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Apple Support doc: retrieve files from an Archive and Install directory
I probably wipe my Macs once or twice a year, sometimes after a particularly grueling semester of work and screwing around with loads of 3rd party haxies and utilities in the name of TUAW. Each time I go through this hand-washing process, I make sure my continuous backup (thanks to Econ Technologies' ChronoSync) is as up-to-date as possible, and then I wipe the machine clean, installing a fresh copy of Mac OS X. I've always seen the option to 'Archive and Install,' but I never bothered to learn about the process, as I was always worried about how to retrieve files at a later date if I took that path. Maybe this 'clean slate' is a holdover from my Windows days, but I've always felt 'safer' starting with a fresh hard drive (but a guy can change).If you're not like me and actually are more curious about taking the Archive and Install route, this Apple Support doc will shed some light on how to handle these archived users after all is said and done, as well as how to create a disk image of your previous user directory and then retrieve files from said image. The doc certainly streamlines the process, offering a few simple steps to get your archive on.
Japan set to implode: Dragon's Quest IX is a DS exclusive
You heard it, folks: at Square-Enix's annual Jump Festa event, they let the bomb drop: the next entry in the venerable Dragon's Quest series, entitled Dragon's Quest IX: Defender of the Stars (another silly "DS" subtitle) will be coming exclusively to everyone's favorite little handheld. This is huge news: this franchise is second only to perhaps Final Fantasy in Japan, and still one of the most respected names in gaming worldwide. Having the title being developed exclusively on a Nintendo system is a clear show of faith from SE (they're also releasing a Final Fantasy XII sequel, Revenant Wings, sometime next year), and hopefully, even more Wii and DS support will follow.Development of the game is being passed over to Level 5 (also working on White Knight Story for the PS3), and it'll feature a four-player co-op mode as well. Of course, there's no definite release date, but the team mentioned that they'd like to have it out sometime in 2007.Let this news wash over your Tuesday, and make it full of glee and joy. Bring on DQIXDS![Thanks to everyone who sent this in, and GoNintendo for the pic!]
Apple Support doc on Intel Macs and 3rd party routers: "just restart it"
Well this doesn't sound like any fun: enough Intel Macs running 10.4.8 must be having a problem connecting wirelessly to some 3rd party routers that Apple had to publish a support doc on the topic. As icing on the cake, Apple's solution isn't a pretty one either. If your Intel Mac is having this problem, here's Apple's solution: restart the router. If that doesn't fix the problem, Apple then recommends calling the router's manufacturer to spend 45 minutes on hold, getting tossed around between operators who probably dish out the same troubleshooting technique, just like the books taught 'em.Not exactly the most effective solution I've ever heard to a problem like this, but I guess one must take what one can get - at least until one can download Mac OS X 10.4.9.
iPod 101 support docs
Apple just went nuts releasing a slew of iPod 101 support documents, most likely just in time for all the iPod-toting user who are about to unwillingly embark on a new side career this holiday season: supporting their family members and friends who just got their own little white (or black, or pink...) music player. Instead of forcing you to trudge through Apple's Support docs, using their less-than-stellar search, I thought I'd link everything I found for your bookmarking pleasure. Don't forget the last doc about backing up one's library, as well as the backup overview our own Scott McNulty wrote about this rocking new feature when iTunes 7 launched: iPod 101: Beef Up My Battery iPod 101: View Videos iPod 101: Set Up a Slideshow iPod 101: Eyeball my Artwork iPod 101: Put Pictures on my iPod iPod 101: Give the Gift iPod 101: Browse and Buy Videos iPod 101: Tour the Store iPod 101: Set Up an iTunes Store Account iPod 101: Lay of the Land iPod 101: What's On the Menu? iPod 101: Installing and Updating Software iPod 101: Which Files Work With iPod and iTunes and of course, the ever-pertinent: iPod 101: Backing Up Your Library
MS banning firmware modders?
Xboxic has a detailed post on Microsoft's response to Xbox 360 firmware modders that I won't attempt to explain in full. Supposedly, MS is now banning users with the easily detected hack. No surprise there, unless you don't happen to have hacked firmware and get the axe anyway.
