Fresh New iSwitched

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Black and White

I released yesterday the new iSwitched homepage. I hope you like it. It’s the first step in the redesign of the website (and the first step in a series of other new things ).The rest of the current site can still be accessed by going to http://web.mac.com/snowy2004

Having too Much fun!

Whew wee! Man I love my MacBook Pro! Sorry for not posting too much. I’m just thinking about stuff. Mac stuff, Windows Stuff, podcast stuff, stuff stuff. You’ll see…

:D

Yay! I got it!

LOST and lovin' it!

Video camera glasses: 200$

Wig: 20$

Rachel Blake Live: Priceless

Something money can’t buy. For everything else, There’s the LOST Experience.

ABC and the UK and Australian networks who broadcast the show LOST started an internet “game” spanning multiple sites and even print and TV ads. In this stage of the “Experience”, hacker Rachel Blake is attempting to expose The Hanso Foundation, the fictional foundation created in the show LOST, for what it really is. And if you’ve been following this like me, get ready to go nuts. during a Q and A session at ComicCon with LOST writers and actors, Rachel Blake herself, stands up says how the Hanso Foundation is paying ABC for ads and how the Orientation videos in the show are real and how they know something. Just like everyone there, when I saw this YouTube movie (thanks to thelostexperience.com for pointing it out) I went nuts! If you follow the Experience, you WANT to watch this movie. Don’t forget to go then to Hansoexposed.com because Rachel told you to!

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It's here!

The latest PDFcast and podcast are here!

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Podcast?…. Oh ya!

With all the MBP fun (and other stuff), I didn’t realy have my mind in iSwitched-mode. It’ll probalby be shorter than usual and formulated differently.

Flock, ScreenCasts Online, Zune and more.

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Let the Holiday Battle Begin!

Ladies and Gentlemen, Meet Zune. Here’s here to kill the iPod. Yes, First it was Mac vs Windows. Then, iPod vs Windows Media Player/PlayForSure/The Rest and now the ultimate battle for your ears has begun. It’s Microsoft’s Zune (and probably Windows Media Player) vs Apple’s iPod ( and iTunes). The teaser site (Comingzune.com) seems to emphasize friends and giving some ground to the Wi-Fi rumours I hear. Does Apple really have to worry? Has it got good competition? It might have to start worrying anyways and get a bit more innovative.

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No News is OK News

Called up FedEx: they expect to deliver the package on Monday. I’m hoping that they get it to my local FedEx location by today and that I might be able to get it from there. The package Is still no longer in Memphis but not somewhere else yet either. (Then again, that’s what I thought of Shanghai).

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Joy! (And I Mean it)

*News Bulletin music*

We have received information staying that the MacBook Pro has arrived and left Memphis. It left this morning at 3:57 AM local time. Almost a year ago, the shipment of a Mac Mini was fallowed by iSwitched. Research into the archives shows us that the departure from Memphis happened last year on the same day of the receiving of the package.

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Goodby Alaska!

The package left Anchorage at 6:56 pm Eastern.

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Hello from The Great White North's US Cousin

*News bulletin music*

Well after over a day and a half of inactivity in the tracking system, the MacBook Pro has been confirmed to have crossed the Pacific and landed in the Great White North à la Bush : Anchorage, Alaska. It was registered there at 1:03pm local time on the 20th; it is now arround 1:50 pm there, 5:50 pm here. Can it make it for the Great Lakes by tomorrow? We shall see…

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Change of roles

When I got my Mini, Apple was pissing me off because it was taking them forever to ship it. Now it’s the shipping company’s turn to piss me off. The MacBook Pro is STILL in China after being received by FedEx at 1:34pm on the 19th (Shanghai time) — or on the 20th depending on who you’re asking. It’s around 6am on the 21th in Shanghai now and THE THING DIDN’T MOVE. C’MON FEDEX. GET IT AT LEAST THIS SIDE OF THE PACIFIC!

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What the Hey?

I call up FedEx. get to the “representative, press 0″ part. And I GET HUNG UP! Call again, choosing the french system, AND GET HUNG UP AGAIN! The third time, I get through but the rep tells me that the package was recieveced on the 20th and didn’t make the flight and will leave on the 21st, BUT THE FEDEX TRACKING SYSTEM SAID THEY GOT IT ON THE 19th AT 1 FREEKING 34 IN THE AFTERNOON!…. I”m…. ACK!

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If you Hate Recodings, Press 1

Oh my gosh! I call them, type in my tracking code and THE COMPUTER TELLS ME WHAT I ALREADY KNOW1 It them offered to let me talk to a representative but seeing how I was on the brink of crying… or swearing, I dedided to try again in a moment.

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FedUp

That’s it! It has been well over 24 hours since the package got scanned anywhere! How freaking long can the Pacific be? Are they getting refueled in mid-air? That’s it! I”m calling FedEx!

