BT210 Bluetooth USB Printer Adapter
Company: BlueTake Technology
Price: $99.00 (US)
http://www.bluetake.com
Bluetake Technology’s new BT210 Bluetooth USB Printer Adapter is a handy little device that adds remote printing from Bluetooth-enabled devices. What this means is, you can print from your PDA, Mobile Phone/Camera or laptop without having to tether yourself to your printer with an ungainly USB wire.
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Remember all the excitement back in January? Apple sites were abuzz with the semi official rumors of a killer promotion involving Pepsi, the ultimate promotion company. The deal was going to become a competition killer. All the lesser online music vendors were going to be over run by the tsunami-size wave of teenagers rushing to purchase Pepsi bottles. Well, a funny thing happened of the way to glory, the promotion fizzled for a lack of carbonation.
On closer examination it was a classic case of Apple hype and Pepsi’s secret penny-pinching. Apple, a company who normally quashes all rumors with legal threats let the promotional rumors fly. After all, the best advertising is always free. Pepsi, looking at theoretically huge financial bill, knew they had to limit their liability. To avoid writing a huge check, Pepsi looked at their slowest-selling bottle product, the 20-ounce single. In addition, they also knew that a lower potential number of iTunes users would purchase this size. The foundation was set by the beverage maker for a controlled promotion that would limit their financial liability over the short term.
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Concord EyeQ 3341z Digital Camera
Company: Concord Camera Corp
Price: $180 US (approximate street price)
http://www.concord-camera.com
We began receiving favorable promotional announcements and press releases for this new brand of digital still camera during the recent Las Vegas Photo Marketing Association show, so we decided to follow up and spend a few weeks with Concord’s entry level unit, the Concord EyeQ 3341z.
The physical camera is very small and light, with well-located controls and menu options. Its high-impact plastic case at first felt flimsy, but now I’m used to it, with no serious gripes except for a rubberized cover over the USB port, similar to many digital cameras from different manufacturers.
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GarageBand. The name alone conjures up images of untalented high schoolers banging away at instruments with their fathers grumbling about “all that noise” coming from what was once his exclusive domain. That’s not to say that many of the best and most popular bands today didn’t start out that way. However, most bands that begin in this fashion come to an inglorious end. The guys (let’s be honest, most are guys) in these bands with names that are notoriously badly spelled on purpose do this as a rule to meet young girls in hopes of a mutual understanding. The understanding is that the girls will feed their egos and hopefully remove articles of clothing. What the girls get out of this deal is a mystery to me and I freely admit that I don’t understand the way woman think and probably never will. Well, let’s not go off on THAT tangent. I think I was talking about GarageBand.
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Quicken 2004 for Macintosh OS-X
Company: Intuit
Price: $69.95 retail
http://www.intuit.com/
In my review of the MacWorld trade show earlier this year, I took a cheap shot at Intuit and Quicken, basically saying that Quicken 2004 was a release to forget. I said on initial use, there were serious problems using the new software that may leave some users stuck at Quicken 2003. But as it turns out, this problem only affects a small percentage of the existing users (like me), so I decided to take a second, closer look. Perhaps the ugly work-around may be worth the time. Stick with me here as I am writing this as I investigate
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In the past several years, I’ve interviewed teachers, poets, cartoonists, Mac evangelists, software developers, singers/composers, military advisors, reporters and people in various different lines of work. The one thing in common for all of them was their love of their Mac.
Today’s interview is no different. The line of work is something new and different, but again, the love of the Mac is still there. Now I’m familiar with DJ’s but VJ’s… that’s a new one on me. So sit back, relax; put your feet up as I get up close with Melissa Ulto, VJ.
My Mac: Melissa, welcome to My Mac. I guess the best way to start our interview is for you to explain to the readers what exactly a VJ is and what he/she does.
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Altec Lansing MX5021 2.1 Speaker System
Company: Altec Lansing
Price: $199.95
http://www.alteclansing.com
As the resident speaker reviewer here at MyMac.com, I have the opportunity to listen to a bevy of different speakers, but that has far from made me a jaded reviewer. In fact, I absolutely love opening the box FedEx or UPS drops off to find a new pair of speakers ready to be tested.
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Gamers who can’t get enough card games, inventive simulations, and monkeys (Yes, I said monkeys), should take a three hour tour over to Freeverse Software and check out the news section for information on the game that will take the Mac gaming community by storm (or at least a brief period of precipitation)! After a wait of a few years, Freeverse Software is coming out with the sequel to its popular game “Wingnuts”. It’s called (in a fit of originality), “Wingnuts 2”.
For those of you who have never played the original, its concept is very similar to the 80s vintage arcade game “Time Pilot”. This top scroller starts you off on an aircraft carrier and you’re soon doing battle with hordes of other planes and ground based units in league with Baron von Schtopwatch. The nasty Baron has lots of tricks up his sleeve, including cannons, dirigibles, floating air bombs, and vintage fixed wing planes. If you manage to beat his nefarious minions, he sends his big bad boss plane (of course he does) to try and finish the job. Once you finish off the Boss Plane, it’s back to the carrier for some R and R. This doesn’t last long, and soon it’s back up in the air to fight the next wave.
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The Best of The Joy of Tech
Nitrozac and Snaggy
Publisher: O’Reilly and Associates
ISBN: 0-596-00578-4
Page Count: 192
Rating: 4/5
I must be crazy; I was flamed so badly after my last review of a cartoon book (published on a much less friendly site) that I had to replace my asbestos review suit. ‘The Best of Joy of Tech‘ may be worth the risk.
