tech ronin

NetNewsWire 3 Alpha Rocks

Ooh! I hardly ever even think about using alpha software, but I wanted to see what NNW 3 had going. Brent Simmons was so enthusiastic about his new baby that I had to see why. Really slick.

Note the right column of tiny screen shots. That is so much more fun that the typical list of tabs showing pages you have clicked on. Makes it easier to navigate too.

No problems so far. I did take his advice to backup my netnewswire folders first because I may need to go back to 2.1 if problems arise.

UPDATE: March 7. Eight days later I am happily using NNW3a and do not plan to turn back. It has crashed a couple times and misbaved once or twice, but no data was lost and I just did a force quit and restarted the app. No problem. If you enjoy NNW, you may want to try this out after backing up a couple files that you will be advised to backup.

I also use Google Reader sometimes. But, since moving up to NNW3, I have been using NNW more and GR less.

BlackBerry Pearl Progress Report #1

The Kool-Aid is starting to work its magic. This is an unbelievably cool device.

The menus are everywhere en masse. The keyboard shortcuts are everywhere and sometimes strange. Comma is a popular short-cut, for example.

What is going on here? The BlackBerry is one of those one-of-a-kind things. Probably designed, not just written, by programmers is all I can figure. There is an option for everything. Feels a little like UNIX or something. Go way back in time.

After using the Pearl for a few days, I tried using a Treo again. What a let-down. My thumb instinctively reached for a trackball. Navigating with Treo's slow, dull, old-school rocker dial was like driving an old pickup truck after test-driving a Ferrari. - Mike Elgan, ComputerWorld

But, what happened is they stumbled upon a major hit with their wonderful push email. That drove huge installs in corporations.

I would not buy a BlackBerry up till now because it was so corporate. I wanted a camera and multi-media. Why should I put up with corporate rules when I'm running my own show?

Luckily, all that corporate crackberry money was gushing to the point where RIM said, why not make a consumer device?

The BlackBerry Pearl is that killer blackberry consumer device.

This thing can do just about anything. Almost everything has options upon options. All you need to know is which options to set. Most things are easy, menu-driven, choices.

It is overwhelming if you just start trying to use a BlackBerry and explore on your own. If you get greedy and want everything on day one, you will be frustrated. If you just take a few new things per day, you will be fine.

I bought a good book yesterday: The BlackBerry Pearl for Dummies. It goes into enough depth to really be valuable.

You need to learn some basics. There is always a slow, methodical way and a fast way to do something. The fast way will almost certainly involve a shortcut key.

The 200+ page manual is all on your device.

But, the power and efficiency by day 3 is off the charts.

On day 4, I am processing and deleting email from my Pearl and having those things deleted from my email account so when I get back to my MacBook Pro that mail is processed. For the moment I am syncing to Outlook on my cheapo PC notebook. Not fun, but seemed like a fast way to get started. There is a free PocketMac for BlackBerry downloadable from the Blackberry site. I will be trying it out in the next day or two.

One last thing. The Basex Research Company named the Pearl the Product of the Year. They are looking for: the product that “provides knowledge workers with the best tools to do their jobs.”

“The BlackBerry Pearl exemplifies the type of device that has broken new ground and points the way to the future,” said Jonathan B. Spira, CEO and chief analyst at Basex. “It is truly a masterpiece of design and the pearl- like trackball used for navigation allows the mobile knowledge worker to literally tap into tremendous functionality without a struggle. The Pearl provides the knowledge worker with as perfect a mobile telephony experience as possible,” said David M. Goldes, president and senior analyst at Basex. “The designers of the Pearl created a better mobile phone and managed to add BlackBerry functionality without any compromises.”

Opinions differ, but I am with Jonathan on this one!

Cool Pearl review from a fellow Mac user

Technorati Tags: Blackberry Pearl

Blackberry Pearl in 6 Minutes Video Rocks

This cool YouTube video is by far my favorite find in my first 24 hours with the Pearl. If you are thinking about buying a Pearl or if you are a new user, you must check this out ASAP.

Technorati Tags: Blackberry Pearl

Replaced my Treo 650 with a Blackberry Pearl

My Treo 650 broke after 21 months of use. No reason. The phone part nolonger works but the PDA portion is fine. I was getting kind of *done* with the Treo 650 anyway. I had to get a phone.

I recently decided that I do not really like cargo pants. Actually, the pants are OK. But, having things in the cargo pockets is not all that comfortable on a long walk. In jeans and maybe a vest, gadget size starts to matter.

After lugging around my bulky Treo for almost two years, the tiny and moderately priced Blackberry Pearl caught my eye.

The obvious advantages of the Pearl are:

• Half the size of a Treo.
• Half the weight - 3.1 oz.
• Cute
• The *pearl* trackball is an easy and efficient navigation device.
• Killer Blackberry email.
• RIM seems to be going up and Palm down.
• Decent smartphone features.

