Computing and Technology

Sunday - February 12, 2006

When touch screen displays take over the world…

It's not often you get to have a glimpse of the future. However, after watching this video demonstrating the use of a multi-point touch screen user interface, I couldn't help but think that this is the way we will all be using computers in the next five to ten years.

Ever since working on touch screen applications for information kiosks and interactive exhibits at the At-Bristol exhibition and elsewhere, I've wondered why touch screen technology has never really taken off, as it seems the obvious way of interacting with on-screen visual content. However, practical problems including the durability of displays, the inevitable fingerprint problem, and limitations of the technology itself, such as poor accuracy and sensitivity, has prevented the widespread adoption of touch screens for the majority of IT applications. However, the recent availability of low-cost LCD displays, advanced screen coatings, and new multi-point touch detection looks set to change all that.

The revolutionary thing about these new screens is the ability to use two (or more!) hands, or multiple fingers to interact with what can only be described as a ‘visual control surface’. The gestures used to control zooming and resizing are particularly ingenious and consist of using both hands or thumb and forefinger to literally expand or compress the image element being viewed. This gesture is particularly intuitive as it's the one we would use in everyday life to indicate ‘smaller’ or ‘larger’, and its use in manipulating the Google Maps-like application in the video is simply stunning. The possibility of allowing more than one person to interact with the screen simultaneously is also intriguing and opens up a whole new world of applications in gaming, creativity and productivity software, as well as interactive artworks, such as the lava lamp and light swirl programs shown in the video.

I also liked the way that windows can not only be picked up and moved around but also rotated as if they were pieces of paper or photos sitting on a desk, which is of course what the desktop metaphor was supposed to achieve. Of course, all of this depends on the use of highly responsive, near-real-time graphics processing, but now that GPUs are becoming much more powerful, and both CPUs and the next generation of GPUs are moving to multi-core processors, this seems well within the bounds of possibility within the next few years.

Interestingly, Apple Computer has recently filed a patent for a gesture-based user interface that includes many of the above operations, and whose screen mock-ups look very much like iTunes, iPhoto and Google Maps. Mac analysts have speculated that this heralds the imminent arrival of a new touch-screen based iPod, although it's likely that such patents are also connected with Apple's ongoing research into tablet PCs, which could see the light of day some time in 2007 once the transition to the low power consumption Intel hardware is complete.

I've felt for a long time that the WIMP (windows-icons-menus and pointing device) interface is due for an overhaul, and that one obvious improvement would be the ability to literally pick up and drop windows onto the desktop, with their contents zooming in and out respectively. Apple's Exposé is a first step towards this as it provides real-time updating of all of the windows in your workspace while you switch between applications or documents. No doubt Microsoft's long awaited Vista operating system will follow suit, but wouldn't it be great if you could actually interact with the windows whilst they were in this zoomed out state? With the use of anti-aliasing and relatively high-resolution displays, this would effectively increase the available screen real-estate by several orders of magnitude, and allow for much more seamless operation. I'm sure that this possibility hasn't escaped the notice of the engineers at Apple who are hard at work on the next release of the company's Unix-based operating system, which is slated to include some major user interface enhancements… OS X Leopard, anybody?

Personally, I'll be happy when the day comes that I can say goodbye to my mouse and keyboard and switch to using a large desk-mounted interactive touch screen display. This is not only a much more natural and intuitive way of using a computer, but also less stressful on the joints, and potentially a lot more fun which, after all, can't be a bad thing, can it?

(P.S. If you're wondering why this blog or my main web site hasn't been updated for some time, it's because I'm working on a new version of the site, which has been designed using Apple's new iWeb application. More info soon…)

Posted at 09:23 AM

Thursday - January 12, 2006

Windows for Mac and OS X for PCs?

A couple of things I forgot to mention in my previous post were that, contrary to expectations, the MacBook Pro doesn't support dual layer DVD burning (although the new iMac apparently does), and that both machines are reportedly capable of running Windows (although don't expect any help from Apple in getting it installed!). The latter should not be beyond any reasonably tech-savvy user, however, and I would expect many 'How to' guides to appear on the Internet shortly after the new machines begin shipping.

As to whether the reverse is possible—i.e. running OS X on your Windows box—don't hold your breath. Apple will have certainly beefed up system security after the OS supplied with the original developer machines was cracked within weeks. I wouldn't be surprised if the same thing happens with the new machines soon enough, but the resulting hack may have sufficiently negative side-effects (e.g. difficulty of upgrading, crashing, software incompatibilities) to prevent all but the most hard-core PC users (of which there are many!) from using it on a daily basis.

In fact, Apple probably has more to gain from a little bit of copyright theft than it does to lose as their market share is so low (less than 5% of PCs worldwide) that they will probably sell more units on the back of people 'test driving' it on their existing PCs than they will forfeit on the basis of people choosing to run OS X on a Wintel PC (not that I am encouraging or condoning this in any way, shape or form!). Rumour has it that Apple may even be planning to sell a souped up 'professional' version of OS X (or even OS Xi—the next major release may see a version number hike) to power-users who wish to run it on existing Intel hardware, although personally I find that hard to believe, mainly because of the hardware and support issues involved. A licensable version of OS X Server, however, is a distinct possibility, but only after Apple has upgraded its own Xserve hardware to run on the Intel 64-bit platform.

In the long run, the ability to run both Windows and OS X may become a major driver for Mac hardware sales, whether this be through software products such as Virtual PC, dual booting, or whatever. It remains to be seen whether Apple will become a victim of their own success by selling cool white boxes to users who only have a passing interest in running Mac software (hard to believe though that may sound), although as long as they are selling more Macs, I'm sure they won't be complaining. However, all the indications are that Apple intends to stick to its high-end, high-revenue and high-aspiration pricing strategy, and so it seems likely that many existing PC manufacturers will soon be able to undercut them in terms of both price and performance. However, any such Intel Core Duo machines will undoubtedly lack the slick OS, high level of quality and undeniable 'wow factor' of the Apple brand. Interesting times though.

I will leave you with Apple's new ad, which I have to say made me chuckle… Are you ready to 'set the Intel processor free'?

Posted at 10:08 AM

Wednesday - January 11, 2006

Intel iMacs and the MacBook Pro

As an avid Applewatcher, I was of course glued to my browser yesterday evening watching MacOSRumors' live transcript of Steve Job's keynote address at Macworld 2006. True to form, Jobs did not disappoint, with announcements of new releases of the iLife and iWork software bundles and, more importantly, the very first Intel processor based Macintosh computers: the new iMac and MacBook Pro (sic).

Aside from being most impressed by the quoted performance (2–3 times faster than the fastest iMac G5, and 4–5 times faster (!) than the existing PowerBook line, although real-life applications are more likely to see a more modest but still very impressive 50 to 100% speed increase), the announcement was as interesting for what it left out than what was actually in it.

