Unfortunately Apple’s iPhone isn’t coming out until this summer, but in the meantime, those of you with Motorola RAZRs can make your phone look fairly close to an iPhone using an Apple iPhone theme for the Motorola RAZR. It is available for download here with instructions on installing it can be found here.
I know I haven’t updated in a while since I’ve been real busy. I probably won’t be updating too often for the next few months, but I will occasionally, just not everyday. I do, however, plan on changing the layout. I’m getting tired of the current two-column layout I have and will probably be tweaking it to a single column layout with the unimportant stuff on the bottom of the blog which leaves more room for content. Maybe a few other changes to make the page easier to read as well.
On a side note, Apple finally released the rumored iPhone today. The technology looks very innovative, but at that price, I won’t be buying one anytime soon.
At its September 12 media event today, Apple updated its line of iPods, introduced iTunes 7, and delivered the first movie sales through the iTunes Store. The 60GB 5G iPod has been upgraded to 80GB, while prices have come down $50 for each model to $249 and $349. The 5G iPod also features a brighter display, the ability to control the level of brightness, improved battery life, new earphones, gapless playback, and the ability to play games. The 2G iPod nano remains available at the same three price points, ($149, $199, and $249) but capacities have been doubled across the board, to 2GB, 4GB, and 8GB. In addition, the new nano features an aluminum enclosure similar to the iPod mini, except much smaller and thinner. The iPod shuffle is now available in only 1GB priced at $79, but is available in a smaller, aluminum button-sized enclosure.
iTunes 7 includes a number of enhancements, including support for iTunes Music Store account holders to automatically add album artwork to any MP3s that are missing it. Along with that, new views allow you to browse your music collection by artwork, as if flipping through a physical CD collection. Apple also added movie sales to the iTunes Store, with 75 titles available today from various Disney studios. Movie sales are available at a resolution of 640×480, encoded with the H.264 video codec, and television shows have been increased as well to the same resolution, a four-fold increase from the previous 320×240 size.
You can check out the new iPods at the Apple Store.
Apple, today, released updated revisions of their iMac and Mac Mini lines. The iMacs have all been upgraded from older Intel Core Duo processors to the new Intel Core 2 Duo processors (making it up to 50% faster than the previous 20″ iMac). In addition, a new 24″ iMac has also been added. The Mac Minis have been updated making them all Core Duo models.
The new iMacs are available in the following configurations:
17 inch 1.83GHz
$999 US
1440×900 resolution
2MB L2 Cache
512MB RAM
160GB SATA HD
24x Combo Drive
Intel GMA950 64MB
Airport Extreme
17 inch 2.0GHz
$1,199
1440×900 resolution
4MB L2 Cache
1GB RAM
160GB SATA HD
8x Double Layer Superdrive
ATI Radeon x1600 128MB
Airport Extreme & Bluetooth
Apple Remote
20 inch 2.16GHz
$1,499
1680×1050 resolution
4MB L2 Cache
1GB RAM
250GB SATA HD
8x Double Layer Superdrive
ATI X1600 128MB
Airport Extreme & Bluetooth
Apple Remote
24 inch 2.16GHz
$1,999
1920×1200 resolution
4MB L2 Cache
1GB RAM
250GB SATA HD
8x Double Layer Superdrive
NVIDIA GeForce 7300 GT 128MB
Airport Extreme & Bluetooth
Apple Remote
The new Mac Minis are available in the following configuration:
1.66 GHz
60 GB 5400-rpm SATA Hard Drive
Combo Drive
$599 USD
1.83 GHz
80 GB 5400-rpm SATA Hard Drive
Superdrive
$799 USD
Both models feature:
-2MB Shared L2 Cache
-512 MB 667 MHz DDR2 RAM standard (up to 2 GB supported)
-GMA 950 Integrated graphics
-1 Firewire 400, 4 USB 2.0
-Optical Digital/Analog Audio In/Out
-Gigabit ethernet
-Airport Extreme and Bluetooth 2.0+EDR standard
Saw this last night and found a clip of it this morning. Funny interview. 
