April 2nd: We got over two dozen emails with some derrogatory words and pure anger from readers. Only one sponsor said a, "we regret to inform the removal of our sponsorship to MPG". I got a laugh out of it and thought HAHA! funny funny.

I did not tell any of our writers either so it is funny to find out how often they even read MPG since in order they replied to the post. Some as soon as it was posted and others toward the afternoon.

Either way there were some great mac - web stories posted that were obviously rumor. Thanks for the laughs! We now return to our regularly scheduled mac news / reviews.

Click "Full Story" for the April Fools entry

Marware has some great cases and the iPod shuffle case from them is one of the first shuffle cases available. rubber and covers every angle of the shuffle and you can still sync and listen to music in the case. A cool clip keeps it attached to your clothing or bag; even your shoelaces. The best thing, is the case costs 8.95 which is amazing for an iPod case. Cases are in the 20s and up and for less than 10 bucks, you can have money left over to spend on the iTunes music store. A snug fit and an array of colors make this case a great pick for shuffle owners.

Find Out More.

March 24th: Apple's UNIX based OS celebrates its fourth birthday today. In the fall, it will enter its final year of preschool, and the previous year finally started using the bathroom alone, broke the pacifier habit and was was still the most secure OS on the block.

Users around the world have OS X parties so join in the fun and HAPPY BIRTHDAY OS 10!

Apple has posted details for the WWDC (Worldwide Developer Conference) 2005 to its Web site.
Click "Full story" for more information.

Hi Everyone,

Read this post http://georgemacfreaknews.blogspot.com/2005/03/disabling-safaris-cache-entirely-good.html and post your comments on this topic directly on that blog.

Thank You,

George

Read this: http://www.benstanfield.com/thrash/2005/03/aol_eavesdrops_.html

and post back here and tell us what you think about it.

George

March 7th: After two days of downtime I finally called my host and they notified me of database server changes. I won't have a fit publicly but I wish there was a notification as it happened but somewhere within the host company they had communication problems and it was not one single person's fault so I will leave it at "miscommunication". Either way, I just had to change the database URL in my config.php file that lies on my server (a 10 second fix) and now we have everything back to normal again. Ads are working, backend is up and I am happy! I feel like sending an iTMS gift cert. to my tech lady, Cindy for being so cheerful during our call. She was friendly and a pleasure to work with. There are some changes coming to MPG I will discuss once I know what those changes will be.

We usually put all iPods together in the iPod Super Review but since the next review is so far away, we will be reviewing iPod cases as they are released. Matias’ iPod armor is a case that has been around for a while and we have finally gotten our hands on one to review. In my experience most media groups reviewing this case are raving but I am not convinced. There are some imperfections I would have changed on this case before shipping. No doubt this is an extremely versatile and high quality iPod case but issues are there as with all cases. Keep in mind; peeves of mine don’t necessarily have to be yours.

February 27th: This is the most emotional entry on this website I have ever done. Inventor, vissionary and genius Jef Raskin passed away on Saturday. He died of cancer at the age of 61. Jef Raskin was on the original Macintosh team and was of the first 50 employees of the company. He was behind every aspect of the Mac's GUI interface and set the blueprints for how we use the Mac today, even the one button mouse. My condolences to his family and friends. I had the utmost privilage of meeting him a few times. We exchanged emails and I looked to him for career advice. I respect his achievements in the personal and professional life. God bless you Mr. Raskin.

Sincerely,
Adam Jackson

In another note, the ammount of Mac news sites covering the news is very few and is insulting for a man that has done so much for the world of computing. You owe him a few words and I am ashamed that I affiliate with some of these websites.

February 25th: The first winner of the MPG book giveaway sponsored by O'Reilly and Sybex have been chosen.

Congratulations to Lauren Stockton from Montana. She has chosen Photoshop Elements 3 Solutions, from www.Sybex.com , by Mikkel Aaland.

For those that entered before, you have to reenter by sending an email to snow98board99 at aol.com or commenting on this entry with an Email. Beware, bots do frequent this website so public emails are susceptible to spam bots. Post emails at your own risk or use the workd "at" instead of @. Good luck!

