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Joshua Topolsky On The New MacBook Air→

Joshua Topolsky On The New MacBook Air

Make no mistake about it, the new MacBook Airs are very good laptops. What they lack in speed and power, they make up for in build quality and big time battery life. Add to that gorgeous displays, solid state storage, and the unquestionably stable OS X, and the concoction makes for a nearly irresistible offering… provided you’ve got the cash. When it comes to the 11.6-incher, it’s hard to see it as our main laptop (emphasis on our): it’s a great companion for bed, the TV, and short trips, but it’s not quite enough to take the place of our MacBook Pro. The 13-inch, on the other hand, may have just enough juice to become a lot of people’s one and only; it was consistently surprising to us during our testing.

After a quick demo at my local reseller and all the reviews that are coming out, I’m firmly convinced my next portable Mac will be an Air.

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Apple Delays White iPhone Again Until Spring 2011

So there you have it. The white iPhone 4 is basically not coming at all, at least not as we know it. Reuters reports:

Apple Inc said on Tuesday that it would delay release of the white iPhone yet again, this time until next spring.

“We’re sorry to disappoint customers waiting for the white iPhone again,” Apple spokeswoman Trudy Muller said. When asked why the white phone would again be delayed, Muller declined to comment.

Ouch. The iPhone 5 is supposed to be announced by the same time next year. Or wait, maybe the “white iPhone 4” is going to become the “iPhone 5”, with an improved antenna design and the same “sandwich” look of the current model. And maybe a Verizon deal in there somewhere. Time will tell, as the wise men say. But unveiling a mid-generation iPhone in Spring is surely a strange move from Apple.

Apple and Spotify Discussing An Acquisition?

According to the latest rumor published by Michael Arrington over at TechCrunch, Apple and European-based music streaming service Spotify might be in the very early stages of discussing an acquisition.

“Apple, Inc. (AAPL) in negotiations to acquire Spotify,” read the tip that came in yesterday via email from an anonymous source. Most tips are just outright false, but we dug into this one a little bit.

Here’s what we heard – Apple and Spotify are in on again, off again discussions about an acquisition, but at best it’s very early in the process. No firm price has been offered, no term sheet tabled. Still, it’s interesting that the two are talking.

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Linkie, Another iPhone App To Track Bit.ly Links. The One I’m Sticking With.

Last week I took a look at Clicks Count, a free iPhone app to keep track of bit.ly links posted by a Twitter account. By using the public bit.ly’s APIs, the app allows you to check on the clicks a link has received and nothing much, really. But it’s free, and I’m sure it’ll be just fine for many of you.

I, however, need more. I want mobile analytics and referrers. So I went digging in the App Store some more and found this other app, Linkie, which comes at a $0.99 but does everything I need. So I’m sticking with it. Read more

Too Late? MacUpdate Desktop Gets Auto-Updating

MacUpdate’s stand-alone application, MacUpdate Desktop, was recently updated with improvements and some new features (but may be too little too late because of Apple’s newly revealed Mac App Store). New features: MacUpdate Desktop lets users keep their installed software up-to-date without having go to the MacUpdate or developer’s website. The Desktop application can automatically check for updates in the background and will alert you of new application updates. Support has been added for checking web-browser plug-ins and installing Safari extensions. Improvements: The scanner engine is faster and uses less resources; improved version and application matching and an improved installation engine that makes updates even more accurate.

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TabCloud, Useful Chrome Extension to Sync Sessions Between Computers

I have a MacBook Pro and an iMac, and Google Chrome is installed on both the machines. I need to keep tabs in sync, otherwise it’s a giant “let’s email open tabs links to myself” mess. In the age of sync anywhere, anytime it amazes me that Google still hasn’t come up with a reliable solution to keep tabs and sessions in sync between different machines.

I’ve been using the Xmarks service for some months now, and while I don’t really care about bookmarks and passwords sync (1Password all the way), it’s been tremendously useful to keep tabs in sync between my two computers. I just don’t like the way it forces me to open tabs: one at a time and I have to hit the Xmarks button for each tab, as they can’t open in the background. Read more

Delibar for iPhone Syncs Bookmarks In The Cloud - Review & Giveaway

I don’t really save bookmarks anymore like I used to, but I know hundreds of thousands of users out there save any kind of content every day on popular services like Delicious, Pinboard and historio.us. I’m out of the bookmarking game, maybe because my browser’s address bar became so smart I can type a few characters and get back to that post I needed. Or maybe because I save the stuff I want as starred items in Google Reader and faves in Twitter or then again, maybe I was just tired of bookmarking. Like I said, though, bookmarking services are far from dead, even if people like me stopped using them.

For this very reason you should welcome the release of Delibar for iPhone, which is, hands down, the best iOS app to access Delicious and Pinboard bookmarks. Read more

Apple Planning Additional App Store LockDown During Thanksgiving Week

Apple usually locks down iTunes Connect for developers during the week of Christmas. This procedure known as “lockdown” doesn’t allow developers to submit updates for their apps and perform price changes, as they’re basically forced to stay out of iTunes Connect, the system underlying the App Store distribution.

According to a rumor published by 148apps, Apple is planning an additional lockdown this year during the week of Thanksgiving. The lockdown is admittedly a problem for developers who need to submit fixes to their applications, but it’s also a great marketing opportunity as charts and top apps are not updated either during the period. If you’re there on the first day, you’ll stay there for the whole week. Read more

RIP, MacBook Pro→

RIP, MacBook Pro

MG Siegler:

And regardless of if storage capabilities hold it back or not, I have no doubt that the Air does point to the future of the MacBook lineup. They’re soon all going to lose their optical drives, gain flash storage drives, and work for hours on end. In fact, the only machine I can think of that I might enjoy more than this one is one that lasts even longer. To get that, I’d accept a model that’s slightly larger (15-inches), slightly heavier (maybe 3.3 pounds), but had 10 hours of battery life. That’s the future MacBook Pro right there.

Is it just me, or purchasing a regular MacBook doesn’t make much sense anymore?

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