First of all, most of the pundits had been predicting updated iBook and Mac mini lines, as these are the models currently most in need of revision. However, in retrospect, Apple strategy makes perfect sense. The new iBook and Mac mini may well have outperformed the existing PowerBook and iMac models, which would be slightly embarrassing for Apple, hitting sales of older machines, which are still being offered at full price via the online AppleStore and elsewhere. Also, many of the Mac faithful (myself included) are so desperate to get their hands on one of the new Intel-based Macs that they are likely to buy the first new model that comes along. This would be bad both for Apple, who would lose out on the revenue generated by sales of the more expensive machines, and for consumers, who would be annoyed when the newer, faster models came out a couple of months later and they wish they had waited and bought them instead. From this point of view, releasing the higher-end hardware first is a shrewd and sensible move that will help to ensure maximum impact and sales in the marketplace (imagine the headlines if the single-processor Mac mini was released first: "New Intel Macs not much faster").

Another reason to hold back the iBook and Mac mini releases is the availability of software in the new universal binary format that contains both PowerPC and native Intel code. Although this may not deter early adopters and power users willing to run existing software under the Rosetta emulation technology, which will almost certainly run faster on the dual-core processors of the new machines, but could be confusing for new consumers, especially if they are unfamiliar with Macs or wish to make purchase new software. On this basis I would expect to see new iBooks and minis emerge some time in March, or perhaps early April, once the new MacBooks are shipping and more applications (such as Microsoft Office) are available as universal binaries.

It's an interesting question as to whether the new iBooks and minis will contain dual or single core processors. If the Mac mini is intended as a home media hub then dual-core would make perfect sense for multitasking the distribution of media streams around a home network, simultaneous recording and playback of digital TV, etc. However, this is unlikely in the short-term because of the cost implication, although perhaps Apple will offer it as an optional configuration. The new iBook—probably called the MacBook mini, or something equally banal—is also intended as a low cost machine, and I would expect to see some fairly aggressive pricing from Apple on the entry-level model, so again, probably no dual-core CPU there.

At the other end of the scale, the MacBook Pro (seriously, guys, what's with the name? MacBook Pro?! A five-year old could have done better…) looks to be an extremely capable and stylish laptop, almost identical in appearance to the existing PowerBook G4, but much faster, slightly thinner, and with a brighter screen, built-in iSight camera, infrared remote control (overkill, but nice), and groovy magnetic power cord, which avoids any damage to the laptop if someone trips over the cable (which, let's face it, we've all done at some time or another). Less obvious changes are the omission of a fast FireWire port (already causing some consternation amongst the high-end video crowd), the replacement of the ageing Type 2 PC Card slot with a pint-size ExpressCard socket, and no more S-video out (presumably this is available via the DVI connector?). More worryingly, and despite increased battery capacity (60W), no battery life figures are quoted, which can only mean that they are worse than the recently upgraded PowerBook G4s, which can manage a fairly respectable four hours or so on a single charge. It's possible that Apple's reluctance to give figures is also due to the large variation in power consumption arising from the brighter display and faster processor, which could burn up the battery in half this time when running CPU-intensive tasks. However, the Intel Core Duo is also supposed to contain some fairly smart power saving technologies, and so with the appropriate settings I would expect battery life to be broadly similar, if a little less than the existing model (say about 3.5 hours?). Even this would better than my current PowerBook G4 1.5GHz, which can only manage 3 hours on a good day, but is of course pure speculation on my part.

Perhaps unsurprisingly, there was no mention of Intel Viiv (pronounced to rhyme with 'five'—oh why do they do it?!). Whether this is because Apple are not interested as they already have their own media strategy based around iTunes, are saving it for the Mac mini, or perhaps have already included it but wish to hold off making any announcement yet (unlikely), your guess is as good as mine. Capabilities like 'instant-on' and robust streaming of digital TV broadcasts are again ideally suited to the home media hub, but as these can mostly be achieved through software rather than hardware (with the possible exception of secure encryption), Apple may have decided to keep its costs down and stick with its own proprietary solutions (as opposed to Intel's proprietary solution).

All in all, I think yesterday's announcements were an encouraging start to Apple's Intel transition, and I can't wait to see some of the other machines that are undoubtedly just around the corner. Although the reality may have seemed slightly lacklustre in comparison with the rumour mills' frenzied outpourings, that would probably have been the case whatever the outcome, given the huge amount of speculation and anticipation leading up to yesterday's event. In any case, there is certainly plenty more to come and I for one look forward to the next few months with interest. I have already started saving for my 15" MacBook Pro… or should I get an iMac, or perhaps a Mac mini? It's so difficult to decide… ;-)

Posted at 10:09 AM

Wednesday - June 15, 2005

Maybe life isn't so random after all…

I've had my iPod shuffle for a couple of months now and have noticed a couple of minor oddities. Firstly, the unit actually takes a few seconds to boot up and shut down. I noticed this because pressing the play or battery buttons immediately after switching it on or off doesn't seem to do anything, but if you wait a few seconds it works as expected. Not a big deal, but worth knowing.

More strangely, when replenishing my iPod shuffle with a new selection of (supposedly random) songs from iTunes, I have noticed that certain tracks seem to come up more than others. Maybe this is just a coincidence, but I have had some of the same tunes come up two, three or four times in a row, and in exactly the same order as before, whilst I've never heard even a single track from other albums. It seems that life may not be quite so random after all…

OK, having implemented a few random number algorithms in my time, I realise that, despite appearances, computers are never truly random. However, with a good algorithm and suitable 'seed' value—such as the current date and time—it should be virtually impossible to discern any sort of recurring or regular patterns. It's also very rare for iTunes to choose a single album track on its own. They normally seem to show up in pairs, so perhaps iTunes is trying to do something clever (or perhaps I have just seen Pi too many times!).

I'm also in the process of converting my entire iTunes music library to QuickTime AAC format (that's MP4 to you non-Mac users) because the quality is so much better than MP3 and it means that I can squeeze more songs onto my hard disk and iPod shuffle (not that I've ever found this to be a limitation). It really brings it home just how much information a computer can hold these days. I've been feeding it stacks of CDs for days now and there's still room for more. Amazing!

Posted at 11:41 AM

Monday - June 13, 2005

More thoughts on the Apple-Intel deal

Well, it's a week since Apple's announcement that they will be switching to Intel processors from 2006 and the Mac community is starting to come to terms with what this will mean for the future of the platform. Overall, there seems to be an air of cautious optimism as the move looks likely to yield faster, cheaper Macs in the not-too-distant future. My own feelings have moderated from the initial shock-horror to mild puzzlement, although after watching Steve Jobs’ keynote address and doing some more rooting around on the net, I think I now understand more of what lies behind this surprising decision.

The problem with IBM's PowerPC roadmap is not so much the lack of processor speed or power, but CPU efficiency. Apple's figures suggest a fourfold difference between power consumption for future PowerPC based processors over Intel's equivalent models. Whilst this is not such a big deal for desktop PCs, such as the iMac or PowerMac (although the liquid cooling featured in the top-of-the-range models do add to their cost), it is critical for portable devices such as laptops and tablet PCs that rely on batteries and are difficult to keep cool without creating additional power drain. Combined with Apple's enthusiasm for dual and quad-core processor machines, this is reason enough for them to get very nervous about the future direction of the PowerPC as IBM have been notoriously slow to deliver thinner, more power-efficient versions of the G5 CPU, a fact that doesn't look set to change in the near future now that most of their clients are using PowerPC variants in non-portable games machines and server hardware (although presumably this could change in the future with the advent of handheld PS3 gaming consoles from Sony).

