, Final Cut Pro X has redesigned the software in order to take full advantage of the capabilities that Macs and the Mac OS X have. The performance end has been improved greatly, and has included background processing of rendering, effects, and imports. It even has the ability to utilize all CPU and GPU resources in any given machine.

Some experienced video editors are giving Apple grief for including the timeline, similar to the one from iMovie, into Final Cut Pro X. Well, basically, there is still a precision editor within the magnetic timeline, so nothing is lost, only added. The magnetic timeline just allows users to save time.

“Final Cut Pro X is the biggest advance in Pro video editing since the original Final Cut Pro,” Apple’s senior vice president of Worldwide Product Marketing, Phil Schiller, said in a statement. “We have shown it to many of the world’s best Pro editors, and their jaws have dropped.”

The thing that Apple focuses on with Final Cut Pro X is that each editor needs to have different demands met. Well, Final Cut Pro X is there to meet those needs. One such need is the variation in color, perhaps. Well, FCP X has built-in color grading tools.

Color, Soundtrack Pro, and DVD Studio Pro are no longer available for Final Cut Pro X, which is a bummer for long-time Final Cut Pro users. Although, Final Cut Pro X has implemented improved audio and color editing, which is believe to supersede the need for separate applications that do so.

One sad thing about not including DVD Studio Pro is that there will no longer be the option to export directly to a disc. Industries still thrive on the use of discs, so this situation is most unfortunate. It’s a shame Apple didn’t include this in Final Cut Pro X, but I feel as if there will be an update that allows such exportation soon enough.

You may be able to do some loops, though. One idea may be exporting the video to your desktop, then opening the saved project with Adobe Encore or a similar application. Then, you will be able to transfer the data to a disc.

Larry Jordan, an editor who specializes in Final Cut Pro training, gives editors one last bit of advice in regards to Final Cut Pro X. “Don’t lose sight of the fact that we are not in the software business,” he said. “We are in the story-telling business.”

Final Cut Pro X is available now via the Mac App Store for $299.99. Motion 5 and Compressor 4 are also available now via the Mac App Store for $49.99 each.

Source: Ars Technica

Lion Capable of Safari-Only Mode

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Mac OS X Lion will feature something seen only once before: a browser-only mode. This was done with Google Chrome’s “Chromebook,” though then it was considered highly controversial. In Mac OS X Lion, the user can “restart in Safari” and allow guests to use Safari to browse the web, but not tamper or view anything else on the machine.

It seems a nice feature to me, as a lot of the things located on my laptop are pretty personal, especially a few of the spreadsheets I have that could easily be messed with. Perhaps someone you really don’t know asks to see if they have an email or something of that sort. This new option would allow that to be possible so that you don’t have to completely monitor the person and make them feel freaked out. And as always, it’s better to be safe than sorry in trusting people with your laptop.

Source: Ars Technica

Apple Offers Free Bottom Case Replacement for MacBooks

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The soft rubber bottom on the white MacBooks can be very nice. It’s rubber, so naturally it doesn’t scratch like the bottoms of MacBook Pros, iPads, iPods, etc. However, they have been having a slightly unique problem. The soft rubber bottom on the white MacBooks has been separating from the aluminum and basically peeling off.

Well, Apple has introduced the “MacBook Bottom Case Replacement Program.” If your MacBook’s bottom is separating from the aluminum, Apple will get you a new bottom for free. All that is required is that it happens within two years of the purchase date, regardless of any warranty status.

The adhesive between the case and the aluminum only gives out in “special circumstances.” I haven’t heard of this happening personally, but Apple has addressed it and is taking care of it. They also noted that this can only happen on white MacBooks made between October 2009 and April 2011. Thus, the problem has been solved lately in the manufacturing process.

Also, if you have already paid to have someone replace or fix the bottom case, Apple is offering refunds. All that is needed is for you to contact them. Apple has said they will continue to monitor the happenings and will extend the program if need be.

Source: Ars Technica

The new Macbook design

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The new Macbook is out in stores and I had to go check them out in person. I have mixed reactions. The appearance is basically the same. Square lines, lackluster styling but with a gray aluminum “Motorolla V3″ look to them. I’m sure it’s a stellar performer just like all of the previous Macbooks but my current laptop is less than a year old and with a better video card, larger hard drive and faster processor it still isn’t enough to get me to shell out $1200.00 for it. Once mine is out of warranty I might get it.

On a side note, the Apple sales rep had nothing nice to say about  the Mac Air. I’m glad I stayed away from it and didn’t fall for the hype becuase Apple does a good job of supporting thier products and this is the second sales rep that had nothing positive to say about it.