MacShrine

It appears that Apple has joined the BAPCo benchmarking consortium. BAPCo produce the industry-standard SYSmark and MobileMark benchmarking tools. The SYSmark and MobileMark benchmarks are used as performance tests by media outlets, corporations, and government agencies worldwide. Apple commonly uses SYSmark to benchmark Dells against PowerMacs. So what does this mean? Well it seems that Apple could be planning Windows support with Mac OS X 10.5. By developing drivers to run Windows accurately on their Mactels, Apple has a fair benchmark platform for the future Intel-powered PowerMacs as well as the MacBook Pro. Bare in mind this could be just for internal benchmark use, but the “Chameleon” technology mentioned briefly last week would fit in with the idea of a Mac “changing its Leopard spots” to run Windows.

Apple today announced that Avadis “Avie” Tevanian (Chief Software Technology Officer) is leaving to pursue other interests. Tevanian joined Apple in 1997 as senior vice president of Software Engineering. Tevanian’s last day with Apple is March 31st. “He’s leaving the company to pursue other interests and plans to take some time off in the interim,” said Apple spokeswoman Katie Cotton. “We thank him for his many accomplishments.” Lately Avie has been leading the Mac OS X team, thinking up and creating the many innovations we now take for granted. So does this mean Apple has 3 days of innovation left? Hopefully not… Anyway, we wish him luck with whatever these “interests” are!

This evening I was delighted to find Chax had come out of beta. It’s such a cool little plugin that boosts iChat above it’s current “I’m a little sucky app” level. Instantly from the image above, you’ll be thrilled to see the addition of tabs! There is a “Log Viewer” to view your chat history. Other minor additions include auto-reply and buddy list customizing. All in all, just download the thing! Chax is “Universal” and freeware.

Echoing France’s recent ban on DRM, it now seems that Denmark is to follow and also ban DRM. Reportedly, Maersk and the Denmark’s largest telecommunications company, TDC, are speaking out in favor of such an action. Maersk and TDC are not only two of largest companies in Denmark, but they are amongst the largest and most powerful in Europe. Both also operate online music ventures. Gert Rieder, CEO of TDC, said that “We can only press for something like the French, because it gives the consumers as many opportunities to shop for music.” In Denmark it is currently illegal to circumvent DRM. Brian Mikkelsen, the Danish Minister of Culture, said that legislation addressing the matter would be introduced in 2007. He expressed optimism that DRM interoperability would be backed by the various record labels. Goodbye iTunes Denmark?

Lots of people moving up and down. The only new entry this week is “Ms. New Booty”. Why can’t the US public have better music taste…

United States Top 10 Songs:

1. Bad Day - Daniel Powter
2. Unwritten - Natasha Beddingfield
3. Temperature - Sean Paul
4. Move Along - All American Rejects
5. Beep - The Pussycat Dolls
6. You’re Beautiful - James Blunt
7. So Sick - Ne-Yo
8. Ms. New Booty - Bubba Sparxxx
9. I’m N Luv (Wit A Stripper) - T-Pac
10. Everytime We Touch - Cascada

Reliable sources have informed MacOSXRumors.com that Apple is developing virtualisation software that could be added to Apple’s next major release of Mac OS X, Leopard. The technology will allow users to create and run virtual machines with Mac OS X, Linux or Windows on any Intel-based Mac. The software, which is said to be code-named “Chameleon”, will be made available in “Client” and “Server” versions. The Client version will have similar features to Virtual PC and will be included with Leopard Client while the Server version will act as a virtualisation server and will come with Leopard Server. Apple may also sell the solution separately just as it currently sells Apple Remote Desktop. Sources also claim that Apple is developing the technology hand in hand with partners such as Intel and Microsoft. They don’t know if Apple’s software will be compatible with Intel’s virtualisation technology announced last year but the possibility that Apple’s software becomes inter-operable with Virtual PC and VMWare has been mentioned. Also they don’t know if Apple will use Rosetta technology so as to make the creation of PowerPC based virtual machines possible. So basically “Chameleon” is Apple’s VMWare.

