11.6 inch 2010 MacBook Air

FedEx just delivered my new ultra slim 11.6 inch MacBook Air (MBA) and it is a thing of beauty. The screen is bright and sharp, boots really really fast (under 15 seconds) and it can do things that my iPad cannot do - much better content creation capabilities. iPad is great for content consumption but it's lacking for any sort of content creation. Above all MBA runs OS X so enough said.

iPad is great for playing games (I am addicted to Angry Birds), reading books for short hours indoors, watching videos and casual browsing. The battery life on the iPad is just awesome. I regularly get around 12 hours doing a variety of tasks. I haven't tested the battery life on the new MBA but I read people reporting that they are getting close to 6 hours.

MBA weighs around 2.3 pounds a little heavier than my 1.6 pound WiFi+3G iPad but it doesn't feel like it's heavier. May be that's because the iPad is a slab and may be due to it's distribution of weight.

Overall this new MBA is just awesome!

1.4 GHz/4 GB RAM/64 GB Flash storage

iLife 2011

I purchased iLife 11 to upgrade the iLife suite on my core i7 MacBook Pro and it arrived at the end of last week. I did the upgrade and didn't get a chance to play around much. I did try the cool new audio features and the movie trailers in iMovie 11. Looks promising but nothing earth shattering.

Living Room Upgrades

As my 15 month old son started messing with our TV and other electronics in our living room, I finally blocked a weekend to do some rearrangements. Little did I know at that time how big of a project I was about to start.

First and foremost I mounted our LCD on the wall. I bought a Sanus tilting wall mount from Best Buy and with the tools so graciously provided by one of my colleagues at work, I was able to complete the task in under 2 hours. Our old TV stand was a beautiful piece of furniture with glass shelves but it didn't come with any doors. So it was really inviting for my son to fiddle with the volume control on our Home Theatre receiver and other gadgetry sitting on the glass shelves. So I went ahead and bought a new TV stand with glass doors from one of the local stores. It took me around a couple of hours to assemble this stand.

We had our front home theatre speakers mounted on iron stands and they were in a bad shape because of all the beating taken from my son. So I decided to replace our home theatre. I purchased the new Denon AVR 991 that is network connected. It is a very awesome AVR with multi-zone support and all the latest goodies. To go with this awesome AVR, I purchased KEF KBT 2005.3 speakers and the Sub Woofer. So by the time all this equipment got delivered and hooked up it was almost 2 weeks from when I started this whole project. Scope creep it is.

Sprint PPC 6700 to iPhone 4

It was 2005 and I was yearning for a portable hand held that would allow me to check and send emails on the go. This was a very basic and rudimentary use case compared to what today's smart phones can do.

Sometime during the end of 2005 I went to my local Sprint store and bought a Sprint PPC 6700. If you really want to take a look at some pictures and get a comprehensive review of this now antiquated phone, you can go here. It was running Windows Mobile 5.0 and it fulfilled my requirements. However it looked and felt like a huge brick compared to all the 'dumb' phones I was on. After a couple of days of use I promptly returned it for a 'dumb' phone - Samsung MM-A800. Fast forward to 2007 and there was Steve Jobs showing off a revolutionary new product from Apple, the iPhone. I followed the Macworld 2007 Keynote on the Web and was really excited to see all the never before seen greatness. Even though this new technology marvel really blew me over I wasn't sure if I was going to buy one. I read about the so called 'Apple hype machine' and so was a little skeptic. Also Verizon had much better service in my city than AT&T and I read about a soon to be released smart phone from Verizon - LG Voyager. It was dubbed as the 'iPhone killer'.

The morning Voyager was released, I was first in line outside my local Verizon store. I configured my email accounts but found that email sync was touch and go. Most of the time I had trouble checking my mail and this really bugged me because I have been wanting this basic feature for quite some time now. So after a week I finally made a trip to the local AT&T store to take a look at the iPhone that everyone was talking about. The minute I laid my hands on one of the demo models, the experience blew me away. The experience was very fluid, so natural and I was very very impressed with Mobile Safari. The iPhone felt like a Ferrari for someone driving a Lexus all his life. It was on a completely different level. Needless to say I returned the Voyager, cancelled my Verizon contract and signed with AT&T to get the iPhone - iPhone 1.