Update: NBC got YouTube to remove it.
Mac Pro
- Dual-Dual Core 2.66 GHz Xeon 5100 Processor, upgradeable to 2xDual 3 GHz.
- 1 GB FB-DIMM RAM (2×512 MB), expandable to 16 GB
- 250 GB Hard Drive, 3 empty slots (3 Gbps SATA)
- NVidia GeForce 7300 GT (256 MB VRAM), configurable to ATI Radeon X1900 XT or Quadro FX 4500 (512 MB VRAM)
- SuperDrive (2 5.25″ slots total, 1 remaining)
- 4 PCI-Express Slots (One extra-wide, taken by GPU)
According to Apple VP Phil Shiller, the new Mac Pro is anywhere from 1.6x to 2.0x faster than the latest PowerMac G5 Quad. It is also $1100 cheaper than a Dell of the same configuration. It can be bought at the Apple Store today.
Cinema Displays
Although not mentioned during the keynote, Apple reduced prices on its Cinema Displays. The 20″ Cinema Display now sells for $699 (down from $799), the 23″ Cinema Display now sells for $999 (down from $1299), and the 30″ Cinema Display now sells for $1999 (down from $2499), representing cuts of $100, $300, and $500.
The specifications for the 20 and 23″ displays have also been bumped. The 20″ display now has a brightness of 300 cd/m2 (up from 250 cd/m2), and the 23″ display has a brightness of 400 cd/m2 (up from 270 cd/m2). Both models also now feature 700:1 contrast ratios (both up from 400:1). The 30″ display remains at 400 cd/m2 and a 700:1 contrast ratio.
Leopard Preview
- 64 bit application support extended throughout the user interface layer of the OS, allowing full 64-bit application development and deployment.
- Time Machine- a constant automative backup allowing users the ability to instantly restore corrupted or accidentally overwritten/deleted files (image below).
- Spaces- Apple’s implementation of virtual desktops.
- Core Animation
- Enhancements to Dashboard, Spotlight, Mail, iCal and Universal Access
- Boot Camp, and “next generation” Front Row, and Photo Booth bundled
Apple plans to release Leopard in “Spring 2007.” A more in-depth preview can be found at the Leopard Sneak Peek pages.
The 2006 Worldwide Developers Conference begin today. 
The keynote is expected to begin at 1PM EST. Already, however, banners can be seen showing that Apple is taking Microsoft new upcoming OS, Vista, directly.
Mac OS X Leopard, Introducing Vista 2.0
Mac OS X Leopard, Hasta la Vista, Vista
Today Apple introduced a new $899 configuration of the 17-inch iMac designed specifically for education customers featuring a 1.83 GHz Intel Core Duo processor, a built-in iSight video camera and iLife ‘06. The 17-inch iMac for education is available immediately and will replace the eMac, Apple’s last CRT based computer.
You can purchase it through the Apple Store for Education.
The deal is buy a new Mac and get a free iPod nano.
1. Buy a Mac.
Buy a new MacBook, MacBook Pro, iMac, or Power Mac G5.2. Buy an iPod nano.
Purchase your iPod with a Mac.3. Submit your rebate.
Your iPod nano is free after mail-in rebate.* Or choose another iPod and enjoy big savings after mail-in rebate.* After you receive your products, start your rebate online for fastest processing. Or download and mail the rebate form.
Sounds like an awesome deal to me. Student discount AND a free iPod nano.
I found a great application for Tiger (OS 10.4). It’s called Temperature Monitor and it displays the temperature of each sensor on your Mac (CPU, hard disk, memory, graphics card, etc.). Temperature Monitor has an option to run right from the menu bar, so it doesn’t take up much screen real estate. It’s free as well.
(These are the sensors on my mac, different models will vary.)
