I am writing this not using my desktop computer or even a notebook but my iPad2.  Now, I know you’re thinking there is nothing extraordinary about that and you are right until you understand I am writing using an online version of Microsoft Word on the iPad, fed live to me by Online Desktop.  I am using the free version for the moment, but this is so cool I could easily be talked into paying the $9.95 a month needed to get priority service. A couple of minutes did pass before I was allowed into the site “because it was full”.  That could be a problem if trying to access critical work documents on a deadline and makes paying the fee a necessity if you’re depending on this service for work.

Love it or hate it, what makes the whole thing so cool is working with the standard ribbon interface, the same one I use when using my MacBook Air or Pro and running Microsoft Office for Mac 2011 or 2007 for Windows. (The application being run is actually Word 2010.)  When you first boot into Onlive Desktop, what you see is a replica Windows desktop on your iPad, complete with a Taskbar along the bottom of the screen and several Office icons, as well as some for Paint, a new photography application named Microsoft Surface Collage, a Sticky Note app, and one for a calculator.  To launch any application, you simply tap the icon with your finger and it goes.  The desktop automatically orients itself into landscape mode, which gives you the most working room.  That said, if you use the software keyboard, it clobbers the bottom half of the screen; so working with Onlive Desktop is really only practical with some kind of hardware keyboard.  I’m using a Logitech Bluetooth keyboard with my iPad but any keyboard that will work with the iPad will suffice.

While typing this review, I launched PowerPoint, entered some text into a slide, saved the presentation, and then switched back to Word by touching the Word icon on the Taskbar visible below the application window.  PowerPoint remained responsive even while I hunted for some photos or clip art to include, something I didn’t find.  Earlier, I had played with Excel, enlarging the view of its cells by using standard iPad swiping motions and found the application responsive enough to make that a useful approach.  It does appear that Microsoft has succeeded in tailoring Office to the iPad environment, making it a true partner in the iPad’s world.  The only problem I forsee with Onlive is that it will be unavailable and therefore useless to the lonely writer sitting in his mountain cabin cut off from the world.  But, like any cloud application, it will work fine as long as you have good Internet access and server loads do not reach a point where responsiveness dies.  Seeing that I got denied entrance for a few minutes when I logged in on a Saturday does make me wonder whether the problem will be better or worse on a day when everyone shows up for work.

For the moment, Onlive Desktop is only available for the iPad, though the website claims it’s coming for PC, Mac, and Android.  When I logged in using my Mac Pro, the browser simply directed me to the files I had worked on while in the cloud.  It let me swiftly download this review, which I easily opened in Word 2011.  All formatting was intact.  I’ll try the same with a handbuilt presentation from PowerPoint and spreadsheet in Excel in a few days.  For now, if you’ve been looking for or hoping to see Microsoft Office on the iPad, go sign up for an Onlive Desktop account at: http://www.onlive.com.  All you need to  spend is a little time waiting for the powers that be to validate and activate your account.  That won’t take long, and it will be worth it.

I wrote the following to assist a friend of mine who was thinking about buying a Mac notebook for the first time.  I am publishing it here in the hopes that someone else might find it useful. Enjoy!

Hi XXXX,

Since you mentioned you were considering a switch to the Mac, I wanted to write this to assist you in understanding the Mac notebook line and the pro’s and con’s of various models.

First, there are two basic notebook lines, i.e., the MacBook Pro and the MacBook Air.  The MacBook Pro comes in 13, 15, and 17 inch formats and the MacBook Air comes in 11.6 and 13 inch formats.  In general, the MacBook Pro line has faster processors, more available RAM (usually 8 GB), and either large capacity (up to 750 GB) hard drives or solid state drives (SSD) up to 256GB.  The MacBook Air line distinguishes itself with more portability that is paid for by a lack of an optical drive and fewer external ports.  The maximum RAM in the Air series is 4GB.  2GB is standard.  They all use SSD for storage in 64, 128, or 256 GB capacities.  These drives are significantly faster than hard drives and make up (to a degree) for the slower CPU by significantly decreased boot and application launch times.

All Apple notebooks have the ability to operate in “clamshell” mode, which means turned on with the tops closed so they can be operated as desktops when hooked into monitors, keyboards, and mice.  (This is how we operate at our house.). They also come with Bluetooth (the Pro’s with Bluetooth 2.1 and the Air’s with Bluetooth 4) and Wireless N, which in the Apple world is known as “Airport” or “Airport Extreme”.  The Pro line has one Gigabit Ethernet port, two USB 2 ports, one Firewire 800 port, an audio port, and one Thunderbolt or mini-Display port, depending on whether the model is one from 2010 (mini-display port) or 2011 (Thunderbolt), a Facetime HD camera (on the bezel), and a SD card slot.  (the 17 inch Pro model also has an Express Card 34 slot.) The Air line has two USB ports, one mini-display or Thunderbolt port, one audio port, a SD card slot on the 13 inch models only, and a lower resolution Facetime camera on its bezel.

The first thing to decide is whether you want an Air for its easier portability or a Pro for its greater horsepower, ports, or optical drive capability.  (NOTE: Apple makes a Superdrive….DVD burner…that can plug into a USB port in the Air if you need it.  The Air can also access an optical drive on Mac or Windows PC (after installing a software plug-in free from Apple) over a network.  The next thing is to decide whether you want a machine in an 11.6, 13, 15, or 17 inch format.  To see the various price ranges, go to http://www.apple.com and click on the “Store” tab and then select the various models you are interested in.  Once done with that, look down the left sidebar and find the “Refurbished” section near the bottom of the page and check out the “refurbished Macs”.  You can generally save $50-$250 off new by buying refurbished and they have the standard one year warranty that new Apple computers carry.