Conversely, Intel have been steadily reducing their CPU power requirements to the point that the latest Centrino (aka Pentium-M plus on-board wireless chipset) laptops now substantially outperform comparable Apple iBooks and PowerBooks in the battery stakes (the latter are using over-clocked versions of the Motorola G4 processor that negate many of the efficiency gains of the PowerPC design, whilst current G5 designs simply generate too much heat to be used in a laptop at all). Of course performance is still an issue, and a suitable replacement for the AltiVec vector processing unit will need to be found, but it is significant that Apple have not yet announced which Intel processor they will be using. Developer units will be shipping with a 3.6GHz Pentium 4 processor, but as their performance is reportedly inferior to the current generation of PowerMacs, I suspect that we will see some interesting developments in this area over the next 12 months. Apple may even be planning to use a custom built CPU design, or perhaps a version of the Itanium 64-bit processor, which would fit in with their overall strategy of pushing OS X as a true 64-bit computing platform. Conversely, switching to a 32-bit only CPU would be a backwards step that would only be acceptable for the Mac mini and laptops as existing iMac and PowerMac models already support more than 2Gb RAM.

Another odd aspect of this announcement is the timing. Apple made it at their Worldwide Developer Conference on the pretext of notifying developers that they should start porting their products, but at the same time they stressed that in most cases this can be done in a matter of weeks, if not hours or days. Why then are they willing to sacrifice sales of existing product lines for up to a year by announcing that future Macs will be based on a different processor platform? Is it possible that we could see new Intel-based Macs—or ‘Mactels’, as Jobs likes to call them—sooner rather than later? Steve Jobs hinted at this in his keynote address when he stated that new Intel-based Macs would be shipping by June 2006, but that OS X 10.6 (aka Leopard) would not ship until the end of 2006. It looks like the initial wave of Intel Macs will ship with OS X Tiger and could even arrive before the end of this year, although early 2006 seems more likely if, as Jobs says, further PowerPC-based Macs are being released this year (presumably faster versions of the Mac mini and PowerMac ranges?). Another possibility is that Apple already feels that it has sufficient new products in the pipeline to keep revenues buoyant despite a temporary fall-off in Mac sales—iPhone, iPod video, or home media hub anyone? Robert Cringely has even gone so far as to suggest that Apple and Intel may be preparing to merge, although this is a little too speculative, even for me…

The idea that Intel has something other than its processors that Apple is desperate to get its hands on, such as on-chip digital rights management (DRM) support, however, looks increasingly unlikely, although it is almost certainly the case that future Macs will be more than just a bog standard Intel PC with an Apple logo on the front. Aside from the possibility of custom chipsets (which could explain why Apple has gone for Intel rather than AMD processors, which outperform their rivals in many respects), on-board real-time compression and decompression of H.264 (the codec used in QuickTime 7 and next-generation DVD formats) is very likely, and would fit with Apple's plans for a high-definition video and TV delivery platform a la iTunes, but for HD video content. Although I still think it's a pity they chose not to adopt the PowerPC Cell processor that Sony will be using in the new PlayStation 3, there are still plenty of ways that Apple can add value to its hardware without having to devalue its brand. An Intel-based Mac that could run Microsoft Windows as well as offering some unique OS X-only hardware features could give Apple a seriously lucrative product with which to entice potential ‘switchers’, as well as offering Intel a chance to bash their ex-buddies at Microsoft, with whom they are allegedly now pretty pissed (in the American sense).

And this brings me to my final point. Far from being a risky strategy, as many analysts were predicting, Apple's decision to switch to Intel actually puts them in a very strong position. A 64-bit ready Unix-based OS with applications that can run on both PowerPC and Intel hardware gives Apple great flexibility and the ability to shop around for suppliers in a way that was never before possible. Should IBM choose to shift their emphasis and release a low-power version of PowerPC/Cell that wipes the floor with the Intel equivalent, Apple could simply incorporate it into a new PowerMac design. We could even see OS X being released for Sony PlayStation 3 and Microsoft XBox, although I personally doubt that they will ever wish to ship their OS as a purely stand-alone product, as selling hardware is where they make most of their money. However, it creates options, and options are good for Apple. In fact, the only real risk seems to be the effect that last week's announcement looks likely to have on Mac sales between now and whenever the new machines actually appear, but you can bet your bottom euro that they'll be selling like hot cakes when they do finally arrive, especially if they are capable of running standard versions of Windows alongside OS X.

Along with many others, I am slowly coming round to the view that the Apple-Intel deal is a good thing for Apple and a good thing for the future of the Mac. Although it undoubtedly involves some short-term pain, in the long run it gives Apple a chance to substantially increase its market share, and possibly even position OS X as a serious threat to Microsoft Windows, which has dominated the home and business markets so completely for so long. Processors come and processors go, but as Uncle Steve says, the real soul of a Mac is its operating system. I say: The Mac is dead! Long live the Mac!

Posted at 02:09 PM

Monday - June 06, 2005

NOOOOOOOOOOOO......!!!

OK, perhaps I am overreacting just a little. However, that was my initial thought upon hearing today's announcement that Apple is planning a phased migration to Intel processors over the next two years. Although the rumours have been flying ever since CNet reported that Intel and Apple executives had been getting rather chummy of late, few of us really believed that Apple really were preparing to ditch IBM in favour of the world's favourite chip manufacturer… How wrong we were!

With the PowerPC architecture gaining increasing momentum—the Microsoft Xbox 360 (yes, Microsoft!) and the Sony Playstation 3 being two recent high-profile converts—and all the much-touted advantages of a reduced instruction set design, why on earth would Apple want to ditch it in favour of an Intel based chipset? Moreover, the new PowerPC Cell processor looks set to be a minor revolution in performance, and includes exactly the sort of rich multimedia capabilities that Apple requires. Why then are they switching to Intel, now of all times?

Well, the answer seems to be twofold. Both Motorola and IBM have been notoriously slow to deliver processor updates, with the fastest G5 clocking in at around 2.7GHz while Intel processors are fast approaching the 4GHz mark. Of course, straight clock speed comparisons are misleading as it certainly used to be the case that you could approximately double the clock speed of a PowerPC compared to its Intel equivalent, but this less true of more recent Intel processors, which use a similar optimised core and superscalar pipeline architecture to the latest PowerPC designs. Even worse from Apple's point of view, there is still no equivalent of the G5 processor that will run cool enough to fit in a laptop, which is really starting to eat into Apple's sales—one of its key markets. Despite persistent rumours of dual- and even quad-processor machines—although Apple confirms that it will be releasing further PowerPC based machines before it makes the switch—it seems that IBM just wasn't able to deliver enough bang for the buck, and so Apple have to decided to shop for their processors elsewhere.

