News Archive for 04/07/07

Choose an article from the archive listing on this page or refine your selection using the controls in the gray box below.

palmOne launches new Mac resource center

07/07, 5:30pm

palmOne Mac resources

palmOne today introduced a new online resource center for Mac users. A newly designed area specific to the Macintosh is designed to help users use their palmOne handheld, including tips and explanations for wireless connectivity, organizing and downloading photos, syncing information with Apple's iSync software, and information about other related software applications. "We count thousands and thousands of Mac enthusiasts among our valued customers," said Page Murray, vice president of marketing for palmOne, Inc. "We created this new Mac resource center to build on the idea of the Mac as a digital hub and the palmOne handheld as your portable digital life."

iTunes sells more than 1.5 million songs in Europe

07/07, 2:10pm

Euro iTunes momentum

Billboard Bulletin reports that Apple's iTunes Music Stores in the United Kingdom, France and Germany have not lost much sales momentum in their second week of operations, noting that the services in each country have had more than 1.5 million combined digital song sales since launching on June 15, but that Apple has not released details on the best-selling titles in each market. The article notes that it took only seven days to sell 1 million songs during iTunes' initial launch in April 2003.

Linksys extends wireless range with new antennas

07/07, 2:00pm

Linksys antennas

Linksys, a division of Cisco Systems, today announced a line of high-gain antennas to be used with select Linksys Wireless-B and Wireless-G products. Developed to help increase the effective range of a Linksys home or small business wireless network, the new antenna solutions include a pair of TNC Connector Antennas (HGA7T), a single SMA Connector Antenna (HGA7S) and Antenna Stands (AS1SMA and AS2TNC) for mounting the antennas to walls or ceilings. Pricing is $30 each for the stands and $60 each for the attachable antennas.

Apps: Menu Master, Webseecon, Adium, TimeSlice,...

07/07, 1:55pm

Menu Master, Webseecon,...

Menu Master 1.2 ($10) is a system utility that allows setting, customization, and removal of keyboard shortcuts for menu items in Mac OS X. This update fixes compatibility with Mac OS X 10.2 Jaguar. The haxie allows uses to change or remove menu shortcut keys in any application. [1.2MB]
Webseecon 1.0 ($6) will automatically create completely customized icons for all your web shortcuts. The shortcut icons, which look exactly like the real website, are available in full-color, 128x128 Mac OS X native icons that exactly match the related website. It supports automatic searching, as well as drag-and-drop. [1.1MB]
A Better Finder Launcher 1.5 ($10) updates the keyboard-based application and document launcher for Mac OS X. It offers fast indexing of all application and instant keyboard-based access to a list of documents/apps matching simple search or the first few letters. Version 1.5 offers direct access to the system preferences panes of Mac OS X. [3.4MB]
Adium 0.62 (free) is a multiprotocol messaging client that offers many advanced functions; it fixes an issue that was causing server-side contact list corruption (in rare situations) and is a recommended upgrade for all Adium users. It also brings an assortment of new custom sorting options, improvements to contact alerts, improved proxy support, and more. [4.6MB]
FXWitz SWF Editor 1.0 is a template-based application for creating Flash-based slideshows, photo galleries, catalogs, and brochures on the web or on CD--without any knowlege of Flash. It supports styled text, image/text hyperlinks, transition/image effects, thumbnails, customize size and output, and action scripts for HTML editors such as Dreamweaver and GoLive. It is available in Mini ($22), Standard ($60), and Dynamic ($73) versions. [3.0MB]
TimeSlice 2.8 ($50) is time-tracking and billing application for Mac OS 9/X. It can export data, create graphs, create custom reports, automatic tracking of time worked on documents, and more. It adds Address Book merge, average hourly rate calculation, better invoicing, a new dock icon, an improved admin application to upload categories/clients/projects, and more. [Classic, OSX]

Apple extends 'Cram. And jam.' promo on laptop, iPod

07/07, 12:25pm

\'Cram. And jam.\' promo

Apple has extended its Cram. And jam. promo for US education customers, offering up to a $200 rebate on a purchase of new iBook or PowerBook and an iPod. The promo runs through September 25, 2004 and offers a $200 mail-in rebate in addition to the usual education discount. All PowerBook and iBooks (except the CD-ROM iBook) qualify; however, the promo does not include the iPod mini. Apple is also holding a Win a trip to the Warped Tour '04 contest: "Not only will we fly you to Boston for the August 19-20, 2004, shows — we’re throwing in a backstage pass. So you can see bands like Good Charlotte, Simple Plan, or Thursday behind the scenes. And, for good measure, we’ll hook you up with an iPod mini."