The most recent Apple computers use the Intel Core i3, i5, and i7 CPU line.  These CPU’s are twice as fast as the previous Core 2 Duo CPU’s used in Apple systems from about 2006-2010.  That said, the Core 2 Duo is a dual core and very capable CPU. All these CPU’s have the ability to run 64 bit operating systems.  All Mac operating systems have been 64 bit since 10.5 (Leopard), though all before Lion have defaulted to 32 bit mode during installation.  Windows XP, Vista, and Windows 7 have both 32 bit and 64 bit versions that are bought and sold separately.  Sixty-four bit operation gives you faster results and allows your system to use more than 3GB of RAM but also requires drivers written for 64 bit operation.  This will be largely invisible to you in the Mac world as drivers tend to be written for operating system versions.

If you want to see performance differences for various CPU’s and graphics chips, go to: http://www.barefeats.com.

As for virus protection, it’s up to you whether you want to run it or not.  Most Mac users do not because of the very limited number of viruses in the wild.  Apple has supplied its own malware hunter as part of the operating system.  You are more likely to pass a virus through to a Windows user than suffer one yourself, though “smart computing” is always in vogue no matter what OS you run.

If you need a copy of Microsoft Office for the Mac, buy Microsoft Office 2011 Home and Student.  Three installation versions run $150.  Single installation versions can be had for $90-$119, if you can find them.

If you still need to be able to run Windows, you can run it natively using Boot Camp (part of OS X) or inside a virtual machine by using VM Ware’s Fusion or Parallel’s Desktop.  You can also run Windows virtually by using Virtual Box which is free, open-source software that will take more configuring than the two commercial packages.

Locally, the best place to look for deals on Apple computers is at MicroCenter.  Apple doesn’t vary its prices much, so one Apple Store is as good as another.  Fry’s has some good deals occasionally, but I’d be careful of any demo models. Microcenter not only has good deals on new Macs (some are one generation back) but also sells some “pre-owned” models, as does PowerMax.  Older model Macs are a good way to get into OS X computing without spending as much money, though these machines will usually have only a 90 day warranty and you will need to understand the CPU type, GPU type, and RAM limitations to understand what you are giving up.  (Apple Care is extended warranty service and one of the few I recommend, especially on laptops which are very expensive to repair.  However, Apple Care can only be applied to new machines while they are in the year of warranty coverage.  Secondly, there are two things not to buy from Apple.  One of them is RAM, and the other is Apple Care.  There are much better prices out there in the market for both.)

Online, Amazon, PowerMax, and MacMall are good places to look for deals.  One advantage of the Mac is how it holds its value over time and you can usually trade in one at PowerMax and get a good deal (plus they do not charge tax).  If you are looking at used, be careful how much you decide to spend; PowerMax prices especially can be as much as for new machines.

Technical Stuff

The current generation of CPU’s being used in Apple’s notebook (and desktop) line are Intel Core i5 and i7 CPU’s.  There are two classes of CPU, i.e. dual core and quad core.  The dual core CPU’s are in the 11.6 and 13 inch models and the quad core are in the 15 and 17 inch models. Each of these CPU’s has two features that increase performance.  One is hyperthreading; this is where each core can run two “threads” (or lines of processing) which essentially allows the CPU to perform as a multiple CPU device.  This means that the dual core chips actually perform like a quad-core CPU (without hyperthreading) and the quad core like an 8 core machine.  These CPU’s also feature Turbo Boost 2.0, a feature that throttles up the clock speed of the CPU’s if only single core functions are being processed.  (Software has to be written to be multi-core.)  Both of these features account for the 2x performance increase over similarly clocked Core 2 Duo CPU’s that have been the mainstay for the last few years.

All models use an integrated Intel 3000 HD graphics processor unit, though the 15 and 17 inch models also have much more powerful and discrete ATI GPU’s that the computer will switch to automatically.  The Intel 3000 GPU is not particularly strong; it is slightly weaker than the Nvidia 320 GPUs used in last year (2010) models.  Most applications (Including Photoshop) still pull mostly on the CPU, so this isn’t much of an impact.  It does show up running games, flight simulators, or 3d applications.  For instance, running X-Plane, my 2010 Air with its Nvidia GPU will run it about 4 frames a second faster than the newer models will.  Whether you can actually see 4fps difference is arguable.  Generally, the advice runs that if you are a graphics professional or a gamer, you are better off buying a 15 or 17 inch MacBook Pro with its discrete ATI GPU.  That said, Photoshop performance is faster on all the newer machines (which simply translates into how long you have to wait before an action is completed).

You can find various performance comparisons at http://www.barefeats.com and at http://www.geekgench.com and http://www.cinebench.com.

The 2011 models also incorporate Thunderbolt, which is a high-speed data transfer conduit capable of 10GB/sec transfer.  It is incorporated in what was the mini-display port last year; indeed, these models work with Apple displays using the mini-display port or the 27 incher that has Thunderbolt incorporated.  One of the beauties of Thunderbolt (eventually) is that adapters should allow the Thunderbolt port to allow multiple types of functionality (i.e., Giagbit Ethernet, high-speed storage data transfer, etc.).  However, Thunderbolt peripherals are just really hitting the market this year.

