loonyblog.

Definitely not a scam.

I'd post impressions of the thing, but so far all it's done is sit on the dock looking pretty while it downloads all my music and photos. I have 2043 songs in my iTunes library, and 1,800 photos, so even over FireWire, it's gonna take a while. My one gripe so far: it's sexy, it's in color, it comes with a ton of crap, including a carrying case, dock, two separate dock connector cables (FireWire and USB 2.0), A/V cables and other stuff...but no remote control. Which kinda sucks, because those things are expensive! Oh well. I plan on getting a better carrying case anyway (I'm thinking of getting the Contour Showcase...anyone have anything bad to say about it?), so I'll probably just walk over to the Apple Store tomorrow (I do work only one block away) and pick up both.

But for now I'll deal. Anyway, here's a photo of its supreme sexiness:

It's about time!

Oh, and for the record, the changes in iPhoto 5 are nice, but very, very subtle. I haven't even fired up iDVD yet, so I have nothing to report there, and I may never run GarageBand, so don't ask me about that (I launched the first version only once to verify that it was definitely not for me).

Anyway, here's some iMovie HD love...marvel at the size of that single movie:

Macworld madness.

• iPod shuffle: Kinda cool. Not quite for me, but I like the fact that it directly plugs into a USB port, and for the price, you get a good amount of space. The lack of a screen would drive me nuts, but I think they'll sell a million of these...it's a great gift for the MP3-weary.

• iWork: Since when did two apps constitute a suite? And maybe it's just that I've been using Microsoft Word since the dawn of time...but Pages just doesn't look like a word processor to me...it looks like Preview. Which is probably intentional, but I don't want my word processor to be pretty, I just want it to well...process words. The price is definitely right, but until they come out with their own counterpart to Excel and/or publisher, it's a pretty weak looking suite.

• Mac mini: A lot of people are going to look at this and say it's like a new version of the 'cube. I was a big fan of the cube (even though I could never justify the purchase of one), and I still think it's one of the nicest computers ever made, but this is a different animal, methinks. It's small. I mean, it's really small. That's very cool. I think it'd make a very nice (if slightly expensive) HTPC. I also think it they'll sell a lot to the iPod crowd, although it's so underpowered, that anyone picking this up expecting to play Doom 3 on it is going to be sorely disappointed. I do take at least a small amount of pride in the fact that my steadily aging G4 is far more powerful than this thing, if only because if that wasn't the case, I'd hang my head in shame.

• Tiger: What's to say? Yeah, it has some nifty features, but that's all just for show. The fact is, as anyone that's been through this with each new OS X release will tell you, that these incremental upgrades are mandatory. In about three months after its release, practically every app will require Tiger, so any new features are nice extras. Mostly I'll be buying this because I have to.

• QuickTime 7: Okay, maybe there's one feature I can't wait for...I love QuickTime, and QT7 sounds pretty cool. I'm not crazy about the fact that I'm probably going to have to buy both Tiger and QuickTime 7 Pro, but I'll do it, I'm sure.

• iLife '05: Oh Apple, what did I do to deserve this? I'm a big supporter of iLife...I bought both iLife '03 and '04, and I'm sure I'll break down and buy '05 eventually as well...but jeez...what gives? Okay, it's nice to see HD support in iMovie, and hopefully this means the filesize limitation's been removed, but what's with the lack of dual layer support in iDVD? When I heard they were touting support for more DVD formats, my heart leapt, only to be shot down when I discovered they were talking about DVD+R/RW (which most SuperDrives have supported for years anyway, even if Apple didn't publicize it). The only reason I could think of for the lack of DVD-DL support is that they're waiting for the next refresh of the G5 line to introduce dual layer superdrives. And until those come out, they can't add support for it into iDVD. Hopefully that will just be a patch when it happens eventually, because I'd hate to wait a full year for that to be added in.

MacWorld rumors.

