The Apple Store, Otay Ranch opens at 10:00 AM tomorrow in Chula Vista, CA and I will be there. I will probably arrive early to get in line, between 6:00 and 7:00 AM. The doors open at 10:00 AM and I should be there about an hour after that, so if your in the area and can make it out I would love to meet you. It should be a great time and I will have some Maccast schwag to give out. See you there.

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A podcast about all things Macintosh. For Mac geeks, by Mac geeks. Show 163. New MacBook Pros. “DVD Jon”‘s new venture. Selling iTunes DRM. Intel Xserve ship date slips to November. Bluetooth proof-of-concept exploit released. Apple releases preliminary 4th quarter financial results. Apple store iPod thefts on the rise. Apple releases iPod Shuffle fix. Apple also releases FinalCut Express HD update. Are MacBooks showing early signs of wear? Correction on fixing iPod restart issue. MacBook RSS fix is now working. iPod virus follow-up. Software recommendations for managing serial numbers. Migrating Outlook contact to Address Book. Managing iPod playback order. Getting around the iTunes tax. Speeding up the Dashboard. iTunes 7 and the disappearing podcast bug. More tips on deleting Mac Apps. Software to better manage and use iPhoto keywords. Locating large files in OS X. Fix for the iCal Alarm issue. Backups and drive formats. Toggling info in the iPod graph in iTunes 7. iLike not the first iTunes music social network service. Fixing battery, power and fan issues on your Macs. ScreenCasts Online Offer.

New music, What I should have said by Melissa

There’s always work at the post office. — Hollywood Shuffle (1987)

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Today, Quark launched their new product to the world. In a packed Apex Suite, right next to Olympia, London, all was unveiled.

“Quark Interactive Designer” allows the use of Quark Xpress 7 and Server Edition, to build fully interactive content. Design for web, print and interactive multimedia, all from within Quark. With full support for Flash (SWF), multiple video formats, with nice add-ons like zooming in on an image, the package mean “No more need for a separate web app or Powerpoint.”

It is available to order today, for Windows and as a Mac Universal application.
Retail price: (USD)$199. Special intro price until April 1st, 2007: (USD)$99. Students get the best deal as they get the new “Quark Interactive Designer” free of charge until until April 1st, 2007.

Interested in learning to play the guitar? Optek Music Systems has a combination of tools to make every amateur a sexy-mad professional rock star in mere hours.

Announced to the press: “Macintosh users can now advance their guitar playing skills in significantly less time than learning from books, charts, and endless hours of tedious practice.” Be careful of the hype. Isn’t it written somewhere that all great artists must suffer? No matter how great this GarageBand plug-in might be, it doesn’t appear to imbibe the would-be Jimi Hendrix with instant skill, and every decent guitar player is proud to have a handful of practice-made calluses.

Optek Music Systems produces four Fretlight guitars: the FG-401 Acoustic, FG-405 Acoustic Electric, FG-421 Electric and FG-451 Pro Electric, ranging in price from $429.95 to $899.95. The new Garageband plug-in allows a Mac to power the lights that are embedded in the guitar’s fretboard, which signify chords and scales. Using the plug-in, a Fretlight Guitar can be added as a GarageBand instrument to light any chord and scale, to create custom sequence lists and to cycle through them with a footswitch, and also to drag and drop loops or songs into the timeline.
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This morning the MacBook Pro update we have all been waiting for happened. Following yesterdays rumors on digg, Apple has updated the entire MacBook Pro line to include all Intel Core 2 Duo processors. Apple claims the upgraded systems provide up to 39% more performance and all models come with double the storage and memory of their predecessors. The new systems also all include a Firewire 800 port. So you now have your choice of either 2.16GHz or 2.33GHz Intel Core 2 Duo processor and can add even more storage (up to 200GB) and memory (up to 3GB) via Apple’s build-to-order options. Apple’s 15-inch MacBook Pro models are priced at USD$1,999.00 and USD$2,499.00 and should be shipping this week, with the 17-inch model priced at USD$2,799.00 shipping next week.

