Techie at heart

So it seems that I haven’t updated in quite some time, and I’ve done a few things that I’ve never thought I would have ever done…I’ve bought two Apple products!!!  Wait a minute…didn’t I curse Apple up one side and down the other for the longest time???  I did!  What the hell has come over me?  Quite a few things actually.  So read more to find out why I’m going back on most of what I said about Apple, and find out what I’ve actually bought!

 

 

 

So what could I have possibly bought from Apple?  First, is an iPhone…… the device that I shunned, mocked, and belittled for ages.  What brought me to this?  Well first off, I technically didn’t buy my first iPhone (we’ll get to that later), I was actually given it by my friend (a very, very nice friend at that!).  Nothing was wrong with the phone at all, but my friend knew that I despised Apple and anything they make.  So he said, how about I give you this phone (an 8gig version) and see if you like it.  If you like it, keep it, it’s yours; but if you don’t like it, return it to me, no harm no foul.  So I agreed to it, I’ll try it, just to see what the “hype” is all about.  Well after getting, I was VERY, VERY impressed with the phone.  Now as some of you know, I was a big fan of Windows Mobile devices, and technically still am, but I was just blown away at how nice the iPhone was.  Noticed how I said nice…the iPhone isn’t technical at all, it’s a VERY easy device, with a lot of flash, but it lacks quite a few things that I’m used to with Windows Mobile:

1. No Exchange ActiveSync (meaning no Push E-mail support for Exchange, only IMAP support, so no syncing contacts, calendars, etc…)
2. An actual tactile keyboard (Yes using the virtual keyboard gets better after you use it, but I’d rather have actual keys I press)
3. Being able to add files, etc…in the OS (meaning you access the phone via Explorer and add files that way, with the iPhone you have to use iTunes for everything)
4. Being able to edit playlists on the phone (On WM, I can edit, or make a playlist while on the phone, on the iPhone, everything is done via iTunes)
5. Ability to add third-party apps (Yes the iPhone can add a very limited number of apps when modded, but the number of apps compared to WM is a lot)
6. WM phones use miniUSB for charging and syncing (iPhone has the “iPod” connector at the bottom meaning to charge, I have to have the special cable)
7. No A2DP on the iPhone (I had to buy a $50 adapter that sticks off the end to get A2DP…shame)
8. No 3G! (And good ol’ Jobsy says that 3G is a battery eater, and that WiFi is faster…)
9. No copy and paste (come on, this is just a no brainer…)

While those are 9 things that I miss from WM phones, the ease of use, the gorgeous UI of the iPhone has actually changed me to it for quite some time.  Here is a pic of my modded iPhone screen:

Isn’t that just REALLY nice looking?  I’ve never seen a pretty home screen on WM, but this, is just so nice   Now you’ll notice that these icons, background etc…aren’t the default ones you would see.  Well I’ve modded my iPhone to allow 3rd party apps, and actual customization!  The reason I mentioned that I actually bought an iPhone is this: When firmware version 1.1.1 came out, it bricked anyone’s phone who unlocked theirs.  Well I actually did unlock mine because I just wanted to see if it would work.  I didn’t need to unlock at all, but I did it just to try it.  Well my phone got bricked…so I went to the Apple store and bought a 4gig for $300.  I didn’t mod this one at all, just updated it to 1.1.1.  I had two weeks to return this 4gig.  Then about 2 days before I’m supposed to return the 4gig, the iPhone SimFree team releases a tool to fix bricked phones!  But, it was $60!  I’d rather have a working phone, then wait for the free version.  So I paid the $60, fixed the phone!  So I returned the 4gig the following day, and am now using the 8gig again.  And now that 1.1.1 has been hacked, I’m using 3rd party apps on 1.1.1 .