This is pretty cool as it is the first keyboard to integrate a universal iPod dock into its design. This allows for easy synchronization and charging of all iPods without the hassle of additional wiring. The keyboard also comes with a line-out for audio peripheral plug-ins, two USB ports for convenient peripheral plug-ins and a gold-plated USB connector for optimal conductivity. The gently sloping wrist rest gives way to an ergonomic design and its pure white exterior paired with blue-white ambient keyboard backlight combines to create a clean, minimalist design. Should be available in April from Razer Pro. No pricing has been announced yet.

Right, its time for a bit of back-slapping. We need to rouse the troops, stand firm, and let them know we mean business. Who? You may ask… What? You may ask… The answer’s simple - Windows is seriously badly written and its ubiquitousness is having a seriously negative impact on the progression of humanity.

OK, so that should get the juices flowing in the lot of you: either you’re fired up and agree that something has to be done, or you’re fired up and reacting to that gross generalisation. So, what I need to do now is prove to you why this is the case - why Windows is so badly written, and why we need to remove it from ours and everyone else’s lives.

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To be honest I was quite looking forward to Vista’s release in November. Windows chief Jim Allchin said on Tuesday that Microsoft still plans next quarter to launch a broader test version of Vista, with the new version to be tested by about 2 million people. Microsoft had hoped to have a massive marketing push around Vista and Office 2007, which is slated for the second half of this year. It is not immediately clear how the delay will affect those plans. Will Mac OS X 10.5 “Leopard” get released before Vista?

French lawmakers approved an online copyright bill Tuesday that would require Apple to break open the exclusive format behind its market-leading iTunes music store and iPod players. The draft law - which also sets new penalties for music pirates - would force Apple, Sony and others to share proprietary copy-protection technologies so that rivals can offer compatible services and players. That would permit consumers for the first time to download music directly to their iPods from stores other than iTunes, or to rival music players from iTunes France. Lawmakers voted 296-193 to approve the bill. The legislation now has to be debated and voted by the Senate - a process expected to begin in May. It seems most likely that Apple will withdraw iTunes from France rather than open up it’s FairPlay technology. I want an open iTunes too!

All iPod video owners must be disappointed with the really crap 2 hour (continious movie playback) battery life. The iLov (pictured left) can boost your iPod’s battery life dramatically attached to the bottom of the iPod. The i603 can extend the battery life to 42 hours, and the i604 can extend the battery life to up to 55 hours. The batteries comes with a silicon skin cover to protect your precious iPod from scratches. For those worried about the added bulkiness, when attached the iPod just a bit thicker than the 4G. Also you iPod nano users, don’t feel left out - they’ve made one for you too. The i602 and i601 models extend the battery life on your Nano to 56 hours and 36 hours. Shame they don’t support us “older” users…

This image has been floating around for some time, just thought I’d post it if you hadn’t seen it before. This is a sketch of the proposed Apple Store to be built in Boston. If it was built, it’d be awesome!

No big changes this week, just Daniel Powter swapping to first place with Ne-Yo. The American chart isn’t that interesting this week…

United States Top 10 Songs:

1. Bad Day - Daniel Powter
2. So Sick - Ne-Yo
3. Unwritten - Natasha Beddingfield
4. Temperature - Sean Paul
5. You’re Beautiful - James Blunt
6. Beep - The Pussycat Dolls
7. I’m N Luv (Wit A Stripper) - T-Pac
8. Move Along - All American Rejects
9. Everytime We Touch - Cascada
10. Shake That - Eminem

Apple quietly posted a new iPod nano advert on their site just before the weekend started. It features CD albums morphing into buildings and forming a city and features the slogan “1000 Songs In Your Pocket” a throwback to the original iPod ad. It’s available in HD and iPod formats. A nice change from the dancing ads, well done Apple.

The iTunes Store is now offering their first movie up for sale. “High School Musical” is available (US-only) for $9.99. The only question to ask is why you would spend that much on a really bad Disney Channel movie in really bad resolution. At least this confirms what we thought, Apple is gearing up to sell movies! Let’s just hope Apple wasn’t using this to test demand…

So finally after around 3 years of planning, developing and then re-developing Microsoft is set to launch their “most advanced” operating system - Microsoft Vista, in November. This blog post at MSDN shows off some of the new features which I suppose are ‘nice’ in Microsoft terms, however the new rounded start button is rather horrid. It will be interesting to see what Apple has instore with Leopard in early 2007. Also, I just noticed - does this mean the Origami devices are already out of date? Mwhahahaha.

