MacPinoy

Bing retracts

I used to have some respect for Stanley Bing, or whoever is writing with that pseudonym. But his last two articles have just shown me that he is not the stuck-up, devil-may-care executive that he portrays himself to be.

The first article—the Laptop and the Notebook—was kind of cute. But the second one was extremely apologetic. The change of tone is blatantly obvious, and it makes me wonder if the writer had a serious conversation with the powers-that-be.

iPhone coming to Singapore? How about Philippines?

According to Channel News Asia, the iPhone may be coming to Singapore this September.

And the carrier may be Singtel.

And what about the Philippines? When will it be coming over?

Now I know you can buy iPhones but I am talking about the legit, non-jailbroken versions.

Not that I am eager to buy one.

Cloning your Leopard Install DVD

My Leopard Install DVD has been acting up lately. I have a Leopard family pack and I had only used three of its five licenses. I was in a party with a friend and I had offered him that I will upgrade his Tiger OS to Leopard. He brought his Macbook; I brought my install DVD. Several hours later and several beers later, his Macbook was still reading the DVD.

There are several other reasons why you should backup and archive your install DVD. Performing a full disk restore using Time Machine requires that you boot up using the installation DVD. Running a disk repair also requires the installation DVD. Of all the devices on a computer, the optical disk drive is one that is most prone to breaking down. The DVD is also prone to damage. Losing either one of these critical pieces at a critical point in time will definitely make your eyes water. An external hard disk is definitely more reliable.

Preparation: You will need your Leopard install DVD and an external hard drive. The external hard drive needs about 10 GB to store the bootable disk image. The hard drive can be one single partition or it can have multiple partitions. It does not really matter. I created a dual partition external drive—one 15 GB for the bootable Leopard DVD image, the rest for Time Machine.

Step 1: With your Leopard installation DVD loaded, open up Disk Utility.

You should see the Mac OS X Install DVD at the left sidebar. Select it and then click on New Image.

You can save the disk image anywhere. Take note of the file name (in my case, it was Mac OS X Install DVD.dmg). I chose to save to the Desktop just so that it will be easy to locate.Now grab a sandwich or take a nap. It takes about an hour to create the disk image.

Step 2: Launch Disk Utility once more and select the Restore tab.Source should be the disk image that you created. In my case, it was Mac OS X Install DVD.dmg located on my desktop. Destination should be the partition on your external hard drive.

Now to test. With the external drive connected, boot up your Mac. Hold down the Option key as you are booting and you will be presented with your startup disk options. Your external drive should be visible. Select your external drive as your startup device and you are good to go!

Apple cracking down on illegal iPhones

According to Apple Gazette, Apple Singapore is seeking legal action against those who are selling unlocked iPhones.

In countries like Singapore Apple is threatening legal action against cellphone carriers selling illegal unlocked iPhones. It’s been reported that Apple plans to charge those responsible for selling the devices $700 per unlocked iPhone sold.

Currently, the only company allowed to sell unlocked iPhones is Orange in France - and if Apple could keep that from happening, they would.

Retailers in Singapore and other areas were emailed by Apple and told that if they did not comply with removing the illegal devices from their shelves, the legal process would begin. After these emails were sent out, most retailers removed the iPhones from their stores.

I suppose this is in preparation for the Asian launch in 2008. Will this legal action reach Philippines?

Keyboard freeze!

It was a strange experience.  Minutes after reading the Appleinsider’s article, I encountered the dreaded keyboard freeze!    

To recover, I didn’t try “force-quitting Finder” solution.  I just turned the power off then turned it back on.

Some Macs are at risk for hard disk failure

I know that not many people read this site (at least, not yet!).  But if I am still able to save the data of even one reader, then it makes the effort of writing this all worth it.

According to Apple Gazette, some Macbooks, Macbook Pros, and Mac Minis are at risk of hard disk failure. 

“The read/write heads are detaching from the arm and plowing deep gouges into the magnetic platter,” Retrodata Managing Director Duncan Clarke explained. “The damage is mostly on the inner tracks, but some scratches are on the outer track — Track 0 — and once that happens, the drive is normally beyond repair.”

The article continues to suggest that owners of Macbooks, Macbook Pros, and Mac Minis to check System Profile, look under Serial ATA, and check if you have Seagate 2.5-in drives with model numbers ST96812AS and ST98823AS  firmware version is 7.0.1.  If so, then you may have a problem.  Proceed now with backing up your data.