Macs are stuck with USB 2 until the new “Ivy Bridge” Intel processors and chips are released in the April-May timeframe.  It is expected that Apple will adopt USB 3 at that time, though it is not a sure thing.

Buying Back

You can often save money by buying Macs one or two generations old, but it is essential you understand the technology they have and what your needs are to avoid paying too much.  I’m going to talk about buying systems running the Core 2 DUO CPU versus the newer “Sandy Bridge” i5 and i7 models.  You can go even further back (I would not hesitate to buy a system with a G4 or G5 CPU since I have run them and know their limitations) but I would stay with at least Core 2 Duo CPu’s to give you the option of running Snow Lepoard or Lion, the latest Mac operating systems.  Most of the “whiz bang” features in Lion mean something to you only if you are using a notebook or Apple trackpad or Apple’s Magic Mouse.  Come see me if you want to try either of those out.

MicroCenter has some Core 2 Duo MacBooks in the $500 range.  I would recommend these only if you are intent on saving some bucks and are comfortable risking repairs on the machines.  While my Air is also a Core 2 Duo notebook, its graphic processor and solid state drive give it definitive advantages over these machines a as well as its Apple care coverage.  Another option for you is Microcenter’s 13 inch 1.86 Core 2 Duo 2GB RAM 256GB SSD MacBook Air for $899 or one with 128 GB SSD for $849.  These are new machines and besides the processor being slightly slower (1.86 vs 2.13) than mine they only have 2 GB RAM vs 4GB in my machine.  For most processes and everyday work, either machine will work fine for you.  Either will run all the iLife applications and even Photoshop Elements, though I would opt for a 4GB RAM machine if you want to do moderate Photoshop work.  You can buy Apple Care from L.A. Computer for $180 anytime during your first year of ownership that will extend coverage out two years to give you three total.  (Mine has already gone through its first year, so it has two years left on it.)  In any case, be sure to look at all of MicroCenter’s offerings as you decide what you’re going to do.

UltraBooks

While I hope you’ll come over to the Mac platform, Intel is pushing “Ultrabooks” from several manufactures.  There are essentially MacBook Air competitors running Windows.  They’ll be hitting the market later this year.  From what I’ve seen, the prices for them are very close to those of Apple’s MacBook Airs; but you can judge that as they come out.  A “Google” will get you info on them.

Hope this helps.

Andy

I own a 2008 eight-core Mac Pro that’s becoming long in the tooth.  It came equipped with SATAII internal buses and USB 2.0 and Firewire 400 and 800 connections for use with external peripherals.  That was fine for the days when hard disks were no larger than a couple of hundred gigabytes, but now my main user disk is a terabyte in size. If I want to move its data to a larger hard disk or to have one whole backup, I have to be willing to dedicate not hours but days to the process.  With some spare PCIe 2.0 slots lounging in the Mac pro’s rear, I decided it was time to see what newer technologies I might be able to use to make data transfers a lot less time consuming.

The two newer technologies that came to mind were USB 3.0 and 6G eSata.  A little hunting established that I could get both technologies in one PCIe card, so I ordered Caldigit’s FASTA-6GU3 card and a Vantec USB 3.0 and eSata disk enclosure case from Amazon.com.  The Caldigit card hosted two USB 3 and two 6G eSATA slots and supposedly worked under both OS X and Windows 7 and would boot into OS X.  I am running Mac OS 10.7.2 (Lion) as my Mac’s primary operating system but also run Windows 7 on its hard disk via boot camp, so I wanted my set up to work under either operating system.

Installing the Caldigit card was easy.  I just popped off the bracket that holds the PCIe slot cards in place, popped the card carefully into a slot, and then reinstalled the bracket.  Unfortunately, the fit of the Caldigit card in the slot was very loose; and I was unable to fasten down the card enough to keep it from moving.  That said, the fault is really with Apple’s design of the bracket and not a fault of the card.

I installed a USB 3 driver downloaded from the Caldigit website into both my OS X and Windows set-ups and plugged in the Vantec case first using an eSATA cable alone. The hard disk inside the case was seen by Windows 7 disk management tools but was not seen by OS X’s Disk Utility.  The Vantec case was seen by both operating systems when plugged in using its USB 3 cables.  I initially thought I had a fault with the eSATA portion of the Caldigit card but later discovered that the eSATA bus does not power a drive inside an eSATA case like a Firewire or USB case does.  eSATA enclosures must be powered by an external power source or pull power from another internal bus like USB.  Indeed, for both the Vantec case and a small case by Acomdata that used both USB 2.0 and eSATA, their drives were being powered by their USB connections.

Since I thought the Caldigit card was bad, I replaced it with two separate USB 3 and 6G eSATA PCIe cards from OWC.  Both cards provided very high speed data transfers.  Copying a 22GB file went from taking many hours to only a little over 20 minutes.   Unfortunately, the 6G eSATA card will not boot OSX, so I’m going to have to move back to a Caldigit card at some point if I want to use 6G eSATA to boot my Mac Pro from a future 6G SSD. In the interim, I plan on moving my Time Machine disk from its Firewire 400/USB 2 case to a USB 3 case to greatly aid in data recovery.  After all, it’s simply a matter of time before some disk inside my Mac Pro fails.  This time, though, when it does, I’ll have USB 3 or eSATA available to help me recover it, reducing the time I have to watch the colored beach ball spin and spin and spin.