Of course it’s easy to enjoy a cartoon book by a pair of cartoonists that share your prejudices. It is obvious from the cartoons that Nitrozac and Snaggy are Macintosh loving, Linux leaning, Microsoft loathing geeks. Hmmm, sounds like me.
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with help from David Weeks
Detour Laptop Case
Company: Timbuk2
Price: $100.00
http://www.timbuk2.com
It is with some irony we finally present our review of Timbuk2’s versatile Detour laptop case. Mark Dwight, company CEO, provided an attractive red Detour bag at last January’s San Francisco Macworld Expo. This was the first item we received for evaluation at the conference, and it’s one of the last to be written about here in MyMac.com. We hope the wait was worthwhile.
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USB 8-LED Flex Light
Company: IOGEAR
Price: $20
http://www.iogear.com
I’m using it now. Dark outside, low light in my office. Far end of Flex inserted into USB port on my iMac’s keyboard. Business end tilted at strange angle so maximum quantity of light falls onto the keyboard. Wish I could show you a photograph of this peculiar contraption at work, but no image does the trick.
I always set switch on top to highest illumination, with all eight LEDs active. Lower level has four active, which is almost useless. Best feature is OFF position, because otherwise Flex would be on whenever iMac is running, even in daylight. How many hours/days/years will Flex Light keep running? Should be quite a few, but for $20 US we can’t be too demanding.
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Seems the Wall Street Journal (Paid subscription required) is about two months behind in the times. They are reporting that users are returning the in-ear headphones at a high rate. (Thanks to MacMinute.com for the link.)
As it seems this is once again a hot topic, we are reposting this article from January 29th. Feel free to post your comments below the article.
Apple’s new In-Ear Headphones Quality Problem?
Not that I am any sort of investigative reporter, but I do happen to speak to a few people who work for Apple and Apple dealers. One such person has reported to me that the recently released Apple In-Ear headphones, retailing for US$39.00, are being returned at an alarming rate. The reason? They sound horrible.
It is getting increasingly more difficult to find links to other Mac related websites. More and more, or perhaps less and less is a more appropriate term, the Mac websites out there seem reluctant to link to other Mac websites. There was a time when almost every Mac website had a links page, a dedicated place to find links to other Macintosh resources on the Internet. One such place is MacPicks, be sure to check them out as well!
While there are specialty Mac linking websites out there to find new Mac related news items or stories, such as our friends at the super-popular MacSurfers Headline News, there is very few places to find static links, with a description of what the site offers. We here at MyMac.com aim to change that.
Since this will be a continuously updated list, I have broken the links up into sub-pages. Simply click the category below for links to those websites that fall under that category. There are some websites, which defy a single classification, such as MacObserver.com, which offer reviews, news, and commentary, so you will find those listed multiple times.
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Rocport 4 Portable FireWire/USB 2.0 Hard Drive
Company: Rocstor
Price: $225.00
http://www.rocstor.com
What is this company? Where did they come from? Why didn’t I know about them until the final hour of the last day of Macworld 2004 Expo, last January?
At the end of an obscure aisle, far from the commotion at many better-known popular hardware vendors, I encountered Tom, employee #1 at Rocstor. He was enthusiastic about the opportunity to have his stylish, versatile products reviewed in MyMac.com, and posed for a portrait.
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by John Nemerovski, with help from David Weeks
BOOQ PowerSleeve 12
Company: BOOQ
Price: $45
http://www.booqbags.com/Detail.bok?no=18
During the last hour of the ultimate day at January’s San Francisco Macworld Expo I was finally able to examine an exciting new line of PowerBook and iBook computer cases by a company with an intriguing name and clever logo. The BOOQ booth was so crowded during my previous attempts that I was worried there would be no more laptop sleeves for MyMac.com to investigate. Founder, CEO, and designer Thorsten Trotzenberg gave me two very different items to review.
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SpamSieve 2.1.2
Company: Michael’s Macintosh Software (By Michael Tsai)
Price: $24 US (Downloadable only)
http://www.c-command.com/spamsieve/
The one major problem that I’ve had with my email program, PowerMail, is that the spam filters just don’t do the job as well as I would like them to. When one has to set up multiple folders of spam addresses to keep them from inundating my mailboxes constantly, it’s time to find something that really works without constantly having to make adjustments and enter data.
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PowerMail 4.2.1
Company: CTM Development
Price: $49 US, $149 US for 5-user license
http://www.ctmdev.com
When I first started using a Mac, one of the first things I did was run out and buy myself Claris Emailer that quickly became my email program of choice. I continued to use Emailer until 1998 when time, OS changes and a definite lack of interest on Apple’s part caused me to part ways with a terrific program. I checked around and found PowerMail 2.0.3 by CTM Development and I have continued to use PowerMail as my primary email program ever since.
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We don’t usually quote Sir Bill on this site, but it is obvious that he has been reading my articles concerning the idea that computer hardware will be almost free in a few years. Either that, or he recently came back from a weekend think-fest where he was mining the thoughts and ideas of others, who have probably been reading my articles. =)
This is what Bill said about computer hardware:
“Ten years out, in terms of actual hardware costs you can almost think of hardware as being free.” – Sir Bill Gates. Here is the link.
Another thinker reported that Intel is ceasing to use speed as an effective tool to sell their computer chips, because they are already so fast and powerful it doesn’t matter anymore.
“When Intel said last week that it plans to stop using gigahertz figures to market its microprocessors, analysts said it was about time. A chip’s clock speed is almost irrelevant in determining the overall performance of a computer.” – Amit Asaravala. Here is the link.
So this means that Apple’s Cash Cow is dying. Their main business and their profit is hardware. Computer hardware, not just neat gadgets like the iPod and the iPod mini.
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MyMac Podcast #385
MyMac Podcast #384