The European Perspective
http://www.myapplestuff.com Copyright ©2006 Chris Marshall
My Stuff
by Chris Marshall
Well we made it through the first month and are back for a second month.
As promised last month this months column is somewhat shorter, and has a lot less foundation information. Without doubt the largest single event of the month was WWDC 06 with itÕs usual high level of pre and post show speculation and comment, and it seems general disappointment. To be honest as a ÒnewbieÓ I am still somewhat amazed at the speculation that occurs, and perhaps more impressively, the level of work that goes into the speculation i.e. the suggested iPhones!
I am not a developer by any means, so I have to confess that WWDC 06 left me somewhat cold. Sure, some of the features in Leopard looked great, some seemed like a natural progression and some just seemed to be a straight lift from third party applications, especially ChatFX which I reviewed some months ago and use on a regular basis. I am keen to see an iPhone, but wasnÕt expecting one until at least January Ô07, and I am not sure that a ÒtrueÓ Video iPod would get my cash. I have a 5G 60GB iPod with video and hardly ever use the video function – not because of the screen size, but because I just donÕt have a use for video on that sort of platform. I am about to get a Mac Mini, so would have liked to see the newer chips in them, but heh ho, for what I am going to use it for I am pretty sure it will be fast enough.
My ÕCasts
Books |
Fun |
General |
Mac |
News |
Review |
Sport |
Technical |
These are all available via the iTunes Music Store.
Under Consideration –
Recently Deleted (a bit of a purge this month)
:Geek Brief TV
As predicted last month I have lost patience with this Ôcast and unsubscribed. I tried stopping watching before the outtakes, but realized just how short each episode had become, and I got increasingly frustrated with the style of presentation. It really did seem to be that since they announced they were Ògiving up the tyranny of the day jobÓ the content got weaker at the same time as the show became more about them than the content – and wow, if you really make that many mistakes producing a two minute Ôcast (average content coverage over my Òunder considerationÓ period) take some lessons, donÕt be proud of the fact and promote it! And donÕt get me started on Second Life – sure have fun with the game BUT why promote it on your show all the time???
:NYT Movies
The format just didnÕt work for me. The very short, sharp and snappy 30-second type clips didnÕt give me enough information. Maybe it is the European vs. American ÒthingÓ again, but I have always found that European coverage is a lot more detailed and substantial – sort of conversational depth, rather than cocktail chat depth.
:NYT Music
Again, not a big fan of the style, and found that the iTunes Ôcast gave me a good enough update each month.
: Jack BlackÕs Nacho Libre Confessional
Purely because I have watched them, found them funny and thought it an excellent way to promote the film. I am actually surprised that more movies arenÕt been promoted this way to be honest.
Just Added – Macnation
I have only listened to a few of these having been directed to it by Robert when Daphne Kalfon was interviewed.
I havenÕt really made my mind up yet, but I think I like it. It is certainly very professional and has just enough about new stuff in it to keep me interested after I have listened to my favorites.
Favourite ÔCasts – The Maccast
No surprise here I am sure?! Despite his relatively young age Adam seems to be becoming the Grandaddy of Mac podcasting, much in demand not only with his own show, but with guest appearances, comments on events and interviews. I am going to stick with why I like the Maccast though.
In all probability a recurring theme with my favorites – he has found a simple and effective formulae that works and he sticks to it. The news is relatively current and he has authority behind his observations and views. I really like the way he interacts with his listeners; involving them in the problem solving and hints and tips, and he is really easy to listen to.
European News
As I have mentioned earlier I am going to get a Mac Mini, so I thought I would share with you the differentials in pricing across the US, Spain and the UK.
I am looking to get the Mac Mini 1.66 GHz Intel Core Duo, with
- a total of 1GB RAM (so for this comparison I am going to assume I am buying it from Apple, which of course I won.t be doing!),
- a 120GB serial ATA drive
- wireless keyboard
- wireless Mighty Mouse, and
- DVI to Audio cable.
Price |
USA |
UK |
Spain |
$1,252.97 |
£792 = $1,493.33 |
1.145,99 Û = $1,465.42 |
Other stuff that made me grin this month included:
- the Czech iPod advert that was banned from the USA for been too sexy here
- LeviÕs iPod jeans here
- The 200 million songs milestone reached for sales thru the European iTunes Music Store,
- The ongoing debate about DRM in Norway, Sweden and Denmark, and
- CanÕt help thinking that Steve has thrown his teddy out of the pram a bit with France over the iTunes row by refusing to give a keynote at the Paris Apple Expo.
Last month I pointed you in the direction of an article about Macs in Spain. Here is another one, first published in 2003 and recently republished in Boston in 2006. It is well worth a look. It will really put the size of the market into perspective for you, and has a little bit of interesting background into Spain as well. It mentions a MUG of about 50 members. I am aware of 14 MUGÕs in Spain in total, several of which are online ones – maybe I should set one up? I took a look at the Apple documentation. If anyone has any experience of doing this, or would like to get involved, than please let me know.
Digital Media Solution
Three things have occupied my time this month:
- trying to resolve an issue I have with my Sony Vaio Media Centre Desktop, and
- reviewing the TVMax from Miglia. And
- getting to grips with my Sky + (same as TiVo).