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ShipWatch Update

It has nearly been a full 24hrs since the last update on the MBP it left Shanghai, presumably to cross the Pacific, at 1:35 this morning but there’s no news of it since. I hate this kind of clueless wait!

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Breaking News Alert

*News update music*

Hello, and welcome. We have just received a confirmed report by Apple and FedEx that a MacBook Pro has been sent from Shanghai, China 19th at 1:34 pm. As we here at iSwitched News Headquarters have yet to pass the 7am mark on the 19th, this is probably according to local time. With the help of timeanddate.com, we discovered that there’s an exact 12 hr difference between here and Shanghai Thus it’s about 6:50 pm there. The package was aquired by FedEx at the shown time, thus meaning it happened about 6hrs ago. Now let’s go to out Google Earth map to see the computer’s voyage. Due to the lack of infromation for 6 hrs, the package is probalby over the Pacific. Please stay tuned for more information.

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Parallels Ready for Prime Time

Although, I didn’t catch the ” Windows and Parallels Required” or the ”Windows Required” note at the bottom of the screen but I did catch the ”Touché” Get a Mac ad durring House MD on Fox, the one that shows that Mac can run Windows. Apple isn’t kidding anymore with the Mac ads.

ShipWatch Update

Well the MacBook Pro has yet to get shipped. Aw, well! I can now track the nano but… all I get is that it’s “In Transit in U.S.”. The only scan date shown is the 17th at 8:30.

Coming along

So I bought Parallels and now the AppleCare 3-year warenty has be registered. I still can’t track the Nano so it’s probalby not yet in Canada and the laptop hasn’t shipped yet.

iShip Nano

That nano I was talking about just got shipped. I can’t track it online with Purolator so it’s probalby still in the States. In other news, I tried to get Parallels Desktop for Mac on the 15th, the last day I could get it for 30$ off, if I understood correctly, but every time I tried to buy it, I was getting charged full price! I sent an e-mail to the people at Parallels and I got their response this morning. They’re nice enought to let me get it at the same reduced price even if the rebate period is over. Aw, that’s nice! Thanks! I’m going to buy it later today.

Slow and Sick of it

It’s nothing new: My Mini is painfully slow with what I want to do with it. GarageBand clogging up is a common recurrence. To be able to get top performance in GarageBand, I pretty much need to shut down all my open programs. And don’t get me started on high quality video. Video podcasts in iTunes take time to load and skips in the video often happen. This thing was made for web, email and music. Anything more is over working it. To top that off, I like to have everything open at the same time. And then there’s widgets. But I do have to give ‘em some credit: It was a great little machine for World of Warcraft. You had your lag (and your LAG in Ironforge) but it was very playable (except in parts of Ironforge). But I’m 99.99% sure of this: I will love my MacBook Pro a lot more.

On that subject: My MBP has an estimated ship date of 1 to 3 business days (Monday to Wednesday… Go Monday!) and then 3-6 for delivery (as always, expedited) but in my experience with recent orders, I’d say more like 1 to 2 days for delivery but then again, it’s a custom french computer and even if it’s isn’t a brand spanking new model like my Mini was, it did add an extra day to my estimated shipping date the fact I got a french keyboard (1-2 days > 1-3 days). With this order, I got a Nano, not for me though. It has a 1 to 2 ship and 3 to 6 delivery. The AppleCare 3 year warranty pack has the same estimates as the laptop.

Episode 3 is out!

The latest podcast and PDFcast are out! Get them now!

Joy! It's ShipWatch 06!

It’s ordered! Yay! And now it’s to go into:

ShipWatch 06

*News Update music*

Hello and Welcome, we, here at iSwitched news, have recieved reports that a MacBook Pro has been ordered from the online Apple Store. Although unconfirmed as of yet, we will update you on this report and any news about the MacBook Pro. Please stay tuned.

Very, Very Soon…

It’s the day! And soon… very soon…

Oh Boy!

Less than a day to go. YAY!

Best Buy more Mac-Firendly

Back when I had my blog with Blogger (dating back before I even did my first podcast ever), I posted how my local Best Buy “locked” the Macs with an ad for their Geek Squad computer help service, something that Mac users probably need less of than PC users. That has been long remove and now you can almost 100% freely use the Macs (You can’t access Finder but you can open applications). I was suprised today to find at my local Best Buy’s Mac section Mac games. There was about 5 games, including The Sims 2 and one of it’s expansions and a Civiliation III game. Not only that but there was 3 new Mac applications to buy. Although all from the same company, they wheren’t from Apple, MS, or Symantec as is normaly the case. Nice move, Best Buy!

Soon…

ONE DAY TO GO

No meaningful post today… just waiting…

Widgets: Back for an Encore

2 DAYS TO GO

I can’t wait! Anyway, today’s post is about Dashboard widgets. I never could get “into” Dashboard because it took it like 5 minutes to launch all my widgets! Obviously, with the MacBook Pro, I’ll be able to enjoy widgeting. I do know some good widgets though. Like Apple Logo: Simply the Apple logo in various colours, or the Lost Widget, to feel like you were in the hatch from the show LOST… and probably drive you insane every 108 minutes.