The Runabout is a Sportsuit designed for the athletic iPod mini users. It bares many similarities to Xtrememacs SportWrap. The Runabout however, attaches to your wrist rather than your arm, which can be more comfortable. The Runabout is pretty much a comfortable wriststrap that carries your iPod mini, it has cord managment straps on both sides, it allows acess to both the scroll wheel and hold button. In the pantented Runabout your mini slips in trough the back of the strap and allows for full view of the screen which is protected by a plastic cover. Allthough I do not own an iPod mini myself i still took it out for a good 3 mile run and i can say that it is very comfortable, and it stays comfrotable even after you get sweaty. The Runabout goes for $29.95 and can be ordered from http://Marware.com

This case is designed specificaly with the U2 iPod in mind, as can be assumed from the color scheme, this case is the U2 iPods soulmate. This is one of Marwares most durable cases, as its name suggest, the TrailVue is meant for the open trail, you simply have to feel how tought this case is for yourself. The TrailVue is made of tightly woven fabric and uses the " velcro " closure as seen on their MetroVue cases. The TrailVue allows total acess to all your iPods essentials when open and it comes with Marwares original, removable belt clip. This particular model you see above is designed for the U2 iPod and a regular color iPod just would not look right in this case, for that reason Marware also offers this case in different colors and for the iPod mini. The TrailVue for the U2 iPod costs $34.95, and can be ordered directly from http://Marware.com but seriously, should your U2 iPod live without its soulmate, would you ?

More and more products are coming out that enhance functionality of the iPod beyond music and Apple has released a few of those itself. Apple has also taken precautions to make sure iPod stays with music. With any Apple product, they lock out things to keep innovation with Apple and not let others profit too much from their products in the accessories market. Talking Panda has done its best to exploit the “notes” feature of iPod and create a way to learn a new language or get around while in another country. ILingo is a piece of software that installs directories of common used terms with audio to accompany them. This is not a substitute for a class on a language but if you are in Mexico or one of many Spanish-speaking countries, learning how to say, “how are you?” will come in handy and you can find it in seconds.

When I travel to other corners of the U.S. and explore the city, I see race, background, sex and sexuality is not as much as an issue than it is in my hometown. Boston, New York, San Francisco and Toronto (Canada for that matter) are places I have visited and they all seem to have it down when it comes to acceptance and equality for gays. I am not gay but would like there to be equality throughout the world. A person of color will argue that they have been “held down by the man” for years and yell out for equal rights but as that person sees two men sitting together eating dinner, they have a derogatory comment to make about their sexuality.

February 18th: This may be a private thing, but I feel it is your duty to know how MPG is doing financially and frankly, we have had a solid 2005, so far. Last year we did very well and that money went towards the purchase of Pmachine Pro, graphics for MPG version 2.0 and we paid for hosting for 2005. I looked at our LinkShare, Google and independent advertiser earnings from January 1st - February 17th and things are looking great!

We received a check from Google, Inc. for a large sum of money, Independent advertisers are paid up through March and in a great note, iTunes and Apple Store referrals are pretty high. I was amazed to see people have purchased over 500 dollars in music and Apple Store products in the first two months. This is excluding an Apple Store session back in January where one person spent $900.00 through our referral link! Thanks for supporting MPG.

Advertisers: There is ad space available. Contact us if you are intersted.
"https://mypersonalgetaway.com/advertise.php"

Audio creation applications have been around since computers were powerful enough to handle the load of multiple tracks, voice and MIDI inputs. As long as audio processing has been around, accessories have accompanied the apps. Input boxes, microphones, speakers, digital sound processing units, instruments and most importantly keyboards. Keyboards, in the digital creation area, can be made to sound like any instrument if you know the correct keys and the sound they make, you can tell the software to make that note sound like a violin, guitar, horn, drum set or the classic piano. Of course, this software was fun to use but cost a fortune to get started. This all changed when Apple purchased eMagic software in 2002 and along came its software, Logic Pro and Logic Express. The standard music software technology Apple owned was untouched until January of 2004 when Apple released a music app bundled with iLife called, Garageband. Instantly, hundreds of people were making music and tons of Garageband enthusiast websites arose where users can publish their creations.

In the third installment of of "Up-Close", we interview Jason Snell. Jason is Editor In Chief of Macworld and Playlist Magazines and had many other hobbies and jobs all related to the Macintosh industry. We were lucky enough for him to take time out of a busy day to give us a look into his life and how he got where he is today.

Click "Full Story" for the interview transcript

February 17th: One of our readers in southern California sent us an E-mail stating she saw accessories for the iPod in a local Wallgreens store. They had FM Transmitter, Car adapter, cables and other things.

