The Unofficial Apple Weblog (TUAW) http://www.tuaw.com The Unofficial Apple Weblog (TUAW) http://www.tuaw.com/media/feedlogo.gif The Unofficial Apple Weblog (TUAW) http://www.tuaw.com en-us Copyright 2008 Blogsmith, LLC. The contents of this feed are available for non-commercial use only. Blogsmith http://www.blogsmith.com/Rig of the Week: PowerBook with USB cooling fanhttp://www.tuaw.com/2007/09/23/rig-of-the-week-powerbook-with-usb-cooling-fan/http://www.tuaw.com/2007/09/23/rig-of-the-week-powerbook-with-usb-cooling-fan/http://www.tuaw.com/2007/09/23/rig-of-the-week-powerbook-with-usb-cooling-fan/#commentsFiled under: , , ,

TUAW reader and Flickr user sninesix posted this snapshot of the USB CPU fan he rigged up to cool his PowerBook. When the original fan died, sninesix found an old fan he had lying around, removed the wires and hacked a USB cable onto it.

He then removed laptop's keyboard and positioned the fan just above the CPU. With a USB keyboard connected, he was back in business. Well done! You can watch a video explanation here.

If you'd like to see your own rig featured here, simply upload photos into our group Flickr pool. Each Sunday we'll comb through the most recent entries and declare a "Rig of the Week!"
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]]>cooling-fancpuhackpowerbookrig-of-the-monthDave Caolo2007-09-23T15:00:00+00:00Rig of the Week: Mac mini at seahttp://www.tuaw.com/2007/09/13/rig-of-the-week-mac-mini-at-sea/http://www.tuaw.com/2007/09/13/rig-of-the-week-mac-mini-at-sea/http://www.tuaw.com/2007/09/13/rig-of-the-week-mac-mini-at-sea/#commentsFiled under: ,


We've seen lots of Mac mini based carputers, but now reader Matt sends us a link to this excellent Mac mini "boatputer" setup. Running MacENC navigation software, this Mac mini is hooked up to a GPS reciever, waterproof display and waterproof touchpad to give real-time marine navigational charts to Bob Etter, the enterprising sailor who built it. I think this nice piece of nautical Mac kit is clearly worth a TUAW Rig of the Week nod.

Thanks Matt!
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]]>boatputerMac miniMacMiniMat Lu2007-09-13T16:00:00+00:00Rig of the Week: Newsstand Mac minihttp://www.tuaw.com/2007/07/22/rig-of-the-week-newsstand-mac-mini/http://www.tuaw.com/2007/07/22/rig-of-the-week-newsstand-mac-mini/http://www.tuaw.com/2007/07/22/rig-of-the-week-newsstand-mac-mini/#commentsFiled under: , , ,


Scott Walker sends in his seriously cool Mac mini mod which, after careful deliberation, we declare our Rig of the Week. Scott is the assistant managing editor at The Birmingham News (Alabama), and decided to build a Mac project around an old newspaper vending machine. As you can see, he's basically mounted a 17" LCD in the newspaper window. Using a Mac mini, GraphicConverter, PhotoPresenter and some AppleScripts, it displays the top half of newspaper front pages as gathered each day from the Newseum. A big TUAW 'attaboy to Scott for combining new- and old-school technology in such a clever way!

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]]>GraphicConverterMac miniMacMinimodPhotoPresenterRig of the WeekRigOfTheWeekMat Lu2007-07-22T14:00:00+00:00Rig of the Week: Cube all-in-onehttp://www.tuaw.com/2007/07/15/rig-of-the-week-cube-all-in-one/http://www.tuaw.com/2007/07/15/rig-of-the-week-cube-all-in-one/http://www.tuaw.com/2007/07/15/rig-of-the-week-cube-all-in-one/#commentsFiled under: ,

This week's rig is another Cube mod. Reader bigtimeproducer has posted a picture of an Apple Cube case that has been stripped clean and retro-fitted with a Mac mini, external hard drive and an Airport Extreme. It looks cool, and probably gets a good wireless signal (seeing as the basestation is inches away).