Email, Web, Music and in fact anything that the iPhone handled, it handled it perfectly. The iPhone was a perfectionist's dream come true. It was flawless. As time passed Apple updated iPhone OS, released iPhone SDK and opened doors to third party native iPhone apps which took it to a whole new level. In 2008 I moved to an area where AT&T had 3G coverage and upgraded to iPhone 3G. Compared to Edge browsing was zippy on the 3G network. Apple's one year iPhone refresh cycle is not in sync with two year AT&T contracts so I passed on iPhone 3GS to get the next big iPhone refresh. Apple beefed up iPhone 3G performance with iPhone 3GS, added the option to shoot video with a better camera but kept the same look. At the very time I upgraded to iPhone 3G, Google started the Android era with T-Mobile G1.

Android grew leaps and bounds to Android 1.5, Eclair (2.1) and now Froyo (2.2). I was very much intrigued by the openness of the Android platform. I tried demo models running Android but wasn't really impressed. Even though they were all running Android they felt different because they were running manufacturer's UI wrappers like HTC Sense, Moto Blur etc. While HTC Sense enhanced the Android experience, Moto Blur made everyone crave for stock Android. Also these custom UI layers frustrated users because they had to wait endlessly for the next Android version until the manufacturers ported their UI wrappers before making the update available. As of now almost 50% of Android devices are still running Android 1.5 and Android 1.6 while the other 50% are running Eclair (2.1). HTC EVO has just received the Froyo (2.2) update and there are rumors that Droid X will be getting it in early September. So there is a huge fragmentation in the Android market and the manufacturers are really ruining things for customers.

The Geek in me really wanted to give Android a try. As my iPhone 3G contract with AT&T was reaching it's climax, I ordered the HTC EVO. I read some great things about this first 4G device from Sprint. I really enjoyed the HTC Sense UI but wasn't really impressed with the hardware. The EVO is limited to 65,000 colors and videos on the EVO looked pale compared to my 2 year old iPhone 3G. It felt bulky in my hands and gave me flashbacks of Sprint PPC 6700. Voice quality on the EVO was harsh and quite often the OS froze after a long conversation. On the positive side, I was extremely impressed with Android, the ability to float widgets and access to the core file system. But the lack of a powerful iTunes equivalent in the Android world was a huge let down. Software like Double Twist allows Android devices in addition to other mobile devices sync music, videos etc but it is not in the same league as iTunes. The available music apps for Android are really really bad compared to the iPod app on iPhone OS (Now iOS). In addition scrolling is extremely jerky on any Android device that I have seen and the experience is not fluid. I returned my EVO and bought the Droid X the day it was released hoping that some of the above quirks would somehow go away.

Droid X with it's 4.3 inch screen dwarfs the 3.5 inch iPhone screen. It's overall dimensions make it taller than even the HTC EVO but it is lighter and thinner the EVO. The iPhone 4 is the slimmest and lightest of all these three devices. Droid X felt much much comfortable to hold than the bulky EVO but the Moto Blur UI wrapper on top of Eclair was a nightmare. Even though the blur wrapper on Droid X is less intrusive than the previous Motorola versions, it definitely was enough to make the UI experience worse. Battery life on the Droid X was much better than offered by EVO but other than that it didn't really solve any of my complaints above. Droid X's form factor made it extremely hard to browse with one hand. It's a device begging to be held in landscape. Do I need to mention that I returned Droid X?

I am on iPhone 4 now and I think it is still the best available smartphone on market today. I think Android devices on multiple carriers offer a very good alternative to people who don't want to put up with AT&T. Apple has given a great feature lift to iPhone with iOS 4 with multi-tasking/fast app switching, folders, universal mailbox etc. Any discussion on iPhone is not complete without now infamous mention of 'Antennagate'. I could definitely reproduce the issue by shorting the two antennae. However it is a non-issue when the iPhone is encased in a bumper or any other third party case. The voice quality on iPhone 4 is excellent and better than that of EVO and Droid X.

Google improved Android by leaps and bounds in the past couple of years but it is still not polished enough. It feels half baked compared to iOS. The one great thing about Apple is that they get things right from the get go 99% of the time. They don't compete on features but they make sure that every single feature they ship is perfect. Google on the other hand is a completely different story. The difference is quite apparent when we see that even after two years after it's release Android feels underwhelming compared to iOS. But with Android 3. 0 (Gingerbread) future is looking up for Android.

So for now I am on iPhone 4 until the next great device comes to the market.

Remote Start Troubles

People living in freezing climates especially in apartments that don't offer a garage or a carport would really appreciate the value of a remote starter for their cars. I belong to this group.

