New life for old friends

I wanted to share an idea I sent to Beth, the lady that wrote about her first Mac, Elcie. I have a great place for people to send such an old an dedicated friend. Like many older, retired people, that older Mac might "enjoy" working with children. Donate it to a local private elementary school (like a Catholic or other religious school). These schools are often underfunded in the technology area and that old Mac will be seen as an extremely valuable asset instead of as an old friend to sit on the shelf collecting dust.

You can then be content that your old Mac will be helping to educate children and brighten their future. Besides, if a child's first school experience is on a Mac, its elegance and ease of use just might be remembered by them when they become full fledged consumers. Also as a side benefit you might be able to use it as a tax write off.

Kevin Halsema afn63855@afn.org

Elcie on My Mac

Hi Beth,
It's 8:20 am Monday in Sydney (Australia), and I'm having my cup of tea while I read my latest My Mac ezine.

I just got to Elcie's story and having finished it with tears in my eyes I felt compelled to write--a combination of the great story as told by a Mac, and the stories within a story about death, despair, sadness and hope.

It touched my heart,
thank you ....

Teena Hughes teena@abfab-australia.com

Mac OS 8.6 Upgrade

The version of Mac OS 8.6 Update which I downloaded from the Apple website seems defective. When I click on the icon a window opens that says "Decoding MacBinary." After that another window opens which says "Sorry. A disk related error -39 has occurred."

Is there something wrong with the Update? It took a very long time to download. I tried downloading it again but with the same results. I tried to get help from Apple Support three times. Once I was told (via telephone that my 90 days support with iMac had expired. The other two times (via email) I got no reply.

I would be grateful for your help.

Dr. Rudolph Masciantonio Rudolphus9@aol.com

Although it's not impossible, I don't believe Apple would have a corrupted update on their website, especially when you learn that thousands of people are successfully downloading the update every week. Assuming you don't really have a rare disk-related error, your update was undoubtedly mangled somewhere during the download.

My guess is that your decompression software isn't dealing with the MacBinary version properly. You might first try downloading the latest version of StuffIt Expander (which is freeware) from any of the numerous software download sites or from http://www.aladdinsys.com, then run your MacBinary download through the mill again. If that doesn't work, try the BinHex version of the Apple update. But if that doesn't work, it might be best to get a CD-based installer. But whatever road leads you to Mac OS 8.6, please do get the update; it's worth the effort.
Russ

eWorld

The original title of AOL was "Apples on Line" It then changed to "Apple link Personal Edition" and then Apple decided it was too expensive. Just a bit of trivia as I beta tested the service for them.

Best regards,
Andy Touchard atouchard@earthlink.net

Opinion of "Pirates of Silicon Valley"

My response to 'The Pirates of Silicon Valley' was "Phenomenal!" It was thoroughly entrancing and visually stunning. It may lack technical details and contain some inaccuracies. But I feel that, instead of being a dry documentary, it implemented well-chosen artistic license to bring alive the people behind the history.

It was cinematic excellence with unique camera techniques and exquisitely selected moments. The mood was instantly established with the captivating opening scene. The parallel created by Steve Jobs' LSD trip and his 'Frisbee Conducting' at the Macintosh party was brilliant. A tentative Bill Gates approaching a glowing Steve Jobs at the Computer Fair set up a perfect reversal for the end. The commentary format was creatively implemented and served as an ideal storytelling framework.

I was astounded by the performances of Noah Wyle and Anthony Michael Hall. They far exceeded my expectations in the depth and detail of their characterizations. The supporting actors were equally exceptional.

The music selection was incredible. The songs chosen encompassed beautifully both the depicted era and the desired mood.

As with any great drama, I was emotionally drawn into the saga. As Steve Jobs was agreeing to lend the Macintosh prototype to Bill Gates, I wanted to scream "No! Don't do it!". And as his temper and antagonism were tearing Apple apart my heart wrenched.

Like a Shakespearean Tragedy, Steve's fatal human flaws lead to his inevitable fall from grace. Yes, I wept at the end. My Macintosh that I love so much...that "better stuff"...was robbed of its deserved place as the triumphant world standard. And, oh, the painful but true words spoken by Bill Gates that it "doesn't matter." I cried for my Mac.

You ask if "The Pirates of Silicon Valley" scored? My answer is a resounding "Yes!".