"Mac Mini Cube Oblique View" posted by bigtimeproducer.

If you'd like to see your own rig featured here, simply upload photos into our group Flickr pool. Each Sunday we'll comb through the most recent entries and declare a "Rig of the Week!"
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]]>airportcubemac miniMacMinirig of the weekRigOfTheWeekDave Caolo2007-07-15T16:00:00+00:00Rig of the Week: Cool Cube modhttp://www.tuaw.com/2007/07/08/rig-of-the-week-cool-cube-mod/http://www.tuaw.com/2007/07/08/rig-of-the-week-cool-cube-mod/http://www.tuaw.com/2007/07/08/rig-of-the-week-cool-cube-mod/#commentsFiled under: ,

This week's rig comes from reader nash_h, who modded a Cube to look like a tiny Mac Pro. First of all, we love Cubes and secondly, this is one sweet mod. Nice job, nash_h.

"new mac pro" posted by nash_h.

If you'd like to see your own rig featured here, simply upload photos into our group Flickr pool. Each Sunday we'll comb through the most recent entries and declare a "Rig of the Week!"
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]]>cubemodrig of the weekRigOfTheWeekDave Caolo2007-07-08T14:30:00+00:00Rig of the Week: The ModBookhttp://www.tuaw.com/2007/07/02/rig-of-the-week-the-modbook/http://www.tuaw.com/2007/07/02/rig-of-the-week-the-modbook/http://www.tuaw.com/2007/07/02/rig-of-the-week-the-modbook/#commentsFiled under: ,

Silly us. In our iPhone excitement, we forgot to post a Rig of the Week. Bad bloggers!

This week's rig comes from tnkgrl, who has a ModBook of her own (or at least had a chance to visit with one). They were announced at Macworld in January, and were scheduled to start shipping this summer. Has anyone received one? They're kinda bulky, but we'd LOVE to play with one.

"Untitled" by tnkgrl

If you'd like to see your own rig featured here, simply upload photos into our group Flickr pool. Each Sunday we'll comb through the most recent entries and declare a "Rig of the Week!"
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]]>modbooknotebookrig of the weekRigOfTheWeekDave Caolo2007-07-02T18:30:00+00:00Rig of the Weekhttp://www.tuaw.com/2007/06/25/rig-of-the-week/http://www.tuaw.com/2007/06/25/rig-of-the-week/http://www.tuaw.com/2007/06/25/rig-of-the-week/#commentsFiled under: ,

TUAW reader omdot has posted a sweet shot of his Mac mini raid - artfully arranged, we might add - to our Flickr pool. He uses it as a backup of his main Linux system, and it updates itself hourly. Pretty cool.

"mini RAID no. 2" posted by omdot.

If you'd like to see your own rig featured here, simply upload photos into our group Flickr pool. Each Sunday (or Monday) we'll comb through the most recent entries and declare a "Rig of the Week!"
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]]>mac miniMacMiniraidrig of the weekRigOfTheWeekDave Caolo2007-06-25T11:30:00+00:00Rig of the Week: The ATX G4http://www.tuaw.com/2007/06/10/rig-of-the-week-the-atx-g4/http://www.tuaw.com/2007/06/10/rig-of-the-week-the-atx-g4/http://www.tuaw.com/2007/06/10/rig-of-the-week-the-atx-g4/#commentsFiled under: , ,

This week's rig features one of the best-looking G4s you'll ever see. Enterprising reader :: Jonathan transplanted the guts from his destroyed G4 into an ATX case he had lying around. Sure, the power buttons didn't line up and the had to do some sawing to make the ports accessible, but the important thing is that he saved a Mac. Good job.

ATX G4 posted by :: Jonathan.