According to Think Secret, the new version of iLife will contain a new, HD-enabled version of iMovie that supports 16x9 resolutions (finally). Hopefully this also means the unbelievably frustrating DV file size limitation's been removed as well. (In the current version, large movies have to be split up to be imported into iMovie, which makes burning movies using iDVD very frustrating). But even cooler than that, is the rumor that iDVD 5 will support dual layer DVD burning. Hallelujah! Praise be to Apple. Dual layer DVD drives are remarkably cheap, but I haven't bothered upgrading because the only software that supports it right now is Toast, and that's way too bare bones for my taste (technically DVD Studio Pro supports it as well, but you still need to burn the disc using Toast, and DVDSP is way too much money for a non-pro like myself). Being able to burn a two hour movie onto one DVD at full quality makes me giddy with excitement.

Of course, since we're moving in the very near future, I'll need to sell off something to be able to afford that upgrade. Fortunately I've got a copy of Shining Force III sitting on my shelf that should be worth just enough to cover that cost. Hmm...stay tuned to eBay.

The genius is in out.

So today I did just that. I walked on in, walked up the stairs to the Genius Bar, and saw...a really, really, really long queue to meet with an Apple-branded genius. I asked about making an appointment (as I was told one would be mandatory), and was told that the earliest I could make one would be tomorrow. Here, go ahead and check the queue at my local Apple Store. Fun, isn't it?

Well, I decided it wasn't really worth coming all the way back in tomorrow, so I did what any self-respecting New Yorker who knows squat about Apple computers: I went to Tekserve. I've used Tekserve a few times before, and just as they've been in the past, service was fast and friendly. I was in and out of there in a half-hour, and I wasn't charged for the time there, as it turned out that it was just the A/C adapter that needed to be replaced. Phew.

I wonder how much business Tekserve gets from fed up Apple Store customers. The Genius Bar is great in theory, but in practice it just doesn't work. It should be a Genius Room for high-traffic locations like the SoHo store, as five guys behind a bar just won't cut it on the weekends. In any event, I'm just happy my iBook is okay. The thought of traveling without it would give me nightmares for months to come.

I ♥ NetNewsWire

The list of changes in NetNewsWire 2.0 is pretty extensive, but the whole program has gotten much, much better from top to bottom. Incredibly, one of the things I like most about it is the decision to split the program in two. Whereas before NetNewsWire had a solid, but somewhat limited blog posting component, it's now been spun off into MarsEdit, which is a full-featured (and very, very cool) blog poster. If you already own NNW, MarsEdit is free, but if not, you now have the option to use an external program like BBEdit instead.

MarsEdit has everything I wanted out of NNW's blog posting software -- it now lets you preview the extended versions of posts, you can set it to nag you if you try and post without setting a category, you can even monitor and edit trackbacks from within the program. Plus the preview function's gotten better too.

It's been a while since I posted that list of my favorite OS X apps, and some of the things on that list are a bit out of date. I still use most of those religiously, although with Watson coming to an end in the relatively near future, I've learned to live without it. Also, MenuMaster is my new favorite Haxie of the moment, as it allows me change keyboard shortcuts with just a few key presses. But NetNewsWire just keeps getting better. And while I would have happily paid to upgrade, the fact that all this stuff was free is just icing on the cake. If you own OS X, download it.

Fearful symmetry.

But at least there are some cool things here. Spotlight uses a system-wide database to enable fast searching across your entire system (sort of like what Longhorn's supposed to be able to do if it ever gets finished). Automator takes Applescript to a whole new level, and while I'll stick to using NetNewsWire, I do think Safari's implementation of RSS sounds great (if you're browsing a site with an RSS feed, an icon pops up in your address bar).

Of course, every now and then there are some questionable additions to the OS. A few years back it was the redesigned Sherlock, which was a carbon-copy clone of the beloved Watson (which is now going cross-platform!). This year there were two: Spotlight, which as I said is really cool, does sound an awful lot like LaunchBar. In fairness to Apple, the system-wide database thing has been talked about with every major OS for years and years (Be was the first to implement it, if my memory serves correct), but it will still take away from the usefulness of the program.

