Filed under: MacBook

A friend's MacBook had slowed down to a snail's pace. Despite looking everywhere for the issue, streamlining everything I could, and yelling at it, it failed to accelerate to usable speed. So I recommended we start from scratch and build it back up with only the things she was using, free of all the other downloads and aborted installs of various software she never used or cared about. It also housed a prior system, and a PC migration from a few years back. All told, the computer was a bloated, duplicated whale of files and applications for what was essentially a light-load writer's computer.

So I backed up the essential parts of her system using Time Machine: documents (including her novel and decades of prior writing, published and unpublished), ten years of family photographs, a 41GB iTunes library, among other things, and then....backed it up again elsewhere, outside of Time Machine.

And again.

And just for good measure, once more time, to yet another drive. I wasn't going to be the (ex-)friend who lost her novel.

What I wanted to do was do the ol' "erase and install" that prior system software discs allowed you to do. But clicking around Snow Leopard left no obvious method for this. But instead of booting Snow Leopard while inside of Mac OS X, if you just directly reboot the computer off the disc itself (holding down the "c" button after the system chime, letting go when you see the Apple logo) you get a few more options. Once you've gone into the installer program, you'll see "Utilities" at the top, and if you select Disc Utility, you can see your hard drive. If you click on "erase" (like I did, with one hand over my eyes) you can wipe the drive clean with various security options, and then you can do a fresh install of Snow Leopard on your computer on a pristine hard drive.

Once you've done that, you can either transfer your files back in directly, or use the installer program's built-in migration utility to restore any or all files from Time Machine.

And now? The world awaits the Next Great American Novel, untragically unlost by yours truly.

Curse you, TwelveSouth! You keep coming up with ways to make me spend my hard-earned money.

This time, it's a wonderfully unique sleeve for the MacBook line, the BookBook. This US$79.99 sleeve looks like an antique leather-bound book, but it wraps around your Apple-made pride and joy to give it a level of class it hasn't had since it first shipped from the factory in China.

The attention to detail is, as usual for TwelveSouth, incredible. Not only does it have the distressed leather appearance of an old book, but the leather zipper pulls look like bookmarks. The BookBook comes in red (seen above) and black, and in both 13" and 15" sizes.

It's practical as well as beautiful. The rigid spine provides crush protection to the MacBook, the hardback covers protect the exterior of your laptop, and the unique look provides a level of stealth that could keep your MacBook from being stolen. After all, who wants to pick up something that looks like an old book that you picked up at a library sale?

TwelveSouth is going to be sending one of these beauties along for a full review and giveaway, so keep your eyes open for a future post where you can win a BookBook from TUAW.

I've never really gotten into the whole 3D file navigation thing (ever since "It's a Unix system! I know this!", it's seemed pretty corny), but BumpTop might be the exception I've been waiting for. It's a 3D overlay for your OS X desktop that turns files into 3D objects to move around, pin on the walls, pile up or break down as needed. It's not too shabby -- with all of these things, there's a fine line between adding in graphic splashes for the heck of it, and making sure everything has a real function, and it seems like BumpTop walks that line pretty well. Most of the graphical flair does actually help with a function also. The app also supports the multitouch trackpad on MacBooks, so there's a little bit of innovation to play with as well.

Mashable says BumpTop is planning even more integration in the future, piping content from sites like Facebook and Twitter straight to one of the desktop's walls, and more involvement with the touch interface, even as we await the tablet's announcement.

I don't know if it's quite enough for me to leave behind the 2D icons and filenames that have worked well so far, but BumpTop is an interesting experiment in adding that third dimension into your normal workspace. The app is a free trial download, with a Pro version available (multitouch support, unlimited stickies, instant search) for $29.

When Gene Munster talks, people listen.

The Piper Jaffray analyst delivered one of his missives this morning stating that his analysis of Mac retail sales in the U.S., based on numbers tracked by NPD Group, are up about 26% year-over-year for the December quarter. This is higher than the average Wall Street estimate of 19% year-over-year growth.

What does that mean in terms of units sold? Munster, who is not pictured at right, believes that translates to about 3.1 million Macs sold in the U.S. last quarter. Munster's last estimate was for Apple to sell around 2.9 million Macs, so even his own estimates are turning out to be somewhat conservative.

Munster believes that Street estimates for 2010 will need to come up. The Street shows about 14% year-over-year growth in Mac sales this year, which is well below the 20% or so growth that Apple is demonstrating. In his note, Munster wrote that "2010 is shaping up to be the year of the Mac."

Munster concluded his note with a statement that he's confident in his estimate of 9.3 million iPhone shipments last quarter. We'll all find out for sure on Monday, when Apple reports the actual December quarter results. We'll liveblog the financial fun right here on TUAW, so stay tuned next week.