I’ve had a long if not necessarily constant love affair with computer accessories from Logitech. So when the company came out with a wireless keyboard similar to Apple’s aluminum keyboard, I had to try it.  In addition to copying the Apple layout, the keyboard is solar-powered but, even better, has a number pad unlike Apple’s current wireless keyboard, making it more useful than the Apple’s.

I first saw mention of the keyboard on some website review; when I looked into purchasing it, no stores in the local area had one so I went to the Logitech website itself.  That was several weeks ago, and the keyboard was listed “out of stock” everywhere I could find that sold it.  About a week ago, I noticed that the online store at Logitech had the keyboard, which comes in several “colored” versions, in the color I wanted (silver) and in stock.  So, I ordered it.  While it took Logitech a couple of days to ship it, it arrived a couple of a days ago.  Even so, I wanted to capture my first impressions.

The differences between the Logitech keyboard and the Apple aluminum wired keyboard are not huge.  The Logitech is set-off by the row of solar cells that cover its top and a small strip above the number pad and parallel to the Function keys.  The strip contains lights that show you whether the keyboard is getting adequate light and contains an ON/OFF switch.  Other than that, the keyboard is almost identical to the Apple wired keyboard.  The keys are the “Chiclet” type but are slightly smaller and more rounded on the tops and their feel is a little more “bouncy”.  I happen to like that at the moment and don’t think that anyone used to typing on the Apple keyboard will find it much different, though it may prove to be more tiring and therefore noticeable when typing a long document.

The function keys are a bit lower on the keyboard due to the solar cell row but are still at the top of the keyset and are marked identically to the ones on Apple’s aluminum keyboard.  This means the icons are really more appropriate to Snow Leopard or earlier rather than Lion, though I’ve always considered that a very minor inconvenience.  I have used the keys as they are marked and not as “straight” function keys, and there are gripes in Logitech forums about them not functioning properly as such.  I have not tested that area.  But if you use the keyboard in the same way you would an Apple wired keyboard, you will see no differences.

The most problematic thing about the keyboard is it has consistently refused to be paired with its own Unifying Receiver.  If you have the latest version of Logitech Control Center loaded, when you insert the Unifying Receiver into a USB port on your system, the LCC will recognize it and add a tab in its window (called up by going to System Preferences/Logitech Control Center) for the Unifying Receiver software.  (In case you don’t know what that’s about, the latest Logitech peripherals –marked with an orange Unifying Receiver logo–can share a single wireless receiver plug with up to five peripherals.  That said, the range of devices that can use this feature is not very large; my Logitech MX620 mice must still have their own radio receivers plugged in to work.)  The software will lead you through a procedure to pair up these devices with the receiver; and it has consistently failed on my Mac Pro and my MacBook Air, both running Lion.  Luckily, it has not affected the operation of the keyboard, i.e., the keyboard does not have to be paired with the receiver to work.  That’s a good thing if you want to use your K750 for Mac keyboard with more than one Mac; the software will only let you pair the keyboard with one machine.

One big question you should have if you are considering this keyboard is how much light it takes to keep it happy.  The keyboard has two small lights on its upper right quadrant that will give you immediate feedback as to whether you are feeding it enough light when you press a “test” button near them.  In my office, I do have a two windows with shades usually drawn, one 60 watt light overhead in a ceiling fan just slightly behind my seat, and another 150 watt lamp in the nearest corner to my workstations.  With only the overhead light on, the keyboard does not get enough light to keep it happy.  With both lights on or the 60-watt on and the shades opened during the day, the keyboard reports it is “happy” (green light).  In general, a well lit room will keep the keyboard happy but it’s all going to be a function of where the shadows are and how much light you’re talking about.  In addition to running the corner light more, I open at least one window shade and set the keyboard in its direct lighting during the day when I am not using it.  I have had no episodes of the keyboard shutting down because it was out of juice, but my use so far has not been extensive. There is a “Solar App” software application that you can download to help you manage the keyboard’s energy state, but how useful it really is I can’t say.

Another big question you probably are interested in is whether the Option key will work during an initial system boot or restart to allow you to select a boot disk.  I am happy to report that it works just fine.  Also, I booted into Windows 7 Ultimate using Boot Camp and that operating system had not trouble responding to the keyboard.  I’ve also used it with Windows XP Pro running under VMWare Fusion 3.1.3.  The CD/DVD eject function keys work in all these scenarios.

I ordered my keyboard directly from Logitech; it was packaged in a brown box with black stamped letters that looked more like a refurbished item box than a retail box.  At $59.99, it’s not a cheap keyboard nor is it expensive either.  Its wireless form has decluttered my desk a bit at the price of one less USB port; but for now, I am happy with this purchase.   If you’re looking for a wireless keyboard that uses the standard Apple layout and has a number pad, then this one may be for you.  Unlike Apple’s Bluetooth keyboards, it is responsive from the moment the machine boots, as long as you remember to turn on it’s ON switch at the same time.

During my daily rounds of Mac websites, I noticed at the “Accelerate Your Macintosh” website a mention of an “OWC Blog on Mac Blu Ray Player” software.  Since one of the things I’ve been deeply disappointed with Apple about has been their lack of Blu Ray support, I paddled on over to take a look.  In turn, that blog referred me to the Macgo website where they were hosting a Blue Ray player for the Mac.  I immediately downloaded it to give it a try.  It works, and very well so, I might add!