No, the much more questionable addition is Dashboard, a new addition to Expose that basically implements Konfabulator into the OS. There is some evidence to support the claim that Apple discovered this concept independently, but I don't buy it. No more than I buy the fact that the redesigned Sherlock looked exactly like Watson (luckily for Watson, the redesigned Sherlock sucked). I never thought Konfabulator was worth the price of entry, so I'm really going on the author's word here, but it does sound like there are a few advantages to Konfabulator over Dashboard. By the same token, I'm sure cool stuff will come out of Dashboard. But still, it's got to sting to see Apple co-op your software like that.

It's not easy liking a company like Apple when they do things like this. In the case of both Konfabulator and Watson, the developers were never approached to implement their software into the OS, it was just done without their knowledge or consent. Mac OS, far more than Windows, is an OS that thrives based on the hard work of independent programmers (see elsewhere on this blog for a list of some of my favorite apps). It's sad that Apple feels the need to compete, rather than help out, so many of these developers.

But then, what's really strange, is the fact that they're implementing things like Konfabulator, when products like FruitMenu exist only because Apple left major features out of the OS.

How to rip DVD audio commentaries.

Anyway, until this week, ripping was a fairly convoluted procedure. Using a PC (as opposed to my desktop Mac), I would extract the audio tracks in question to AC3 format using DVD Decrypter, convert them to WAV using Ciler's AC3 Tool, and then convert them to DVD using Musicmatch, which I would also use to add in proper ID3 tags and rename the files to a more acceptable format. This system, although a bit clunky, worked fine. But thankfully, I've finally stumbled upon an easy-to-use alternative that's native to OS X (yes, I know I could have used OSex all along, but that was an even worse procedure).

This method's not free, but it works great, and I've even got some fancy touches thrown in for good measure, so read on for complete directions.

Continue reading "How to rip DVD audio commentaries."

I am lord and master of the DVD.

So instead, I labored to find a solution, and can now actually say that I've figured it out. Of course, iDVD has a really annoying 2 hour limitation, so I needed to split the movie in two and burn it to two separate discs...but it's worth it.

While I've long known how to do it using Toast, that was a bare-bones affair. Because I used iDVD, I was able to include the easy-to-make custom tracks and menus, and anything less to me wouldn't have felt right.

Ahh...I rule.

If I'm feeling ambitious, I might post a tutorial on how to do it one of these days. It's a bit complicated and convoluted, but once you get the hang of the process it becomes second nature.

The bane of my existence.

In all, I've probably killed about five different pairs of headphones. The reason's not too hard to understand...when not in use, I wrap the headphones around the iPod. Over time (and the abuse anything put in my bag goes through) this wears them out, and this will kill even high-quality earbuds (for the record, I went through three pairs of Apple's buds faster than anything else). I solved this problem by picking up Macally's Retractable Earphones. These things totally rule. They're the only headphones I've managed to keep alive for any significant period of time.

But the earphones are only part of the problem. The bigger issue is the wired remote. As I said, I love my retractable headphones. But see, I'm a tall guy. Which means I can't clip the headphones' base on my belt, because then it won't reach my ears or my iPod. What I usually do is clip the remote to the shoulder strap of my bag, and my headphones plug into that. The retractable cable gives me plenty of room to work with.

Unfortunately, I've killed two of those wired remotes so far. And they're expensive! Again, I have a first generation iPod, so mine didn't actually come with one. I had to buy it. That means I've already shelled out $80 for these damn things, and I keep killing them. Grr.

I can't justify spending another $40 on headphones that won't last a month and a remote I'm just going to kill again. Apparently the wired remote that comes with the third generation models is much more durable, so when I do get a new iPod some day, hopefully that will last.

Until then, I've been forced to clip my headphones to my jacket pocket, where I have to keep my iPod. This is awkward since the headphones can get pulled out of the plug there. But I'll live with it...for now. We'll see how long I can tolerate this.

Today's reminder that being a Mac gamer sucks.