I checked mine.  And fortunately—sigh of relief—I am spared. 

iSight and Photo Booth problem

After the upgrading my Mac Book Pro to Leopard, I found out that Photo Booth was not working.  It would display a black screen even if the LED light was on.  Through a quick Google of the problem, I was led to the Apple support site where it mentioned that it could be caused by System Management Controller (SMC).

I performed the following steps, as recommended by Apple:

1. If the computer is on, turn it off.
2. Disconnect the AC Adapter and remove the computer’s battery.
3. Press and hold down the power button for 5 seconds and then release the button.
4. Reconnect the battery and AC Adapter.
5. Press the Power button to restart the computer.

And voila!  Everything back to normal.

Why kill the Mac Mini?

I am seriously considering the Mac Mini.  Not for myself but for my family members.  While I am now an avid Mac user, I had kept an old Windows XP machine.    It had been giving me some headaches lately.  Frequent BSODs.   Virus infection.  Sound card erratic.  It became a pain to maintain.  A month ago, the machine was working fine; now, all of a sudden, the sound card isn’t working, someone installed two Sony Ericsson suites, there is this Photo Gallery installation routine launching that consistently searches for a CD-ROM, and Yahoo Messenger crashes for no apparent reason.  I get incessant requests from family members to check on the machine.

I now want to replace the machine.  The Mac seems to be the platform that marries both security and convinience.   For the computer novice, Linux can seem to be daunting.  A Mac, with its colorful and intuitive GUI, is more suited for people who want to spend less time learning about the computer and spend more time getting their work done.  But an iMac will be an over-kill, especially since my LCD monitor, keyboard, and mouse are still working fine.  My sights are aimed firmly on the Mac Mini. 

But I found out from Apple Insider that it is now reaching its end-of-life.   I wish Apple doesn’t kill off the Mac Mini line.  I am pretty sure that there are a number of people that are facing a problem similar to mine.  I want to replace my computer, but I don’t want the same Windows experience to haunt me months down the road.    The Mac Mini seems perfect for people who want a new experience, not just a new computer.

So dear Steve Jobs, or whoever is in charge of the Mac Mini line, please don’t kill the Mac Mini.  Apple Macs are now gaining in market share.  The Mac Mini still gives other users a cheaper opportunity to switch.

Battery upgrade

My Macbook Pro’s battery life was dismal and I was already planning to purchase a new one. Fortunately, Apple’s latest battery upgrade saved me the trouble.

Before upgrade, I was lucky if my battery capacity would max out at 57%.

But after the upgrade, the numbers look better.

You can download Battery Update 1.3 here.

To check the version if Battery Update 1.3 has been installed

1. In the Finder, navigate to the Go menu and choose Go to Folder
2. Type /System/Library/SystemConfiguration, then click Go
3. Select the file named BatteryUpdater.bundle.
4. Choose Get Info and check the Version.

Apple update relocks unlocked iPhones

Apple makes good it’s warning.

Despite what some folks at the Philippine Mac Users Group are claiming, Apple has issued iPhone update 1.1.1, which, according to Macworld, relocks unlocked iPhones.

When the phone restarted an activation message appeared that said, “Insert an unlocked and valid SIM to activate iPhone.”

A similar message appeared in iTunes. A note saying the SIM card was not valid and to insert a valid SIM card greeted the user.

You could not navigate through the iPhone’s menus, either. The “Slide for Emergency” slider is the only thing available after installing the update. This allows customers to make emergency calls only.

Of course, iPhone users in the Philippines will say that this is just a temporary setback “hackers will eventually win.” Yeah, yeah, yeah—big frickin’ deal. Just go on and live in denial. What will you do? Avoid updating the iPhone? I agree it’s a cat-and-mouse game with Apple playing catch-up. Ever watched the movie “Catch Me If You Can?” Wanna live your life always afraid that the next update will brick your expensive phone?

Personally, I am not impressed. Yes, the iPhone looks beautiful but I still have my doubts when it comes to its functions. Of course, fan boys will continue to praise and worship the iPhone, but what else will you say if you forked out P30,000 or even P50,000 for a phone? If some bozo comes up to me and brags about an unlocked iPhone, I feel that this would be the same kind of guy who would purchase a fake Rolex watch in the hope to pickup girls.

Bill Maher said it better: “Early adopters is a business term for dipshits who wait in line for 6 hours for a frickin phone.”