iFixit.org — The People Who Are Fixing the World — is a new project by the talented and helpful team at iFixit.com, the ‘free repair manual you can edit.’ I have used iFixit to get detailed instructions on upgrading our Macs and it’s been a really useful resource. You can find repair guides for all kinds of things—including game consoles, automobiles, cameras, household items and more. They have a free repair manual app for iPhone and iPad so you can download guides right from your mobile device.
On ifixit.org, we’ll be writing about the problems caused by our throwaway culture. [...] We’re going to profile repair gurus and share why people fix things.
Simplicity, security and speed. These are the three virtues Google is promoting to the enterprise with their new Chromebook.
Google claims new users can be up and running on the system within four minutes — and that includes unboxing time. Gone are the days when a new employee must wait for an appointment with an IT person to get up and running on the system. Everything can be done remotely.
Whether or not this approach makes sense for many companies will depend heavily on the application needs of the organization. If you rely on Microsoft’s Exchange or Office applications, Chromebook is not for you. But for smaller organizations that have some flexibility in their choice of applications, or those who are giving serious thought to a cloud-based approach to infrastructure, this might be the start of an important shift in equipment provisioning and support.
A Chromebook is a mobile device designed specifically for people who live on the web. With a comfortable full-sized keyboard, large display and clickable trackpad, all-day battery life, light weight, and built-in ability to connect to Wi-Fi and mobile broadband networks, Chromebooks are ideal for anytime, anywhere access to the web. They provide a faster, safer, more secure online experience for people who live on the web, without all the time-consuming, often confusing, high level of maintenance required by typical computers.
What is Chrome OS?
Chrome OS is an open source operating system for people who spend most of their time on the web. It is built around the core tenets of speed, simplicity and security.
Who should use a Chromebook?
Chromebooks work best for people who live on the web – spending most of their time in a browser using web applications.
The Unofficial Apple Weblog (TUAW)reporting today that demand for netbooks is dramatically dropping as more people are considering the iPad for a lightweight computing device. I think the key factor here is that a lot of people mostly do just email and web browsing, and for these customers—millions of them—a full ‘computer’ is not only overkill but unnecessarily complicated for a few simple tasks. The iPad is a new category of device designed for a category of user that’s been around for years.
Netbook Demand
Tablet Purchase Forecast
Forecasts for tablet purchases are highly in favor of the iPad, but that’s likely because there really isn’t much of a competitive field right now, and the average consumer today probably doesn’t know much about the tablet devices from RIM, Samsung, HP and the others. The iPad’s brand recognition is huge now, and the next six to nine months should tell us more about how well these other tablet offerings are being received.
iPad Satisfaction
Satisfaction among iPad owners is high but, again, until competitive devices hit the market this data may not be particularly relevant. I do think that Apple has established such a commanding lead in the category that competitors will have a hard time breaking through. They won’t beat the iPad on a price-vs-features metric (Apple’s supply-chain management is one of its strengths, allowing them to price very aggressively), nor will any of these companies be able to offer anything remotely close to the App Store selection (the store is the killer app) or the software and hardware engineering that make the iPad experience what it is. I think it’s all a battle for second place now, anyway.
This guy got over 90 million writes before failure. He could still read data from the drive after that, just couldn’t write to it anymore. Your mileage may vary, but wow.
A few things of note from yesterday’s Apple event. Keynote video can be seen here.
Two new MacBook Air models introduced: an 11-inch and a 13-inch model with on-board flash memory and beefed-up battery life. It seems clear that Apple is moving toward phasing out hard drives on all of its laptops as flash component prices come down.
New iLife ’11 software suite. Nice upgrades to iPhoto, iMovie and GarageBand. iLife will come installed on all new Macs for free, or a $49 upgrade if you already have it. If you use iPhoto and/or iMovie this looks like a worthwhile upgrade, with some great new capabilities in both apps. The new audio and video editing tools in iMovie are really impressive, making it easy to create professional-looking productions, with integrations for uploading videos directly to YouTube, Facebook and Vimeo.
Preview of Mac OS X Lion. Release targeted for summer 2011. Apple calls this ‘Back to the Mac’ as they are taking some of what’s been popular on the iPad interface and bringing it to the Mac OS.
A few changes coming with this OS X release:
Mac App Store. The iPhone and iPad have an App Store for quick and easy downloading and installation of apps, so why not the Mac as well? This model could be very successful as it will give Mac users a convenient way to find applications they want, a notification system to let them know when updates are available, and customer reviews to see what other users have to say about the apps. Apple will offer the same 70/30 revenue split with developers as they do today with iPhone and iPad apps, and traditional application sales and installation has not been eliminated — the App Store will just be another distribution channel. The more I think about this approach the more I like it, because although installing applications on any computer is generally easy, it’s not always intuitive — and even less so for those who don’t have much experience with computers. The iPhone/iPad model just seems perfect for most situations: select an app, click the Install button, done. The average user shouldn’t have to deal with file systems or compressed archives or virtual disk volumes for something as trivial as installing an app.