I ran out of the military base, with about a minute to spare on the bomb timer.

The end sequence starts to roll.

The game crashes.

Every. Time.

Reliably.

Sigh.

I've said it before...

Apparently the version 1.04 patch for Halo disables the ability to walk forward.

Being a Mac gamer sucks.

Sigh.

I'm glad I bought mine. I've been a bit disappointed with the multiplayer experience, but at least I can go on record as saying I support Mac game makers.

Yes, I have no life.

So here it is, a re-edited, re-cut version of the Return of the King trailer, with Herb Alpert's "Spanish Flea" as the soundtrack. One quick note about the size: when posting to .Mac, iMovie creates this super-small sized version...there's not a whole lot you can do about it. Next time (if there is a next time) I'll re-encode a better version with Quicktime Pro. But anyway, here it is:

Pointless? And how!

Hard drive envy.

For my needs, that 120 GB size is just about right. It's the exact same size as my desktop drive, so if there's a crisis and I need to backup everything or clone the drive I can do so easily. But for the truly power users out there, LaCie has unveiled something incredible...a 1 terabyte. drive.

Yeah, that's right, 1 freakin' terabyte. That's nearly ten times the size of the drive I have right now, of which I've only used about 40GB. For professional users of Final Cut Pro or DVD Studio this is like a dream come true. It's small, supports all three high-speed protocols (FW 400, FW 800 and USB 2.0, plus iLink support for direct DV input) and if necessary, it can be stacked and daisy-chained for increased storage. Oh, and it's entertainingly called "Bigger Disk."

For standard desktop users, the falling price of storage has accelerated much more rapidly than the amount of space they actually need. But at the same time, I fully welcome the release of 1 TB drives. That uber-TiVo I mentioned the other day is the perfect use for a drive that's 1 or more TB...if you can get 30 hours of HD video (at questionable quality) on a 250 GB drive, then you can get over 100 with a terabyte. And that's really what I need in a TiVo. My massively upgraded first generation unit has about 100 hours of high-quality storage, which is enough that I've never filled it, and have never been concerned about space for new recordings. Actually, looking at the list of things currently on my TiVo, I'll soon have a movie that's been on there for a full year!

So bring on the terabyte drives. I'm sure someone will think of something to put on there.

Priceless.

Microsoft has said that it plans to offer its own MSN music store later this year. Thursday the company appeared unprepared for the Apple-Hewlett agreement, which clearly stung Microsoft executives. They said the agreement would limit choice and harm consumers.

"Windows is about choice, you can mix and match all of this stuff," said David Fester, general manager of Microsoft's Windows digital media division. "We believe you should have the same choice when it comes to music services."

Yeah, I'm a sucker.

So yeah, I'm a sucker. I'm a subscriber to .Mac, which I primarily keep because of how much I use iPhoto, so I really shouldn't have to pay on top of my subscription fee. All I know, is that this is as far as I'm willing to go. If Apple decides to charge for the next release of either Safari or iTunes, they can stick it up their collective wazoo. I don't expect that to happen, but then, I expected iPhoto to remain free.

Grumble, grumble, grumble.

• New iLife Suite: The only app I care about is iPhoto, and now I have to pay just to get the new version? How much does that suck? I don't have any desire to own GarageBand, so why should I pay $50 for a package that includes that? I'm good and angry about it.
• iPod Mini: Nice, but at $250 it's waaaaay too expensive. They desperately need a $150, 2GB version.
• Bigger low-end iPod: Okay, this is actually good news. I'm not looking to buy a new iPod anytime soon, but when I do, this will be the one I get.
• New Office: Some of the new features sound interesting, although I haven't heard much about Entourage, which is the app I use the most (and desperately needs better IMAP support). Ditto for the new Virtual PC.

It-it-it just keeps going!!!

Some of my favorite apps.

Continue reading "Some of my favorite apps."

Panther unleashed.