I was in Walgreen's yesterday, and on a side endcap of one of the aisles, not even noticeable, was a display of iPod accessories! What got me is they are the real deal--and they are cheap! They had the car lighter charger, the headphones, and about 5 other items that I need to look up...

This is not Apple's fault, I just think Walgreens became a reseller of Belkin or another iPod company. There is no such product in my local stores in Florida, but if you have a Wallgreens nearby, please let us know.

A friend and reader of this site posted an interesting thing to his blog today. I had to repost it and I hope this is alright by him. You can his other entries at this address.

Without more delay; here is his entry:

Most go through life seeking wealth and fortune. To many this means a bank account, a larger house than our friends and neighbors, to furnish the house with nice things and to treat our friends with gifts and things. What is wealth really?

We arrive in this world with nothing, no clothes, just a screaming entity. How do we leave? With the same, nothing. The hell of the material accumulations? Someone else gets the ones that we managed to hold on to.

So, what is real wealth and treasure?

The wealth and treasure are in ourselves and each other. How do we increase this wealth then? We increase it by giving it away. We give others our love and ourselves. I'd say that on the average this has a much greater return than any of the markets in our world. To me it is an honor to have another accept my love, to accept what help that I can give them, to accept my ear and know that they can tell me anything.



Thanks "Mr. F" for the words of wisdom.

Griffin had an amazing 2004. They sat on the top sellers list of Apple’s online store for their iTrip FM Transmitter for most of the year and when you see iPod, Griffin is next in line as maker of the best of accessories for the device. They have done things with the iPod you can’t imagine and a neat little device is the iBeam. An inexpensive product, the iBeam is a flashlight and laser combo for use with the iPod. iBeam works with all iPods with modified remote control port (3rd generation and above). It has two little bean shaped sticks that resemble an enema.

February 14th: Happy V-Day everybody. The holiday populurized by chocolate manufacturers and jewelers. I hope you all spend your money well and if you don't have a date, spend it with family or a close friend. V-day is not just for lovers but everyone to show you love each other. Don't spend all day online. Go out and have fun. Don't forget, you can still load XML on modern day cell phones so feel free to stop by while you are out and about. If you feel down and alone, smile cause you are not the only one.

Children are a big part of pro-creation. I assume you already know this, unless you are not sure of where babies come from then I suggest visiting allaboutsex.org and brushing up on that. Anyway, people in general have a certain attraction to newborn babies in particular. I have yet to understand this but by putting a multitude of sparse observations and theories on this entry, I may uncover what lies beneath in this fascination. Like I was saying, babies attract attention. They don’t care whether it is negative or positive but they need the attention. If you leave a baby to itself, not only will it not survive from lack of food and lackluster environment but I am betting not having that social embrace or a mental and spiritual bond with another human or animal for that matter may cause effects that you won’t notice for years to come. Imagine a kid that is treated poorly throughout day 1 to age 12. For starters, it was not planned and has no father. The mother , in her hatred of the babies creator, takes it out on the child not physically with violence or neglect but an underlying hate by never smiling, talking or having any compassion for the child. If the kid grows up with this environment, think about the future attitude the child may have, as it grows older and the attitude it has towards its mother and the world it lives within.

The Metrovue cases for the iPod mini rank among my top favorite cases, it is one of those few that combines functionality, protection for your iPod and style all into one package. The Metrovue has a sleek front that Velcro closures to stay in place, the face of this case opens up te reveal a scratch resistant polyvinyl plastic strip, this is what actually holds your iPod mini in place. The case itself is made of rather tightly sewn together fabric which I can bes describe as very tough denim. Metrovue has a slot for your headphones, to manuver the click wheel, hold button or charger dock however, you must open the case. And in the back off course, there is Marwares low profile belt clip. The design of the Metrovue was ment to mimic the sights of a big city, personally they remind me of the paint jobs often seen on sports cars. Metrovue comes in guy packs and girl packs and will cost you $39.95 for a pack of three, which means around $13.32 each, but they are not sold seperately. Marvare also makes similar cases for other iPod sizes, to order visit http://www.marware.com

Sony, IBM and Toshiba, who have been working on the Cell processor for three years, unveiled the chip on Monday. This chip is extremely powerful, and is being touted as "the Super Computer Chip" even though it only reaches just over three gigahertz and is significantly slower than any super computer. It is significantly faster than the P4 however, carrying out 10 tasks to intel's 2.