Disc Makers ships MacElite CD/DVD duplication system

07/07, 11:30am

MacElite CD/DVD duplicator

Disc Makers has begun shipping MacElite, its high capacity automated duplication system for Mac computers and will be showcasing the solution at Macworld Boston (Booth No. 626) The MacElite systems allows users to design disc label artwork, copy CDs and DVDs, and archive images of frequently copied titles. The systems include the 4800 dpi Autograph6 inkjet disc printer with up to 10 CD-R/hour throughput and are available with one or two CD-R or DVD-R drives. Both systems are equipped with a large 125 disc input capacity and connect to both G4/G5 Power Macs (with Mac OS X 10.3 or later) through FireWire and USB. The single-drive MacElite1 with a 52x CD-R is $3,000, while the 8x DVD+/-R model is $3,700.

PhotoshopWorld kicks off Sept. 1

07/07, 11:00am

PhotoshopWorld 2004

The fifth annual PhotoshopWorld Conference & Expo kicks off this year in Orlando, FL, Sept. 1-3. Sponsored by Adobe Systems and the National Association of Photoshop Professionals (NAPP), the conference offers 60 classroom sessions over three days taught by industry professionals that cover learning experiences of every level. Additionally, more than 60 companies will be on-hand exhibiting and demonstrating their products. Admission is $600, or $500 before July 30. NAPP members save an additional $100.

Briefly: Cocoa session, MacBUS, Imaging Cruise, ...

07/07, 10:50am

Cocoa session, MacBUS

In Brief: Eric Tremblay and MacDev.ca are featuring a special 2-day summer session of the "Introduction to Cocoa Programming" Class featuring XCode in Montreal, Canada starting on July 24th. MacBUS (Philadelphia) will hold its next meeting on Tuesday, July 27th, at 6:30 pm with Dave Marra, Apple Senior Systems Engineer. An 8-day Digital Photography & Imaging Cruise featuring workshops for beginning and intermediate photographers will embark from San Diego on December 3, 2004, aboard Carnival's luxury superliner SPIRIT; Hemera has added a portion of photographer Keith Levit's image collection to AbleStock.com.

Memorex announces D2 DVD recorder

07/07, 9:15am

Memorex D2 DVD recorder

Memorex today announced its D2 (D Squared) dual-format, dual-layer DVD recorder, capable of writing to single-layer and dual-layer DVD+R discs at 16x and 2.4x, respectively. The drive is also capable of writing to DVD-R media at 8x and CD-R media at 48x. The D2 ships only with PC software but should be compatible with Mac users running Toast 6. The D2 will be available as an internal configuration ($150) and FireWire/USB 2.0 external configuration ($230) in early August.

RealBasic Showcase shows off applications

07/07, 9:10am

RealBasic Showcase

Real Software today launched the RealBasic Showcase, a new part of its website that displays information about software applications made with REALbasic. "There are thousands of applications made with REALbasic, and the Made with REALbasic Showcase is a small sample selected to demonstrate the kinds of software people can create using REALbasic," Geoff Perlman, president and CEO of REAL Software, said in a statement.

WiebeTech offers 1.6TB G5Jam configuration

07/07, 9:00am

1.6TB G5Jam

WiebeTech has added a 1.6TB configuration to its G5Jam offerings, consisting of the G5Jam bracket that allows a G5 to hold two additional hard drives, as well as four 400GB Serial ATA drives. The 1.6TB G5Jam sells for $3,500. Pricing on the G5Jam starts at $500 without drives.