If you'd like to see your own rig featured here, simply upload photos into our group Flickr pool. Each Sunday we'll comb through the most recent entries and declare a "Rig of the Week!"
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]]>atxcase modCaseModg4rig of the weekRigOfTheWeekDave Caolo2007-06-10T12:00:00+00:00Rig of the Week: The "Boogie Hustler" sessionshttp://www.tuaw.com/2007/06/03/rig-of-the-week-the-boogie-hustler-sessions/http://www.tuaw.com/2007/06/03/rig-of-the-week-the-boogie-hustler-sessions/http://www.tuaw.com/2007/06/03/rig-of-the-week-the-boogie-hustler-sessions/#commentsFiled under: ,

This week's rig - and we're only guessing here - is owned by a musician. Here we see a Power Mac G5, Cinema Display, LaCie external HD, speakers and a slew of recording equipment. Looks cool, ryan.gilligan, though the stickers on that beautiful Mac kind of make us cringe.

"ay yes" posted by ryan.gilligan

If you'd like to see your own rig featured here, simply upload photos into our group Flickr pool. Each Sunday we'll comb through the most recent entries and declare a "Rig of the Week!"
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]]>mac proMacPromultimediarig of the weekRigOfTheWeekDave Caolo2007-06-03T13:00:00+00:00Rig of the Week: Al Gore's setuphttp://www.tuaw.com/2007/05/20/rig-of-the-week-al-gores-setup/http://www.tuaw.com/2007/05/20/rig-of-the-week-al-gores-setup/http://www.tuaw.com/2007/05/20/rig-of-the-week-al-gores-setup/#commentsFiled under:

We're going to break from tradition this week and highlight a rig that is not a part of our flickr pool. At right we see former Vice President (and Apple Board member) Al Gore flanked by three huge Apple displays. We can only imagine where the computer powering those things is located in that cluttered office.

By the way, does anyone know where I can get an enormous tree frog for my wall?

"Al Gore's American Life" photographed for Time Magazine by Steve Pyke.

If you'd like to see your own rig featured here, simply upload photos into our group Flickr pool. Each Sunday we'll comb through the most recent entries and declare a "Rig of the Week!"
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]]>al goreAlGorecinema displayCinemaDisplayrig of the weekRigOfTheWeekDave Caolo2007-05-20T15:00:00+00:00Rig of the Week: Concert setuphttp://www.tuaw.com/2007/05/13/rig-of-the-week-concert-setup/http://www.tuaw.com/2007/05/13/rig-of-the-week-concert-setup/http://www.tuaw.com/2007/05/13/rig-of-the-week-concert-setup/#commentsFiled under: ,

This week's rig comes from kekiahij005, who shares a sweet concert setup, writing:

"...iMac is Hooked up to a Mackie 1604VLZ that is running alongside an Alesis Effects Processor, through a Behringer Compressor, then through a 2 Channel EQ."

Um, yeah. Cool. And I thought my Soundsticks were nice.

"Concert Rig" posted by kekiahij005.

If you'd like to see your own rig featured here, simply upload photos into our group Flickr pool. Each Sunday we'll comb through the most recent entries and declare a "Rig of the Week!"
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]]>iMacitunesrig of the weekRigOfTheWeeksoundsticksDave Caolo2007-05-13T15:30:00+00:00Rig of the Week: We're late againhttp://www.tuaw.com/2007/05/08/rig-of-the-week-were-late-again/http://www.tuaw.com/2007/05/08/rig-of-the-week-were-late-again/http://www.tuaw.com/2007/05/08/rig-of-the-week-were-late-again/#commentsFiled under: , ,



Yes, Rig of the Week is late again. You still love us, right?

This week's entry is a sweet home/office server. A Mac mini, two 500GB external drives (one for backup, one for media), two 250GB FW drives (set up as a RAID), a D-Link Wireless G Gaming Router with Gigabit Ethernet and a D-Link Gigabit Switch look very nice on top shelf of fabrico's closet. He notes that this closet - and, in fact, his whole apartment - was already wired before he moved in. Lucky guy.

"Home/Office Server" posted by fabrico.