Adobe's John Nack explains lack of PPC support in Soundbooth
Some corners of the Mac web aren't too happy about Adobe's choice to not support the PowerPC chip with their latest beta offering, Soundbooth. We've received a few comments on our original post, and Macintouch has a few posts from readers who are, let's say, 'somewhat upset.' To help bring some sense to the table, Adobe's John Nack (the product manager of Photoshop, mind you) has stepped in to lay down the company's decision on his blog. Long story short, John explains that support isn't being 'removed' from the product - while it's been dubbed as 'Audition Elements' by some, it's a brand new baby for both Mac OS X and Windows. In this context, Adobe made the choice of streamlining development (supporting one chipset) which favors focusing on things like features and performance, rather than trying to get a team of audio engineers who are used to working with Intel-based chips to start jugging a second architecture (PowerPC) which Adobe believes Apple is treating as "dead to us."I think this is a really difficult position for Adobe to be in, and given the circumstances, I understand their decision. While the PowerPC architecture is by no means 'dead' just yet, it's getting up from the dinner table and making its way for the coat closet (don't forget, there's plenty of conversation and lingering while putting one's coat on and rounding up all the kids). Readers at Macintouch have cited that a fair portion of the Mac audio industry are still using PowerPC based rigs and probably will for quite some time, and I think that might also have been a significant factor in the decision: Soundbooth isn't competing with Pro Tools and professional workflows, it's a mid-range app (at least from what I understand). I am certainly no software engineer, and I know equally little about the intricacies of audio software, but if a company with Adobe's girth says that now is a bad time to start building PowerPC support into a brand new product - I'll listen. From the non-developer sidelines, it sounds like it's a lot easier for code ninjas who already had a PowerPC app to unite forces with Intel support (thanks in part to Apple's UB efforts), as opposed to getting Intel backgrounds (remember: Adobe's audio guys are coming over from Windows development on this one) to shake hands with PowerPC. In the grander scheme of Adobe matters, however, they haven't shown this "abandoning" attitude in any of their other existing products, such as the entire Creative Suite (in fact Nack reminds us PPC hasn't gone anywhere in CS3), and even Lightroom Photoshop Lightroom, another recent beta offering for the pro photography crowd, is in fact a Universal Binary. I think Soundbooth was simply caught in the crossfire of this chip architecture migration, and Adobe had to make a hard decision that was ultimately tipped by looking ahead at the Mac platform, and realizing exactly where Soundbooth is going to sit on the ladder of Mac OS X-based audio editing.
Rumor: Apple might support both Blu-ray and HD-DVD in Leopard
In another move by a major player to negate this ridiculous next-gen DVD format war, Think Secret is reporting they have evidence that Apple might very well support both Blu-ray and HD-DVD with their upcoming Mac OS X 10.5 Leopard release. This is an interesting (and wholly welcomed) move from Apple in part because they're on the board of the Blu-ray Disc Association, while others like Microsoft, Toshiba and (strangely) Intel are camping out on the HD-DVD side of the fence. It would be great to see this rumor come true, as the last thing users need is another headache-inducing, hardware-stratifying format war to both up their daily computing.
Zinio offers fix for QuickTime + Flash quirk in their magazines
Zinio, if you aren't familiar, offers magazines in digital format (yes, with DRM), many of them with rich media like embedded movies right in the pages, for Mac and PC. They have quite a selection and they've been around for a few years now, but apparently their latest version (released around the dawn of time) is suffering a quirk due to Apple changing the way QuickTime renders Flash with the latest QuickTime 7.1.3 update, causing embedded rich media to misbehave.Fortunately, they've issued a fix via email, and it goes a little something like this: Close the Zinio Reader, if open Go to the QuickTime pane in System Preferences In the Advanced tab, check 'Enable Flash' After that simple process you should be able to return to your regularly scheduled, though in my opinion ridiculously overpriced, reading.This fix, by the way, is also how you enable iTunes 7 to play interactive booklets from the iTunes Store according to this Apple KB article.
FileBanc - another online backup solution now supports Mac OS X
We found UK-based online backup solution OnLine Pro back in August, and now FileBanc supports Mac OS X as well. The concept is the same: install a software client (localized in a plethora of languages and written for Linux, NetWare and Solaris), chose a monthly storage plan ranging from 500MB/$4.95 to 10GB/$39.95 (larger plans are available for business users) and set up a backup schedule. After the initial operation, FileBanc claims their backup software works with lightning-fast ninja precision, with 'in-file bit level delta backups,' meaning: "if you only change a single word in a file, only that word is backed up." I sure hope I don't have to sift through all those words some day to restore my thesis paper, but hopefully I wouldn't have to: FileBanc offers email and/or phone support with their plans.FileBanc sounds interesting, but I haven't tried it out myself. I'm pretty happy with ChronoSync, my external hard drives and my 'plan B' .Mac backups for the little essentials. Feel free to enlighten the class if you've had any experiences with this online backup solution.
