Apple MagSafe Replacements Are Now Free
In our anecdotal experience, Apple has been pretty good about replacing clearly faulty MagSafe power adapters—the ones that split or fray from faulty manufacture. But now they are making their replacement policy official and offering free MagSafe replacements for the MacBook (13-inch Late 2006), MacBook (13-inch), MacBook Pro (15-inch Glossy), MacBook Pro (17-inch). (We read that as all models that use the MagSafe power adapter). Bring in your bad MagSafes to any Apple retailer and they’ll take care of you. [Apple via Cult of Mac]
Popularity: 10% [?]
Crafty iPhone dock mod supports iPhone 3G, saves $29
If you’re an owner of the first generation iPhone then one of the (many) annoyances you’ve discovered with your new curvy and slightly chubbier 3G sib is the fact that it won’t fit your existing dock — be it the dock bundled with the iPhone or with the Bluetooth headset. To make matters worse, Apple chose not to bundle a compatible dock with the iPhone 3G — you have to purchase that separately for $29… you know, assuming you can find it. Fortunately, that old dock can be made into a suitable charging base for your iPhone 3G with just a bit of simple Dremel action and elbow grease. Sounds like a bargain to us. [hardmac]
Popularity: 8% [?]
Busted iPod Modded Into a Mouse; Could Be So Much More
If your old iPod is suddenly about to become useless when you acquire an iPhone 3G, why not repurpose it as something else? One enterprising modder took an iPod that had been accidentally run over by a car (yeah, I hate it when that happens) and turned it into a fully-functioning mouse, with the buttons on the trackwheel all functioning as mouse buttons. Unfortunately, due to the car smashing the crap out of the screen, it just has a piece of paper that looks like an iPod screen in its place.
I’d love to see this taken to the next level, with the screen working as a secondary screen for the computer. Imagine, being able to see your RSS feeds or new emails on your iPod mouse and saving screen space. It would be cool-looking and impressive and make you king of the nerds. Get to it, modders. I demand satisfaction.
Popularity: 4% [?]
Blu-ray recordable drive for Macs
Is it time to finally put your HD mountain biking documentary on Blu-ray? Apple upgrade vendor MCE Technologies announced availability of a totally Mac-compatible Blu-ray recordable drive for Mac Pro and Power Mac.
The $499 (internal) drive is compatible with Mac OS X 10.5.2 and later, requiring no special drivers for burning — just install it in your Mac Pro or Power Mac bay, pop in blank Blu-ray media, and you’re ready to roll. The drive does both single-layer (6X BD-R or 2X BD-RE) and dual-layer (4X BD-R, 2X BD-RE) burning for capacities of 25GB or 50GB respectively. That’s up to 50,000 photos, 12,500 music tracks, or 4 hours of HD video.
There’s a $599 version bundled with Roxio Toast 9 and the Toast BD//HD Plugin, as well as an external drive with FireWire and USB 2.0 ports for $749.
To write professional Blu-ray discs that can play on set-top Blu-ray players or Sony PS3, you’ll need Adobe Premiere Pro CS3 Encore along with Adobe Premiere Pro CS3 or Final Cut Pro. Basic Blu-ray movies can be burned with Roxio Toast 9 and the BD/HD Plugin.
[via The Mac Observer]
Popularity: 15% [?]
MacBook Air SuperDrive super hack makes it work with any computer
As tnkgrl mentions at the outset of this hack, the MacBook Air SuperDrive is a nice little slice of hotness, retailing for a mere $99, and doing the whole external drive thing with Apple’s sense of style. Unfortunately, it only works with the MacBook Air due to a proprietary IDE to USB bridge, as tnkgrl discovered. For a mere $9 she was able to find a replacement part, and after pushing some internals around she had her self a Mac mini and HP Mini-Note-friendly USB disc drive. We’ve all been laboring under the assumption that Apple needed more than the standard USB power draw, so it comes as a bit of a surprise that she was able to pull this off with a regular part, and we demand Apple start selling $108 SuperDrives-for-all immediately. Er, please? * Read
Popularity: 14% [?]