Another factor may be the inclusion of full digital rights management and media encryption in the silicon of the latest Intel CPUs, as this may be a factor in getting Hollywood executives to give Apple the go ahead for their new HD video distribution network, which is similar in concept to the existing iTunes Music Store but for high definition film and TV media. This analysis seems less likely as any such algorithms could almost certainly be implemented by other manufacturers unless Intel holds some essential patents to the technology, which seems anti-competitive—not that that ever stopped Microsoft—but the use of an Intel processor for any media hub type device certainly seems to make sense purely on cost-performance grounds. Booming sales of the Mac mini and iPod product lines may have given Apple a taste for high volume, lower margin product, although it is never going to be able to compete with Dell for low cost PC systems. Of course, there may be other factors that we don't know about, such as new developments that Intel has in the pipeline (excuse the pun) that leapfrog anything IBM is working on, but that is even more wildly speculative than the above, even though there are hints of some pretty drastic performance improvements over the next few years.

Plans for an Intel-based version of the Mac platform seem to be at relatively advanced stage, with Steve Jobs demonstrating a version of Mac OS X Tiger running Apple applications on Intel hardware during today's WWDC keynote presentation. In fact, he revealed that all previous versions of Mac OS X have been compiled to run on Intel processors as well as PowerPC ever since OS X was first released, and that it had been living a “secret double life”, which can now finally be brought out in the open. Test machines will be shipping within a month to allow developers to recompile their applications using the new PowerPC-plus-Intel ‘fat-binary’ format, meaning that both architectures can be supported from a single runtime installation, although it will be a year before new Intel-based Macs finally hit the shelves, starting with a new entry-level model in 2006 and more high end machines some time in 2007.

So does this mean that OS X will be available to install on existing Windows PCs any time soon? Not likely is my guess. Apple is first and foremost a hardware company, as that's where it makes most of its money. As soon as they release a version of OS X for bog standard PCs, they can kiss goodbye to their high revenue hardware sales and say hello to all of the compatibility headaches that Microsoft has to deal with, which I can't see them doing in a hurry. Rather, OS version 10.5, aka ‘Leopard’, will almost certainly be restricted to run on Apple hardware only, although it's certainly possible—indeed, very likely—that such machines would be able to run Windows XP / Longhorn, giving Apple a compelling case for persuading possible switchers: buy an Apple PC and run all your existing software natively right alongside Mac OS X—you can't go wrong! Having said that, it remains to be seen whether cracked versions of OS X Leopard emerge, and the arrival of virtualization technologies could soon change everything.

Apple's last migration between the Motorola 68000 series and PowerPC line used hardware emulation built into the operating system to allow existing 68000-compiled programs to run on the new PowerPC hardware. This is similar to the way that Java programs employ a standardised 'virtual machine' to allow programs to run on any Java-enabled device without the need for specialised hardware. Recent developments in so-called virtualization technology mean that additional instruction sets can be emulated in software with (apparently) almost no loss in overall performance, mainly courtesy of a company called Transitive, set up by researchers from the University of Manchester. Along with several other as-yet unnamed major players, Apple have licensed this technology for inclusion in OS X 10.5 in order to provide support for both Intel and PowerPC applications without recompilation. With this in place, Apple could effectively release Intel based Macs in a matter of weeks and we could all go on using the same software regardless, although of course things in the real world never go quite that smoothly, and so Apple is wisely giving its developers as much time as possible to make the transition, even though that will almost certainly damage its hardware sales in the interim.

The arrival of viable virtualization software means that the traditional barrier between hardware and software compatibility may soon become a thing of the past, as users will increasingly be able to run the OS of their choice on the hardware platform of their choice. This is undoubtedly a good thing for PC users everywhere, and Apple have chosen to turn it to their advantage, allowing them to combine state-of-the-art OS X software with cheap, fast components build around an Intel core. It may only be a matter of time before someone releases Macintosh emulation for Intel PCs (although quite who would do this I'm not sure—certainly not Apple or Microsoft), at which point Apple may be forced to release OS X for Intel anyway, and so today's move may be a way of keeping one step ahead of the game.

All in all, this is a very brave move by the folks at Cupertino that could mark the start of a new era for Macintosh computing, or the end of the Mac platform as we know it, or quite possibly both. Only time will tell which of these scenarios pans out, but in the meantime I can't help feeling a little sad that the company that encouraged us to Think Different™ has finally come to the same conclusion as everybody else: that as far as processors are concerned, it's better to follow the crowd. In any case, I think I'll be hanging onto my G4 PowerBook for some time yet, and will wait to see how things develop before committing to any further hardware purchases for a while

Vive la difference!

Posted at 08:32 PM

Saturday - May 14, 2005

Technological overkill

The other day, one of my housemates and I were talking about the way that technology has changed the way that people communicate and it occurred to us that sometimes this can go a little too far. For example, despite the fact that he lives in room adjacent to mine, it is sometimes actually quicker to write an e-mail, which will be transmitted half way around the world (his account is hosted in Italy) via the Internet and then wirelessly onto his laptop, than it is to just stand up and walk through to the next room to give him a message!

Similar examples include texting someone to find out where they are in the same shop/pub/venue as you, sending a picture of yourself to the mobile phone of some random stranger via Bluetooth in the hope that they may want to go out with you (apparently some people do this, and it is known as ‘toothing’), or instant messaging someone who lives downstairs to ask if they can put the kettle on.

What all these examples have in common is that they all use a technological sledgehammer (so to speak) to crack a perfectly ordinary nut, and it makes you wonder what on earth people use to do before they had all these gadgets to do the work for them…

Posted at 06:14 PM

Saturday - May 07, 2005

Mac OS X 10.4 Tiger Review: The best bits

I was going to write a full blown review of the latest version of Mac OS X, which was released last Friday (and was installed on my PowerBook the following day), but as that topic has already been covered elsewhere rather more comprehensively and eloquently than I could manage, here is a quick jaunter (if that's a word—if not, it should be…) through some of its best bits.

Performance

The first thing I noticed after installing Tiger was the dramatic improvement to overall system performance. There seem to be two main reasons for this: (i) optimised graphics and text rendering, which gives OS X's use of the graphics co-processor to render and composite windows (a system known as Quartz Extreme) a major performance boost, and (ii) improved multitasking, which increases the responsiveness of the user interface by allowing less processor intensive tasks to respond more speedily to user input whilst sharing out the remaining CPU cycles amongst other background tasks. As a result, the whole system feels a lot more snappy and responsive, especially when multitasking, when you can hardly even notice that other tasks are running in the background (which is just as well because the first thing OS X Tiger wanted to do was to index all the files on my hard disk, a task that took a little over six hours to run!).

Spotlight

Undoubtedly the most impressive and powerful feature in Tiger is Spotlight, the new full-text and meta-data search facility that finds files, e-mails, appointments, documents, PDFs, system preferences and just about anything else you have lying around on your hard disk in little more time than in takes to type in the phrase that you're looking for. Instead of rooting around in files and folders on the desktop, you can simply click the blue Spotlight icon in the top-right hand corner of the screen, or hit Command-space, type in what you're looking for and bang, a menu of hits appears with the top match highlighted for rapid selection. A ‘Show All’ option gives a complete list of matches, with various options to inspect and display individual files, sort and filter by various criteria, show thumbnail images, and even display a slideshow of pictures at the click of a button. In short, Spotlight is an incredibly powerful and easy to use feature that will—as the marketing blurb rightly claims—change the way you use your Mac.