Many a time during the winter months I have to scrape my car in the cold, warm it up for a good 10-15 minutes so that I don't freeze myself in the car and also to keep my engine safe. I have been looking at remote starters for quite some time but avoided them as I read some horror stories about them messing up the car electronics/electricals. However I gave in when I came across the Viper SmartStart. This remote start solution from Viper comes with an iPhone app that brings a great cool factor and infinite range. The app itself is free on the iPhone App Store.

I got the SmartStart installed at my local Best Buy for around US$ 600.00 that includes the SmartStart system, additional interfaces for plugging the SmartStart system to my car's electronics and installation fee (included in the SmartStart price of US$ 499.00 before tax). Before I went to Best Buy to pickup my car, I dowloaded the SmartStart app onto my iPhone. When the Best Buy technicians installed the starter in my car, Viper sent me an email with my account information. So, I got my iPhone app ready before I made my trip to Best Buy.

Version 1 (The version that I first downloaded) of this app enabled me to start the car, lock the car and unlock the car, from anywhere in the _world_ where my iPhone has a data connection - WiFi/3G/Edge whatever. However there was no two way communication. So when I pulled up the app there is no way of knowing the current state of my car. There was integration with climate controls etc. Viper advertised that Notifications/Two way communication would be available in the next version. All in all, I found this remote starter system to be real good.

The Best Buy technician told me that this app would communicate with a car only over 3G/WiFi but I tested the app on EDGE and it worked just fine.

After exactly a week the remote system in my car became unresponsive to the app. The physical remote was still able to communicate alright. I took the car to Best Buy and the technician told me that the signal receiver was out of position. The app started working after he seemed to adjust the receiver's position in the car.

However, I ran into the same trouble after some time. The remote works real good but the remote system became unresponsive to the iPhone app. I was very unimpressed with these constant troubles and I conveyed my annoyances to the Best Buy guys. They gave me two options -

1. Get the system corrected
2. Return for a full refund
3. Get a different system

I wasn't interested in (1) at all. I have to wait for both (2) and (3) as appointments weren't available for a month. After talking to the technician I decided to go with (3). After using the system for some time now, I really appreciate it's value. So, given the choice I decided to go with (3). I don't have any specifics about this but the technician informed me that he would install a system that would have two way communication, a remote with an LCD screen that would spit out the Vehicle status - current status (on/off), inside temperature, ability to turn on defrost controls etc. So, I am looking forward to this new system. It doesn't have a cool iPhone app, but it's better to have something that _works_ for a change.

Windows 7 + MacBook - Match Made..

I just went through an excruciating cycle of ups and downs trying to replace my beloved 1 year old 13" Unibody Aluminum MacBook.

I have always been a PC user and ever since Apple moved their Portable Macs to Intel x86, I wanted to switch to the Mac world. Apple's introduction of the very powerful Leopard coupled with Microsoft's now infamous Vista finally made me open my wallet for a MacBook in January 2009.

I was a little skeptic and tentative in the beginning as I was finding my feet in the OSX land. I was very much impressed with the iLife suite and immediately upgraded to iLife '09 the day it became available. I have a Canon HG10 HiDef camcorder and started processing my movies in iMovie '09. I manage my music in iTunes and I started using iPhoto for pictures. My iPhoto usage spiked after getting the Nikon D90 DSLR. This is an amazing camera and I bought some great lenses to complement Nikon D90's excellent hardware. iPhoto handled D90 RAWs very well without any hiccups.

I bought VMWare Fusion with my Mac so that I can run windows-only applications and also as a life branch (the skeptic I was) entering into a new OS world. Since I was very much used to developing applications on the windows platform, I installed Windows XP on Fusion and started using Windows XP for my development purposes (J2EE, LAMP etc). I also got a heavily subsidized MS Office 2007 Enterprise license thanks to my work, so I installed MS Office suite on the guest OS. So I started using heavily both Snow Leopard and Windows XP to satiate my different needs.

Apple is always behind their PC counterparts with regards to Hardware specs. They can actually afford to do so because their OS officially runs only on their hardware. The PC manufacturers are in intense competition with each other so they all equip their models with the latest and greatest silicon, video cards etc.

Even though iMovie solved my immediate video editing needs I realized that the output is not that great because iMovie translates my video files (M2TS)/AVCHD videos into an intermediate format before processing them. So when I compare the DVDs produced by iMovie with those produced by Corel video editing suite bundled with my Canon, the contrast is very apparent. Also, even though I can create Hi Def movies in iMovie, they don't play real well on my MacBook due to hardware limitations.

