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TUAW Sunday snacks: Some tasty tidbits of random information
Filed under: Analysis / Opinion, Software, Odds and ends, Bugs/Recalls, iPhone, Snow Leopard
In between watching those Sunday NFL games, we're hoping that you're snacking on some TUAW goodness. For your munching pleasure I thought I'd cook up some of the interesting tidbits that have accumulated in our inbox this morning and present them to you for consumption.

First, from TUAW reader Tom, is a fascinating look at a pre-Apple "Apple logo." Apparently in 1969, Piaggio Vespa, world-famous for their Vespa scooters, had an Italian ad campaign featuring apples with both sides missing a bite. The campaign used the Italian phrase "Chi Vespa mangia le mele," or "He who Vespas eats apples." Echoes of the campaign can still be found on various Vespa websites, including the USA site where you'll find many dingbats and buttons are apples with a bite or two taken out of them.

Next, TUAW fan Keith pointed out something interesting. If you go into Settings > General > Usage, there's a list of your iPhone usage. Down near the bottom of the list of statistics is a section called Tethering Data.

This shows up on 3G / 3GS models, since tethering is allowed by many carriers. Of course, as "Seth the Blogger Guy" notes in the AT&T video, American iPhone owners don't get the joy of using their iPhones as wireless data modems for laptops because the AT&T network has insufficient capacity. We've talked previously about AT&T's view on tethering; read here for more info. Of course, there's always the jailbreak option. Read on for more news tidbits.
Continue reading TUAW Sunday snacks: Some tasty tidbits of random information
TUAW TUAW Sunday snacks: Some tasty tidbits of random information originally appeared on The Unofficial Apple Weblog (TUAW) on Sun, 13 Sep 2009 18:30:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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Talkcast tonight: 10 pm EDT Sunday; it was only rock and roll, but we liked it
Filed under: TUAW Business, Podcasts

This is our first TUAW Talkcast of the month, since we were all being slackers and slept through the Labor Day weekend.

Not to worry, we're back again tonight for another hour of live general silliness, with talk about the September 9th announcements, Snow Leopard 10.6.1 upgrade, and other assorted and sundry topics. As usual, we'll also entertain any questions or comments you may have. Our usual group of shady characters will be joined by Ross Rubin from Engadget and NPD.

To participate on TalkShoe, you can use the browser-only client, or you can try out the classic TalkShoe Pro Java client; however, for maximum fun, you should call in. For the web UI, just click the "TalkShoe Web" button on our profile page at 10 pm Sunday. To call in on regular phone or VOIP lines (take advantange of your free cellphone weekend minutes if you like): dial (724) 444-7444 and enter our talkcast ID, 45077 -- during the call, you can request to talk by keying in *-8. Talk with you then!

Recording support for the talkcast is provided by Call Recorder from ecamm networks.
TUAW Talkcast tonight: 10 pm EDT Sunday; it was only rock and roll, but we liked it originally appeared on The Unofficial Apple Weblog (TUAW) on Sun, 13 Sep 2009 18:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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The iPod touch has 802.11n, so what?
Filed under: Analysis / Opinion, Hardware, Odds and ends, iPod touch
Author and blogger Glenn Fleishman over at TidBITS has some great insights into iFixit's discovery that the 3rd generation iPod touch has an 802.11n-capable wireless chip. We mentioned this in our initial analysis of iFixit's teardown, but we still had a few comments asking what it could really do and some who claimed it could do nothing. With the help of Glenn's article, I'll put a few of those thoughts to rest and probably fuel more conspiracies with these highlights:
- Until recently, 802.11n-capable devices required two antennas. That has changed with the introduction of Single-Stream 802.11n, thus making it possible for manufacturers to put wireless-n into handheld devices.
- Part of the Single-Stream endeavor was a desire for better battery life. If Apple enables wireless-n in the future, it's very likely that you'll see the battery life improve when doing anything on WiFi because these chips should consume less power than wireless-g.
- Wireless-n could allow the iPod touch to send 50 percent more data across the network. That would give it a theoretical throughput of 30Mbps or more instead of its current 20Mbps.
- It's also possible that Single-Stream wireless-n technology will be more efficient on wireless networks. In order for that to happen, Apple will have to update their wireless routers to contain space-time block coding (STBC), but that could be as simple as a firmware update.
If Apple enabled 802.11n in the iPod touch, we could see a lot of new uses come to the device, including video streaming, wireless sync/home sharing, on-device video rental, and many other possibilities. I have always wanted to be able to start a movie in the living room and continue watching it live while doing other tasks around the house. With this new technology, that dream could someday become reality.

