An interesting but at times erratic patent filing from Apple published for the first time this week describes a proprietary in-car navigation system focused on maintaining driver safety while a vehicle is in motion.
25 Useful Free Mac Apps for Freelancers
As a full-time freelancer and part-time geek, I like to play around and install applications on my Mac. In the following list I share some of the free Mac apps that make my life easier. I also own a PC, so I give my readers who use a PC an alternative for each app.
Eltima's Flash'in'App 2 adds customization options
Eltima Software has released Flash'in'App 2.0, an update to its Cocoa framework that enables developers to load and manage Adobe Flash movies in any application on the Mac. The software will support SWF files, manage their playback, and can handle sounds, videos, and images. The new version provides several added features that allow users to set Flash background color for playback, to customize th...
Apps: iPrint, BannerZest, TextExpander
iPrint 2.0 ($15) allows users to select data within an application that they would like to print. The selection of data can be done through the use of a keyboard shortcut or a popup Dock menu and allows users to print only the material they desire to print. A new Preferences window has been added which allows users to set a default option of always displaying both the Page Setup and Print dialog b...
Little Hoppers Treasure Hunt comes to Mac
Fast Rabbit Software has launched the latest game in its series of educational applications for the Mac, Little Hoppers Treasure Hunt. The game is geared towards students in grades 2-to-5, and designed to introduce kids to two dimensional graphing and the Cartesian coordinate system. While trying help students learn to read and identify points on a graph using the Cartesian coordinate system, the ...
iShoot goes 2.0, adds networked play
Filed under: Gaming, iPhone, App Store
When your simple-yet-addictive tank shooting game blasts its way to the top of the App Store sales charts and earns you a reasonable fraction of a cool million bucks, what do you do for an encore? Developer Ethan Nicholas has released iShoot 2.0, adding much-requested features to the $2.99 artillery battle (the free iShoot Lite remains unchanged).The new version of iShoot (App Store) adds plenty of customization options, including a weapon designer, new rulesets and rule editor, background music -- and a local LAN network play option, allowing you to blast 3 of your friends over WiFi whenever you like. Check it out.
TUAWiShoot goes 2.0, adds networked play originally appeared on The Unofficial Apple Weblog (TUAW) on Wed, 25 Mar 2009 23:45:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
Seagate to Launch its First 2 TB 3.5" HD Soon
Seagate unveiled a new NAS model, the BlackArmor. Beside its performance and its support for up to 4 HDs, specifications indicate that it will soon be available with 8 TB storage space (8 TB = 4 x 2 TB). In other words, Seagate will soon join Western Digital as the second manufacturer of 2 TB HD. It might even be the first 2 TB HD spinning at 7200 rpm, however, there is no define release date.
AMD Will Launch its Radeon HD 4890 on April 2nd
It is on April 2nd that AMD/ATI will officially launch the new flagship, the Radeon HD 4890, which should be immediately available.
Without bringing any deep modifications, when compared to the Radeon HD 4870 recently made available for Mac Pro owners, the Radeon HD 4890 brings an average 10% performance gain. This is mostly achieved by increasing both GPU and memory frequencies. In addition, some early tests have shown that this graphic card can easily and stably be overclocked. Some sites claim to have pushed the GPU fequency to 1 GHz instead of the default 850 MHz. The best news is most probably its price, as it should be around 250 USD. If one can find a way to flash this GPU with the bios from a Mac edition card, the Radeon HD 4890 might also become popular among Mac users, especially for those who do not need the DisplayPort output.
Kena Kai debuts eco-friendly laptop sleeves
Kena Kai has announced FELTtech sleeves, a new line of laptop sleeves made from a fiber that's been created from 100-percent recycled Polyethylene Perepthalate (PET) bottles and containers. Designed initially for 13.3-inch Netbooks and 15.4-inch notebook computers, each sleeve features a wide easy-access zippered opening, and 4mm of cushioned protection to guard against scratches and scrapes. FELT...
Apple drops to number two in reliability
Filed under: Analysis / Opinion, Desktops, Hardware
RescueCom is a company that provides tech support and help from a 1-800 number, and they've released the latest version of their computer reliability report. This thing is actually pretty well done -- it examines just which brands and makes of computers are getting the most support calls, and then compares it to the average US market share for each brand. For example, if XYZ brand computers are getting a lot of calls, but they're also selling like hotcakes, it won't rate quite as high as ABC brand, which is only selling a few computers, almost all of which are breaking down.There's bad news, however, for Apple, in this quarter's report: they've fallen to spot number two. For the overall year of 2008, Apple reigned supreme in terms of reliability. But in the first quarter of this year, Asus and IBM's Lenovo have had their numbers rise above -- both of their shares of the US market are smaller than Apple's 6%, according to this report, but Apple's 2% of calls to RescueCom still means Asus and IBM/Lenovo have them beat in overall reliability. Unfortunately, they don't show us the fun side of the chart: HP/Compaq end up in the fifth spot, but their 17.9% of all the calls to RescueCom is only the fifth most reliable, not the worst.
Apple still probably doesn't have too much to worry about -- as Wired notes, these are only quarterly scores, and don't forget that this is the quarter in which many people were still learning how to use their iPhones, iPod touches, and the App Store. But this might be an early sign that as Apple grows, it'll be tougher for them to guarantee reliability in their products.