The Specs:
Faster than 4 GHz
256 billion calculations per second
2.5MB of on-chip memory
Able to shuttle data to and from off-chip memory at speeds up to 100 gigabytes per second,
234 million transistors

Plus the size which will possibly allow it to be used in PDAs makes it even more impressive, imagine one of those in the newest Powerbook.
Personally, seeing those specs wowed me. Imagine seeing OS X run on one of those!
Expect great things from Sony in the year 2006.

MPG will be giving away a book each 2 weeks to commemorate the ownership shift that is taking place here at MPG. As most of you know by know, our current owner will be signing the company over to a different owner in 2 weeks, thus the MPG 2 week giveaway. While at MacWorld San Francisco, we made some great sponsors who happily gave us books for the giveaway, O’reilly and Sybex are both online book stores with a wide selection of books and other merchandise at reasonably low prices, there is a total of 10 books, 1 for every 2 weeks until supplies run out.

Here is how it works, to enter the contest, simply make a comment on this entry, include your name and e-mail address. Or you can e-mail me at
At the end of every 2 week period we will have a random drawing to determine the winner who will be allowed to choose a book of the list below, this entry will act as the sign up sheet for the book giveaway # 1, for all following giveaways I will post an additional entry open to comments.

We sincerely thank our sponsors : www.oreilly.com and www.sybex.com for their help.

Click more to see the list of books up for grabs

February 6th: It saddens me to do this. I registered MPG one year and 5 days ago and now I am stepping down as owner. Although my name will not be under the WhoIs query of our server, day-to-day operations will continue to be managed by me. On Februrary 21st, I will start a new job with our favorite company (hint: their stock is climbing over $80) and under NDA (non disclosure agreement) having a journalistic site about a company I work for makes me at risk for releasing trade secrets, insider info and other knowledge. I won't know anything more than I do today about them but that is how it has to be to keep my job. As a precaution, it was needed to sign MPG over but I could continue with behind the scenes work and continue in an editorial complex.

The new Owner is Adam Barber. He has been my lead PHP and backend developer since March of 2004 and is the only person I know that will not muscle me out of the site's operations. He has show me great responsibility and displays knowledge and respect enough to handle this properly and I trust he will continue to take care of things on the technical side.

In an E-mail, I outlined some legal things to a friend and although it is written poorly, it gives everyone an idea of what I can and can't do:


I cannot discuss related products or subsidiaries of said company. I cannot work for someone or be affiliated with someone in an editorial complex "publicly" (meaning they know and their readers know that I work for this company) if the said publication / message board posts info about
this company and its trade secrets (I.e. rumors).
I can, however be involved in the business management area of my website or future ventures and draw an income from this as long as they only post simple news of the company's announcements and no reviews / opinion articles. However, my writers can post reveiews / opinions but not rumors as long as my name is not on the ownership listed of said venture. meaning I can run the business aspect, post reviews / articlews about third party things as llong as m name is not on MPG's owner's list . I can post info on Macintosh OS and related info.

I have taken action to end all ties with Macdirectory, macaddict and machome as of today. I will also be removing myself of different district, com themacmind.com and apple-x. I will keep ties with my site, Mypersonalgetaway.com and isinta.com.

finally, MPG and affiliates is being turned over to lead developer, Adam Barber. he has been with MPG since february of 2004 and continues to make improvemens to the backend and design of the site. He has exhibited trustworthinness and will remain out of day-to-day operations of my site except for his current job description. we are currentmly making a contract to handover ownership to himn as long as I can get the site back when ready and who knows how long that will be. Adam takes over in 2 weeks, just as I start my new job. you can contact him through me if you have any more questions.

That sums it up. Sorry I cannot say what job I am doing publicly.

Don't do anything nice this Valentines Day for your neighbors. Yes, you heard me right. Don't even think about taking heart shaped cookies and a Valentines card to that little old lady down the street, it could end up costing you more than you thought.

Everyone clapped while Steve was showing off new features of iLife ’05 at the Macworld keynote but when the price of $79 USD was announced people started booing. It was not many but there were a few. Apple is doing it again. They have done this with the iPod and now with iLife. They add a couple of new features and make the price higher. Apple added very little things to the iPod photo or U2 Special Edition and expected people to pay 49-200 dollars more. Now, Apple is so surprised there are stockpiles of the photo and U2 version. I don’t know how much my readers love Apple computer and think as a company, they can do no wrong but I have to remind you of how iLife used to be. Mac Fanatics, skip a paragraph.

