Category: Mac

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Stack your Drive Mounts in Leopard

I was looking for a way to get any drives or shared folders I had mounted to show up in my sidebar under Leopard. I mean it is a little cumbersome to move to an empty space, F11, or minimize everything to get to your mounted drives on the desktop. SO, I went looking on the net for a solution.

After looking around a bit I found that there is in fact no way to put mounts into the sidebar in finder. What a bummer…seems like that should be a no brainer on Apple’s part, BUT, fear not, I have a solution that is a close second. Stacks.

That’s right, let’s use the stacks on the dock to show my mounted drives. So I can easily click the icon on the dock and instantly see a list of my drives. Here is how you do it.

Open Finder. Click Go in the menu, and select Go to Folder. A box will open and asking what folder you want. Put in ‘/Volumes’ (no quotes) then click go. Once there, you should see your mounted drives. Click on the column view. Now you should see the Volumes folder. Just click and drag that folder to the area on the dock where your other stacks are/were and there you go. You can now just click on that to see anything mounted like external drives, thumb drives, shared folders.

There you go, hope this help you out!

(Thanks go to MacOSXHints.com)

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iTunes with Podcast support

iTunes 4.9 is available for download now! It supports podcasts out of the box, and I think that this is great for anyone new to the medium.

I installed it and found that it was easy to start building a list of podcasts that I was subscribed to. One notable feature I like is that there are options for what to keep, so that you don’t fill up your harddrive with shows that you are done with or didn’t listen to. Also, it keeps your podcast shows separate from your Library of music. To me that is a awesome. I often loose shows when they are mixed in with the general population, unless the genre is set to “Podcast” or something.

There are a few notable things that I believe could use improving. One is importing of OPML lists, and maybe some smartlist capability, however I think that this is a step in the right direction…

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Linux is likely the big loser in Apple’s Shift?

In this article John Dvorak says that Linux has the most to loose from this apple shift aside from the likes of IBM and Microsoft.

He mentions OSS licensing issues, and people being more prone to switch to a machine that can basically run OSx and Windows as being factors that could detract from Linux’s development. But I don’t exactly agree. I mean, you will still have to purchase an Apple machine, just like today to get to OSX. If that will be the case, then why isn’t it happening now?

Now if OSX was stand alone, like Windows is and ran on Intel for everyone….That would be another story. I could see a mass exodus from MS and Linux for that matter.

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Apple throws the switch, aligns with Intel

Ah, now some more info…
Looks like OSX will only run on x86 Macs, and not just any x86 machine…

Apple throws the switch, aligns with Intel | CNET News.com
…
After Jobs’ presentation, Apple Senior Vice President Phil Schiller addressed the issue of running Windows on Macs, saying there are no plans to sell or support Windows on an Intel-based Mac. “That doesn’t preclude someone from running it on a Mac. They probably will,” he said. “We won’t do anything to preclude that.”

However, Schiller said the company does not plan to let people run Mac OS X on other computer makers’ hardware. “We will not allow running Mac OS X on anything other than an Apple Mac,” he said.

Awww Man!

Update: I started thinking about this whole thing after I posted…I guess this really means that there is no story. So what, OSX will run on Intel, but only Mac with Intel. Big Deal.

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Here is really what happened to Apple.

Marty McFly: What about all that talk about screwing up future events, the space-time continuum?
Dr. Emmett Brown: Well, I figured, what the hell.

Looks like Apple is doing it. They do make great machines…but if I can run OSX on a standard PC why buy a premium Mac x86? Maybe the only hardware they care about is the iPods…and selling software.

I hope this works out for them.

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Me and minime

Ok, I know that I am not the only one to call my Mac mini ..well.. minime. But hey, I did name my iPod “Escape Pod” so I get points there.

I wanted to share some impressions during my first month with the Mac mini. The form factory is a big plus. I have it on my desk right beside my monitor, and it takes up no space to speak of.

I purchased the 1.5g model with 512mb or ram. Performance seems to be very good. I have used it to burn DVDs and iMovie for editing, and it seems to just crank along. It is also very quiet. I have turned off my Linux box, and really only have the Mac on always. I can sit in my small windowless (in more ways than one) office at home, and I can think.

OSX is nice. Linux with Gnome is a lot like it in some ways, so I feel comfortable with it. I like how when I attach a new device to it, you don’t see balloons popping up telling me that there is a new device installed (Well Duh). For example, my DVcam, I hooked it up, couldn’t tell if it was recognized. I opened iMove and it was just there waiting for me. Now, Installing applications are a little different. Most of which you just drag the application into the applications folder. It is odd at first, but makes the machine very easy to manage.

I did install Gimp on it, and I wasn’t quite happy with that. It felt very “Tacked onto OSX”. I get that feeling with the Windows version too, like mouse focus was quirky or something with X. However native OSX apps are awesome. So unless Photoshop for OSX falls out of the sky, There are some things that I will just have to continue do on my Linux box.

So, I see me using it for really anything. I bought it for editing movies primarily, but it has proven to be a great general purpose machine. Very happy with it, and I would recommend it to anyone, especially family.

BTW: iLife is worth the price you paid for the whole machine, and consider a USB, and a Firewire hub.

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Dude, I got a Mac!

So far I likes what I sees.

First off..This thing came all the way from China to Charlotte, NC in 2 days. I got a shipping notice on the Jan 19th and Here it is on the 20th.

I have never really used OSX, except looking at it in the store. It is nicley done. In some ways Linux with Gnome is like it, but OSX, of course is more polished and the interface is a little different.

Garageband is very easy to use, I was throwing together music in no time. I am hoping that the rest of iLife will be the same and I think that it will be.