It takes about 2 minutes to set up your email accounts. That was a miracle I had never seen before.

I purchased locally at Cellular World in Mill Valley. Cellular World is Cingular-only but is not an official Cingular store. That store choice could cost me, should I want a chance to get a discount on the iPhone. Apple insists that only official Cingular and Apple stores can sell the things.

Anyway. This little guy is tiny. I can type on it but people (like a lot of men) with bigger hands might not find it as easy. I like the fact that the suretype arrangement gives me a very nice numeric keypad for typing in phone numbers. The microscopic numeric keys on full-QWERTY keypads drives me nuts!

The Pearl has a MicroSD slot under the battery. Do not plan on regularly swapping cards, but once in a while might work OK. So far, you can get a 2 gig card and that will suffice for now. MicroSD cards of 4 gb are near release as of this writing.

Do not think about replacing an iPod with the Pearl unless you really are not using your iPod. The Pearl has an extremely rudimentary music player that has less than 10% of the power and convenience of the iPod. Of course, given how popular the Pearl has been, a better 3rd party music player should be available fairly soon. But, the iPod is a 5 year old device and its music player is very sophisticated in many ways. You will not match that quickly if at all.

The user manual is huge: 200+ letter-sized pages. The box comes with a tiny getting started manual that covers only the highlights of the phone. If you want to know about the task tracking features, for example, it is in the big manual on page 163.

I have some reading to do. I am committed to this little Blackberry for at least 3 months and will report back soon with more information in the on-going saga of smartphones.

Technorati Tags: blackberry, blackberry pearl

MacBook Pro 2-finger tap to right click

Just saw an essential tip for MBP owners. You can tap the trackpad with two fingers to right click. This is a system preference you set in the keyboard & mouse pane. See above. Works great! [Ron Brown]

Technorati Tags: MacBook Pro, Macintosh, MBP

My Airport Extreme N Box Shots

You can always look at what they got at the Apple Airport Extreme N page which is somewhat limited. Or you could look at the great photos that AppleInsider has posted.

Here are a few shots of the box. It is about 2-1/2 inches thick and 8 x 8 inches square. That's the box. I like the economy there.

Box Top Showing the Airport Extreme N front

Box Bottom Showing the Airport Extreme N back

Airport Extreme N Box Label -- including all the specs

Technorati Tags: 802.11n, Airport Extreme n

Airport Extreme N Up and Running

Took possession of my new Airport Extreme base station today. It has one USB port that you can attach a printer or hard drive to. Since it is the same form factor as the Mac mini (but only 1-1/4 inch high, I like the idea of putting a Mac mini-shaped hard drive under it so I will have a true NAS (network attached storage).

You can attach a USB 2.0 hub to this USB port and attach multiple printers and/or hard drives according to Digital Trends which has a full review including performance tests. Price is $179 by the way.

I just plugged it in a couple minutes ago so do not have any performance numbers yet. I am guessing it will be roughly equivalent to the 100-base-T ethernet network I have running now. So there will no longer be a need to get wired when copying files around the house.

My MacBook Pro is the only n-enabled device in the house, but that is the one that matters right now. I have a MacBook core duo as my backup notebook. It is never gonna run *n* I guess. Too bad.

I installed the Airport Utility from the CD that was included with the new airport extreme. The redesigned set-up utility was an absolute breeze. Quick and clear.

I ran the Airport Utility from my MacBook Pro. Afterwards, I wanted to see if I then had 802.11n enabled on my MBP. And yes I do!

One nice thing is you get three outbound ethernet ports. I have my express n hooked up right next to my favorite spot on the couch. It is supposed to have double the range. I wonder how well it will stretch to my upstairs or patio. Maybe I will try the patio first.

I will play around and post an update.

Technorati Tags: 802.11n, Airport Extreme n

Cancelled my Apple TV order

I decided to cancel after listening to the MacCast podcast for Feb 3. This special edition of the maccast was devoted to Apple TV. Adam interviewed Ara Derderian of the HDTV podcast.

I have a standard def TV with high rez. It can benefit by digital cable but isn't techically HDTV or even EDTV as far as I know. So, it won't work with Apple TV. Sometime this year I expect to buy a new HDTV, but it will probably be in the second half of this year.

End of story. Until I have an HDTV, Apple TV makes no sense.

The main benefit of Apple TV is to let you play your iTunes content on your HDTV. That's a benefit but I'm not planning to purchase all my content via iTunes. I'm also going to be buying DVDs. I'll be getting content from Youtube perhaps.

I may still buy an Apple TV once I have an HDTV, but I'm not sure. I'll wait and see what all my options are at that time.

Ara says he is really happy using a dedicated Intel-based Mac mini with a 750 gig Newer Technology miniStack hard drive and elgato eyetv plus Remote Buddy which set him back $1200 but he feels he has exactly what he wants that way. Right now that combo is priced above my tolerance level, but I'm sure the prices will be dropping steadily for this kind of functionality.