Apple issues support doc for wonky AirPort performance on Intel Macs
Sketchy AirPort performance has been bugging me for weeks, probably over a month now, and I've been going through all forms of troubleshooting with my AirPort Express trying to squash the issue, but to no avail. My MacBook and iMac drop their Wi-Fi connection seemingly at random, sometimes right in the middle of Unreal online, and never regain it unless I manually re-select the network. I've been following the typical methods of changing channels on the APE, reducing range and using Interference Robustness - but it's all been for naught.Now, Apple has released a support document that might provide a solution for those like me who are experiencing less-than-stellar AirPort reliability and connectivity with their Intel Macs. The document specifies that these issues are related to the use of WPA2 and upgrading to 10.4.8, and I can't offer any feedback just yet as to whether my problem has been solved, but this doc is at least a step in a troubleshooting direction other than 'pull out more hair.' Feel free to share your experiences and any solutions in the comments.[via HardMac]
New Slingbox supports Mac OS X, Symbian - but where's the software?
It's time to check in again on the Slingbox's journey to Mac OS X, as Dave Zatz pinged us with some more details and a purty picture he took off one of the new Slingbox AV models at Best Buy. Turns out there are going to be three new models - Tuner, AV and Pro. Tuner ($150) goes the bare bones route for regular cable or antenna, AV ($180)can interact with a set top box, and Pro ($250) is the One to Rule Them All™ with support for multiple feeds and that hot new 'HD' thing the internets keep talking about. The interesting thing, as you can see, is that these new models list support for Mac OS X (as well as Symbian) right on the box, but as we learned a couple weeks ago, the company is still in the middle of a private beta of their SlingPlayer software for the Mac - nothing is public yet. So for now, it sounds like they're cranking out these boxes without actually having any way for John Doe Mac user to work with them, though after an update over on Dave Zatz's original story, we might have a public beta of the software very soon.If any of you rush out to grab one of these, feel free to let us know if there are some wires mixed here and Mac OS X software actually is shipping in the box.
iTunes controls for Mac not working as intended
If you're running WoW on a Mac and trying to listen to iTunes while playing, you've probably hit the same problem Timi over on Kirin Tor has: the controls ain't just workin' quite right.Sure, crossrealm BGs are cool, but for a few people, ingame iTunes controls were an even more awaited feature. The dev team didn't get it exactly right, however-- Tigerclaw tries to explain why over on the forums, but I couldn't get much farther than "a Plan-B version was shipped using 'osascript'... to solve the blocking/deadlock issue" before I gave up and reached the same conclusion you probably will: Blizzard shipped something out that didn't work the way they wanted it to (that snickering you're hearing right now is people who played Hunters right after WoW's release, when the class wasn't even close to done).Even if it isn't working right, however, it still seems to be working, as Timi finds a solution after a little tweaking. Tigerclaw, of course, promises the next major patch will bring relief (have we heard that before?), but if you want help, you can probably find it on the support forums. Meanwhile, Rollak offers us another program that does something even Blizzard hasn't done yet-- control iTunes while playing WoW in Windows. Pretty slick-- maybe that's the guy Blizz should hired to implement this feature next patch.
Apple issues one-liner support doc on random MacBook shutdown problem
Apple seems to be *so* happy to finally fess up that this MacBook RSS (Random Shutdown Syndrome) isn't just all in our heads. xlr8yourmac tracked down a new Apple Knowledgebase article that is another amusing one-liner from Apple's support crew: "If your MacBook is shutting down intermittently, please contact AppleCare for service." A little bird told us they finally know what's going on and have a fix for the issue, but don't quote us on that.If you are an unfortunate MacBook RSS victim and you do give AppleCare a call, feel free to comment here with your experience and how Apple is treating this issue. We honestly don't know much more about it aside from this theory, so we're in the dark as much as you are.[via InsanelyMac News]
Test your MacBook for random shutdowns
Some MacBook owners around the web are reporting a 'random shutdown' issue, where the machine will - as you might guess - seemingly shutdown at random; either during work or patiently idling for your next command. If you haven't experienced this issue yourself yet but are still concerned about it, The Apple Files has devised an unofficial test to see if you might be a victim. The test involves entering a few simple commands into the Terminal and testing a few things over roughly half an hour of your time. Just to be thorough, the author recommends running this test two or three times to be sure, but it's really up to how paranoid you're feeling. Again, this is an unofficial test, and we haven't seen any official reports or announcements from Apple on this issue, its cause or how widespread it might be, but it's simply nice to have options, hey?[via digg]
New Vista build is Boot Camp friendly
A blog post that has risen through the digg ranks reports that a pre-RC1 release of Vista (build 5536) can now be installed easily on Intel Macs via Boot Camp. No more messy instructions, just a good clean install and (apparently) smooth running. Reports indicate that most of the fancy schmancy Aero effects are supported, even on a regular MacBook (Aero, for those who don't know, is a hardware-intensive new UI for Windows Vista with a lot of flashy effects and Transparency Everywhere™ technology).Microsoft has announced a Release Candidate 1 of Vista for September, for which we believe another public rollout and serial code registration process will be available. Those who manage to get ahold of a copy of build 5536 will need a registration code from the recently-closed beta 2 offering in order to install it.While we aren't quite sure how Microsoft worked around the EFI limitation in Vista (EFI support was axed along with many other features some time ago), but this Vista + Intel Macs development is good news for anyone who needs to build apps and test websites for Microsoft's new Windows version.