My test rig was a pretty powerful one, a 2008 Mac Pro with dual 2.8 quad-core GHz Xeon processors running with 16GB of RAM and an ATI Radeon 5770 video card.  The machine is connected to one of Apple’s 27 inch Cinema Displays.  For the blue ray part, I had mounted an LG BH12LS35 blue ray burner connected via one of the Mac Pro’s aux SATA ports and alongside a Pioneer DVR-112D DVD burner running on PATA.  Thinking that my new Cinema Display must be fully Blue Ray compliant (since it ran iTunes HD stuff), I had set up Windows 7 Ultimate 64 bit to access the blue ray drive only to find out that the display wasn’t.   This is one area where Apple consistently gets a “fail”.  There is no reason a one thousand dollar display should not match the current video standards of the day.

To test out the software, I used the Blue Ray version of “Star Trek: Generations” and played the movie at fullscreen.  It played the blue ray masterfully with no skips and with the resolution you would expect out of blue ray and did it on my 27 inch Apple display!  It was a beautiful set-up.  Finally, I feel I am getting my money’s worth out of my system.  A word to you, Apple: Handcuffing your users to try to force them to use iTunes exclusively works against you in the long run.  Just because I have this capability now does not mean I’m going to shy away from iTunes purchases.  I still like the portability that media provides.  But it is great to have this “new” capability in addition, and doing so makes me more likely to buy your computers and software, not less.

System requirements says that the software needs at least a 2.4 GHz Intel Core 2 Duo to work, so I decided to see if my 2010 2.13 GHz Intel Core 2 Duo powered MacBook Air could run it.  I loaded the software on my MacBook Air and used Remote Disc to mount the blue ray disk on the MBA’s desktop.  The MBA was hooked into an “older” 24 inch Apple Cinema Display and it also ran the movie flawlessly, i.e., fullscreen on the 24 inch with no delays, stuttering, or pixilation.  Sometime soon, I plan on buying a small external blue ray burner and seeing if it will work with my MacBook Air as well.  I’ll let you know how it goes when that happens.

Until October 1, the company is selling licenses for $39.99.  After that date, the website says the price is going up to $59.99.  That’s kind of pricey for just a Blue Ray player, but considering that nothing has been available for the Mac until now it’s a bargain.  The application works with a Mac or a PC.  (I intend to try the Windows version to see if it will work with the Apple Cinema Display.  I’ll let you know when I do.)

One thing that can be showstopper for some people is that the software requires an Internet connection to work.  I have only used our home internet connection for any testing and today that is running at 25.12 Mbps download and 3.15 Mbps upload speeds. I’ll try it later using my iPhone 4’s Personal Hotspot and let you know how it works there.  But if you can get past that, then I think this is a great product…as long as they can keep the Feds or Apple from shutting them down.  The Internet connection allows Macgo’s servers to bypass the Blue Ray encryption.  Whether that’s a legal loophole (since I doubt if the servers are in the U.S.) that can be successfully exploited remains to be seen and is the only long term threat I see to the viability of the software. It’s too bad that both the US government and Apple has put us in that boat in the first place.

By the way, Macworld did a review of this software back a few months ago.  It looks like the software has improved considerably since then, so be sure to do your own downloads and trials rather than take my word for it or theirs.  Your mileage will surely vary depending on your machines and your Internet connection.

This week IDC predicted that more Internet users will access the Internet through mobile devices than by the PC and by 2015.  Apple’s Lion is that company’s first steps toward integration of iOS and OS X, and Windows 8 has now been released to “unify” mobile and desktop computing.  This has lead some to speculate that the PC will be obsolete by 2015.  I’m here to say: “Not So Fast!”

First, you can do some content creation on today’s tablet devices, but their capability is still seriously limited.  For serious or high-output content creation, a PC or Mac is the only way to go.  That’s not only because of the very limited computing power of today’s tablets but also because of their limited ability to accept various forms of input devices.  Touchscreens are somewhat useful performing graphics creation, but mice and drawing tablets still have their place and often greater utility.  While touchscreens, swipes, and those other intuitive input forms have achieved wide utility in the public domain, the business domain is still adapting to their use and it will take them longer to do so than 2015.  My guess it will be more like 2020 before we see the actual convergence of today’s modern tablets and the desktop PC and perhaps as late as 2025.  I do believe it will come, but not as fast as some in the industry will predict.

Secondly, there is still an open question as to whether it is really best to merge the two mediums.  Apple’s Lion is a case in point.  While many iOS features may adapt themselves well to a desktop environment, some do not.  Launchpad is one of those.  While the Launchpad approach of filling your screens full of application icons makes a lot of sense on a tablet, it works horribly on a desktop with a large screen (say 27 inch) and a machine running tens of applications.    Using Lion’s Dock or opening the Applications Folder in one large grid makes more sense and saves time over wading through screen after screen of applications to find the one you want.  That problem could be addressed by allowing icon sizing that might allow you to collapse everything onto one screen, but what have you gained over the standard desktop way of doing things?  This is only one example of how the tablet environment does not always translate, and computer companies need to carefully examine the concepts involved when performing these types of transfers and not succumb to them simply for love of the technology.  In the end, people are looking for the easiest ways to achieve desired results.  If that is forgotten, the product will fail, no matter how “intuitive” it may first seem.