As far as the new features go, they're a mixed bag of nice and ho-hum additions. Exposé is great, although I keep forgetting to use it (I've even got a mouse button bound to it, and I still forget). The new command + tab method for switching programs I like, except for the fact that it follows your mouse position, and I keep hitting command + tab when my mouse is in the exact center of the screen, causing me to switch to the wrong program by accident.

My favorite new feature is the overhauled Finder. I still use the wonderful Default Folder X for handy keyboard navigation (and all those other features) but for most situations, the new Finder and open/save menus are a huge improvement. Fast User Switching is cool, although that's only necessary on my iBook, which Heather and I share (and since that doesn't have a particularly strong video card, it doesn't show the nifty cube when switching).

Safari 1.1 is an improvement, but not in the way that would benefit me the most. Unfortunately, just like I observed back in August, it still takes an eternity to load pages from IGN. I figured out that this is because of some weird JavaScript thing, and so when I'm compiling my nightly LNC posts for Shacknews I just disable JavaScript...but it's a pain. And here at work, on my much slower iMac, IGN pages can take an unacceptable several minutes to load if I'm not careful. Still, there's been a slight speed bump, and Safari is my default browser across the board again, so it's a step in the right direction.

There are of course lots of other new features in Panther, but they aren't too important to me. I'm glad I upgraded, since moving forward all OS X software is going to require it, but I'm not nearly as enthusiastic as some have been.

Tapwave responds.

Well that's a relief. It still doesn't make things much easier for me for reviewing the platform at launch, but it's good to know they're not just ignoring Mac users (as Sony does).

Damn you, Tapwave!

That same error is quite familiar to me, as it's what I got when I first tried syncing my Clie with a Mac. But, thanks to Mark/Space and their MissingSync software I was able to get past that hurdle. I contacted Mark/Space, who told me that they have heard that the Zodiac isn't Mac-compatible, but at this time they have no plans to release a product to enable it. I tried getting it to work with Virtual PC, and I couldn't get that to work either (which is weird, because I know people have managed to get Palm devices working with VPC).

Admittedly, for more than 90% of potential Zodiac users, this won't be an issue (Sony's managed to get a huge portion of the market without any official Mac support). But it's still disappointing. I have been able to send files over Bluetooth, and this includes installing new software. But for formal syncing, I'm out of luck.

Look for my full Zodiac review to run on Shacknews next week.

iTunes kicks Winamp's ass.

In fact, now that I've been using the program religiously for a while, I have only one real issue...what's up with that creepy browse button? It looks like a seriously hung-over or strung-out eyeball. I've grown used to it...but jeez, who came up with that one?

Is Panther worth the hassle?

If all it took to upgrade to 10.3 was just running the installer I wouldn't question it...but this review on OS News disturbs me. Apparently the author was told his Jaguar installation "had errors" and he was forced to do a full, clean install. With Jaguar, I did the "archive and install" method at work and on my iBook at home, and that was fine. But my G4 tower (which came with Jaguar pre-installed) has some 70 gigs of files to worry about. Not to mention my super-customized installation of Dreamweaver MX (which is another thing I have no intention of upgrading). An unfortunate side-effect of having an obscenely large hard drive, is that I don't have any easy way of backing up all that data. And while the idea of a 120 GB FireWire drive is tremendously appealing, that's just not something I can afford to run out and buy right now.

There's also another issue at work here. I'm not sure I really need to upgrade my desktop at home. For the same reason I'm not tempted by the awesome power of the G5, I can't say Panther is really that enticing. As of right now, my desktop does everything I need it to, and it does so with no problems at all. Exposé seems cool, and I love the look of the new Finder, and that improved Samba support would be very handy. But I don't really need any of that for my day-to-day use. Pretty much the only real reason for me to upgrade is that eventually (probably sooner, rather than later) Apple will stop supporting 10.2 in their software releases. Chances are that the next full release of iTunes will require 10.3, and the same goes for iSync and probably QuickTime as well.