Apple's iPod mini to ship worldwide on July 24

07/07, 8:20am

iPod mini now worldwide

Online Apple Stores across Europe are currently down as the company prepares the worldwide roll-out of the iPod mini, MacNN has learned. Pricing and availability are unknown at this point. In January, an Apple executive told The Guardian that Apple was looking at a U.K. price of £199 for the mini, a move that drew criticism as it represented almost a $50 premium over the U.S. price, including taxes. The iPod mini was originally scheduled to ship worldwide in April, but high demand and component shortages forced Apple to delay the release until July. Even today, new U.S. orders for minis face month-long backorders. Update: The iPod mini is now available in Europe for €279, in the U.K. for £179, in Japan for ¥28,140, and other regions (prices include tax). In Canada, the mini is available for C$349, excluding taxes but including the CPCC's Blank Media Levy of $15. Delivery is expected July 24.

Disney ships first DVD with Mac OS X bonus content

07/07, 7:35am

DVD with Mac bonus content

Disney today announced that it has started shipping its first DVD with enhanced bonus content for Mac OS X. The Haunted Mansion, starring Eddie Murphy, features Mac-compatible interactive technology developed by InterActual. Such bonus content includes a Ghostly Effects Studio, where fans can turn their digital photos into a ghost, zombie, or more; Haunt The Mansion Ride, which takes fans on a 3D virtual tour of the mansion; and Haunt This Computer, which creates customized desktop themes, wallpaper, and screensavers from digital photos.

FT: Digital music Apple's biggest prospect

07/07, 7:25am

FT: Apple and online music

Apple is in danger of marginalizing its lead in the digital music industry if it stumbles in its efforts to stay ahead of competitors, an article in today's Financial Times explains. Such a blunder could be especially painful for Apple, which has seen its shares rise 124 percent since launching the iTunes Music Store, despite continuing to lose market share in the PC space. "Against this background, digital entertainment appears to represent Apple's best long-term growth prospects... Yet investors are still waiting for Steve Jobs to make his next big move."

Apps: SnapWeb, URL Manager Pro, KnowledgeTank...

07/07, 5:15am

SnapWeb, URL Manager Pro..

SnapWeb 2.0 ($18) is a snapshot, archiving and publishing utility for web content It creates complete screenshots of web pages in either JPEG, PNG or PDF formats. Version 2.0 adds features for automation, implements basic AppleScript support, adds Services support, and more. Upgrades are $10. [1MB]
URL Manager Pro 3.3 ($25) is a professional bookmark manager that offers system-wide access to bookmarks, global history between browsers, and import/export between browsers. Version 3.3 adds a new Search Bar, adds support for the new bookmark file formats of Camino 0.8 and Firefox 0.9, and allows LaunchBar and History Hound to index your URL Manager Pro bookmark files. [3.4MB]
KnowledgeTank 1.2 ($20) updates the information management software with Journal functions, metadata support, and more. It supports simple version management, organizes information (categories, topics, and date) and can create templates for info entry. Version 1.2 supports Apple's WebKit, can bookmark URLs (saves metadata and attaches the page as a PDF file), and leverages advanced Google search features. [276KB]
Tasks Pro 1.2 ($125/5-users) and Tasks 2.1 ($30) are new versions of Alex King's cross-platform, web-based task management/to-do list software. The new versions add additional localization support, a new custom RSS feed for upcoming and overdue tasks, and optional display of task's hierarchy in lists, RSS feeds, iCalendars and e-mail notifications. [Tasks Pro, Tasks]
iStumbler 87 (free) is an open-source Mac OS X 10.3 tool for finding wireless networks and devices with an AirPort- or Bluetooth-equipped Macintosh. It offers a realtime display of signal strength and complete debugging information. Release 87 restores noise reporting for AirPort Extreme radios and also introduces the Bluetooth plugin which reports on bluetooth devices. [133KB]
You Control:Fonts ($20) is a new software utility that lets you create a WYSIWYG font menu in Mac OS X. Users can create a custom font menu in the Mac OS X menu bar that displays fonts in their own typeface as well as grouped by font family. It supports both the new Cocoa-style applications as well as Carbon-based applications. It is $10 for owners of You Control or You Synchronize. [1.6MB]
iTunes Watcher 2.5 (donationware) lets users automatically display up-to-date information about their music, including album art (using Amazon's Web API Token). It uses an AppleScript application to pass information from iTunes 4 to a MySQL 4/PHP 4 server. Version 2.5 brings an improved setup process, support for modules, and support for multiple templates. [339KB]