What makes Spotlight particularly effective is the way that searching has been built in not only to the operating system and Finder (the Mac's equivalent of Windows Explorer), but into many standard applications, including Mail, iCal, Address Book, the Safari web browser, and the Apple iLife suite of digital media applications, iTunes, iPhoto, iMove and iDVD. This seamless integration means that no matter what you're doing, you can simply click on the distinctively rounded search field, type a phrase, and the system will take you straight to the file or files that you're looking for. There is plenty of scope for the power user to customise Spotlight searches and presentation, but it's the beautiful simplicity that makes it such a killer feature that Microsoft will no doubt seek to emulate in next year's much-hyped release of its Longhorn operating system.

Dashboard

The next big-hitting feature is the much touted Dashboard, an entire eco-system of desktop widgets (what used to be known as desk accessories) that can be called into view with a click of the mouse or keypress (F12 by default). Combined with Exposé, a feature introduced in OS X 10.3 Panther for switching rapidly between application windows, Dashboard gives you unprecedented control over the computer's desktop environment, allowing near-instant access to calculators, calendars, weather forecasts, stock quotes, and just about any other kind of gadget you can think of, without having all of them cluttering up your desktop when not in use. Pressing F12 for a second time or clicking on the desktop, which remains dimmed but partially visible—and updates dynamically in real-time—behind the Dashboard display, and the widgets fly back out of view, allowing you to continue with whatever you were working on.

What really impressed me about Dashboard though is the incredible attention to detail. Things like the way that the round ‘plus’ icon rotates when clicked to reveal a brushed metal grille at the bottom of the screen containing icons representing the various types of widgets available (more third-party widgets can also be downloaded from the Internet), turning into a sideways ‘X’ that may be used to close the widget bar again. Dragging a widget onto the screen causes its icon to morph into the relevant widget in real-time, which can then be dropped onto the Dashboard with a gorgeous—if slightly self-indulgent—ripple effect. Dashboard widgets may also be flipped over to reveal their configurable settings, again animated in real-time, and multiple copies of the same widget can be dragged onto the display to show different time zones, weather forecasts, etc. The second hand of the clock widget even slightly overshoots and then corrects itself exactly like that of a real mechanical clock! I could go on about it all day, but these are exactly the kind of details that make Mac OS X a joy to use, and also provide great eye-candy for turning one's Windows-bound colleagues green with envy... (You know who you are! ;-)

Safari RSS

The third major enhancement to OS X Tiger is an update to Safari, Apple's own Mac specific web browser, which was effectively the prototype for Mozilla's Firefox, whose user interface is practically identical. As the the name suggests, Safari now handles RSS feeds and also Atom syndication, a technology that allows content to be 'pushed' down to the browser, allowing you to view a list of recent changes, news headlines, web site updates, etc. without having to keep checking the relevant sites. Again, the implementation is characteristically slick, with RSS feeds showing up as a blue RSS button in the address bar which, when clicked, slides down a Spotlight-style browse window that may be used to sort and filter the various content. Even better, the number of new RSS articles shows up in the bookmark and/or menu bar, making it easy to spot additional content, and multiple feeds may be combined into a single bookmarkable page in order to navigate and group related articles (e.g. news) for rapid access.

It's impossible to do justice to this excellent feature with such a brief description, but suffice it to say that Safari RSS is an absolute pleasure to use, and provides a powerful new way of accessing and browsing web content. Again, it is the level of integration and simplicity that makes this feature so easy to use, and I'm already wondering how I managed without it, as well as finally being able to take advantage of all those little blue and orange RSS and XML buttons that seem to be springing up everywhere (see the link on the right of this page). Apple even ships a flashy new screensaver that allows the contents of an RSS feed to be visualised as a set of gyrating headlines, floating around in three-dimensional space within a cloud of swirling blue smoke—a beautiful and functional way of keeping up to date with the latest news and events.

Web browsing performance—already very fast in Safari—also seems to have been turbocharged, with much better and faster display of pages while they are being loaded. In fact, with a 2Mbps broadband connection, many pages display almost instantly, as if being loaded from the local hard drive rather than accessed via the web, which is an impressive achievement.

Other Goodies

The above features only scratch the surface of what is available in Mac OS X Tiger as there are many other goodies to play with and enjoy. I haven't mentioned, for example, Automator, a powerful new application designed to allow users to take advantage of built-in scripting support in many Mac applications to automate or repeat commonly used tasks. I haven't mentioned the smart folders in Finder and Mail that may be set up to access commonly used sets of files via a set of Spotlight search criteria, regardless of where they are located on your hard disk. I haven't mentioned the built-in dictionary and thesaurus tool that allows definitions and synonyms of words to be looked up from any Mac OS X application, the multi-way audio and video conferencing that is built into iChat, along with support for Jabber instant messaging, and the high definition QuickTime 7 streaming and H.264 video codec that gives four times the playback resolution using the same network bandwidth, native support for 64-bit applications, and don't even get me started on the built-in speech recognition that allows you control any Mac OS X applications by simply talking to the computer. Oh, and Java 5.0 support is finally available on the Mac (although this currently has to be downloaded as a separate package presumably because the Java team missed the deadline for getting it into the Tiger release—something that will no doubt be rectified in 10.4.1).

In addition to the raft of new features, it's also surprising how many elements of the OS have remained practically unchanged. Unlike previous Mac OS X releases, which introduced major new user interface elements, the Aqua interface has remained remarkably stable, making upgrading smoother and more comfortable than before. There's almost no need to relearn anything that you used to do on OS X 10.3 Panther, which is a testament to the excellent design of the existing user interface, which simply does what you require in a simple and intuitive manner and has little reason to be redesigned except where new features and capabilities are added.

Conclusion

Mac OS X 10.4 Tiger is a powerful and substantial upgrade to the Mac's Unix based operating system. As well as providing many invaluable new features that will be of interest to both novice and power users, it improves overall system performance and usability to the point that it really feels like you are using a new computer. I can tell that it's making good use of my laptop's G4 processor as it now runs slightly hotter than before, although this is more than compensated for by the increase in speed and responsiveness compared to previous—and already quite nippy—versions of OS X. At just £89 recommended retail (£75 on Amazon, £59 academic), OS X Tiger is an essential purchase for anyone who owns a Mac. It's as simple as that. For anyone who doesn't yet own a Mac, it's worth going out and buying one just so you can use it—it really is that good.

Apart from being beautifully designed, stable and secure, OS X has full support for multimedia (images, audio, video and graphics processing, games, etc.) built right in rather than grafted on, as with Windows DirectX, making it ideal for home, creative and professional use. In my opinion, Mac OS X Tiger is human-computer interface done right, with a perfect balance between power and simplicity that to my mind makes it the first true 21st century operating system, and gives many hints as to the direction that computing is likely to take over the next ten to twenty years.