So I'm not sure what I'll do. I'll probably wind up installing it on my work machine and then waiting to see if I miss those new features when I'm at home. If so, I'll go ahead and upgrade, even though that will mean a great deal of work for me to do so.

You gotta be kidding me.

What year is this? I haven't used a one-button mouse since the mid 80s, and don't know anyone who stuck with Apple's default mouse. The argument out of Cupertino that single button mouse make things simpler doesn't wash with me. You tell me which is the easier scenario: using the right mouse button to bring up a contextual menu, or hitting the option key + the single button? Right clicking is so integrated into every single OS X program (including Apple's own!) that I just don't understand why on earth they would bother shipping a $70, single button wireless mouse. And even without a second button, there's no doohicky wheel! Can you imagine paying $70 for a mouse that didn't even have a scroll wheel? I paid significantly less for a wired mouse not too long ago that has eight buttons and a scroll wheel. How Apple thinks they can get away with only one button is beyond me.

Apple (finally!) makes Backup useful.

1. That sweet, sweet integration with iPhoto
2. The obligatory virus scan software
3. The ability to easily share files between my home and office macs
4. An easy-to-use way for scheduling regular backups.

Backup sounded great on paper: it melds Apple's sense of simplicity in software design with the very important task of backing up files on a regular basis. Unfortunately, when it was released the program was crippled to the point of sheer uselessness. While you could backup anything you want, and it was quite easy to create new backup sets, you could only backup files to CDs/DVDs or your iDisk. I have made a few hard-media backups, but by and large what I want to do is backup to my internal network server on a weekly basis.

As of this morning, I can actually do that. Backup finally lets you do what it should have done from the beginning: back up to whatever you want. It now supports network disks, firewire drives, and even iPods (if you're lucky enough to own one with enough free space to make that possible).

This has made the decision to renew my .Mac subscription much, much easier. Sure I can just set up my own shell script and cron job to back up to a network drive (that's what I've been doing) but this is a much more elegant solution, and it backs up to standard OS X package files for easy reference. It's a long-awaited update and I'm going to start using it immediately.

So long, Safari, welcome back Camino!

In an attempt to bring back the Safari I had grown to love, I cleared out my cache, disabled the cache entirely, zapped my preferences and performed everything I could possibly think of, all to no avail. And so I've just switched back to Camino, the browser formerly known as Chimera.

The switch was easy enough, thanks to this handy bookmarks exchanger and Unsanity's Metalifizer, which applies the same brushed-metal look to Camino. I'll miss some of Safari's features, but not much, since Camino now offers automatic file-extracting for downloads and a very cool white-listing feature for pop-up ads. And one of the nicer browser features I've seen in some time is the ability to prevent other sites from altering the size of browser windows, something that used to drive me nuts.

At home, Safari still works perfectly fine, and since I originally switched there because Camino started crashing on startup (for no particular reason) I'm not going to be switching back there any time soon. I'm sure I'll download the next release of Safari here and if they manage to fix any of the problems I have with it, I might jump ship again. Until then, it's certainly nice to have utilities like the aforementioned ones that make moving back and forth between the two so simple.

Wireless and pointless.

Don't get me wrong, I don't love all the cables coming out of my computer, but with their ADC connection Apple's already reduced the power, USB and DVI connections for their LCD down to one, and there's a single USB cable running from my monitor to my keyboard and another from my mouse to my keyboard. That's hardly a mess.

By my best guess, I'd say the average amount of space between a monitor or CPU and keyboard is a foot, maybe two or three. How lazy do you have to be when that becomes too cumbersome for you? Here at work, there's literally mere inches between my keyboard and CPU (it's an LCD iMac, so my large Microsoft keyboard starts underneath the raised monitor).

And then there's the problem of batteries. Batteries! In something as simple as a mouse or keyboard! I'd hate to be in a situation where I can't get any work done because the batteries on my mouse have died. Logitech found a satisfactory solution to this problem by adding a cradle and rechargeable battery, but then that means you have to have a wire going from the computer to the cradle (or the wall to the cradle). I imagine Apple's planning something similar, since I can't see them releasing anything that requires AA batteries.