Megan Garner Meglizar@aol.com

"The Simplest Explanation is Most Often the Correct Explanation"

Bob,
Just read your article about getting your cable modem service going. Phone-tech support nightmare for sure! I'm waiting for either cable modem or DSL service around here...

Anyway, I mean absolutely no offence by this... In my nonprofessional trouble shooting experiences for computers, audio equipment, etc. there is a pearl of wisdom I have: The simplest explanation is most often the correct explanation. Following this, the AppleTalk Control Panel would have been the very first thing I checked.

Sincerely,
David Crandon dcrandon@loop.com

David,
Thanks for writing. I really appreciate you taking the time to do so. I agree with your assesment. It is usually the simplest things that can really mess you up. I guess it truly was a situation that I "couldn't see the forest for the trees" kind of situation. When every tech rattled on about this "known problem" I was relying on their experience.

And of course no offence taken. I felt really silly for not checking it in the first place. Ironically, when I got the call back the next day from the techs that had helped me, their comment was that they were working on another Mac and had almost changed the exact same setting on that person's Mac. Another caller would have been on the phone with @home and would have had a similar experience as myself.

Luckily for me and other Mac clients, the techs realized their error and were caring enough to call me right then and the confusion could end. I figured that I would solve it with some more experienced friends. (Though I'm glad I saved that embarrassing moment of realization that the AppleTalk Control Panel was the problem. ;-)

And it would have been nice if someone at @home would have actually tried to troubleshoot with me from the basics instead of assuming and jumping to the conclusion it was this one "known problem."

Thanks again for writing. :-)
Bob McCormick

@Home

I too had problems when I had TCI @home installed. It seems everyone thought it wasn't sync-ing but then thought the problem was a bad node in my area somewhere. The original people who installed the software were not Mac-experienced but knew enough to get by and it didn't bother them at all that I used Netscape and not IE.

After about 10 days of calling the @home service people (all of which were very friendly) I eventually called one night at about 2am and was able to talk to a supervisor who along with another service person were able to solve my problem. Aside from the occasional software freeze up with the @home Netscape, I have been blazing along.

Downloaded 8.6 in about 2 minutes and the new QuickTime in about 5 minutes. I was getting upward of 135.0 kbps. That's not a typo: 135.0 kbps!!!! I don't know about you but that's about 30 times the speed of my old 56k internal. On top of that they credited me 1 month free due to tech problems I was having and my installation was free also because a friend of mine had a mailer for free installation!

They arrived on time and the only real complaint I had was when we called the original techs who installed it and originally told us it should be up within 48 hours, we asked him to send in a repair order that day and he hung up on us. He was a contractor and the @home service people were very unhappy about his lack of care and apologized profusely. So far I have been very happy with the service once it was up and running.

Jeff M jeffysan5@yahoo.com

Jeff, I've heard from several @home users and found that inconsistency is the theme. Some users call one time and get great, thoughtful service. And the next get service that borders on abuse. Frustrating. Actually I think that part of this comes from so many partners that the @home has. So many different cable companies, so many different franchises and as you point out subcontractors too. It is hard to keep things consistent.

Yes, the speed of my modem is quite amazing! I'm regularly downloading at 80 to 110 k a second. And I've even seen it go as high as 178. WOW!

It really makes the Internet a much more useable tool. It really does bring about a different "paradigm" if you will. With my access on all the time. I can check and send email much more easily. I can download files without the fear of being "disconnected" if it takes a long time.

Slowly but surely I think these access problems will iron themselves out. And if they don't the next big thing will be some other form of connection to the net.

Who knows. Our grandkids may someday laugh behind our backs when we talk fondly of 135k a second with our cable modems. ;-)

All the best,
Bob McCormick

Seti article

Thanks for an interesting article... My historical background is identical to yours. Thus I could really relate with the interest that you sparked in your article. I have now logged over 150 hours of analysis (code name Pooh) and I did not see any spikes or other patterns.

Please note that there is a version 1.05 of the SETI program, I downloaded it yesterday. To install it, you reinstall on top of old version: nothing could be simpler.

The race is on... Who will get the first call from E.T. from his home?

Regards,

Patrick Meratp@aol.com

Thanks for the note, Patrick! Yup, I also downloaded the new SETI recently, though I now see a version 1.06 will be out very soon. Glad it is not a large download :-) I did read that some people were having problems with the older version, but it worked perfectly (as did 1.05) on my machine.