The Xtreme line of silicone cases by Xtrememac.com were introduced in 2004 and have made the top list of many reviewers since their debut, and we are one of them. The Xtreme silicone line comes in 7 flashy colors, pink, blue, green, white, orange, yellow and lime to match any outfit. These cases provide access to all controls of your iPod ( scroll wheel, hold button, charger and headphone jack ). There are heat dissipation membranes in the back to keep your iPod as cool as the person wearing it. Grip ridges on the sides provide security and the Xtrememac man logo on the back is a nice touch. These cases come with out a belt clip and leave your screen unprotected, however they will protect your iPod or iPod mini from any immediate damages, and are compatible with the click wheel iPod, U2 iPod, iPod mini, iPod Photo and 3G iPod. The Xtreme Silicon cases range in price from $19.95 for a single or $29.95 for a three pack, which is a great deal, to order visit http://xtrememac.com

Apple’s iTunes 4.0 software with the iTunes Music Store was released on 2003 and it makes you wonder what is next for “the worlds best digital jukebox”. Apple released iTunes 4.5 late spring of 2004 and added a better iTunes store, Party Shuffle, Apple Lossless audio codec, and a few minor upgrades. iTunes 4.7 ads support for Apple’s new iPods’ U2, photo and shuffle. I find it amazing that almost two years have gone by and we are running iTunes 4.7.1. It seems we would be at five by now and why didn’t Apple release iTunes ’05 at the Macworld conference? Some can argue it is a free application due to the iTunes Music Store’s income which fuels iTunes development so Apple is welcome to update the jukebox anytime they want.

For those that have purchased or looked at Apple’s iWork and iLife ’05 software boxes, they noticed the horrid appearance of these boxes and how “un-Apple” they truly are. When I first saw the boxes during Steve Jobs’ keynote address three weeks ago, my mouth dropped and I quickly added to our transcript how bad the packaging looked. I know that is irrelevant to how the software works. If you look at Microsoft’s Office packaging, you may feel inclined to pull out the MasterCard but after using it for five minutes there is a sad and alone feeling deep in your soul and thoughts of suicide are present for weeks after using it. It may not be that bad, but for some it is.

The following entry I have been working on for over a week each night and I hope you enjoy reading it. It is a guide to every iPod released since the beginning. The article may be long but is great for seeing how long we have journeyed since the Apple press event back in 2001.

Click "Full Story" for the article

January 25th: One of our readers and conference pass attendees, Lennie Budgell, made two collages using photos from our MWSF photo gallery. Both are available for download. Thanks Lennie for the submissions. They look great!

Collage 1 (5.6 megabytes)
Collage 2 (2 megabytes)

Option click to download and view.

The Icewear line of iPod cases from Tunewear is an interesting addition to the family of silicon iPod skins. The Icewear is unique in the fact that, like its name, it only comes in a transparent white. The folks at Tunewear believe in making simple yes useful products, and the Icewear is just that. This silicon case is a very tight fit on your iPod, I mean a very tight fit, Tunewear even offers instructions on how to remove the iPod from the Icewear on their web site. Icewear are made of extremely durable silicone, this stuff is really tough, and rather than having a belt clip, the Icewear has two slots for your belt to slide trough for more security. The Icewear allows full access to the scroll wheel, charger, headphone jack, and hold button. However, this case provides no protection for the screen of your iPod and I only recommend it for those who would constantly keep it in the case. Tunewear makes Icewear cases for iPod mini, slick wheel iPods of all sizes, including the iPod photo and U2 iPod, and also the 3G iPod or button iPod ( as some call it ). Tunewear products can only be bought trough resellers, visit http://www.tunewear.com to get a link to an authorized reseller.

The “ iPod Xperts ” have come up with something really unique and fun for the iPod mini, Shieldz, are transparent plastic covers for the iPod mini. They are much more useful then I first assumed. Shieldz snap on and off easily, they provide protection for the screen and access to the scroll wheel. Shieldz are compatible with Apples belt clip and arm band as well as with XtremeMacs mini accessory kit. Now the real fun comes in when you mix and match the 6 different colors of the Shieldz with your iPod mini, you can create some totally new and snazzy looks for you and your iPod mini. The Shieldz are $12.95 each and can be ordered at http://xtrememac.com