I’m a little slow out of the blocks on this but Disco released their second public beta yesterday. I really like the additions they have made to the app in the short space of time since the first beta a week ago. They have added highly requested features such as the ability to drag items to the dock to burn them even before the app is open. This is something I was personally hoping for and it works great.
Other things they have added include the ability to eject the disc on every menu screen in the app and ability to check the status of a burn or erase by checking the dock icon without having to open the window itself and interupt what your doing. They have also updated the accuracy of file size calculations, the dock icon bouncing when interaction is needed and updates to the graphics in the app among other things.
Get a full release notes here.
With a Core 2 Duo 64bit chip it’s looking good, and, according to Apple, 25% better in performance. I’m a little sceptical of this as the MacBook pro has been clocked at around 19% percent faster instead of Apple’s quoted 39%. Nevertheless, I’m a big fan of this computer, and I’m only basing this on the first gen model and not the improved version which has hopefully eliminated the discolouration problems and has certainly solved the mooing sound and random shutdowns a minority of users were reporting.
Aside from the main defects some users were reporting, the first gen model was also criticised for the black macbook being more expensive than the white model with the same specs. This was despite the black casing cost apple no extra to manufacture. So it’s pretty cool now the blackbook’s price is in-line with the white macbook of the same spec. If you upgrade the RAM to 2gb and the hdd to 120gb on both models they work out the same cost. This is on the Apple store though, the only place I know of where you can buy a mac tailored to you’re specs for no extra labour cost.
So now if you’ve liked the black version and have held out on buying one because of the extra cost then now’s the time to get one.
If you’re into Mac software (especially free mac software) then you should definitely check out these sites:
Macheist - software giveaway and apparently great low cost bundle at the end of the 5 weeks.
Mac App A Day - They are going to be giving away a piece of software every day in December right through to new years day.
Play.com have put up new Intel Core 2 Duo MacBooks on their site for pre-order. They will apparently have 2.0 ghz chips max and apart from the processor upgrade, everything’s the same (including only 512 of RAM).
Via Macworld.
I’ve been meaning to blog more but there are so many things to write about it’s just flown by and I’ve forgotten about it.
The number of iPod / Mac rumours means that I want to be more selective about which ones I blog about. However, to cut it short, recently it has been rumoured that Apple have signed a deal with Cingular almost certainly regarding an iPhone.
Apple have also perhaps given away the release of the touchscreen iPod in a PDF in their docs section of their site on the iPod. I’ll stay sceptical on this right now. It could easily have been photoshopped or if it is real, a strange, unlikely typo.
In other Apple news, they have released an update to Aperture and a demo version of the software which I’m contemplating taking for a spin. Finally, an 8GB version of the iPod product (RED) has been released. It looks good but I’m not sure if it’s $10 dollars from the price or more for the more expensive version. I’m starting to think though that maybe a better way to combat aids would be to just make more people aware that they can donate any amount they wish to.
There’s no escaping it. I read on engadget earlier that Microsoft will very generously provide every Zune purchaser with a free 14 day pass to the service. In this time they can download all the music they want. The downside being that after the 14 days, unless you re-subscribe you’re not going to be able to play any of the tracks you downloaded.
How can this work? I mean who wants to pay a fixed monthly fee just to be able to play music you should already own. I much prefer the eMusic or iTunes ways of doing things where the music you buy is yours. Plus, in the case of eMusic which is subscription based, you can cancel the subscription any time and not be restricted to what music you purchased can be played.
Learn a lesson from the top two download services Microsoft and come up with something better.
Update: you can also download per track / per album on Zune Marketplace too. This is really the only option for most people. I’m sure not many people will like the proposition of not owning their music collection. Then again there may be other stipulations that prevent proper ownership. So check out the fine print before you buy anything when Zune launches soon.
Disco has now been released to the public. I downloaded it this morning and it looks pretty cool. I havn’t burned anything because I don’t need to right now but I had a play with dragging files into the app and moving through the menu’s. It’s really easy to use and looks great.
You get 3 test burns (same as AppZapper with 3 test zaps) before you have to buy. I would have bought straight away but I’m not sure what’s happening with upgrades. With AppZapper you buy and get free upgrades for life. In a recent Disco blog post they wrote something about free upgrades until the next major release. I guess that means it will probably last for a while before I would need to pay again if I wanted new features.
Either way, get your hands on the beta now, download it here.
Update: After finding out about the MacZOT! offer and testing out the CD-RW erasing and writing features I decided to purchase it. Partly motivated by the surprise MacZot are offering with the purchase of Disco, along with the chance to win a DVD burner which has the ability to etch a label in the disk while it’s burning. If you have a mac and either have toast and don’t like it, or don’t have any burning app, I urge you to make use of this offer.
According to engadget, Apple are working on a new Mac Pro with 8 Cores. The new Core 2 Quad comes out soon so I guess that would be a nice addition to Apple’s top of the line model.
Apple might be considering 15.4 inch macbooks for 2007. I can’t say I really approve of this. It would confuse the differences between the macbooks and the macbook pros too much and make purchasing a system more complicated. I think simplicity is one of the things that makes Apple so desirable, and something they should hold onto as much as possible.
Apple have also extended their patent on a multi-featured multimedia device with a touch screen to include more details and an image depicting a device (supposedly that iPod widescreen touch) with touch sensitive areas around the bezel of the screen that do various things. This looks very interesting.
Thirdly, Microsoft has been heavily criticised by Acer who say that the new Vista Basic is a way for Microsoft to make more money by releasing a product no one wants, forcing a lot of people to instead reach for the premium offering which costs more. I’m not sure if Microsoft are trying to deliberatly screw people out of their money because of the fact that a lot of people will want to run vista on their current pc that may not be able to handle the premium versions’s graphics. I’ll give microsoft the benefit of the doubt on that one. I don’t understand however why they didn’t just offer one version for one price and just install the windows components that the pc in question can handle and leave out Aero.
Finally, the question is asked about whether or not Microsoft Office is doomed. I have to say a definitive yes to that question, but that is only dependant on the growth of Open Office. This article seems to focus on Google’s attempt to dethrone MS with Google Docs (Writely) and Spreadsheets. These are both great tools but the privacy issue is always going to be at the forefront with a non-desktop productivity tool like that. Open Office is definitely the way forward however as I don’t think normal families who want to do simple word processing things will want to pay for an Office License. In fact, people like this (anyone but business users) could just use the Google Docs service, as privacy isn’t likely to be an issue.
I hope to see the rise and rise of open source and free web-apps in the future.
Wow. We’ve had some pretty successful blog posts and news announcements in the past but I don’t think anything can possibly compare to the last few days. In 48 hours we have received and responded to nearly 2,000 emails and talked with countless journalists and tech media personalities. Likewise, MediaTemple might never forgive us for the complete reaming of their servers you guys gave them.
“The best viral marketing ever. Ever.”
-Leo Laporte on Macbreak Weekly
So, what’s next? Well, we’ve been taking into account the great feedback and bug reports and are readying up the next beta. At this point we think it’s clear that the demand is high enough to go ahead and make it public. That’s right, on Monday everyone will be able to download, try, and (if they want) purchase Disco for the introductory price.
Disco - The Fallout
The first few days of the beta for only people who have purchased Disco through MacZot! have been a great success for the guys at Disco. Therefore we can all look forward to the beta on Monday. I probably will buy it because it’s a really easy way to burn data and manage it once it’s been burnt. Mac at this time doesn’t have a very good built in Disk burning utility. Then again neither does Windows.