I read some rave reviews about Windows 7 after it was released and also found it to be a huge leap over Vista when I tried a beta version on my Sony VAIO before I got the MacBook. So, the hardware limitations of my MacBook, coupled with the much improved Windows 7 got me looking for a Windows 7 laptop.

So to recap, I got looking for a new Windows 7 Laptop -

1. That is not too heavy ( Thinking back, I should have quantified this)
2. That runs without generating excessive heat
3. That has excellent build quality (I am really spoiled by my MacBook)
4. That is expandable
5. That is powerful enough for HD Movie editing
6. That plays HD Movies with ease
7. Excellent I/O Hardware (Keyboard, TouchPad etc)

I bought a desktop from HP before so I bought a 17.3" HP dv7t Quad edition Laptop from them. The display on this Laptop is gorgeous and it's i7 processor is very much powerful to meet all my requirements. However I found that this Laptop is too big for my needs and too heavy for casual surfing. Actually I started getting averse to using this laptop for anything. I decided to try my luck with HPs top of the line and the latest and greatest - HP Envy 15. The Envy 15 looks like a 15" MacBook Pro with it's Magnesium alloy casing. Like the dv7t this Envy also runs an i7 chip and is a powerhouse. However after a day of playing with it I almost burnt my palms working on it. It runs HOT!. It came with a sleek additional battery, but this battery added a good 2 lbs to the weight making me carry around 7 pounds. The TouchPad is very very clumsy and is light years behind the Apple TouchPads. I found that the Envy 15's deficiencies don't make up for it's steep US$ 2000 price point. So I promptly returned this purchase after a day. I got to say that HP customer service is excellent.

I was really let down by the PC market which made me realize how much ahead Apple's Hardware is. I think Windows 7 is an excellent OS that is being bundled in some very very bad hardware. Apple hardware is excellent but Windows 7 is better than Snow Leopard with regards to ease of use and a ton of software is readily available for Windows. So finally, I decided to marry these two.

I bought Windows 7 Home Premium from Microsoft and fired up Boot Camp assistant on my Mac. However no matter how much partition size I specified for Windows, Boot Camp kept complaining that it cannot move some files. I deleted my huge Windows XP Virtual Machine file (I have Time Machine backups) and tried again without any success. So I downloaded the excellent defragementation tool for Mac- iDefrag and as expected I had data scattered all across my Macintosh disk. However I cannot do a clean defragmentation of my Macintosh disk while it is mounted, so I used Coriolis disc utility to create a bootable DVD from my Snow Leopard install disc. Coriolis disc utility created a OSX bootable DVD with iDefrag on it. So, I booted my Mac with this disc and defragmented my Macintosh disk. The defragmentation process ran for around 4 hours. After defragmentation, Boot Camp was able to install Windows 7 without any issues. Once Windows 7 is installed, I booted into Windows and used Snow Leopard disc to install Boot Camp drivers. Now I have Windows 7 running on my Mac with all the hardware running healthy thanks to the latest drivers installed by Boot Camp. Finally, I downloaded Boot Camp 3.1 from Apple that has the latest driver updates, installed all the Windows 7 updates and installed Norton 360 to keep my beloved Mac secure.

So finally I am very much happy after installing the best OS for my needs on the best hardware that I could find - Windows 7 running on my Mac. This looks like an excellent mix, like Steve said the other day describing the new iPad - "...Best experience ever..".

Here is the recipe -

1. Get Windows 7
2. Run Boot Camp assistant to create a Windows partition and install Windows 7
3. If Boot Camp cannot create a partition because it cannot move some files, get iDefrag and create a bootable OSX DVD with the bundled Coriolis CD/DVD maker.
4. Defrag (Compact) the Macintosh disk with the disk created in (3) above.
5. Repeat (2) above to install Windows 7
6. Boot into Windows 7 and install Boot Camp drivers with the Mac OSX DVD.
7. Install all required Windows 7 updates, install an anti-virus to secure Windows and install the latest Boot Camp drivers.
8. Enjoy Windows 7 on Mac.

As you might have figured out by now, the above still doesn't answer my need for more power - better video card and processor for HD Movie editing and playback among other things. I think the next MacBook refresh will solve this problem.

The Happy ending is in the ultimate solution - For a "Best ever experience" run Windows 7 on a Mac !