Update/Note from Editor: I have been able to confirm from Belkin that at this time this product is not Mac compatible. A Belkin spokesperson has said the company is working on Mac compatibility and are planning support for Macs. When Mac support is added we will try to get a unit for a full review and update.

For a Mac-head who uses his laptop as a portable desktop, plays videos in the corner of an external monitor while working, and has lots of stuff to plug in, the Belkin Notebook Expansion Dock might be a great tool.

The word “might” is important here because although Belkin’s information page says the dock will work with any laptop with an ExpressCard port, e.g. a MacBook Pro, Belkin never mention’s OS X, only Windows XP and Vista.
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A podcast about all things Macintosh. For Mac geeks, by Mac geeks. Show 162. Apple sees (RED) with new iPod Nano. Apple ships a few infected iPods. Apple purchases Silicon Color. Analyst claims 2 iPhones are in the works. Apple plans support for BluRay and HD-DVD? A fix for iPods that reboot after 1.2 firmware update. Find more music you iLike. Mac Bluetooth keyboard and mouse recommendations. “iPod tax” is wider spread than I knew. Converting WMA files for use in iTunes. How to remove old applications from OS X. A response to my .Mac and iTunes support rant. iCal alarms pop up in wrong place after 10.4.8 update. Followup on creating an enhanced podcast. The latest on the MacBook “RSS” repairs. smcFanControl app to adjust your MacBook (Pro) fan speed. ScreenCasts Online enhanced podcast tutorial and special offer for MacCast listeners.

New music, Coversation Piece by Superbeing

Promos from The MedicCast and the God’s Mac Podcast

You know, for kids. — The Hudsucker Proxy (1994)

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You have all probably heard about the new iPod Nanos from Apple. Well Steve jobs claimed in the Showtime Special Event that they were suppose to get an astonishing 24 hours of battery life.
Well any company out there claims that their batteries last forever. Consumers just take an educated guess on how long the battery will really last.

I recently purchased a new 8GB iPod Nano. I was very impressed with the battery life on it. I listened to if for a few hours and the battery bar continued to stay full! Well I was ready a post on a forum somewhere talking about the battery life of a new Nano, and it got me thinking… “How long does the battery actually last?”
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NYC Apple photo courtesy of iProng.

Listner Paul just sent me an email to let me know that it looks like Apple is in the process of replacing the silver Apple logo over the elevator and stairs at the 5th Avenue NYC store with a red Apple logo. My first thought was maybe they are getting ready for the holidays, but then I saw this post on Think Secret. Apparently Bono will be on the Oprah Winfrey Show tomorrow and will show off a special edition red iPod Nano. The unit will be a 4GB model wrapped in a special red case and will sell for the standard USD$199.00 price. USD$10.00 of each unit sold will go to Bono’s AIDS-awareness charity, (RED). RED then passes the money they raise to The Global Fund who helps women and children affected by HIV/AIDS in Africa. Until this launch (RED) products have oinly been available for purchase within the UK where they have special (RED) American Express cards and Motrola SLVR phones.

Update: Friday (10/13) Apple did release a special edition red iPod Nano. Also, the 5th Avenue Apple store in New York did have it’s logo changed to a red version. Thanks to Bill at iProng for the photo.

Mungai Mirrors, a UK company, has just announced a cool little device to turn your MacBook or MacBook Pros iSight into a quick and dirty DV cam. The device is called the Huckleberry and it’s genius is in it’s simplicity. It consists of a set of brackets and a small mirror that attach to the top lid of your Mac notebook. It fits just above the built-in iSight and effectively turns the iSight around allowing you to shoot video directly while monitoring what you are capturing on your Mac’s screen. Now one slight problem with the technique might be the “mirrored” image effect but, as the companies site points out, that is easily solved by using iMovie’s “Mirror” Video FX filter or by picking up a copy of eCamm’s iGlasses. Unfortunately the company’s site doesn’t seem to offer any images of video captured via the device so I can’t say what the quality is, but assuming there is no image loss this could prove to be a fun little gadget. The Huckleberry available for pre-sale now and is just £15.00 plus post & packing (shipping and handling to us Yanks). It will be launching at Mac Expo in London, October 26-28 2006, in partnership with Computer Warehouse and will be shipping in mid-October.