This week marks the second anniversary of our Take Control project, so we celebrate with a 50 percent-off sale and a look at how we’ve done. In Apple news, Geoff Duncan covers Apple’s new PowerBook and Power Mac G5 models, and Jeff Carlson gives an overview of Aperture. Glenn Fleishman stays wireless with looks at Salling Clicker 3.0 and the back-room battles surrounding the next wireless standard: 802.11n. We also include brief bits on preventing hard drive sleep, encoding video for the iPod, and the slow demise of the eMac.
Preventing Second Drive Sleepiness -- A while back I wanted some more disk space in my Power Mac G4, but I didn't want to buy a new boot drive to replace the 80 GB drive I've been using for a while
Encoding Video for iPod -- Since the release of the new video-enabled iPod, a few noteworthy articles have appeared about getting video content onto the device
eMac Fades Away -- Sources have confirmed that the eMac, Apple's inexpensive all-in-one Mac with a CRT-based screen, is no longer available for individual sale, although educational institutions can still buy the model
DealBITS Drawing: MaxProtect II Winner -- Congratulations to Paul Perry of sympatico.ca, whose entry was chosen randomly from 452 valid entries in last week's DealBITS drawing and who received a MaxProtect II PowerBook case, worth $49/$59/$69, depending on size
At a special press event in New York last week, Apple rolled out new revisions to its professional line of PowerBook computers and unveiled new high-end quad-processor Power Mac G5 systems.
More Pixels -- First up, Apple refreshed the 15-inch and 17-inch members of its PowerBook line, adding larger displays, increasing battery life, and making DVD-burning SuperDrives standard across the entire PowerBook line
At a press conference in New York last week (which coincided with PhotoPlus Expo), Apple announced Aperture, a new professional application geared toward photographers shooting and working with digital photos in RAW format
Salling Software's latest releases extend its remote-control software across all kinds of technology. The original Salling Clicker let you use a cellular phone to control a Mac via Bluetooth
Apple has signed on as part of a broad alliance to push a new proposal for faster Wi-Fi. The group, called the Enhanced Wireless Consortium (EWC), comprises 27 companies, and was formed outside the standards process that has been working on next-next-generation Wi-Fi for several years.
The IEEE standards group handles wireless local area networks in its 802.11 Working Group
As of today, the Take Control publishing project that Tonya and I started in 2003 marks its second year. We've come a long way from our first copy of Joe Kissell's "Take Control of Upgrading to Panther," and since we've been tracking Take Control's progress here in TidBITS all along, I want to share what we've accomplished and give you a sense of where we're going
The first link for each thread description points to the traditional TidBITS Talk interface; the second link points to the same discussion on our Web Crossing server, which provides a different look and which may be faster.
Internal Drive Reports Failing SMART Tests -- When Disk Utility reports a hard drive's SMART (Self-Monitoring Analysis and Reporting Technology) status as failing, is it time to retire the drive, or can it still be used? (11 messages)
New video-capable iPod -- Apple has been careful to note that the new iPod is a music player that also plays video, leading to a discussion of the company's marketing