[via Business Insider]

It's no secret that I am an unabashed fanboy of Mac accessory design firm Twelve South. Their BackPack for the iMac and Apple Cinema Display is sleek and utilitarian, and the BookArc is a stylish way to stash that MacBook Pro when you want to use it with the cover closed. So it was with a great deal of interest that I read about another of the company's accessories, the BassJump portable subwoofer for MacBook.

The idea behind the US$79.99 BassJump is simple -- the built-in speakers on the current MacBooks do a poor job of replicating the low-end of the sound spectrum, so why not add a USB-powered subwoofer to the mix to make the MacBook sound better?

The BassJump portable subwoofer kind of reminds me of a shrunken Mac mini. Five inches on a side and a tiny bit over two inches tall, the speaker has a rubberized base to avoid sympathetic vibrations that could ruin sound quality. There's no power supply -- as noted earlier, this is a USB-powered accessory.

You're not going to be able to use the BassJump as a replacement for a high-end audio system. The existing speakers in the MacBook line do an "OK" job of replicating the higher frequencies and the BassJump can fill in on the lower frequencies, but the combo still doesn't beat a dedicated audio system. But if you have a need to pump good-quality sound out of a MacBook for a presentation, or just don't want to be tied to a set of earbuds or headphones when listening to your iTunes library, the BassJump is a great solution.

• Unibody 13" 2.53Ghz Intel Core 2 Duo MacBook Pro
• 15" 400Mhz G4 Titanium PowerBook
• 15" 1.25Ghz G4 Aluminum PowerBook
• 15" 2.5Ghz Intel Core 2 Duo MacBook Pro

Amazing stuff -- think of the engineering, manufacturing work, and design arguments that went into those little bands of metal, and all of the good work and art that has since been created with them. Beautiful.

Now here's a fascinating app -- Inklet is a new Mac app by Ten One Design that purports to turn your Macbook's trackpad into a tablet-style input. The program uses the multitouch trackpad interface to sense where and when you're touching the pad, and then translates that into "drawing" marks just like a Wacom pen tablet. Unfortunately, the trackpad doesn't have sensitivity built-in (it can only tell when you're touching, not how hard you're pushing), but with Ten One's Pogo Sketch stylus, which I presume sends pressure information back to your Macbook somehow, you can get that "line thickness" functionality -- press harder for a thicker line, or less for a thinner line. Pretty awesome. It's not as big or probably as sensitive as a commercial Wacom tablet, but just for doodling and messing around, it's a much cheaper solution.

Inklet requires Snow Leopard to work, so if you're running anything pre-10.6, you're out of luck. The software is $24.95, and their website has been brought to its knees by recent press, so you can download it from Apple's site if you can't reach it the official way. The Pogo Sketch stylus is only required for pressure sensitivity, but it's a very reasonable $15. Like I said, if you're like me and want a Wacom but haven't had the cash or inclination to spend on it, Inklet could be the stepping stone you're looking for.

We'll have a full TUAW review of Inkjet within the next few days.

It's Saturday night and you're out and about painting the town red, or whatever color it is that towns are painted these days. Whether you end up at a night club, a lounge or a bar, there's a good chance there's going to be a DJ spinning up some tunes at the venue. And there's a good chance that you'll see a glowing Apple in front of the DJ, as said DJ may be accompanied by a MacBook or MacBook Pro. If you've ever looked into doubling your Mac as a virtual turntable, then this post may help you scratch the surface -- err, vinyl.

Apple typically reports their 1st quarter financial results in late January, so we'll have to wait a few more weeks for the official word. However, the analysts have begun to share their estimates and the numbers are very impressive.

Brian Marshall at Broadpoint.AmTech has estimated that Apple sold 3.3 million Macs during the last quarter, according to MacNN. Here's a little perspective: Apple's all-time sales record for Macs, set during the previous quarter, is 3.05 million. That record was a 17 percent jump from the 2.6 million it sold in the same quarter a year ago. Marshall also suggests that laptop sales could be up as much as 19 percent year-over-year at 865,000 units.

Meanwhile, Philip Elmer-DeWitt has begun gathering estimates of iPhone sales and posting them at Brainstorm Tech. They range from 11.30 units sold (Brian Marshall at Broadpoint AmTech) to 8.17 units (Mark Moskowitz, J.P. Morgan). The interesting thing is that the low estimate, 8.17 million iPhones sold, would represent a 10.8% increase from the last September's record of 7.37 million if true.

Despite would could have been a rocky year for Apple -- Steve Jobs was out for serious health reasons and a lousy US economy -- they did very well. Are you optimistic for 2010 or waiting for the other shoe to drop?