Frankly, I haven’t looked at Windows 8, and while I will look at it, I probably will not move to it. I don’t run any Windows tablets; what can it offer me?  Even as a Mac aficionado, I moved back to Snow Leopard, though some of the things that engendered the backwards move I have since learned of workarounds for.  That said, I have to ask myself: “If I have to use workarounds, why move at all?”  Until I have a compelling answer to that one, I’m going to stay where I am.  I need to be able to work and not spend any time reconfiguring machines.  After all, I own a computer to allow me to create things I otherwise could not.  If it doesn’t do that, tablet or PC or Mac, what good is it at all?

Well, I was one of those who downloaded Mac OS X Lion the day it was released.  I’ve been using it ever since on a Mac Pro with a 27 inch Apple Cinema Display and on a 2010 MacBook Air mainly hooked to a 24 inch Apple Cinema Display.  I am using Lion no more.  After weeks of mixed feelings, I wiped Lion off both machines and reloaded Snow Leopard, even though it cost me almost a full day of work.  I’m much happier now.  My world is at peace, and my computers are operating like computers instead of schitzo machines that can’t figure out what they are.

I realize this bodes poorly for me.  I am now probably committed to no more operating system upgrades until I’m forced into it by buying new hardware.  But I’ll make do.  At least all the software and hardware I currently own works and I don’t find applications opening up pages I’m through working on (Yes, I had turned that feature off in System Preferences and still found it happening).

Here’s why I went back to Snow Leopard and intend to stay there.

(1) Lion ruined Dashboard’s implementation. I’ve always really enjoyed having a few widgets that I could pop up and quickly reference without moving from the tasks I was working on.  With Lion, when you call Dashboard, your entire desktop vanishes and you are taken to a new screen, as if my 16GB Mac Pro can’t handle popping the widgets up anymore.  In the world of iOS, widgets really don’t exist and don’t need to; they are simply other apps.  In OS X, widgets provide handy little functions like a calculator that saves me from having to hunt it down in Applications or pulling out a real one to use on my desk. Lion’s driving me to a new screen was distracting.  I might have well have just called up a calculator from my apps using Launchpad, if I hadn’t also found it totally useless.

(2) Launchpad is useless on a machine with lots of applications. On an iPad, it makes sense and doesn’t prove annoying to have to swipe to another screen to pick up an app that is stored there.  On a computer with a 27 inch screen, it is worse than annoying not to be able to reference all my Applications on a single screen.  Launchpad’s inflexible implementation yields no way to manipulate the size of the application icons, so my applications were spread out over three screens!  I could have partially reconciled that by moving applications into Folders, but then what have I gained over using OS X’s Application Folder and Dock by doing that?  Nothing!  The only way Launchpad made any sense was if it provided single-click access to all my applications. Including an application that provides only large-icon-eye-candy and doesn’t increase my productivity makes me wonder what the hell Apple is thinking.  It appears they think that moving to iOS functionality on a desktop computer is a good thing and it just ain’t true in all cases.

(3) The Swipe functions are nice but just another way to turn the page. I appreciate the intuitiveness of the various finger gestures used in iOS.  I have Apple Trackpads co-located with mice on both my machines and used the swipes offered as routinely as I could.  Frankly, though, they didn’t really save me time over using a mouse, though I admit that may be partially due to the fact I’m just more used to a mouse. If my computer displays were touch screens, then I might feel like the use of finger gestures was a lot more important than I do.  For now, household and small business computing is not likely to incorporate touch screen computing as a routine function for at least a decade, and this is an area where Apple is ahead of the game but runs the risk of leaping too far and disconnecting itself from its users.

(4) Mission Control is nice but not necessary. Mission Control (as and ex-shuttle guy, I appreciate what appears to the space program “nod”) is really Expose reinvented.  I was fine with Expose as it was and still need to learn to use Spaces effectively, so I’m probably not the best guy to evaluate this feature.  Still, Apple used this as a major selling point of Lion.  To me, it just wasn’t that compelling.

(5) Running a dual boot with Snow Leopard didn’t prove to be as clean as I had hoped. I had some Rosetta powered applications I didn’t want to replace, so I initially set up a dual-boot Snow Leopard/Lion system.  To avoid having to manage two different user accounts and desktop environments, after I set up Lion on the Mac Pro’s SSD, I forced the SSD over to the User account on the Snow Leopard hard disk.  For the most part, I could freely boot back and forth and the applications on each OS would work but there were some that choked on this set-up.  My computing life simply was more manageable if I consolidated to one OS, so I decided that moving back to Snow Leopard was the thing to do.  Additionally, on my MacBook Air, Lion had killed a USB Gigabit Ethernet adapter I got back by going back to Snow Leopard.  That’s a small thing, but it simply made me feel better about not throwing away my investment in hardware due to an OS upgrade.  That also holds for not losing access to the applications that needed Rosetta.  In this economy, replacing hardware or software “just because” is not something I need to do.

The bottom line for me was that Lion simply didn’t yield enough gain to overcome the losses it was introducing.

Yes, at some point the tablet may become the main computer of the future.  But that’s not today.  Introducing tablet technology for its own sake holds out perilous risks for Apple if they wish to hold onto their computer-based audience. They may not.  They are going to go, after all, where the money is.  It may not be in the PC market.

