Apple News, Analysis and Podcasts

Is Apple Better Served Making Austin Its Main Campus?

Steve Jobs’ grand vision for the amazing “spaceship” campus is an awe-inspiring project like no other. Amazing amounts of green space and trees in a city dominated by cement and rooftops. Underground parking, materials and techniques never thought possible on such a grand scale. But this grand project is running into reality, as costs have soared nearly $2 billion over original estimates — now totaling $5 billion.

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iCloud's Missing Link: The Mac

The iPhone, iPod, iPad and iTunes, all seamlessly working in harmony with iCloud. But one main player has been left out in the cold -- the Mac. It's left users wondering whether iCloud is as useful as advertised for the heavy lifting file and folder world.

OS 10.8, Mountain Lion, promised to change the paradigm and bring the Mac into the fold of iCloud management. But outside the realm of entertainment, iCloud's power for the Mac is fuzzy math at best. Without the Mac and iOS devices having some form of built-in Finder or directory app, the methods of syncing files seamlessly between the Mac and mobile without third party solutions is dubious at best.

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Apple’s Big Secret: The iOS Laptop

It seems since TIm Cook took the controls at Apple it's been one ho-hum Keynote after another. Whatever happened to the day when Steve Jobs would say, "... oh, and one more thing..." and then that thing would be revolutionary. I remember when Steve did this in 2007 at MacWorld with the iPhone. It was totally awesome. Then three years later he did it again with the launch of iPad. However, since 2010 Apple has released new versions of existing products, making them better and better, but nothing revolutionary.

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Apple's Easy Server Solution

If you are an IT professional and yet love the Mac OS, it's tough not to have a "real" Mac server in the line-up. While the Mac Mini Server is a nice choice for home use, it lacks the redundancy needed for business applications that can't afford downtime or to lose data because of hard drive or power supply failures. 

Recently I had a conversation with Brian Stucki, owner of Mac Mini Colo, located in Las Vegas, NV. What his company has done with the Mac Mini Server it is very impressive. While his solution doesn't solve the redundancy issue, he has a nice setup for those who need to colo for a Mac Mini Server. He said the Mac Mini's reliability was great and has yet to see a power supply fail on any of the 1,000 plus Mac Mini Servers he's dealt with over the years.

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