Extra, Extra! Read All About it!

3 DAYS TO ORDER

I’m slowly getting closer to the 1st big day (the other one being the day I get the MBP) and like I said, here’s another meaningful post: I have my sources for my Mac news and while I do sometimes browse around, I like having a main Mac news site with RSS for a quick overview. That site is MacDailyNews. Great source of info. Their comments are fanboy-ish and even their choice of articles and news post titles sometimes seem fanboy-ish but you can still find some good info. They even do up-to-the-minute keynote summaries. My second most important Mac news site is probably MacBytes, which is pretty much a list of links to articles.

Flocking Good Time

Flock is a free web browser that makes it easier than ever to share photos, stay up-to-date with news from your favorite sites, and search the Web. Take our tour to learn what’s different about Flock, then download the beta to get started – and please tell us what you think.

Flock — The web browser for you and your friends

Playing arround with Flock. Just blogged about the Flock homepage by selecting text, right-clicking it and choosing “Blog This”. Check out the Firefox-based browser, Flock, at www.flock.com. And by the way, stil 4 days to ordering my MacBook Pro

The BookDown Pro

(get it: Countdown… MacBook Pro…. nevermind…)

4 DAYS TO ORDER

I decided to blog a bit more meaningfully in these final 4 days, find something interesting for you, the reader. First off is the preview of the next podcast: Skype, MacTV and Age of Empires III. Expect it this weekend, as always.

And second is probably next week’s Macapp, Flock, a browser and so much more. Just finished watching Don McAllister’s screencast (www.screencastsonline.com) and I must say it’s pretty amazing! It might just be the browser to make me leave Safari. Safari had, in my opinion, the best RSS support and while this one might not have exactly what I’m looking for in that field, all the other sweet features included (Like intergrated blogging) might just make it the best browser avalible. Get it at www.flock.com for Mac, Windows and Linux. I have to go and check it out. All this and I haven’t even installed it yet!

Countdown Update

Well, the finalised date for ordering my MacBook Pro is the 16th so, counting today there’s 5 days before the order day.

Just a Quick Note

Forgot to say yesterday that the 2nd podcast and PDFcast are out!

Tomorrow

COUNTDOWN : 5 DAYS

A lot of the podcast and PDFcast is finished. I just have to make the chapter images, insert them and the links into the podcast and then review both the podcast and PDFcast. I decided to give the PDFcast a much nicer look that’s less hard on the eyes; I hope you like it! You should expect both the podcast and PDFcast tomorrow.

Meet the Book

COUNTDOWN : 6 DAYS

I’m slowly working on the podcast and PDFcast. They should be out Saturday or Sunday. In other news, I think I pretty much have my MacBook Pro all configured so here it it:

*Prize showcase on a game show music*

Sporting a quick 2.0 GHz Core Duo, this 15.4 inch screen MacBook Pro can take what you send it’s way. It comes with a stick of 1 GB of RAM, a 100 GB Hard Drive running at 5400 rpm, and all the fixings like a DVD-buring SuperDrive, AirPort and Bluetooth. With 128 MB of dedicated video memory, it leaves the MacBook in the dust for gaming. Complete with iLife ‘06, this system will surely keep you speedy for years to come. Yes, it’s the MacBook Pro!

The Countdown

I concluded that there’s no point for a trip to the Yorkdale Apple Store to get the new Mac so that means I’ll be able to order it from here. I still do need to wait a bit. The order will probably be sent on the 14th or the 15th so why not do a countdown to the big day. Let’s say it’s the 14th just to be on the positive side. That would mean, not counting today seeing how it’s nearly done, there’s 7 days ’till I order my MacBook Pro!! Can’t wait!

MacTV+Jemca

The guys at MacTV launced their new site, MacTV Jemca. It’s the next verison of the MacTV site and adds new features like celebrity playlists, forums, an HD podcast and a new way to explore MacTV’s content. I was subcribed to the podcast for a long time (even before I got my Mini!) and it was great. Now MacTV is even better. Check out MacTV Jemca at http://jemca.watchmactv.com/

Coming up on iSwitched:

Quinn, TWIT, Office 07 and more! I’ll start working on the podcast tonight or tommorow night. In other news, it’s nearly confirmed that I’ll be going to the Apple Store to get (or order depending on the avaliblity of the kind of MacBook Pro I want) my MacBook Pro not this weekend but the next. I have a possible buyer for my Mini (I’m selling it at $700 with some extra stuff) so everything is going pretty well!

Enjoy!

After tweeking every element of my site, reviewing the podcast and PDFcast and resubcribing to Libsyn, it’s showtime! The first podcasts and PDFcasts are out! Here’s the iTunes link.