Why I’m still not interested in the MacBook Air
Posted on May 4, 2008
Filed Under Macintosh | 2 Comments
Om just posted his impressions of the Lenovo ThinkPad x300 on GigaOm.
He linked to a funny Lenovo video which shows exactly why I have absolutely no desire whatsoever to buy a MacBook Air, even if I had an extra $2000 burning a hole in my pocket (which I don’t):
My 2.33 GHz 15″ MacBook Pro is starting to get creaky and it’s barely 18 months old. I’m on it for so many hours a day, some of the printing on the keys are worn away.
If I was able to replace this machine right now, I don’t think I’d buy another MacBook Pro as Apple currently offers them. It’s heavy and bulky.
The Air’s footprint is too big and it requires way too many compromises for someone who wants to use just one computer and not buy it to supplement a desktop machine.
I would probably look at a top-of-the-line MacBook first, as the form factor/weight is a little closer to what I want, and it’s still a performance upgrade over my current 2.33 GHz machine.
My dream portable:
- Mac OS X as its primary operating system
- 4 lbs. or less
- at least 4 GB RAM
- High performance CPU, whatever the flavor of the month is…I can never tell the difference between chips
- at least 200 GB hard drive. I want to keep everything I need with me without worrying about carrying external drives to get to essential data (but use external drives as well as online services for backups).
- 13″ display and the form factor to match. I don’t necessarily need a full size keyboard, but not a cramped one either
- CD/DVD drive. Doesn’t have to burn anything, just want to install software and play movies.
- at least 4 USB ports, Ethernet, external video port and external audio port. That’s it. I don’t care about Firewire or PCMCIA.
- Built-in EVDO modem
- At least 3 hours battery life (in reality, not what the manufacturer says)
Sad thing is, I think I could probably find this machine if I didn’t insist on the “OS X” part. This Sony VAIO gets pretty close. I have no desire to go back to Windows fulltime, certainly not to Vista.
Maybe the Blackberry 9000 doesn’t want to be an iPhone killer
Posted on March 30, 2008
Filed Under Internet & Technology, Macintosh, mobility | 3 Comments
I’m beginning to drool over the upcoming Blackberry 9000, now that it seems to be a reality.
It has everything I already love about my Blackberry 8800, plus wifi, a faster network and a camera. I know that rumors also say iPhone is due for an upgrade later this year to AT&T’s faster 3G network.
Some of the Mac press refuse to see what’s attractive about the Blackberry over the iPhone, like this tidbit from MacDailyNews:
“Uh oh, RIM shareholders. If this is all RIM’s got, you guys and gals might want to quickly add “former” ahead of that suddenly scary description of one of your portfolio positions, as it’s now painfully obvious that RIM has learned nothing in the past 15 or so months since Apple unveiled the iPhone,” SteveJack writes.
“It’s the same old, same old in an iPhone-inspired wrapper. And that should fail to inspire much confidence in RIM,” SteveJack writes.
MDN is an extreme example because it’s a site where Steve Jobs can rob a bank at gunpoint and they’ll turn it around into a positive message for humanity, but it’s become typical to measure the Blackberry by an iPhone standard.
Some of us genuinely enjoy our Blackberrys for what they are, not as some sort of second fiddle to the iPhone. If I wanted an iPhone, I would have bought one. Sleek design can only take you so far.
I’m relieved that RIM is staying true to its focus on functionality first and foremost. Given a choice, I think I may still choose Blackberry when both companies roll out their new devices in a few months. When I want to use my phone to update Twitter or send an email, I’m thinking of the message, not the tool. I think the iPhone’s awkward keyboard will always be a barrier for me. We’ll see what happens when I have the opportunity to walk into an AT&T store later in the spring and (hopefully) hold both devices.
When it comes to technology, in my opinion, the best design quickly gets out of the way and doesn’t have to try too hard. This is why I still feel that the MacBook Air is an interesting proof-of-concept but will fail long term unless there is more thinking towards functionality than just being “impossibly thin.” Maybe it was impossible for a reason.
Frankly, If RIM can adapt the browser on a Blackberry to work better with “iPhone enhanced” sites, that may be all it takes for me to stick with their devices and never look back.
Trouble in the AIR
Posted on March 28, 2008
Filed Under Internet & Technology, Macintosh | Leave a Comment
After extensive searching, I can’t believe I’m the only person who is having trouble getting Adobe AIR apps to recognize my default browser.
My default browser (Mac OS X 10.4.11 Tiger) is an Intel-optimized build of Firefox 2.0.0.12, aka “BonEcho” that a guy named Neil Lee is nice enough to whip up for us Mac folks.
Why not regular Firefox 2? BonEcho has some configuration tweaks which make it run a tad smoother on Macs. It also contains pretty form widgets. If you’ve ever seen the ugly form buttons on a Mac running Firefox 2, you know what I’m talking about.
But wait, you say, Firefox 3 beta 4 is optimized to run smoothly on Macs and has pretty form widgets! I know, I know. I tried it for a while. Not stable enough for me yet. Too many crashes and it was especially buggy with the Remember the Milk plug-in that I now heavily rely on. Not to mention how much I hate the heavy default Mac theme. Why do Mac windows have to be so dark and dreary?
So back to AIR… My favorite Twitter client is Twhirl, written on Adobe AIR. I’ve tried many other clients, including Twitterific, and this one just feels right to me.
BonEcho is set as my default browser system-wide, and every application that has a click-through link doesn’t have a problem with this and opens the link as expected. Except for AIR ones.