Our friends over at Engadget have selected their top 10 gadgets of the last decade (the naughts, as I like to call them), and Apple has come up big: four out of the ten choices are made by the company from Cupertino. The iPhone is on the list (of course), as is the iPod. The original Titanium PowerBook fills a spot for its "category-shaping design" and its influence on laptops since its release in 2001.

Perhaps most interesting, Mac OS X is on the list right alongside Windows XP as a co-gadget of the decade. Engadget says that both operating systems provided fresh and clean restarts for their respective companies, and that while OS X took a little while to "become a usable daily OS" (ouch), it still helped to "set a new standard for computing."

Being the Apple weblog that we are, we might argue that Windows XP provided a solid update to Windows 98, while OS X offered up some actual innovation in the operating system market (and Apple still carries the banner on commercial UI innovation today). But we're nitpicking on that one -- 40% of their gadgets that shaped the decade were made by one company, and that's good enough for us.

Just a quick note that the online Apple Store has quietly dropped their white MacBook from $949 to $899 for students, teachers, and faculty members. Some buyers are even seeing pricing as low as $728, according to Engadget.

The white polycarbonate MacBook specs remain at 2.26GHz Intel Core 2 Duo, 2GB DDR3 memory, 250GB hard drive, SuperDrive, and the NVIDIA GeForce 9400M graphics card.

Other Macs and accessories seem to have retained their previous student pricing. It's only $50, but if you're an education customer in need of a cheap Mac this is a nice post-holiday gift from Apple.

You've heard me rant about Quirky before on TUAW: it's a company that uses social development (i.e., group-think) to create innovative new products. Everyone who participates deeply in the creation of a product can benefit monetarily from the sales of it, and the result has been a string of fascinating products.

A while back we heard about the PowerCurl, a product that was originally dreamed up by Jeff Scholen of Atlanta, GA. I was so taken by the design and utility of the product that I ended up buying one, and it's extremely useful.

Scholen's original idea was a plastic bracket that surrounds the Apple MagSafe Power Adapter and allows both the long extension cord and the small power cable to be neatly wrapped up. The result is a US$14.99, bright orange device that really has two primary goals -- keeping your cables neat and making sure that there is airflow around the adapter to keep it cool. Quirky offers three different models; one each for the 45W, 60W and 85W MagSafe Power Adapters.

How does it work in practice? Beautifully. In the past, I tried to organize my MacBook Air cables in my computer case, but more often than not they were tangled around each other when I extracted them. Since slipping my MacBook Air power adapter into the comfy confines of the PowerCurl, the cables are nicely tamed. As advertised, the power adapter is cooler now that it isn't lying directly on the insulative surface of the floor.
The PowerCurl is simple, functional, and (if you like bright orange rubberized plastic) attractive. I'd recommend this product to anyone who has a MacBook.

If you're feeling like your MacBook or MacBook Pro is cool, but could be cooler, maybe it's time for a trip to Etsy to check out the selection of custom vinyl decals. For as little as US$10, you can make your MacBook a one-of-a-kind at the coffeehouse, and maybe even pick up a date for New Year's Eve (although the latter depends greatly on your personal abilities to do so).

There's a pretty wide selection of decals at Etsy, but one artist in particular has caught my fancy. Ivy Boersma, a.k.a. IvyBee, has some designs destined to be classics. I'm especially fond of the William Tell and Newton images, but it's obviously subjective. There's enough variety that you can find something that really fits you, and carry it as a classy and subtle expression of your personality.

Ivy also offers custom designs upon request, so if you don't see what you want in her online shop, contact her through Etsy (just sign up for a free account) and let her know what you're looking for.

Apple today released several updates today including AirPort client software, and EFI firmware revisions for some MacBook and MacBook Pro models.

First, the AirPort Client Update 2009-002 update fixes the following issues:

• An Inability to turn AirPort on or off in some cases after upgrading from Mac OS X Leopard.
• An occasional loss of network connection when using Wake on Demand.
• An Inability to create a computer-to-computer network, or share the Internet connection on some MacBook, MacBook Pro, and Mac mini computers.

Next, the MacBook and MacBook Pro EFI updates allow the installation of SuperDrive Firmware Update 3.0, reducing the noise of the optical disc drive when waking from sleep and startup. The SuperDrive firmware installation is a 2nd step; you need to do the EFI update, then check again for software updates. This update is available for the Late 2008 aluminum MacBook model and the Early 2009 and Mid 2009 white MacBook models, and for Late 2008 15 inch MacBook Pro models and Early 2009 17 inch MacBook Pro models. (The KB article for the MacBook EFI update may need a little editing, as it refers to a suggestion from a mysterious 'Glenno.')

These updates are available through Software Update, or they're available from Apple's support page.