mac

2009: Netbook or notebook?

2009 may be the year of the Netbook. But there's a big if.

Here's the choice: Will consumers buy a thin, light, relatively fast $1,800 MacBook Air or a thin, light, ultrasmall, not-as-fast $450 Hewlett-Packard Mini 1000 Netbook? (Correction: the HP Mini 1000 configuration cited here was originally stated incorrectly as $700.)

If many people, fully aware of this choice, opt for a Netbook then we have the foundation of, at the very least, a rethinking of the pricey ultraportable.

At most, we have many more consumers buying into the Netbook concept--particularly if 3G broadband wireless comes … Read more

Dan's favorite laptops of 2008

After looking at countless laptops during 2008, a small handful have jumped out as personal favorites. I'm not saying these are the very best laptops of the year, nor the highest-rated--they're just the ones that struck me as particularly interesting, useful, or well-designed.

Chances are high that you'll disagree with some or all of this list--which is what makes the comment section below so handy. Share your personal favorites, and see how they stack up against mine.

Gateway P-7811FX For a brief time in 2008, PC gamers had a single bright spot in their otherwise drab world (… Read more

Mac Starter Kit

Now that your new Mac is set up and you have the Internet hooked up, how about some software? Out of the box, your Mac is loaded with cool apps to get you started on stuff like uploading and organizing your digital images, creating a music library, making your own movies, and surfing the Web. But it doesn't come with everything.

New Macs come with a ton of goodies already, but there are several cool apps Mac users count on every day that aren't included in the initial setup. To get you started, we've rounded up our … Read more

As Intel ships 160GB SSD, pricing nags buyers

Updated at 1:40 p.m. PST with pricing information.

Intel is now shipping 160GB solid-state drives as it vies with Samsung and Toshiba to deliver high-capacity SSDs that rival hard-disk drives in capacity. Price, however, remains a big obstacle for many consumers.

Intel said Monday that it will add 160GB versions of its X25-M and X18-M Serial ATA (SATA) solid-state drive. To date, Intel has limited shipments to its 80GB versions. Laptop-size 2.5-inch versions of the 160GB drive are shipping now; 1.8-inch models for ultraportable laptops will ship next month, Intel said.

Larger-capacity drives from other SSD … Read more

Nvidia bids to dislodge Intel as rivalry gets ugly

Intel and Nvidia are entering into a new, nasty phase of competition. What's at stake? Only the future of the personal computer.

Although the Santa Clara, Calif., neighbors (located only a couple of miles from each other) have never really been on speaking terms, the rivalry is intensifying with the emergence of the Netbook--small, lightweight laptops priced below $500.

The competitive backdrop is still the same--Intel's longstanding (and very successful) vision of a CPU-centric universe versus Nvidia's creed that graphics processing matters more and more in a multimedia-intensive world.

The challenge for Nvidia is that as laptops … Read more

What we Craved this week

What a hectic week it's been. If you, like some, were busy lobbying for a federal bailout this week, that likely left you even less time than usual to keep up with the happenings on Crave. No worries, here's a roundup of some of our favorite stories from this week.

The Mac maker will no longer be part of MacWorld after this year.

Rumors swirl regarding a possible Dell competitor to the MacBook Air, apparently called "Adamo." Yeah, we're not sure how to pronounce it either.

T-Mobile is dropping its handset upgrade fee.

No ZunePhone … Read more

Files in Mac OS point to new iMacs, Mac Minis

A Mac fan with way too much time on his hands may have discovered evidence of new iMacs and Mac Minis coming soon.

A forum poster on InsanelyMac.com found code strings inside the version of Mac OS X running on the new MacBooks that point to a new version of the iMac and Mac Mini. MacRumors.com verified that the identifying marks uncovered by the poster (iMac9,1 and Macmini3,1) would indeed represent a new version beyond the marks used by the current iMac and MacMini (iMac8,1 and Macmini2,1).

The new systems appear to use the … Read more

Dell's superthin Adamo--due in February?

You can never be too thin, the saying goes, and that's apparently the guiding spirit as Dell contemplates the success of Apple's MacBook Air.

Reports in the last day or so have offered up some tidbits about an "Adamo" laptop purportedly in the works at Dell. Citing a "totally amazing" source, Engadget says that a superthin, black-and-silver laptop by that name is a bona fide product-in-waiting, with a little extra emphasis on "waiting":

(T)hat rumored Adamo is very much real, and very much like what we've been hearing. Apparently the … Read more

Voice, video chat coming to Mac Messenger

In some great news from Mac Mojo, the Office for Mac team blog, it looks like Windows Live Messenger for Mac will receive a major update sometime early next year. The biggest new feature update will be AV support for the personal client, which means users will be able to participate in cross-platform audio and video chat using the personal version of Microsoft Messenger for Mac. They are also working on additional features for the personal Windows Live Messenger client and are on track to preview some of the new implementations at Macworld in January at the MacBU booth. The … Read more

Apple offers advice on 10.5.6 upgrade problems

Apple has acknowledged an issue encountered by some Leopard users trying to install the company's latest update released Monday.

In a support document posted to its site, Apple described an issue in which a Mac would hang on a "Configuring installation" window when trying to install Mac OS X 10.5.6. That was apparently the result of an incomplete update getting seeded into the Software Update process, and Mac OS X will freak out if it tries to install a partially downloaded update.

Apple recommends that if you encounter this problem, or have already, that you … Read more