If you'd like to see your own rig featured here, simply upload photos into our group Flickr pool. Each Sunday we'll comb through the most recent entries and declare a "Rig of the Week!"
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]]>home serverHomeServermac miniMacMinirig of the weekRigOfTheWeekDave Caolo2007-05-08T15:30:00+00:00TUAW Rig of the Week: Crunching numbershttp://www.tuaw.com/2007/04/22/rig-of-the-week-crunching-numbers/http://www.tuaw.com/2007/04/22/rig-of-the-week-crunching-numbers/http://www.tuaw.com/2007/04/22/rig-of-the-week-crunching-numbers/#commentsFiled under: ,

TUAW reader el frijole should have no trouble "crunching numbers" with this bad boy. A plethora of Xserves get busy...well, doing something important and demanding. Note the three empty slots that once housed dead drives. Poor little guys.

"Number crunching" by el frijole

If you'd like to see your own rig featured here, simply upload photos into our group Flickr pool. Each Sunday we'll comb through the most recent entries and declare a "Rig of the Week!"
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]]>rackrig of the weekRigOfTheWeekxserveDave Caolo2007-04-22T17:00:00+00:00Rig of the Week: Oh, the horrorhttp://www.tuaw.com/2007/04/15/rig-of-the-week-oh-the-horror/http://www.tuaw.com/2007/04/15/rig-of-the-week-oh-the-horror/http://www.tuaw.com/2007/04/15/rig-of-the-week-oh-the-horror/#commentsFiled under:

This week's rig was chosen for one reason only: It made us shudder. We realize that the Cube wasn't exactly Apple's greatest success, but this is like using a Ferrari as a doorstop. At least we can take consolation in the fact that it's not at the dump. Poor little Cube.

G4_peaceplant_2 by erlendekseth

If you'd like to see your own rig featured here, simply upload photos into our group Flickr pool. Each Sunday we'll comb through the most recent entries and declare a "Rig of the Week!"
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]]>apple cubeAppleCubeg4rig of the weekRigOfTheWeekDave Caolo2007-04-15T14:30:00+00:00Rig of the Week: EmBee and Blackiehttp://www.tuaw.com/2007/04/09/rig-of-the-week-embee-and-blackie/http://www.tuaw.com/2007/04/09/rig-of-the-week-embee-and-blackie/http://www.tuaw.com/2007/04/09/rig-of-the-week-embee-and-blackie/#commentsFiled under: , ,



So Rig of the Week is a day late this time. Oh, well.

A few weeks ago we pointed out a modded MacBook that had received a key transplant (among other things). This week, TUAW reader Alexandra Roberts took the idea a step further with this pair of MacBooks. Looking at these 'Books, we can imagine what an Apple-branded piano would look like.

EmBee and Blackie by Alexandra Roberts

If you'd like to see your own rig featured here, simply upload photos into our group Flickr pool. Each Sunday we'll comb through the most recent entries and declare a "Rig of the Week!"
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]]>macbookrig of the weekRigOfTheWeekDave Caolo2007-04-09T10:30:00+00:00Rig of the Week: The wireless Newthttp://www.tuaw.com/2007/04/01/rig-of-the-week-the-wireless-newt/http://www.tuaw.com/2007/04/01/rig-of-the-week-the-wireless-newt/http://www.tuaw.com/2007/04/01/rig-of-the-week-the-wireless-newt/#commentsFiled under: ,



Rig of the Week is back (again). Why? Because Rig of the Day was overkill.

This week we take one more stab at the Newton's being named Apple's number one flop with this shot of a 2100 wirelessly browsing TUAW. No images, of course, but it's our words that are important, right?