I’ve been a relatively happy Apple convert since 2001.  That said, we’ve put up with a lot to stay with Apple computing, shifting through the change from the G4 to the G5 to Intel CPU’s, upgrading operating system and utility software, and lately putting up with the too limited selections of Apple displays and video card upgrades for the Mac Pro.  I was reading this morning a web report that said Apple was looking at moving its desktops and notebooks to ARM processors in 2013. If that’s true, I have three words for the company: “Don’t Do It!”

We will not follow the company through another CPU transition, especially one that looks like it’s a step into the past.

One of the great things about Apple’s current hardware designs is that though they are optimized for use in OS X but allow running Windows and Linux without modification. So, why would any of us want to give that up?  Would a move back into the world of ARM force us to relive the early days of OS X when if we needed to run Windows we had to run it under performance-sucking emulation; or, if that wasn’t good enough, force us to keep and maintain a separate Windows box?  And even if the ARM processors ran native Intel x86 code, why would I want to risk dealing with incompatibilities or possibly take a performance hit I wouldn’t have to suffer through with a native Intel CPU?  (Note: Yes, that argument can also be made for running AMD CPU’s, which I used almost exclusively in the days when I hand-built my PC’s.  The difference here is that AMD is been on the block for a while and ARM hasn’t, so the risks running each are not the same.)

Apple likes to run a “closed shop”, and so far, that has largely worked to their advantage.  But changing out CPU’s in their notebook or desktop lines is a move that doesn’t seem to make sense, especially considering Intel’s continuing march into higher performing CPU’s.  If I had wanted to stay in the Apple-past, I would not have followed the company into today’s Apple future.  It’s been hard enough as it is.

I have finished reconfiguring my Mac Pro with the addition of a 120GB OCZ Vertex 2 Solid State Drive as my boot drive, and I’m pretty pleased with the result.  The system is faster overall and mostly noticeably so, though there are a few areas where I saw little performance improvement at all.  I’ll show you some data in a few minutes that will illustrate what I’m talking about, but for now let me detail how I set my system up, why, and what I’ve learned from that.

My Mac Pro is a late 2008 model, with twin 2.8Ghz four-core Intel Xeon CPU’s, 16 GB RAM, an ATI Radeon 5770 video card, and a 12X Superdrive.  Before the “upgrade” I was running a 1TB 3.5” Hitachi 7200 rpm hard drive as a boot drive, a 500GB 3.5” Maxtor 7200 RPM hard drive as a scratch drive, a 500GB 3.5” Maxtor 7200 RPM hard drive as a Boot Camp drive running Windows 7 Ultimate, and a 1.5TB 3.5” Seagate 7200 RPM hard drive as a Time Machine Disk.  I have now replaced the Time Machine disk with a 2.5” Vertex 2 solid state drive of 120GB marketed capacity.  (I say “marketed” because after formatting as an HFS+ drive, it showed about 115GB and during the Snow Leopard installation it showed only 106GB free.)  I moved the Time Machine disk out to an Acomdata Firewire400/USB 2 external case whose power is controlled through an APC backup unit that automatically powers up and down with the Mac Pro.  I set up the Vertex from scratch with a complete installation of every application I wanted to install, being sure to set up the User account so that the short and long names and password matched up exactly with the one on my old boot disk, the Hitachi 1TB.  I installed all applications with this set-up, i.e., pointing toward the User account on the SSD.  While I eventually intended to point the User account to the one on the Hitachi hard disk, having a separate one on the SSD would allow me to run all my applications and get e-mail if the Hitachi hard disk failed.

Once I had the SSD completely set up and had verified all my applications were working, I then went into System Preferences, Accounts, and unlocked it before right-clicking on my account name.  The “Advanced Options” window popped up that, when selected, brought up a larger window that showed where the associated User account was.  I clicked on a “Choose” button next to it and then selected the User account on the Hitachi hard disk I wanted to ultimately point to.  It asked me to choose a “Reboot” and I did, and the machine rebooted on the SSD but using my user account on my Hitachi, i.e., the old boot drive.

While most of my applications launched without any modifications, my Adobe CS 5 applications almost universally crashed on launch.  Suspecting that it had to do with permissions, I reselected the User account on the SSD, rebooted, and verified that all my CS 5 applications worked without complaint.   I then right-clicked on my (short name) User folder on the Hitachi drive, and down in the “Sharings and Permissions” window clicked on the “+” sign and added myself (short name) to the list (system/admin/everyone) and selected “Read and Write” privileges and “Apply to all enclosed items” and then hit the “Apply” button.  Once it completed, I went back up into Accounts in System Preferences and reset the User folder to the one on the Hitachi drive and rebooted; this time all my applications launched with no problems.  This is the type of configuration I suspect most people are going to run in, i.e., with their applications only on an SSD and the rest of their data on a conventional hard drive, at least until prices fall where all hard drives can be SSD. (The next best thing would be to make your data drive a Velociraptor if you can afford to limit yourself to its current limited size.)

That said, running in this kind of configuration raises the question of what kind of performance hits am I taking by doing so?  So, I’ll answer that question by sharing with you the data from some simple benchmark testing I did with my machine.  It will also show you what kind of performance you can expect from running in a straight SSD set up where data and applications are both on the SSD.