Hopefully this new cordless mouse will at least contain more than one button. Wireless mice and keyboards are significantly more expensive than their wired counterparts, and Bluetooth ones even more so. And if someone's going to have to shell out $100 or more for a keyboard and mouse, one would hope it offers a bit more than a single button. Actually, I'd love to find out if they're going to use this wacky wheel patent they filed for some time ago.

Update: According to Think Secret, these new devices will run on AA batteries. The mouse will require two, while the keyboard needs a whopping four.

Safari and IGN

Make Weird Al #1

As such, I propose the following to test this theory:

Anyone reading this with an iTunes Music Store account should log in and purchase Weird Al's "Amish Paradise". Why this particular song? Because I can pretty much guarantee that it won't just randomly pop up in Billboard's charts. Let's see just how easy it is to game the list.

If you can, do it yourself, and tell everyone you know with a Mac. At only $0.99, it's hardly an expensive experiment.

Nice, but not for me.

The biggest surprise is that these are well...kinda ugly. Apple makes great, elegant hardware, and these? These don't inspire me in the slightest. Already, some of the more cynical sites have taken to calling these the "cheese grader" macs, because of the metal grating that adorns the front and back of the unit. While I'm sure they're quite functional, they're a little hard on the eyes.

And then there's Apple's puzzling decision to only include one optical drive bay. On my G4, I have a SuperDrive and a separate, significantly faster CD-R/W drive. I love having two drives like that, and can't imagine myself going back to having just one. Of course, it's easy enough to get a FireWire drive as the second one, but I like the elegance of internal optical drives.

The biggest thing that would keep me from upgrading (aside from financial reasons...I won't be ready to buy another desktop for at least two years) is the fact that my current dual 1.25 GHz/1 GB RAM G4 is more than enough for my needs. I don't play games on it, so it's just there for Photoshop, Dreamweaver, BBEdit, and all the other programs I use. And unlike my previous, Windows desktop, I can have as many programs as I like open at once, with no slowdown of any kind. So while Apple's new machines are really very nice (albeit slightly ugly) I can't see any particular reason for upgrading. I will of course be moving up to Panther as soon as it's released. My system may not be able to take advantage of the 64-bit features of the OS, but it can more than handle anything else it throws my way.

And there was much rejoicing.

For what it's worth, Epic's Cliff Bleszinksi told me at E3 that the real hurdle in getting UT2k3 ported to OS X was actually the OS itself, and that it should be much easier to get the next one out. We'll see. In the mean time, Mac gamers can look forward to a few months before their shiny new game becomes obsolete.

Pretty Cool

For the unaware, here's the general idea: you browse the store like you would your own collection, and can purchase songs for $0.99 and whole albums for $9.99 (two disc sets are around $19). After you've bought it, it's more or less yours, and you can put it on an iPod, or burn it to CD. No monthly fees, no expiration dates, nothing.

I only rarely buy new CDs, but I have to admit, this is pretty cool. Ever since I got my iPod and a computer with a seriously huge hard drive, I've been convinced that CDs suck...this pretty much cements it. As I've seen from my insane packing experience, CDs take up space, and they can be scratched or cracked, and generally speaking they're overpriced as well. With Apple's music service, I can bypass that whole burden and get straight to the music right now, and it's legal to boot.

But of course, I really don't buy music very often. The selection on the iTunes Music Store (couldn't they come up with a better name than that?) is pretty good from my casual stroll around the listings. There's an impressive selection of Tori Amos and Pink Floyd, although since I pretty much own all that there's no reason for me to buy any of it. I like the idea of being able to buy a single track off a CD single though, as you can with certain releases. I mean, how cool would it be to buy just the b-side tracks off of singles for $0.99 a piece? And unlike Amazon or any other online retailer, therea are 30 second clips from every song that's available for purchase, with no exceptions. That rules.