Launchpad. An iPad-style interface for organizing and launching Mac apps, in addition to the existing Dock method.
Full-screen apps. Another iPad-like feature, taking some apps to a full-screen view to maximize the use of monitor real estate and reduce unnecessary clutter on the screen. I think this will be especially useful for working on photos, videos and word processing tasks. I frequently use Aperture in full-screen mode for photo editing and I think it’s a good feature that could extend well to other applications.
Mission Control. This is a trackpad gesture-based feature that combines some of the functionality of Exposé, Spaces, Dashboard and full-screen apps. Apple is really pushing the touch interface here — learn a few simple swipe gestures on the trackpad and reduce the number of times you have to grab the mouse for common tasks. This seems like both a bold step and an obvious one. Millions of people are accustomed to using a touch interface on mobile devices today, so the way we physically interact with technology is already undergoing a subtle transition. I think that little features like this could play out in a much bigger way than might seem obvious today.
FaceTime for Mac. FaceTime was recently introduced as part of iOS4 on the latest iPhone 4. It’s basically like Skype video-calling but only worked over WiFi between iPhone 4 devices. With FaceTime for Mac you can install the app and, if you have a Mac laptop with a built-in iSight camera or an external camera, make FaceTime video calls between iPhone and a Mac. iOS 4.1 or later is required. FaceTime for Mac beta download is available now.
If you want to do any repairs or upgrades to your Mac, check out iFixit.com for some terrific guides that will walk you through every step and even tell you what tools you’ll need. The guides include good photos of all the steps and there’s a PDF version you can download and print before you get started.
Last week I upgraded to a mid-2010 15-inch MacBook Pro, the 2.66 GHz Intel Core i7 model. The only thing I wanted to do to it is swap out the stock 5400 RPM drive for a faster 7200 RPM model. I found a nice Western Digital 320 GB at Newegg.com for $60.
I used this iFixit guide to replace the drive, and it took maybe 20 minutes to complete the job. First I cloned the internal drive to an external firewire drive using SuperDuper, swapped in the new one, then booted from the external drive and cloned back to the internal. The cloning takes some time because I was moving about 200 GBs each way, but the actual drive swap was quick and easy, and SuperDuper performed flawlessly as it always has. The only other thing I needed was a $3 tri-wing screwdriver that I found at Microcenter, but the iFixit guide mentioned that so there were no surprises.
I used an iFixit guide three years ago to do another drive swap and it was really helpful. This is a great resource for DIY projects and may save you some money on repair costs, but beware of doing things that could potentially void your manufacturer’s warranty.
According to this Bloomberg article, Research in Motion (RIM), the maker of Blackberry smartphones, plans to release a competitor to the iPad this November: the Blackpad.
Pricing for the device will be in line with the iPad, which starts at $499, the person said. RIM is focused on reaping additional profits from the tablet effort, rather than competing on price to sell a large number of devices, the person said.
In the tablet market, RIM will have to demonstrate how its device can stand out against products including the iPad, which has attracted buyers because of its integration with Apple’s iTunes service and many software applications, or apps. More than 225,000 apps are available for Apple devices, the company said in June. RIM said in April it had more than 6,000 apps.
So they’re going to launch a new device with far fewer native apps, to compete against the iPad which has a mature app store containing tens of thousands of titles and huge brand awareness right now, and they’re going to demand the same price as the iPad? Good luck with that strategy. I have a few questions:
Where’s the mobile OS to compete with Apple’s iOS4? RIM still hasn’t delivered anything close to the touch capabilities found on the iPad/iPhone today. This is not a trivial point and I don’t know that RIM has the engineering chops to do it.
What’s RIM’s answer to the App Store/iTunes ecosystem? Easy integration is critical to the adoption of a new device like this.
What’s the retail strategy — is there a store people can walk in to and get their hands on the Blackpad when it’s released? This has been huge for Apple, and RIM needs a response here.
What’s the differentiator? Is there anything about the Blackpad that says better than iPad?
I can see RIM getting some limited traction in the enterprise just due to brand recognition, but I don’t know if that’s enough to take the Blackpad very far considering they’re already late to a game they probably don’t even want to be in. And Blackpad is an awful name.
Hewlett-Packard Co., which bought smartphone maker Palm Inc. this month, said it plans to produce a tablet device that runs on Microsoft Corp’s Windows operating system.
HP bought a company with a strong mobile operating system (Palm’s webOS) and tons of valuable patents, and they’re going to put Windows on their tablet instead?
Microsoft Chief Executive Officer Steve Ballmer said yesterday the software company plans to increase its focus on tablets.
Translation: The software company plans to increase its focus on what the innovative companies are doing and attempt to duplicate that somehow.