TUAWApple drops to number two in reliability originally appeared on The Unofficial Apple Weblog (TUAW) on Thu, 26 Mar 2009 07:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
Apple filing details safe touch-screen navigation system
An interesting but at times erratic patent filing from Apple published for the first time this week describes a proprietary in-car navigation system focused on maintaining driver safety while a vehicle is in motion.
25 Useful Free Mac Apps for Freelancers
As a full-time freelancer and part-time geek, I like to play around and install applications on my Mac. In the following list I share some of the free Mac apps that make my life easier. I also own a PC, so I give my readers who use a PC an alternative for each app.
Eltima's Flash'in'App 2 adds customization options
Eltima Software has released Flash'in'App 2.0, an update to its Cocoa framework that enables developers to load and manage Adobe Flash movies in any application on the Mac. The software will support SWF files, manage their playback, and can handle sounds, videos, and images. The new version provides several added features that allow users to set Flash background color for playback, to customize th...
Apps: iPrint, BannerZest, TextExpander
iPrint 2.0 ($15) allows users to select data within an application that they would like to print. The selection of data can be done through the use of a keyboard shortcut or a popup Dock menu and allows users to print only the material they desire to print. A new Preferences window has been added which allows users to set a default option of always displaying both the Page Setup and Print dialog b...
Little Hoppers Treasure Hunt comes to Mac
Fast Rabbit Software has launched the latest game in its series of educational applications for the Mac, Little Hoppers Treasure Hunt. The game is geared towards students in grades 2-to-5, and designed to introduce kids to two dimensional graphing and the Cartesian coordinate system. While trying help students learn to read and identify points on a graph using the Cartesian coordinate system, the ...
iShoot goes 2.0, adds networked play
Filed under: Gaming, iPhone, App Store
When your simple-yet-addictive tank shooting game blasts its way to the top of the App Store sales charts and earns you a reasonable fraction of a cool million bucks, what do you do for an encore? Developer Ethan Nicholas has released iShoot 2.0, adding much-requested features to the $2.99 artillery battle (the free iShoot Lite remains unchanged).The new version of iShoot (App Store) adds plenty of customization options, including a weapon designer, new rulesets and rule editor, background music -- and a local LAN network play option, allowing you to blast 3 of your friends over WiFi whenever you like. Check it out.
TUAWiShoot goes 2.0, adds networked play originally appeared on The Unofficial Apple Weblog (TUAW) on Wed, 25 Mar 2009 23:45:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
Seagate to Launch its First 2 TB 3.5" HD Soon
Seagate unveiled a new NAS model, the BlackArmor. Beside its performance and its support for up to 4 HDs, specifications indicate that it will soon be available with 8 TB storage space (8 TB = 4 x 2 TB). In other words, Seagate will soon join Western Digital as the second manufacturer of 2 TB HD. It might even be the first 2 TB HD spinning at 7200 rpm, however, there is no define release date.
AMD Will Launch its Radeon HD 4890 on April 2nd
It is on April 2nd that AMD/ATI will officially launch the new flagship, the Radeon HD 4890, which should be immediately available.
Without bringing any deep modifications, when compared to the Radeon HD 4870 recently made available for Mac Pro owners, the Radeon HD 4890 brings an average 10% performance gain. This is mostly achieved by increasing both GPU and memory frequencies. In addition, some early tests have shown that this graphic card can easily and stably be overclocked. Some sites claim to have pushed the GPU fequency to 1 GHz instead of the default 850 MHz. The best news is most probably its price, as it should be around 250 USD. If one can find a way to flash this GPU with the bios from a Mac edition card, the Radeon HD 4890 might also become popular among Mac users, especially for those who do not need the DisplayPort output.
Kena Kai debuts eco-friendly laptop sleeves
Kena Kai has announced FELTtech sleeves, a new line of laptop sleeves made from a fiber that's been created from 100-percent recycled Polyethylene Perepthalate (PET) bottles and containers. Designed initially for 13.3-inch Netbooks and 15.4-inch notebook computers, each sleeve features a wide easy-access zippered opening, and 4mm of cushioned protection to guard against scratches and scrapes. FELT...
Apple drops to number two in reliability
Filed under: Analysis / Opinion, Desktops, Hardware
RescueCom is a company that provides tech support and help from a 1-800 number, and they've released the latest version of their computer reliability report. This thing is actually pretty well done -- it examines just which brands and makes of computers are getting the most support calls, and then compares it to the average US market share for each brand. For example, if XYZ brand computers are getting a lot of calls, but they're also selling like hotcakes, it won't rate quite as high as ABC brand, which is only selling a few computers, almost all of which are breaking down.There's bad news, however, for Apple, in this quarter's report: they've fallen to spot number two. For the overall year of 2008, Apple reigned supreme in terms of reliability. But in the first quarter of this year, Asus and IBM's Lenovo have had their numbers rise above -- both of their shares of the US market are smaller than Apple's 6%, according to this report, but Apple's 2% of calls to RescueCom still means Asus and IBM/Lenovo have them beat in overall reliability. Unfortunately, they don't show us the fun side of the chart: HP/Compaq end up in the fifth spot, but their 17.9% of all the calls to RescueCom is only the fifth most reliable, not the worst.
Apple still probably doesn't have too much to worry about -- as Wired notes, these are only quarterly scores, and don't forget that this is the quarter in which many people were still learning how to use their iPhones, iPod touches, and the App Store. But this might be an early sign that as Apple grows, it'll be tougher for them to guarantee reliability in their products.
TUAWApple drops to number two in reliability originally appeared on The Unofficial Apple Weblog (TUAW) on Thu, 26 Mar 2009 07:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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