In the meantime, expect to see some amazing new applications and upgrades over the next year in addition to the ones that are already shipping, of which the bundled Apple iLife suite is an excellent example. With rumours of new hardware including dual-processor laptops, quad-processor desktops, and a home entertainment digital media hub on the horizon, the future has never looked so bright for Apple. The fact that the next release of Microsoft Windows is still a long way off means that they have a chance to stay ahead of the game as the next release of OS X is rumoured to contain some major new interface enhancements that will again redefine what we expect from a desktop operating system—3D environments and virtual reality desktops here we come!

Posted at 01:38 PM

Saturday - April 30, 2005

I love my iPod shuffle

I recently decided to invest in a shiny new iPod shuffle and, as the title of this entry suggests, am extremely happy with the purchase. Part music player, part USB drive, the iPod shuffle is about the same size a packet of chewing gum or cigarette lighter and has no moving parts as it's completely RAM based. It comes in 0.5 or 1Gb flavours and connects to a Mac or Windows based computer via USB 2.0 using iTunes to transfer a random (hence the name) or preselected set of songs. Apple has very cleverly based their whole marketing campaign on the unit's ability to play a random selection of music, and with the 1Gb model having a capacity of around 240 songs, this works surprisingly well, as does the device itself, which simply oozes style and quality.

First impressions are good and—as you might expect from Apple, a company renowned for its attention to detail—even the packaging is slick and well designed. However, it's only when you open the box that you realise quite how tiny the iPod shuffle really is. It's a slim white rectangle that fits easily into the palm of one hand and, in appearance, more resembles some kind of Star Trek-style communicator than your average piece of consumer electronics.

The case is in trademark iPod white with the characteristic ‘wheel’ arrangement of controls that sits conveniently under the thumb. Turning the unit over reveals a single three-way switch controlling the play mode (off, repeat and shuffle) and a battery indicator that lights up green, amber or red when you press it, depending upon the current charge (up to 8 hours of normal use, although I have not been able to confirm this as yet). The lack of any kind of built-in display could be considered a handicap, but in practice the interface is so drop dead simple that it becomes a virtue. The iPod shuffle simply does what you ask it to, no questions asked, and once you've mastered the few simple controls (play, pause, volume, skip and hold, which is toggled on and off by holding the play button down for a couple of seconds), using the unit is a breeze. A pair of coloured LEDs concealed just beneath the surface, give useful visual feedback on the current play and hold mode, and each of the buttons has a nice positive clicking action. It even notices when you unplug the headphones and automatically goes into pause mode—now, if that's not user-friendly, I don't know what is!

Removing the cap on the base of the unit reveals a standard USB connector, allowing iPod shuffle to be plugged directly into a computer or USB hub without the need for fiddly connecting leads. This stroke of genius on the part of the iPod shuffle's designers will no doubt spawn a legion of copycat devices as when plugged in, the iPod shuffle recharges itself and can be resynchronised with iTunes, replacing the current set of music with another random selection or manually assigned playlist. Although transfer is not particularly quick, especially if you choose to re-encode your music using the 128Kbps AAC format recommended by Apple for maximum quality and capacity (AAC is the next generation audio codec used in the MP4 file standard, and beats MP3 in terms of quality and compression ratio hands down, although converting your existing MP3 files to AAC won't achieve much unless they were already higher quality to begin with), the delay is quite acceptable, especially when you consider that the iPod shuffle is charging at the same time.

Interestingly—and this was one of the reasons why I originally decided to purchase the unit—the iPod shuffle doubles up as a portable USB drive. You can set the proportion of drive space to songs via iTunes and, when plugged in, the iPod simply shows up as a drive on your computer and you can drag and drop files to it as you would any other external drive, even while synchronising.

But enough technobabble and onto the important question: What does it sound like? Well, I'm pleased to report that the sound quality from the iPod shuffle is excellent, even with the supplied earphones (which are of course white). It surpasses the (relatively good) quality of the headphone output from my laptop computer and the bass response is confident and solid without any of the tinniness at the top end that is often an indicator of cheap D-to-A converters or poor quality headphones. No controls for adjusting the frequency response are provided or required. Although I have yet to try the unit with a more substantial pair of headphones, I am more than happy with the sound quality for everyday listening, and it is especially impressive for a unit of this size.

My only minor complaints are the lack of any crossfade playback facility or volume levelling so that tracks recorded at a lower level play back at the same loudness. Both of these facilities are supported by iTunes, although presumably the latter could be added via a software update that pre-processes the MP3 or AAC files during synchronisation. All in all, however, the iPod shuffle is a beautiful and functional device that does exactly what you'd expect of it, no more and no less—in my opinion, exactly what you want from a consumer electronics device. Its diminutive size belies a big personality that it's hard not to warm to. In fact, once I started listening to it, I didn't want to take it off. (I am of course wearing it now, while writing this review!)

In summary: it's great, go and buy one (although I would recommend the larger memory capacity as you're bound to need the space for USB data if not music)! I love my iPod shuffle and am happy to have finally joined that select band of individuals who walk around sporting white earphones and looking smug, also known as the iPod generation.

Posted at 09:30 AM

Sunday - April 24, 2005

The pros and cons of weblogging

I've been posting to this blog for over a year now (although some of the archive entries are much older than that) and have noticed a number of interesting phenomena—a favourite word of mine at the moment—associated with the practice. They are, in no particular order…

1. An initial suspension of disbelief that anybody will actually be interested in anything you might have to say, followed by a total and almost immediate failure to give a hoot, and finally a massive and narcissistic swelling of the ego and the resultant devotion of substantial portions of one's life to writing large quantities of meaningless drivel about oneself or inner life that no-one else will ever read. (See blogorrhoea.)

2. Occasional paranoia—which I hereby christen cyberspatial vertigo—about who may or may not be reading one's blog entries. This generally comes in two forms: (i) that nobody is the slightest bit interested in anything you have to say (although, as mentioned above, this soon passes), and (ii) that people you'd rather didn't know too much about your life now have access to every thought you've ever published. The latter can only be avoided by being very, very careful about what one says about anybody out there in cyberspace, or by enthusiastically embracing open source living.

3. The strange and rather unsettling experience of attempting to have a discussion with somebody who has read something you've posted on your web site and suddenly realising that you've already said everything you wanted to say on the subject online and so have nothing to add to the conversation, which abruptly grinds to a halt.

4. Having an idea for a new blog entry on some obscure aspect of existence, say the number of vine weevils in the remote South American village of Quajagogo, suddenly mushroom to a matter of epic importance, if only as a tactic for trying to remember the point of whatever the hell it was you wanted to say in the first place.

I have come to the conclusion that, for me at least, blogging is a therapeutic activity that allows me to exorcise various persistent, niggling, occasionally profound, and often downright silly thoughts in order to help me clear my head for what's really important, whatever that eventually turns out to be. Until then, offloading my mental states to a remote location in cyberspace turns out to be a rather good—if somewhat time consuming—way of clearing the mind for something that is often quite difficult to achieve, even after prolonged and diligent practice: being quiet.