This brings us to the 2nd item that I’ve bought from Apple (ok, technically 3 things, but I’ll get to that).  Because of all my Windows woes, I decided that I would buy a Mac and just use that as a every day computer, and my PC as a gaming PC (oh and I fixed my PC problems, the whole DSR errors in Vista, was because I had my water block on the GPU a little too tight!  I loosened it up, and no more crashes!).  So I bought a 2Ghz Core2Duo Mac Mini:

Upon getting this little computer, I was so amazed at how quiet it was.  There’s no fans what-so-ever (or if there are, they’re insanely quiet) and it produces so little heat it’s incredible!

I can leave the Mac Mini on the entire day, and come back to a completely cool room, something my PC couldn’t do.  The only noise from the Mac is the hard drive spinning every so often.  It’s just that awesome .  Not having really ever used Mac OS X, I didn’t really know what I was getting myself into, but having some Linux training, I figured I could get the hang of it since OS X is UNIX based.  This OS is just so easy, and so idiot proof it’s not even funny.  It’s just a dream to use, I couldn’t even believe it.  There are some programs that I actively use on Windows that don’t have a Mac equivalent, so I’m trying to figure out how I can go about things (i.e. Newsleecher, and uTorrent).  The same friend who gave me the iPhone also has two Macs and just loves it, but said that once I get it, I’ll figure everything out so quickly that I’ll be teaching him how to do things.  Well after about a week of use, I don’t think I’m quite there to where I know everything about it, but I’m getting there that’s for sure!  I still don’t really know what Automater is or really does, but I might just play around with it to see what I can really do with it, or even if I’ll use it.  One thing kind of disappoints me about using OS X, but this has nothing to do with Apple, it actually has all to do with Microsoft!  Office 2004…well I’m mainly using Entourage with it since I have a paid Exchange 2007 server, and Mail.app only supports IMAP from Exchange (like the iPhone) .  Well Entourage isn’t the best app I’ve ever used, and it seriously lags behind Outlook on the PC, in usability and looks.  But I hope that is all going to change when Office 2008 comes out, and includes the Ribbon UI that was introduced with Office 2007 for PC.  So me being me, I knew that the beta version of Leopard was out, so I decided to download it, and install it on my Mini, and I have to say, Tiger just looks so dated compared to Leopard.  At first I installed Leopard on my BootCamp partition and just dual booted.  But after actually using Leopard, I HAD to install it as the main OS, beta or not.  And as of right now, I’m currently running build 9A559 and it’s been about 99% stable, it’s never crashed only a few iChat crashes and bugs to report.  So I’m hoping that the GrandMaster build is going to be flawless (not in software speaking of course).

One thing that overly impressed me with Apple, is they announced that Leopard would be out on the 26th, and anyone who’s bought a Mac starting from October 1st can get Leopard for only $10!  I even had a pre-order at Amazon for the full $129 price!  Just an awesome gesture from Apple if you ask me.  So instead of spending $129 on this, I only spend $10!  How can you not like that???  Thank you Apple, thank you

Now I know some of you guys might be thinking that I’m all loving of Apple and they can do nothing wrong, HA!  That is so far from the truth!  While I may love the iPhone, Mac Mini, and OS X, I still cannot stand smug ass Steve Jobs!  And there are a few practices of Apple that I really do not like either.  I will never think of Steve Jobs as a “god” or wait on his every word, and if I ever do, PLEASE someone shoot me, as I’ve clearly gone mad!  Even Leo Laport (who you might know from the Screensavers on TechTV, or now on TWiT) even said he was an asshole (my words of course, but he said he was a very mean person), and Leo is a very nice person!  While Steve Jobs may be doing some great things at Apple, he is just a plain old douche bag, and that’s just sad.

So that about does it for this entry as I’d rather not write more and get people thinking I’m now kissing Apple’s ass or something like that.  So once Leopard officially comes out, I’ll write up a little review about it.  I still need to finish my third part of my Vista article, and I also plan on writing up an entry for the new fall shows that I’m currently watching, so stay tuned!  Posts should be about once a week from now on!

written by Jason