I review the TVMax this month so I wonÕt repeat myself, but suffice to say I am going to buy one :-)
I am still working on the best way of using the Sky + alongside the TVMax so will write about that next month. This month as I have effectively been testing them both, I have created some duplication which has led to a couple of obvious issues, namely that there is no way to transfer recorded material off the Sky + box to an external hard drive, even though it has a USB port. Sky say that port is for the future and hasnÕt been activated as such yet, and if a movie is split either side of the news (as is common on the commercial channels) the system doesnÕt automatically record the second part!!! One up for the TVMax for sure as it is easy to edit the recorded material on the Mac.
By far the most frustrating problem though, has been with the Sony Vaio Media Centre Desktop and the Sony Triniton TV. Now I have no problems at all connecting the TV to the PC and can record and play back recorded items really well. It is also possible to use the TV as a monitor for the PC, although the quality of the picture isnÕt great. The problem is that the PC screen image is too big for the TV screen, so I only get the centre part of the PC image. I can scroll around on the TV screen and move the image so that I can see all of the screen, just not all at once. For example, if I was browsing the Internet and had it so that I could see the browser toolbar at the top of the TV screen, I wouldnÕt be able to see the Windows START toolbar at the bottom. This is a total pain. The only way that I have managed to get round it so far is to view movies with QuickTime and adjust the screen size so that I reduce the problem.
I have tried a number of forums with no luck, so if anyone has any thoughts please let me know.
And Finally ÉÉÉÉ Back Ups
It seems like the whole area of backups is becoming even more topical since the announcement of Leopard. Both Adam (MacCast) and Tim (MacReviewCast) have discussed this for many months now and there are a lot of options around.
I am somewhat anal about backups, as you will see!!
At the moment I have three computers in the apartment that we use – my PowerBook, my wifeÕs Notebook, and a shared Desktop. I also have a 250GB external Hard Drive.
My PowerBook has my files, pictures and music that I use and this is backed up each month to the external hard drive. I also back up my applications folder as well.
I do the same each month with my wifeÕs notebook, so on the external hard drive every month we have a back up of our own music, pictures, emails, documents, Quicken files, diaries etc.
I have ALL our music and photos on the Desktop and a copy on the external hard drive. Any music that isnÕt on a CD (they are all loaded onto the PC) is burnt to 2 CDÕs and one copy is stored outside of the apartment. I file all our pictures by year, so at the end of every year I take 2 CD backups and again store one outside of the apartment. Ditto downloaded digital media e.g. audiobooks. I havenÕt worked out what to do with all the movies that I am now recording but I donÕt want to copy them to disc, as that sort of defeats the objective of reducing the amount of ÒjunkÓ I have laying around. The new Mac Mini will resolve that issue for a while, but after that I think I will just create more and more external drives as back ups.
Finally my mate Scott shoved me in the direction of a script in Automator that I use to back up my user folder to an old 3G iPod that I have. In theory, this would make restoring easier as it ÒsavesÓ the meta data as well i.e. all the links.
Anyway, if you are interested this is the script that I have set up:
Build the script in Automator, or you can just use Terminal. Either way, you are using a Terminal script (not Applescript).
If you use Automator, you need to make the initial backup in Terminal first. The command itself is pretty easy, but you must get the full paths right (source and destination). It looks like this:
sudo rsync -avE /source /destination
In the above example, the folder "source" (and all of its contents) will be duplicated within "destination". If "source" is your Users folder, there will be a new folder named "Users" created in "Destination". When you run rsync subsequently, you just need to update the backup, so I use a slightly different form of the paths:
sudo rsync -avE /source/ /destination/Users
Since "source" already exists at both locations, you only need to update its contents. The above paths will look at the contents of "source," copying any changes to the "Users" folder duplicate that is at "destination."
I like to use an additional option that will delete items that have been deleted from the original. This keeps my backup from growing over time with old files (I have no doubt that the new "Time Machine" uses rsync without this option, thereby allowing the ability to "rewind"). With this option, the command will be:
sudo rsync -avE --delete /source/ /destination/Users
I also like to have it write what it does to a log file. This allows me to troubleshoot in the event of some problem. To do this, I just need to "pipe" the command line "stdout" to a file:
sudo rsync -avE --delete /source/ /destination/Users >> ~/Documents/Backup.log
About Chris Marshall
Educated in the UK and USA, I have lived and worked in the UK, USA, and Spain. I currently live in Spain in a state of semi-retirement where I spend most of my time developing my skills on the Mac and understanding the significance and opportunities of the ÒWeb 2.0Ó explosion.
I have recently started writing reviews and articles for macCompanion[1] and for The Mac ReviewCast[2].
From a Òday jobÓ perspective I donÕt really have one at the moment. I am doing some PC training and support locally and have been advising a couple of small start-up businesses. When I do work, it is a business consultant[3] with an emphasis on small and start-up businesses and mentoring individuals. I am particular keen to help US organizations establish themselves in Europe. I am also keen to develop my writing skills.
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And just added
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