Posted at 05:43 PM

Friday - April 22, 2005

The cult of Mac

It's a good time to own a Mac. Software updates are flowing out of Cupertino like sweet manna from heaven (the recent iLife and iWork software suites being just two examples), and the eagerly awaited OS X 10.4, aka Tiger, is available later this month (I've already ordered my copy). New quad-G5 processor Power Macs, widescreen iBooks and the much anticipated iHome media hub look likely to be released later this year, and the small but beautiful Mac mini is selling like the proverbial hot cakes. This article from a BBC reporter likens worship of Apple products to some kind of religious cult, and the phenomenon has reached a whole new level with the recent success of the iPod, whose white headphones can be seen adorning the head of every self-respecting teenager and student across the country, and the iMac G5, a personal computer that would look more at home in an Ikea furniture store than your average high street retailer. He may have a point.

Apple's emphasis on innovation, user experience and great design have spawned an immensely loyal and evangelical following, of which I am (somewhat unashamedly) a devoted member. There is a kind of semi-religious fervour with which us Mac enthusiasts, embattled though we are as a tiny minority in comparison to the Wintel-worshipping masses, attempt to convince our peers to transcend the limitations of their current operating platform and see the light. After undergoing a religious conversion, it's sometimes difficult to curb one's natural enthusiasm, and if we sometimes overdo the missionary zeal, it's only because we want to bring the same ease of use, stability and Aqua interface to others so that they can enjoy the inner peace and harmony that we ourselves feel every time we switch our Macs and hear that comforting start-up chime.

Of course, many Apple iUsers—or Podlings as we are sometimes known—actually hate Apple (the company) whilst simultaneously revering their wondrous creations (the Mac platform). Apple is merely the church whose purpose is to interpret the Word of the great God of Software and Industrial Design and, like any organised religion, they sometimes make mistakes. However, like all compassionate beings, we forgive them for their transgressions, and if Pope Steve the Pious sometimes misdirects his reality distortion field, then we accept that this is the price one has to pay for being in such close communion with divinity.

So, as we eagerly await the rapture of near-instantanious document searching and floating desktop widgets, the Mac faithful quietly go about their daily business, taking comfort from the knowledge that they have found the one true path, and the world's most advanced operating system is safe in the hands of an enlightened oligarchy with Mr Jobs firmly at the helm (you can almost forgive him for being an American). We know that in time, the world will come to realise the truth of our convictions and, like the Dalai Lama returning to his erstwhile homeland, the third age will usher in a new era of downloadable rich media and interoperability. As somebody once said, ‘blessed are the meek, for they shall inherit the Earth’. Or was it ‘the Mac’…?

Amen.

Posted at 11:29 AM

Thursday - April 21, 2005

Episode IV: A New Breadmaker

Our wonderful breadmaking machine broke down last night and so George took it back to the shop to get a replacement. Unfortunately, they didn't have any of the same model in stock and so we have a diifferent one now, although the results so far seem pretty good.

I must be turning into a bit of a breadspotter (another one to add to my anorak collection!) as I noticed that the new machine has some intriguing design features, although it does take slightly longer to bake, which is frustrating if you get up as late in the morning as most of our house does. The non-stick tin has bevelled corners which allow the bread to come out much more easily without getting stuck in the bottom. The tin is also square rather than rectangular, which seems to help the loaf rise more evenly without risk of collapse, as was the problem with so many of our early breadmaking experiments…

I managed to bake a near-perfect country grain loaf earlier today that tastes delicious and have my eye on some of the other recipes in the handbook, such as granary bread and the intriguingly named ‘floury baps’. The less said about that one the better I think!

Posted at 05:12 PM

Saturday - March 19, 2005

Computer game inspires hit record!

I was using Google the other day to try and locate downloadable copies of some computer games I wrote back in the mid-1980s when I came across this article. It recounts how Daz Simpson of dance band Bus Stop fame (never heard of them) was inspired to create a dance remix of the 1974 classic Kung Fu Fighting by Carl Douglas whilst playing Yie Ar Kung-Fu on his Amstrad CPC-464 (remember them?). The record subsequently went on to sell 250,000 copies and became a smash hit both in the UK and around the world. The funny thing about it was that I wrote that computer game!

As you can imagine, I was rather surprised, not to mention extremely pleased, to discover that something I wrote was not only still being played some 15 years later, but that it gave somebody the inspiration for a hit record. The game was actually a conversion of the original Konami arcade version, although in those days doing an arcade conversion involved literally playing the game to death and then writing it from scratch on the target machine, since the original manufacturer supplied no information, graphics or anything else of use other than the physical arcade machine itself. The said box was duly installed in my Dad's garage (I was only 13 at the time!) for the five or so months that it took to finish the CPC conversion and the rest, as they say, is history.

I remember it involved a lot of fairly intricate Z80 assembly code to get the various characters to put up a convincing fight without totally obliterating the human opponent. In order to pack in such large and colourful graphics and two full-colour backgrounds (this was the 80s remember – computers only had 64K of RAM, including the 16K of video RAM!), the sprite routes used what was then state-of-the-art compression (run-length encoding), which was unpacked dynamically to a double-buffered display area to achieve rock solid (if a little jerky) animation. All the hard work must have paid off because it was certainly a very popular game in its day, and reached number 1 in the national computer game charts for the Amstrad CPC and other 8-bit formats (ZX Spectrum and Commodore 64, although the CPC version was widely acknowledged to be the best version!).

Most of the character graphics were drawn up by local computer game impressario, Brian Beuken, who hired me via a friend that I'd done some work for a year earlier on a game called 1985, a variant of the old Atari Lunar Lander concept. I made about £3,000 for the conversion, which is a lot of money when you're only 13, although it was small potatoes compared to the massive revenues it generated for Ocean/Imagine software, who published the game just before Christmas. (Unfortunately there was no such thing as a royalty deal for arcade conversions in those days, otherwise I would have been minted!) I seem to remember that the first thing I went out and bought were some Trio hi-fi separates with remote control CD player (a new-fangled invention), which I still have at home to this very day!

I went on to write another successful CPC conversion, Green Beret, with my friend George Wright who designed the graphics, and an original arcade-adventure game known as Moonshadow (later released by Cascade Software under the terrible name of Zone Trooper). I have a sneaking suspicion that the latter might have partly inspirated the setting of some of the excellent Iain M Banks sci-fi novel Consider Phlebus (the part where they are wandering through the deserted underground railway network), and to this day George swears blind that we were ripped off by the geezers from Dundee that we hired to write the Spectrum version. After creating untold havoc and deadline slippage on our project, they subsequently went off to form DMA design (aka Rock Star North of Grand Theft Auto fame) who released Lemmings, a game whose backdrops share more than a passing resemblance to those generated by the highly innovative screen rendering system that we originally developed for Moonshadow... but perhaps that would be stretching the point a little too far!

In any case, it's nice to know that some of my early creations have brought a certain amount of enjoyment and inspiration to others, and it's funny to think that Yie Ar might have been instrumental in bringing about a hit record (which of course, as it was listened to by thousands, might have had cause to inspire others to do otherwise unexpected or unusual things, and so on, and so forth until everything becomes connected to everything else, and the universe pulls itself out of a large fluffy hat).

If you'd like to relive the technological heyday that was 1985, you'll need to download an Amstrad CPC emulator (I believe you can even get them for mobile phones these days) along with a copy of Yie Ar Kung-Fu from my downloads page. Alternatively, click here to hear the dance remix... Enjoy!