I also like the idea of being able to make my own "greatest hits" compilation. In order for this to work there has to be enough music from a particular artist, and that doesn't look possible quite yet with most bands. But if you want your own David Bowie or Bob Dylan collection, you're in luck, as there are plenty available from each.

One criticism I've read online is that there aren't any songs from indie labels. I can't imagine that being a long-time thing. In order to launch they needed mainstream music and lots of it. Now they can concentrate on building their catalog, and I'm sure indie labels will get in on the action. If they really want to be cool, they can go the MP3.com route and let anyone who wants to sell their music. By leveling the playing field, they could really give new bands great exposure.

My one real complaint is that there aren't any reviews of albums on here. I'm a total review junkie, and whether I'm reading ShackReviews before buying a game or movie reviews at NetFlix or book and movie reviews at Amazon, I always like to know what other people think about the stuff I'm about to pay for. There's a rudimentary recommendation system in place, but reviews would be much more helpful.

Beyond that, I'm sold on the thing. The next time I buy music (whenever that may be) it's safe to assume that if I can, I'll get it off of iTunes.

PC to Mac to PC

Blizzard took the lead by releasing WarCraft III as a hybrid Mac and PC disc from day one, but that's really very rare. As much as I'd love to see that happen more often, I'm not going to hold my breath. What I would like to see more of, is what id's done for years, and that's to make the only native portion of the game the actual executable file, allowing you to download the playable demo and use the files off your PC disc to get the full game on a Mac (or Linux box, for that matter). This can be done with any Quake game, and some of the third party Quake engine titles as well.

There are two games I can see myself wanting to do this with: Unreal Tournament 2003 and HOMM IV. In both cases I already own the PC version, but would like to use 'em on my Mac, and don't feel like going out and buying them all over again. Of the two, I'm much more likely to buy UT2k3 again, since I miss being able to jump into a quick game on my server and then get back to work without having to get up and walk across the room (not to mention the fun of multitasking!). I mention this now, as I face the prospect of having to pack up my computers for the move, and am trying to avoid doing this, as I'm still desperately addicted to HOMMIV. While I do have Heroes III Complete for Mac, I'm enjoying the storyline of part IV, and don't want to regress until I've seen this thing to its conclusion.

All of this would be moot, if Virtual PC were able to run games, but sadly it can't (believe me, I've tried). My iBook doesn't do VPC so well, but my desktop does it perfectly, and it made a world of difference for me during my recent switch from a PC to a Mac desktop. There is some hope on this front, as RealPC is back from the dead, and claims to be able to run games. Apparently they signed a non-compete agreement with Connectix, which became null and void when Microsoft acquired Virtual PC. So we'll see. In an ideal world I could effortlessly glide from one OS to another, taking my games with me as I did it. It probably won't happen, but that doesn't mean I can't hope for the best.

Just when I thought I couldn't get any geekier...

I've actually been immersed in *nix geekiness lately, as I've been working to get the loonybin back up to full speed after flushing it out and starting anew with the recently released Mandrake 9.1. I had previously attempted to upgrade from Mandrake 8 to 9.0, but that didn't go well at all, thanks to a handful of issues that plagued the initial release. Some of those remain in 9.1, but by and large this is a much better version.

One thing I was thrilled to discover actually has nothing to do with Mandrake, but OS X. Ever since I switched from a PC to a Mac as my main desktop, I've had issues with Apple's implementation of Samba. For some reason, when copying to a Linux machine over SMB, it's painfully slow, but also has a tendency to lock up the system after a few minutes. This was a really big annoyance for me, and was driving me nuts. It wasn't until I rebuilt my server that it occurred to me that using a protocol meant to connect Unix to Windows machines to connect two *nix boxes was actually quite moronic. So I switched to NFS, and good lord, is it better. It's stupid fast, I have it set to automount my backup and user directories on startup in OS X, and it doesn't crash at all.

...but that all just contributes to my ever-increasing geekiness. I make this pledge: if I ever get so bad as to declare all Linux distributions inadequate and insist on compiling the kernel myself, I'll check myself into geek rehab.