Add SMS support to Address Book for some Sony Ericsson phones
Apple's iSync supports a lot of phones (and we don't have time now to get into why it doesn't support all phones), but that support for some phones can be a little wonky - namely Sony Ericssons (and I just happen to own a W800i, one of the victims). For these phones, iSync supports syncing just fine, but Address Book might not be able to talk to the phone for SMS sending or phone number dialing. Enter this article at mobile.feisar.com which offers a simple workaround for fixing this broken support and enabling Address Book with the true Sony Ericsson super powers it deserves.As an added bonus, the article even offers a download link for Apple's Property List Editor, which I believe is a tool that can only be had by installing the Developer tools from a Mac OS X installation DVD. This simple little app can come in handy, however, for all sorts of file tinkering hints like this one, as well as many from the likes of macosxhints.com.Check out the mobile.feisar hint to get Address Book working with your somewhat-supported Sony Ericsson phone, and just in case you're getting any ideas: I have no idea if this simple tip can work for other brands/phones, so proceed at your own risk.
New Parallels Desktop beta enables better USB, performance, integration
Parallels must have been missing their beta days, as they have already announced a new beta version of their Desktop software at WWDC today that brings quite a few much-requests updates. Parallels Desktop, in case you haven't been following the Mac web the last few months, is virtualization software which enables users to run Windows and other OSes inside of Mac OS X on Intel Macs.At the top of the list of updates is much-improved USB performance and broader device support, including Windows Mobile 5 devices. Fleshing out the list is "substantially" improved Mac OS X performance while running a virtual machine (which is a different OS, like Windows. We've explained virtual machines before in our Parallels Desktop How To), improved graphic performance, complete keyboard support including the Eject key and shift key mapping for non-English layouts, Unicode path support, improved shared folder performance and, of course, minor bug fixes.This is, or will be, a free update for paid users once it goes official. For now, users can download the beta the Parallels Desktop update page.
Nintendo: Their own worst enemy
As we all know, Nintendo once ruled the video gaming skies. Titles were published for their systems or fell into the abyss. Soon, however, there came a time when the almighty Nintendo looked around in confusion as its once-loyal companions deserted them for greener pastures. The Nintendo 64 and Gamecube, though still playing host to some of the finest games of all time, fell by the wayside due to lack of third-party support. It is a problem that has plagued Nintendo to this day, and something they are desperately trying to correct with the Wii. There were, of course, numerous reasons for the desertion. The N64's stubborn refusal to switch from a cartridge-based format, lack of online support, and high licensing fees all took their toll on the gaming giant. But fundamentally, when a true competitor came along, third parties sought to leave the most frightful prospect of publishing for a Nintendo system: Nintendo themselves.
NVIDIA is happy about AMD + ATI merger
FiringSquad, a site covering all things gaming, interviewed Derek Perez, the Director of Public Relations for NVIDIA (ATI's largest competitor), about yesterday's news of the AMD and ATI merger. Mr. Perez looks at the merger as a boost to their own business, excited that NVIDIA will be the only GPU company that supports both AMD and Intel. If this is true, however, this merger could wind up being a bad thing for Mac users as Apple's machines are 100% Intel Inside (yes, I know that slogan is dead now). FiringSquad didn't get much out of Intel, their only comment was basically "we'll get back to you after we're finished reading all this legal mumbo jumbo".It's still way too early to tell, but I hope this merger doesn't mean that Apple's customers will lose one custom build option in the online store.[via IMG]
Apple adds Nike+ section to iPod Support site
Apple must have heard our jab at their one-line Nike+ Sport Kit support document yesterday and decided to whip up a full-blown Nike+ support section of their much-loved iPod Support site. Delusions of grandeur aside, the support section offers the typical troubleshooting and 'How do I...' sections, along with a video tutorial detailing how to run how to get on your feet with using this slick new kit to enhance your run. It also includes a link to Apple's new Nike + iPod Sport Kit discussions sub-category which lives under their iPod nano forum. While these should be handy new resources for all sorts of internet-related arguments over Nike and why 5G iPods didn't make the cut, just remember to still get out on your feet with your shiny new running kit, as we're pretty sure Apple Stores won't accept "I just never got around to it" as a return excuse.