Every time I click a link in Twhirl, I get this:
“Close Firefox: A copy of Firefox is already open. Only one copy of Firefox can be open at a time.”
If I close Firefox (BonEcho) and click a link, same problem.
The problem happens with other AIR applications I use (such as the outstanding Google Analytics app), too. So it’s not an issue with the individual app. I have an email in to Adobe, but I’m curious if anyone had any ideas to make this work.
I know it may be related to an invisible .parentlock file. However, as soon as I delete that file and try and click another link it comes right back. The problem is AIR.
If Word, Excel, Zinio, Text Wrangler, etc. can recognize that a hyperlink should open in BonEcho without complaining about it, so should AIR.
When tech support rocks
Posted on March 16, 2008
Filed Under Macintosh, Salesforce | 4 Comments
Last week I complained about the nightmare that is calling Verizon. Now I want to blog about what it’s like when tech support is done right.
First, Apple Computer. Apple has always had a reputation for really good tech support, and it’s still well-earned.
I had been having trouble with my CD/DVD drive for a while now. Sometimes DVDs would just stall in the middle. More often, I started having difficulty copying files. I’ve hired photographers for our events who send me files on DVD. I couldn’t copy the data. I would begin the copy, and it would estimate really long times to complete (1-2 hours for 1 GB), and the Finder would typically get stuck in the middle, with no disk activity. If I tried to cancel the transfer after it wasn’t moving for a while, the entire Finder would crash. After this happened with 3 different CD/DVDs, (restarting many times in between) and those disks worked just fine on other computers, I called SOS-APPL under AppleCare on Friday.
Compared to calling Verizon, the experience of calling Apple is great from the first moment. The voice recognition actually works and is quick and easy to navigate. I only had to tell the computer which device I was calling about, and whether I was calling from a school and I was right in the queue. The friendly bot-voice told me accurately how long I could expect to be on hold.
I wish I remembered the CSR’s name, because he was outstanding. Easy to understand, friendly, and very competent. He never once talked to me like I was an idiot. We talked about what could and could not be causing the problem, and what it would involve if it was a hardware issue with the drive that needed to be repaired by Apple. He suggested that I might fix the problem by resetting the SMC. I heard about this, but didn’t realize that it could help CD drive issues. He patiently walked me through shutting the computer down, removing the battery and power supply and holding the power button down for 15 seconds. Then put the battery back and restart. Sure enough, it worked! The same CD that just wouldn’t complete a copy of data before now smoothly moved 1.5GB of data in about 5 minutes.
Next, it’s a shout out for AppExtremes, and in particular Mark Whiteside, the company’s COO. AppExtremes makes a product called CongaMerge which automates mail merges through Salesforce.
Out of the box, you can easily create a report in Salesforce, run it out to Excel and then in to Word for a mail merge. In addition to having to execute all those steps, you also have no easy way to leave an activity entry on records. If you want to run a letter leaving an activity entry (to log that the letter was done), you have to do it one-at-a-time for each record. With CongaMerge, you can create mail merges for multiple records in a couple of clicks, leaving an activity log on each record. Even better, while the initial templates are best set up on a PC, the merges can be run to Word or PDF from any platform, including Mac.
I played with the demo of CongaMerge months ago, but never had a strong case to purchase it. AppExtremes offers a 50% discount for nonprofits ($72 per user per year, minimum 3 users). I have a specific need now where CongaMerge is essential and well worth the $216 annual cost.
I wrote Mark a note, as my demo had long expired. Not only did Mark get back to me quickly on a Saturday afternoon (I would have been fine waiting until Monday, but I was still glad to hear from him), not only did he quickly enable the full version after I said we were ready to buy, but he realized based on something I wrote in an email that I was making something more difficult than it needed to be. He called me this afternoon to catch me before I spent too much time going down the wrong path (yes, it’s Sunday but I answered my work # anyway). We ended up having a great conversation, complete with GoToMeeting session to get things set up exactly as it should be.
Talk about going the extra mile for a customer. Thanks, Mark!
MailPlane
Posted on February 24, 2008
Filed Under Macintosh | 1 Comment
Now that I’m living my email life under the Google umbrella, I’ve fallen in love with MailPlane.
MailPlane is a Mac OS X desktop application for Gmail. I know what you’re thinking…$25 for a dedicated Google email browser? I can load Gmail or my Google apps page in any browser for free. I can get my email via POP or IMAP for free. Why Mailplane?
- While Google has IMAP access, with 4 accounts and some large mailboxes I found Mail.app to be unreliable. Searches were slow, crashes were frequent. It would have been more reliable had I used POP to get my mail, but I wanted to keep read states in sync between the Google browser and email client.
- I have 5 Google email accounts that I regularly check, including one @gmail.com address. Bouncing around browser tabs is a pain in the butt. This is especially true for addresses in the same domain, requiring me to sign in and out each time. With MailPlane, I can keep all accounts signed in at the same time and switch back and forth easily. That alone was worth the fee, but wait, there’s more…
- I can use Apple’s Address Book for email addresses.
- MailPlane is tons faster and more flexible than any email client for searching. It’s the browser version of Gmail, after all.
- Drag & drop attachments. Images are automatically optimized.
- Growl notifications and a clean, handy menu bar icon.
- mailto: links direct to MailPlane, not Mail.
I prefer a desktop client for email and couldn’t get used to doing all my email in browser tabs. MailPlane gives me the best of both worlds.
