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MacWorld Keynote live Jan. 15th

Jack

Sr. Administrator
Staff member
Any thoughts on SSD vs regular hard drives?

agree on screen size but loathe taking laptops anywhere so size and weight are important to me. I have a teeny Sony with a virtual keyboard and stylus that was a Japanese model that came to the US for about a month.Useless for photography but great for basic travel.
The biggest advantage to SSD drives right now is they are virtually bomb-proof if you drop your system. A regular spinning drive can withstand maybe 1/2 G without damage, and maybe 1G when off. However, an SSD drive is probably more like 8 or 10G running or off, so a drop will not likely damage the drive. (Nothing saving the screen though...)

They are also theoretically going to be faster, but the new parallel recording technology, larger on disk buffers and 7200 RPM spindle speeds on the latest SATA2 laptop drives means this performance gap is pretty narrow.

Bottom line, the SSD drives are VERY expensive right now for the added benefits IMO. In two years though, I suspect they'll be run of the mill in high-end laptops.

My .02

MacPro just arrived, so off to unpack it!
 
S

Sean_Reid

Guest
I see a processor upgrade for the Mac Book Pro in the same light. Benchmarks with the new processors in other laptops have shown some modest gains in power consumption and even more modest gains in speed. So the switch will be a nice upgrade for pros who need it, but isn't necessarily worthy of the attention and PR that gets generated with a Keynote a la Jobs.

So I think it will happen, and it would have been nice to know when, but that ain't the Apple way.
I think, for photographers at least, the speed is less of an issue than is the potential for a 17" LED screen.

Cheers,

Sean
 

Terry

New member
iPhone Update

I just did my iPhone update. I'm impressed.

For those waiting for GPS the new system that triangulates where you are worked perfectly and drew a circle around my block in NYC (and yes I was inside the circle). This is significant for me because I get very poor cell phone coverage from Verizon and AT&T in my apartment that has brick walls that are very old and thick. To get any coverage on those two a device needs to sit on the windowsill. Strange but T-Mobile is perfect all through the apartment. For the GPS test I was not at the window and I had one bar of coverage. So, while no "real" GPS if there is cell phone service or WiFi your position can be detected and set with a pin and directions to your destination can be obtained. Not nearly as robust as using a full GPS system but certainly not bad. It runs off of Google Maps and unlike your GPS I assume you will always have the latest maps.
The map application as a whole also got easier to use :clap: (this was the least intuitive of all apps).

I then went to GetDPI and put the site on an icon on my home page. But to keep clutter off the main page I moved it to page 2 which I will use for a number of frequently visitied places. Gives direct access to favorite web pages very quicly. Bravo Apple, VERY WELL DONE :thumbup:. Getting to content was easy before but this takes it a step further and it will be interesting when there are more web apps.

Need to rent some movies for my flight to Salt Lake City (for Moab).

In two weeks, I will definitely pick up Apple TV.
I have an airport extreme but will probably still get Time Capsule because it does solve a big Time machine problem that I have.
What will be hard is going to the Apple store and resisting the Air :ROTFL:
 

Guy Mancuso

Administrator, Instructor
I did the the Iphone update as well and NOW is the time to make the investment and buy one. The extra features makes it more usable and getting directions now you can kick mapquest and a car Nav system out the window. No more getting lost. It will give me directions anywhere.

The Air sounds nice Terry but has some serious downfalls for a shooter. No CD compartment, no built in SD reader, no firewire for backup drives and a few other shortcomings like only 2mgs of Ram. It is truly a word, e-mail and that is about it machine, your Iphone does almost the same thing and with the release of the SDK for 3rd party developers we may see word on the Iphone anyway. Personally not worth my money since the 15 in i can do everything on it without carrying all the other crap. But if all you do is travel for work and don't need shooting functions from it than maybe great.
 

Terry

New member
Thanks Guy,
I know the Air pretty much s**ks for a lot of our stuff but hey don't most M users dream of traveling light. But, I do have a question.....everyone talks about having to carry so much gear around with the Air but I don't think I would have anything extra. I need a card reader now and a portable hard drive. The only thing I could think of extra would be a small USB hub so that the reader and drive could plug in at once and with Lightroom I can copy the files to both drives on import.
 

cam

Active member
Terry, i get to take a gander at the new Air late tonight so i'll give you first impressions. (the only description i've gotten thus far is GORGEOUS!)

Mitch, i'll check about your question as well. it's something *i'd* like to know.
 

mwalker

Subscriber Member
FYI...I talked with a VP at AT&T today and where he couldn't say anything, yet, he said an announcement will be made soon, maybe as soon as next week, addressing iphones on business accounts. So I take that as a go!
 

cam

Active member
Mitch, there is a USB port on the back of Time Capsule so you can plug in another drive for secondary back-up/archiving.

Terry, i'm afraid i must keep mum since it's not out for another few weeks. sorry. i will say this much though, the first words out my mouth when i was handed it was a four letter word beginning with F and ending with K. and i mean that in the best of ways!
 

Terry

New member
Thanks cam....I can't wait till they hit stores here in two weeks!
 
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mwalker

Subscriber Member
My friend gave me good info; At&t will offer the iphone to business accounts as of Jan 21st. The details will include;

- same iPhone, no 3G, no 16GB, same price
- requires eligibility (unknown qualifications to me, but supposedly regarding whether or not the company receives discounts), eligibility determined with the 'foundations account number'
- same data plan (UNLIMITED!), rumors of a 5GB cap are false.
- data plan will be more expensive -- $45 for 200txt/unlim data per month
- $25 discount per month promotion starting on the 21st (essentially a promotion to keep the $20 price of the data plan of individual users)
- $25 promotion ends after the 2yr service agreement is up
- no activation fee
- (current at&t customers) no upgrade fee
 

Guy Mancuso

Administrator, Instructor
Maybe time for my wife to have it now. I have a Blackberry for her on my plan to get e-mail from her exchange server but e-mail is so much nicer on a Iphone. Hmmm only if she let's me buy something:D
 
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