Boot time:

Mac Pro using Hitachi hard disk as boot and data drive:   39.7 secs

Mac Pro using the Vertex 2 SSD as boot and data drive:    28.9 secs

Mac Pro using the Vertex 2 as the boot drive and Hitachi as data:   28.6 secs

Since I was using a manual stopwatch, I consider the two SSD times to be equal.  This says there is no penalty for using a conventional hard drive for the User account.  There is a 28% improvement in boot times using the SSD.

Shutdown time:

Mac Pro using Hitachi hard disk as boot and data drive: 9.8 secs

Mac Pro using the Vertex 2 SSD as boot and data drive: 9.7 secs

Mac Pro using the Vertex 2 as a boot drive and Hitachi as data:   9.4 secs

This says there is no significant difference in shutdown time with either type of disk in my system.

Application Launch Times:

Final Cut Pro 7

Mac Pro using Hitachi hard disk as boot and data:   17.5 secs

Mac Pro using SSD as boot and data:                     5.6 secs

Mac Pro using Vertex 2 SSD as boot and Hitachi for data:     7.3 secs

This shows a 2X to 3X launch time improvement with this application.  This time is time from start to first window (looking for camera) and not full application load.

Color V 1.5.3

Mac Pro using Hitachi hard disk as boot and data:   5.6 secs

Mac Pro using SSD as boot and data:                      5.1 secs

Mac Pro using Vertex 2 SSD as boot and Hitachi for data:     4.7 secs

Amazingly, there was no performance gain using the SSD.  I think this kind of thing is what you will sometimes see, depending on the file sizes needed for a particular application launch.

Photoshop CS 5

Mac Pro using Hitachi hard disk as boot and data:   10.9 secs

Mac Pro using SSD as boot and data:                     2.7 secs

Mac Pro using Vertex 2 SSD as boot and Hitachi for data:     4.1 secs

Photoshop showed a significant improvement in launch time when using the SSD. It launched about 2.6X to 4X times faster.  Most people are not going to have their data files on the SSD, however, so the 2.6X time is probably more representative.

Microsoft Word (Office 2011)

Mac Pro using Hitachi hard disk as boot and data:   10.5 secs

Mac Pro using SSD as boot and data:                     1.6 secs

Mac Pro using Vertex 2 SSD as boot and Hitachi for data:    2.6 secs

Word showed a significant improvement in launch times when run from an SSD.  This time was from application start to the Gallery window, not full application load.

Overall, I’m happy with the performance I’m seeing out of the Vertex 2.  It didn’t hurt either that I got it on sale from Newegg for $199 ($169 after rebate).  I thought it was worth both the money and time spent in reconfiguring to run the drive, though admittedly it would be worth more if I were using the machine for business.   I’ll keep you abreast of how well things go from here.  We’ll both be interested to see if I still feel it was worth it a year from now.

My wife and I recently traded our MacBook and MacBook Pro for MacBook Air’s , one 11.6 and one 13 inch model.  I moved most of the data on my MacBook Pro to my Mac Pro not only because it had plenty of storage space but also to get more utilization out of that machine.  The move instigated a side-effect I didn’t anticipate, and that was to get me pondering what would happen if I installed a Solid State Drive in the Mac Pro.  I hadn’t considered it before because of the cost and how I had the Mac Pro configured.  At the moment, a 1 TB hard disk holds all applications, system folders, and my user folders, eating something over 700GB altogether.  However, my Applications, Library, and Systems folders only take 105 GB of space, and so a hard disk in the 120GB range would barely work.  I also believe that if I do a clean reinstall I will recover some space (and I’m hoping for at least 10GB) due to garbage from uninstalled or upgraded applications still sucking space in my Library folder.

My interest in SSD’s peaked this week when MicroCenter put a Vertex 2 160GB SSD on sale for $259 after rebates.  I almost jumped on that one, but my out-of-pocket costs are what kept me from it.  Without the rebate, the price was a decent $279 but with tax and the cost of an Icy Dock adapter the price escalated to slightly above $300.  That was about $100 more than I wanted to spend.  I decided to save up and wait for the Intel Emcrest SSD’s (rumored to be released next month with much higher read and write speeds than anything currently on the market) until this morning when I stumbled on a “Super Shocker” deal at Newegg.  With a $30 rebate, they were selling a 120GB Vertex 2 SSD (2.5″ format) for only $169!!  That put my total cost even with an Icy Dock in the $220 range before the rebate and $190 range after.  SOLD!

I am expecting the Vertex 2 to arrive later this week.  I intend to install it where my Time Machine disk is in the Mac Pro and move the TM disk out to an external case.  I plan to load a firmware update to the SSD first using Windows 7 under Boot Camp and then erase the drive and reformat using HFS Extended.  I intend to load OS X up from scratch, and, once I have that working, start reinstalling all my Applications.    I’m going to use it and my current hard disk as alternating boot drives until I am satisfied that the SSD is working fine and will fit my needs.  At that point, I’ll wipe out the Applications, Library, and Systems folders from the hard drive so all that remains is my User profile, which I will have pointed toward long before.  That will isolate the User folder from my applications hard drive and put me in a position to clone the SSD to a replacement later.  And my intent is to replace the OCZ with an Intel Emcrest drive if they turn out to be the barn blazers they are rumored to be.  I’ll make the OCZ Vertex a scratch disk and give Photoshop, its other CS 5 apps, and Final Cut Pro and company all the performance they can handle.  Won’t it be sweet?