Wireless Surfing by Yazdgerd

If you'd like to see your own rig featured here, simply upload photos into our group Flickr pool. Each Sunday we'll comb through the most recent entries and declare a "Rig of the Week!"
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]]>2100newtonrig of the weekRigOfTheWeekDave Caolo2007-04-01T13:00:00+00:00Rig of the Year (So Far)http://www.tuaw.com/2007/01/02/rig-of-the-year-so-far/http://www.tuaw.com/2007/01/02/rig-of-the-year-so-far/http://www.tuaw.com/2007/01/02/rig-of-the-year-so-far/#commentsFiled under: , ,



Digg today brings us our first TUAW rig of the day/week/month/year. Owned by flickr user washington_dc_photographer, this workstation sports three 30 inch Apple Cinema displays, 1 G5 Quad, 1 G5 Dual, 1 15 inch PowerBook, 6TB of external storage, 6 CF card readers, and a 15 inch Sony wireless TV. I can only imagine the kind of money that he must have spent on this setup, but I certainly see why this would be needed for a full time professional photographer shooting large RAW files and running Aperture.

In any case, this setup certainly sets a high bar for future 2007 rigs, so don't forget to submit yours to the TUAW flickr pool.
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]]>awesomediggphotographerrigtuawworkstationDan Lurie2007-01-02T18:00:00+00:00Rig of the week: 6 displays are better than 1http://www.tuaw.com/2006/10/15/rig-of-the-week-6-displays-are-better-than-1/http://www.tuaw.com/2006/10/15/rig-of-the-week-6-displays-are-better-than-1/http://www.tuaw.com/2006/10/15/rig-of-the-week-6-displays-are-better-than-1/#commentsFiled under: , ,



The Rig of the Week has risen from the ashes of the Rig of the Day. It is better, stronger, and less frequent than before. We will now feature a super cool rig from the TUAW pool every Sunday.

This week features one Mac Pro hooked up to 6 23" Apple Cinema Displays. The software that is being displayed is used by geologists to analyze core samples. Imagine how productive you would be with 6 displays!

Corelyzer on 6 23" display Mac Pro by julian9.

If you'd like to see your own rig featured here, simply upload photos into our group Flickr pool. Our crack team of rigologists will scan that group for the best of the best, the rigs that deserve the title: 'Rig of the Week!'
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]]>corelyzerrig of the weekRigOfTheWeekScott McNulty2006-10-15T20:30:00+00:00Rig of the Day: Romantic monitorhttp://www.tuaw.com/2006/09/21/rig-of-the-day-romantic-monitor/http://www.tuaw.com/2006/09/21/rig-of-the-day-romantic-monitor/http://www.tuaw.com/2006/09/21/rig-of-the-day-romantic-monitor/#commentsFiled under: , ,



30 inch Apple Cinema Displays boost productivity, especially when they are hooked up to 17 inch MacBook Pros. It is a fact. This cool rig, the backlight monitor really does it for me, is spartan but some folks were crying out for simpler rigs. See, I do read the comments!

New Setup by pdsphil.


If you'd like to see your own rig featured here, simply upload photos into our group Flickr pool. Due to popular demand we have dropped the 'Rig of the Week,' but sound off in the comments if you want it back.
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]]>rig of the dayRigOfTheDayScott McNulty2006-09-21T23:45:00+00:00Rig of the Day: Monitors are just cooler on the wallhttp://www.tuaw.com/2006/09/20/rig-of-the-day-monitors-are-just-cooler-on-the-wall/http://www.tuaw.com/2006/09/20/rig-of-the-day-monitors-are-just-cooler-on-the-wall/http://www.tuaw.com/2006/09/20/rig-of-the-day-monitors-are-just-cooler-on-the-wall/#commentsFiled under: ,



Say what you will about Rig of the Day, and I know you will, but nothing says 'Rig of the Day' to me more than a monitor mounted on a wall. It just does something for me, plus think of all the extra productiity. So, today's rig is simple, clean, and one that isn't an orgy of Apple products.

Fernanda I by edbarrios

If you'd like to see your own rig featured here, simply upload photos into our group Flickr pool. Due to popular demand we have dropped the 'Rig of the Week,' but sound off in the comments if you want it back.
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]]>rig of the dayRigOfTheDayScott McNulty2006-09-20T22:00:00+00:00