What I think is likely to happen with these companies scurrying to jump into the ‘tablet’ space is something akin to the commodity PC market: A race to the bottom.
There’s no rounded plastic back like the previous two models, the 3G and 3GS. The front and back are flat, covered with a specially-engineered glass surface from top to bottom and a stainless steel frame holding it together. I think this new form factor looks much better, more solid and modern than the curved-back models. The weight is about the same as before, 4.8 ounces, but it feels heftier.
Screen Resolution
Apple calls it the Retina Display, and resolution on this screen is ridiculously sharp. It’s most noticeable to me when looking at text — there’s none of the jaggies or pixelated stuff we’re used to seeing on small screens.
Speed
This model feels much faster than my two year-old 3G. The 3GS was probably closer in terms of speed, I don’t know, but it’s a big improvement over the older model. Everything just feels faster and smoother, from app launching and switching to game performance.
Multitasking
Apple has worked out a way to allow multiple apps to run in the background (sort of) without putting an extraordinary drain on the battery. So you can stream music over Pandora while continuing to read email or browse the web, for example. What I like most about this feature is the ability to switch quickly between apps and pick up where you left off — it’s more like switching apps and less like quitting and restarting.
Folders
Folders are a great idea, and something that’s been needed since the App Store took off and people started filling their iPhones with dozens of apps. Instead of having several screens worth of apps you have to scroll through, you can group apps together in folders for quick access. I predict that many users will have a folder that’s the equivalent of the ‘junk drawer’ in the kitchen — a folder for those apps we thought we might use, and still could someday, but probably not, so we’ll just stick them in a random folder and forget about them rather than delete them.
Cameras
There are two camera lenses, one on each side of the phone, so you can shoot still photos or video from either side just by touching a button on the screen to toggle from one to the other.
Still Camera
The 5-megapixel still camera with LED flash shoots in 4:3 aspect ratio, and is probably good enough to replace many point-and-shoot pocket models, certainly good enough for casual use. It won’t come close to replacing my DSLR, but it’s not intended to, and sometimes the best camera is the one you have with you. Below is an unmodified shot from the camera.
Video Camera
It’s amazing to me that a little mobile device can shoot High Definition 720p video at 30 frames per second, but the A4 processor seems to handle it well. Shoots in 16:9 aspect. Short clip below to demonstrate the quality, this is unedited HD video straight from the phone.
I used to work in litigation support technology when I was with Arthur Andersen in the 90s (pre-Enron, AA was a great company), so I had the opportunity to work closely with a few law firms and corporate legal departments during that time. The technology landscape is dramatically different now, so I thought I would touch on a few resources for the legal profession.
The Mac Lawyer (themaclawyer.com) is a site about using Apple’s Macintosh in the practice of law. They have a good article there called “Why We Went Mac and Have Never Looked Back” (Part One and Part Two) with an overview of the various applications and processes implemented in a law practice, including hardware, software, calendar, mail, networks and backups.
The short of it is this — I can’t tell you how simple my and my practice manager’s jobs are not having to worry about the technology in the office. Our technology does what it is supposed to do — it works and lets us work to serve our clients. We don’t spend valuable time working on getting our technology to work. While there have been a few headaches, are significant only in that they are the exception, not the rule.
Apple’s TimeMachine for incremental file backup and recovery
I would also recommend a small-to-medium size law practice consider the Mac Mini Server for local file-sharing, calendars, contacts and web site hosting. It runs OS X Snow Leopard Server and offers a lot right out of the box for $999.
Personal anecdote: In 1997 I was working with a young litigation attorney on a new web-based document management system that provided an environment for lawyers, opposing counsel, outside counsel and consultants to review discovery documents, which was great because it eliminated the need to copy and ship mountains of paper among the various parties. The lawyers could review docs online, redact sensitive info, flag for privilege, create production sets, print files, annotate, etc. It helped keep costs down and there was good security built in. The young lawyers really “got it” but the senior partner on the case — the guy who wrote the checks — said there’s no way I’m putting my confidential documents on the internet. I understood the concern—he thought of the internet as a wild frontier where anything goes and there’s no security and you can’t trust technology. We finally were able to assuage his fears a bit, but he was never very comfortable with it. I hope things have changed a bit since then.
Other legal tech resources
MacLitigator – Litigation & trial technology for the rest of us
Apple Briefs – Improving your law practice with Macintosh
Folders are a great idea, and something that’s been needed since the App Store took off and people started filling their iPhones with dozens of apps. Instead of having several screens worth of apps you have to scroll through, you can group apps together in folders for quick access. I predict that many users will have a folder that’s the equivalent of the ‘junk drawer’ in the kitchen — a folder for those apps we thought we might use, and still could someday, but probably not, so we’ll just stick them in a random folder and forget about them rather than delete them.
