Category: Thoughts

  • Blaspheming in the temple of the Mac: Boot Camp

    Ah, the crazy things we do to play a silly computer game known as Civilization, or in this case Sid Meier’s Civilization IV: Beyond The Sword expansion. Each and every version of Civ comes out first for Windows and some months later for Macs. And so, each and every time, I have to obtain, borrow…

  • Civ IV’s latest expansion piles on the complexity

    My long-ago pre-ordered copy of the Civilization IV expansion pack “Beyond the Sword” arrived today, and after a very busy work day, Friday family dinner and the usual bed time dawdling rituals from the kids, I found myself with a bit of free time (the wife is just back from a business trip to Europe…

  • Hardware updates galore

    I happed to glance over at the “Tools I use” link that sits on another part of my web site this morning and I realized that it was horribly out of date. Using a few minutes snatched from my lunch break, I’ve deleted the verbiage about my trusty old Powerbook G4 and added a description…

  • An Aussie answer to all bag lusters

    My wife thinks it’s hilarious but it’s undeniable that we gadget guys need bags, lots and lots of pretty bags. Well, maybe not pretty — you know, sort of manly, handsome bags. A bag for the camera, a bag for the phone, a bag or two for the laptop, a bag for all the bags.…

  • Netgear’s confusing power play

    I was reading the latest issue of the excellent Mac newsletter Tidbits this morning when I came across an article comparing the performance of a wifi network to one of the new powerline networks. Ah, I thought to myself, I remember when I hoped that powerline, which runs ethernet over the electrical wiring in your…

  • Doh, hit by a MacBook Pro revision

    So after advocating avoiding the first iteration of new gadgets and programs, I finally ponied up for the latest revision of Mac laptops, the Macbook Pro with Intel’s Santa Cruz Core 2 Duo chip. It also happens to have a new generation of video controller chips, Nvidia’s GeForce 8600M GT. Ho hum…or not. One reason…

  • Don’t rush out for an iPhone (really)

    (Updated 6/21) With the release of the undeniably super-cool iPhone just around the corner, I have a plea for gadgetistas everywhere: Please don’t camp out, queue up or generally make a fool of yourself on the evening news in front of an AT&T wireless store next week. Like I’ve said over and over, there’s no…

  • Calling all comparers – time for virtual showdown

    Software developer Paul Lefebvre has a tidy comparison up on his blog between VMware’s Fusion and competitor Parallels Desktop. Both products let owners of Intel-based Macs run other operating systems like Windows XP or Linux. I’ve been messing around with Fusion for a few months now and it’s very impressive. One cool feature absent from…

  • Curious Aaron solves iPhone voice-over mystery

    It was driving me a little crazy — no, make that A LOT crazy. Couldn’t sleep, couldn’t focus on reading the paper, couldn’t think about washing my hair in the shower — WHO was the voice behind Apple’s compelling new iPhones ads? You know the one where the guy is watching “Pirates of the Carribean”…

  • Not all EMI content available sans DRM yet

    With one day left in the month of May, Apple and record label EMI made good on their promise to start selling higher-quality digital music without annoying copying limits (so-called digital rights management, or DRM, technology). The new files are $1.29 each although buying a whole album of these “iTunes Plus” files doesn’t cost any…