Sorry it’s late, we had a rather hectic weekend. New entries this week include “Beep” and “King Without A Crown”. “Unwritten” seems to have jumped up thanks to Ayla singing it on Idol last week.

United States Top 10 Songs:

1. So Sick - Ne-Yo
2. Bad Day - Daniel Powter
3. Unwritten - Natasha Beddingfield
4. You’re Beautiful - James Blunt
5. Temperature - Sean Paul
6. Beep - The Pussycat Dolls
7. I’m N Luv (Wit A Stripper) - T-Pac
8. Shake That - Eminem
9. King Without A Crown - Matisyahu
10. Everytime We Touch - Cascada

AppleInsider reports that Apple is set to host a special event around April 1st for their 30th birthday celebrations. They say:

While the company’s precise plans are shrouded in secrecy as usual, sources are almost certain the event will play host to a new line of 13″ widescreen consumer iBook notebooks based on Intel microprocessors. Additional announcements such as a high-end 17″ MacBook Pro and a high-profile iPod-related product may also be in the cards.

Microsoft has finally announced details of it’s “Origami” project. The project, now named UMPC (Ultra Mobile PC), was revealed at the CeBIT conference in Germany. The image above shows the first 3 UMPCs that will be released by Samsung, ASUS, and Founder. They all feature a 7″ touchscreen, 40GB harddrive, 512MB memory, Windows XP Tablet Edition and an Intel Celeron M processor. They are expected to retail for $699-999 starting late April. I would wait for the 2nd generation however because these only feature 2.5 hour battery life.

Another of our favourite ‘little’ apps. ImageWell is a popular image editing software for quick manipulation and uploading to an iDisk (.mac account), FTP server or other web server. Whether you are adding images to your documents, editing offline images, or posting photos to the web for others to see, ImageWell will do the work for you. Drag images in and out of the well, resize, crop, shape, rotate and add a watermark, border, or drop shadow. No need to launch multiple applications to add text, labels, arrows, circles and squares to your image. The latest version is Universal so now anybody can enjoy this little app!

Apple today made some changes to the iTunes store. They introduced a “multi-pass” system to pre-purchase upcoming episodes of daily TV shows a month in advance. The new system will automatically download new shows as they are aired. The shows downloaded still have the same FairPlay DRM, so they’ll never ‘expire’ to play. For example you can buy 16 new episodes for one month at $9.99, which is quite a large discount. It’s currently US-only, but hopefully the rumors of the video store spreading to other countries will turn out to be true. Apple is also expected to add some new functionality to podcasts, mainly allowing users to purchase special podcasts or subscribe to them by in sets of a week or month.

I’ve been commenting on Apple and Mac OS X for a few years now. I switched to Apple back in… ah, well… a few years ago now. Back when Apple were putting out public betas of the first version of OS X (little aside: if you or anyone you know ever comments about the sluggishness of OS X, please go and check out the original public beta of OS X and compare it to the loveliness that is 10.4 Tiger. You won’t complain again). So I’ve written a fair amount covering Apple’s chequered past in the last four years and one thing that I seemed to have noticed more than anything else is the unnerving sense that- hold on a minute- Apple are actually doing quite well now, aren’t they? Disconcerting, I know, but it might actually be true. I can’t believe there might actually be a time when I don’t have to look at the system requirement for absolutely every piece of software or hardware I buy just in case someone decided to support OS X… but it might actually be starting to happen.

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You should know the drill by now. Yes these pictures were edited on an eMac, yes they were adjusted in size and had corners added to them (we like our curves) and yes we’re ready for the barrage of comments on how fake it is. Clicky for the fullsized image. Interesting to note that the model pictured is 40GB. We’ll get a 80GB top-end hopefully! The model number listed is A1185. If you have to comment, then please don’t just regurgitate what the previous commenter has said.