[via TidBITS]
TUAW The iPod touch has 802.11n, so what? originally appeared on The Unofficial Apple Weblog (TUAW) on Sun, 13 Sep 2009 17:30:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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MacBook Car-nage: Surviving a drive-over
Filed under: Hardware, MacBook
Yesterday, I had a distraught customer come into the store and lay the remains of a black MacBook (13-inch Early 2008) on the front counter. My immediate thought was that the machine had been trashed and was just at the shop to be recycled.

I asked the customer what happened and he explained that it had been run over by a car. At this point I thought to myself, "Yikes, there's gotta be a story behind this one." As it turns out, it was just an unfortunate accident of forgetfulness. He just returned home from a road trip and set the machine down to bring in a load from the car. After being inside for a bit, he came out and decided to check his mailbox, which was just down the road. He stepped into the car, backed up and... CAR-NAGE!

What's most amazing here isn't the accident, but what he discovered when he tried to power up the MacBook. Even after having a car completely crush it, it still worked. When the customer told me this, I couldn't believe it. I opened the display -- which you can see is absolutely smashed in the picture -- and pressed the power button. To my excited surprise, the machine turned on and booted into Leopard.

After running a full suite of diagnostics on the machine, I found it needed a display assembly, optical drive, and optical drive bezel (the part of the inner frame that the discs go through). All of that was cheaper than getting a new machine, so I went to work. It took me a couple hours and some frame bending here and there, but after all was said and done, I gave the customer back a machine that would pass any warranty inspection at the Genius Bar. See the gallery for more pictures!

Disclaimer: The Unofficial Apple Weblog cannot and will not be held responsible for any damage done to your computer by cars. Just because we think it's cool that it may survive doesn't mean you should go out and crush your MacBook.

Gallery: MacBook Car-nage

TUAW MacBook Car-nage: Surviving a drive-over originally appeared on The Unofficial Apple Weblog (TUAW) on Sun, 13 Sep 2009 12:30:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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Oh, Canada: App Store north of the border goes all Skype-y
Filed under: App Store
Over the past day or so we've gotten a smattering of strange reports, starting with Derek on Twitter, of a bizarre 'takeover' on the App Store for users who are browsing for apps from their iPhones and iPod touch handhelds. These poor souls are faced with the scary image seen here: an App Store devoid of categories and filled with repeating copies of the Skype icon. The horror!

A bit of detective work by the affected users sharing their stories on the Apple Discussion boards soon revealed what they all had in common: Canadian residency. According to the thread, conversations with Apple support folk have pointed to a database problem in the Canadian app store that should be sorted out in the near future.

One workaround suggested by a poster in the thread: try switching the App Store location preference (in Settings -> App Store on the phone) to USA from Canada, then switching back. If this works for you, chime in below or on the Apple support boards.

Thanks to everyone who sent this in.
TUAW Oh, Canada: App Store north of the border goes all Skype-y originally appeared on The Unofficial Apple Weblog (TUAW) on Sun, 13 Sep 2009 11:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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The Bookmark App: Audiobooks finally done right
Filed under: iPhone, iPod touch, App Review
The Bookmark app [iTunes Link] has solved a number of problems I've always suffered while listening to audiobooks on an iPhone. It isn't pefect yet, but what is currently in the app store is the best implementation of digital audiobook listening I've found. It's earned a place on my home page and that alone is quite a recommendation. I'll get to a play-by-play in a bit, but first a bit of context is in order.

I have always been a fan of audiobooks. Long before the inception of the iPod, I was a constant Books on Tape customer. I'd choose a book and in a few days, receive a sizable box filled with anywhere from two to over forty cassette tapes. It was worth it to me to go through all the hassle of keeping the tapes in order and carrying a stack of them with me to play on a portable cassette player when I wasn't listening in my car.

When the iPod came out, I found Audible.com and life became much easier. I always carried at least a dozen books with me on my iPod Classic. The books usually downloaded in one or two big files making a book easy to manage. A few years later, Audible.com started embedding chapter markers in their books so jumping to a particular chapter was a snap, but I always had a problem with the iPod losing my place in a book. It could have been due to syncing, or being knocked around, but it was constant and always annoying.

When I bought my iPhone, I found the way the iPod module handled audiobooks had changed. Instead of downloading a few big files, what wound up in the library was a separate file for each chapter. So, for example, Fool by Christopher Moore, which my iPod Classic saw as one file with twenty-six chapters, appeared to be twenty-six files on the iPhone. That would have been fine, except for the fact that the iPhone was no better than my iPod Classic in losing my place seemingly at random. Worse, I never knew which file I was on when my place got lost.

Read on to see how Bookmark has solved this dilemma for me.

Continue reading The Bookmark App: Audiobooks finally done right
TUAW The Bookmark App: Audiobooks finally done right originally appeared on The Unofficial Apple Weblog (TUAW) on Sat, 12 Sep 2009 18:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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Sponsored Topics: iPhone - Apple - IpodTouch - App Store - IPod Classic
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