Posted at 06:11 PM

Wednesday - January 19, 2005

The Mac mini - a new classic?

In case you hadn't heard, Apple have just launched the Mac mini, a cut-down, entry-level version of the iMac and Power Mac range featuring a G4 processor, optical combo drive and optional wireless support, all for an impressive price tag of £339 for the basic model.

Whilst a lot of critics are already rubbishing the lack of power (1.25GHz or 1.42GHz with a 167MHz system bus and 333MHz DDR RAM), keyboard and mouse (not supplied as standard, although available as an option or BYO - Bring Your Own) and limited expansion capability (single DIMM slot, two USB ports, Firewire 400, Bluetooth, Airport Express but no PCI slots), I have to say that Apple has pulled a rather impressive (if diminutive) rabbit out of their design goodie bag.

First of all, the new machine is TINY. It can practically sit in the palm of your hand! OK, it's no Cray supercomputer, but it's no less powerful than your average high-end laptop. And let's face it, for most computing tasks (wordprocessing, photos, gaming etc.) this is perfectly adequate and in fact probably well in excess of the average PC system that is probably sitting on your desk right now.

The size is appealing in itself for two reasons. Firstly, most 'normal' (i.e. non-technologically obsessed) people tend to object to devoting their entire desktop to a bulky PC, monitor and associated gubbins. The PC itself often gets relegated to the floor or a storage shelf, partly because they are just sooo ugly, so it's nice to see a computer that's actually pleasant to look at for a change. Secondly, the diminutive size actually creates the impression of increased power. Sony worked this out years ago when they started selling us tiny metallic gadgets, and the current obsession for miniscule mobile phones is just another manifestation of the phenomenon. The idea that good things come in small packages comes from the perception that, all other things being equal, we get more 'bang for the buck' from a small device than a large one. Big old clunky PC = heap of junk; small, sleek device that outperforms one's natural expectations = a technological marvel. Or, for the more mathematically inclined, Power = Functionality ÷ Size (or Complexity, to be precise).

Secondly, it looks BEAUTIFUL. The Apple designers have learned a lot about stripping a design down to its essence (iPod or PowerBook anyone?), and the Mac mini is no exception. Other than the slot loading CD drive and a tiny power LED, the machine is a gorgeously minimalist aluminium box with a chic white polycarbonate top sporting an obligatory Apple logo. The power button and all the connections are round the back (admittedly the addition of cables slightly spoils the effect, but for about £100 more you can get an Apple wireless keyboard and mouse with integrated Bluetooth, and then there are only two: the power cable and the monitor).

So why not have a computer that's nice to look at? Some of us remember the days when computers didn't look like miniature tower blocks and were aesthetically pleasing objects in their own right. We already buy cars, stereos and kitchen appliances at least partly on the basis of physical appearance, and the same will eventually apply to computer hardware. As a self-confessed design fanatic, I think that Apple's attempt to marry form with function is a large step in the right direction, and the minimalist styling of the Mac mini would look equally at home in the office or in the living room, paving the way for the much touted Apple digital 'media centre' to be released, possibly as early as next year.

The Mac mini is a leap in the dark for Apple who have always pitched the Mac platform at the discerning high-end of the home and professional markets, because that's where they can make the most profit. Apple are basically a hardware company, and even though their software is (in my opinion) some of the best engineered and most beautifully designed (yes, I'm using 'beautiful' to describe a piece of computer software!) currently available, its primary aim is simply to sell more computers. For this reason I doubt that we'll ever see OS X or iLife for Intel x86 machines, even though Apple already has the technology and resources to make this technically possible.

Essentially, Apple is calculating that although many existing PC users won't want to spend £1000+ on the latest iMac (lovely though they are), they might just be willing to upgrade their old Windows PC for a shiny new Mac simply by replacing the beige box. Their existing monitor, keyboard, mouse etc. can be used with the new system and for just £339 you can buy a passport to the wonderful world of Macintosh (and believe me, once you're there, you won't want to go back!). Individual components can then be upgraded afterwords, and expect to see a lot of third-party bundles of systems and peripherals in the likes of PC World, Dixons etc. any day now.

Will this strategy pay off? Only time will tell, but I think Apple has created a beautiful (that word again!) product that deserves to do very well. Whether iPod users will consider switching from PC to Mac just because it says Apple on the box is debatable, but let there be no doubt about it, the Mac mini is a very capable machine despite its limited aspirations. Even so, one gets the impression that Apple itself isn't investing all its hopes in the machine, and that it is something of an Trojan horse, designed to increase mindshare amongst PC users. But at this price even die hard Mac enthusiasts such as myself are thinking twice about investing in a second (or even third!) system, and I would definitely recommend that anyone who owns a slightly ageing Mac or PC to think seriously about upgrading one of these little beauties.

The Mac is already one of the most desirable pieces of technology money can buy, and this new addition to the Apple family only serves to strengthen its claim on the growing consumer market, as well as being a design classic in its own right... and if anyone else tells you otherwise, send them over to York and me and the boys will SORT 'EM OUT! Know what I mean???

Posted at 04:26 PM

Tuesday - January 18, 2005

Confessions of a former electric toothbrush virgin

Review of the Braun Oral-B electric toothbrush I recently purchased from Amazon.co.uk.

After being recommended to buy an electric toothbrush by my dentist because of gum problems caused by over brushing, I decided to invest in a Braun Oral-B 7500 DLX from Amazon. As this was my first experience of using an electric toothbrush, I can't really compare it to any other models, but it does seem to do a pretty good job. Whilst I wouldn't say that my teeth feel dramatically cleaner than with manual brushing, the Oral-B does seem to be better at getting into all the nooks and crannies, and my teeth did look noticeably whiter even after just a few days of usage.

The unit itself feels solid and easy to handle, thanks to the rubber grips, and is an dark blue colour with attractive 'sparkly bits' moulded into the plastic (unlike the one in the photo). Whilst it takes a bit of getting used to guiding a vibrating stick around your mouth, with a bit of practice you can easily locate the brush head over each tooth in turn as the instructions recommend. A timer function causes the unit to emit a brief judder every 30 seconds as a reminder to move onto the next part of your mouth, with a final double dose at the end of the two minute cycle before starting all over again. This is a great feature and I was amazed at how quickly the two minutes are up - I must have been brushing my teeth for way too long before! The only slight gripe I had was with the placement of the on/off button, which doubles up as the speed control, as several times I accidentally pressed it with my thumb. However, once I got used to holding the unit properly with my thumb over the moulded rubber grip this wasn't a problem.

As a former electric toothbrush virgin, I would highly recommend the Braun Oral-B 7500 DLX to anyone who is thinking of taking the plunge into battery assisted oral hygiene. Although forty quid is a lot of money to spend on a toothbrush, I was very satisfied with the results, and it makes toothbrushing a brief and almost completely effortless experience (no more excuses for sneaking off to bed without brushing my teeth first!). Although it's too early to tell if it makes any difference to my gums, I don't think I'll be going back to using a manual toothbrush in a hurry.

Now, if only Braun made an electric flosser then I could REALLY impress my dentist...

Rating: 5 out of 5