MacBook Pro Graphics not running at full speed.

You can speed up the graphics using an ATI Tools BETA (Windows)

Speed up the graphics card from 310MHz (GPU) / 278MHz (RAM) to 475MHz for the GPU, 470MHz for the RAM.

Obviously not supported, almost definitely will void your warrantee and don't even think about getting it anywhere near your lap

Apple drops Portal Player in iPods

PortalPlayer has been working on a successor to its PP5021 chip, but Apple has said it will not use it in new high-end and midrange flash models.

The iPod accounts for 90% of the companies revenue. Their stock dropped 40% in 10 minutes after the announcement.

Other iPod and iTunes News

Apple chief financial officer Peter Openheimer expects the average selling price of its iPod digital music players to decline this quarter.

Points to Apple selling more low end models like the Nano and Shuffle

Piper Jaffray analyst predicts 8GB and 10GB iPod nanos to be released in late Summer or early Fall. Also says Apple could push back the release of a larger-screen video iPod until 2007 to wait for Movie content in iTunes.

Apple shipped just over 8.5 million iPods in the second quarter, a 61 percent increase compared to the same quarter last year.

Looks like Steve has won the battle and songs on iTunes will stay at $0.99 at least for now. Record companies fought hard for tiered pricing and subscriptions.

Free season (5 x 30 min. episodes) of the Noggin show "O'Grady". Noggin is a network for kids and O'Grady is a cartoon where a normal town affected the paranormal “Weirdness”.

Free iTunes: "O'Grady"

Mac software news

Apple released Remote Desktop 3. Some features include Spotlight search, Automator support and Curtain Mode to hide actions from users

Remote Desktop

Universal Adobe Photoshop as part of new Creative Suite targeted for next Spring.

Apple made Bonjour for Windows 1.0.3 available. Great for Bonjour enable shared printers.

Apple planning a new 50 acre campus

Apple is planning to build a new 50-acre campus near its current headquarters in Cupertino.

Could take three to four years to design and build the new Apple headquarters, which could accommodate 3,000 to 3,500 employees

Apple will continue to use the old campus.

Video of Steve at Cupertino City Council meeting

Video: New Apple Campus

New security flaws in OS X exposed

Tom Ferris, a security researcher in Mission Viejo, Calif made public 7 security flaws in OS X

5 flaws are "heap overflow" issues with different graphics formats. Another deals with how ZIP files are handles and he claims to have found several issues in Safari

Bud Tribble, Apple's vice president of software technology says they are investigating and fixing the issues.

Issues will be fixed in the next OS X update

No known exploits are taking advantage of the flaws

Apple's official stance is that public disclosure does not help.

Rubinstein not gone completely

The former head of Apple's iPod division Jon Rubinstein retired April 14th

Will continue to consult one day a week for one year

Was succeeded by Tony Fadell head of the iPod engineering team

A more eco-friendly Apple

Apple now offering free computer take-back and recycling with the purchase of a new Macintosh system beginning in June.

Free shipping and environmentally friendly disposal of their old computer.

Fifth-generation iPod, iPod nano and iPod shuffle are 100% compliant with the upcoming restrictions of hazardous substances (RoHS) in California and Europe.

Apple removed most of the materials covered by the RoHS from iPods almost a year ago.

iPod power adapter exceed Energy Star requirements and meet California’s stricter appliance efficiency regulation which doesn't even go into effect until 2008

Rumor of 17" MacBook Pro at NAB

Expected to be announced around April 22nd.

Similar specs to the 15" MacBook Pro. Possibly with the 2.16GHz Core Duo standard. Could offer unannounced 2.33GHz as a BTO upgrade.

Expect pricing well above $3,000

We are still waiting on the MacBook. Doesn't look like a dual launch as some sites were reporting.

Mac Mini Power Brick Follow-up

The Mac Mini has always had a large external power brick.

Several people told me the MBP power adapter is almost twice as large as the PowerBooks.

Bootloader correction

Listener Shirley

LILO is a Linux bootloader. Windows' bootloader is called ntldr. (NT Loader)

"In order to boot linux, this method chainloads the lilo bootloader
from the windows xp (ntldr) bootloader. "

Still think Apple will switch to Windows? Read this

Paul Thurrott's Win Supersite Article on the failures of Windows Vista

Windows Vista Failures

Example: User Account Protection (UAP). Supposed to offer the same Mac/Linux security model requiring a password before potentially damaging procedures. Vista delivers password pop-up overkill, asking for credentials over and over for the same task.

Interesting discussion about why Microsoft has become to large to move quickly

Boot Camp follow up

Correction. Windows XP's install routine can't format FAT32 partitions larger than 32GB, but you can have FAT32 volumes larger than 32GB.

Robert Cringely thinks Apple may be planning to implement the Windows API (Application Programming Interfaces) directly in Mac OS X 10.5 and will be switching to a newer, faster, not Mach kernel.

Apple lawsuit against rumor websites

Finishing up trial against O'Grady's PowerPage for leaking what Apple considers trade secrets.

Leaked the reports of Asteroid, a Firewire audio interface.

Electronic Frontier Foundation is helping with the defense and hoping to set precedence so online writers can qualify as journalists and get First Amendment protection.

Whiny MacBook Pros

Reports from more than a few listeners who purchase MacBooks that have an annoying whine.

Another noise seems to be a fan under the right hand side of the keyboard that sounds like a mooing cow.

MacBook Pro firmware update 1.0.1 released April 19th has corrected the issue for some.

The problem seems to be related somehow to power consumption. Try these tips:

Turn on iSight
Reports that turning on the MacBook Pro's built-in iSight eliminates the whining noise.

Plug in power adapter.

Adjusting screen brightness

Wait a few days
It may just be a side effect of the system being "broken in."

Try tilting the display back and forth a few times
Tilting the display back and forth, or gently squeezing on the screen casing's lower left corner eliminates the noise.

Turn off ambient light sensor
"Keyboard and Mouse" pane of System Preferences and uncheck "Illuminate keyboard in low light conditions".

Turn off one processor core
In order to turn off one processor, you need to install Apple's Developer Tools (from the install discs included with your MacBook Pro). You will then have access to a System Preference pane labeled "Processor" that can toggle between single and dual-core operation.

Turn on Bluetooth

QuietMBP Software
Software to quiet the CPU

QuietMBP1.1.zip

Apple is taking the units back and replacing them, but there are mixed results.

I have heard there is supposedly a "Rev E" model released in March that does not have the issue.