Today I had to part with a dear friend of mine.  My poor MacBook Pro’s video processor died.  It started out one day when my screen went pink.  I tried connecting it to my TV via the DVI port and everything worked.  This made me think that the GPU was not the problem but maybe I knocked something loose when I replaced the 160GB x 5400RPM drive with the new 500GB x 7200RPM drive as part of the Snow Leopard upgrade.  The laptop worked for another week or so and then it completely died (video).  I was still able to connect via VNC (Remote desktop) so I knew the laptop was booting and was still working.  I checked the “About this MAC” and found that it had no clue as to what the GPU was.  This fits the issue as noted via the Apple site: http://support.apple.com/kb/TS2377

I knew before I could take it in, it’s best to have the “factory” installed parts to avoid an Apple Care warranty issue.  I had to tear it down and remove the upgraded hard drive.  On the plus side, I know that my data is safe as they have the older drive.

I made an appointment with the Genius Bar.  I’ve got to say that I like this.  It took one visit not knowing the system to figure out you can make the appointment in advance and online.  Apple’s got this down to a science.  After a couple minutes chatting with them, I had to leave my baby for a new logic board.  If they have one in the store it will take about 3 days.  If not, it’s going to take up to 7 days.

For those questioning buying the extended Apple Care Warranty, I’ve had the screen replaced which would have cost $800, a bulged battery $130, 2 x Apple 85W MagSafe Power Adapter (both for frayed cabling) at $79 each, and now the logic board which would cost more than $800 not including installation.  When I go to pickup the laptop, I’m going to get my Mighty Mouse replaced as the roller ball on top stopped working.  It’s also covered under the laptop’s warranty so who knows, I might even get the new Magic Mouse as a replacement (Apple Rocks).  I.E. in the 2.25 years that I’ve owned my baby, Apple’s not made a great profit from selling me this laptop.  That said, Apple has been really great taking care of mine and for that, they have my loyalty.

I just stumbled on a really cool app.  1st you need a jailbroken phone.  All you need to do is to install MobileSubstrate and VoIPover3G located in the Cydia application.  I’ve tested it with Skype and it works great

Last October when Hostmonster moved my site from one of thier smaller servers to the new hardware, they somehow screwed up my photo site.  I finally got some time and moved the site as is to a new location and re-built it.  The software package I use is called Gallery.  I’m using version 2.3 which is quite stable and very nice.

Once I got everything back up, I re-imported my parents 488 photos.  The import process was able to read the pictures from the old site but I had to copy by hand all of the picture titles.  As you can guess, it took me hours to get them all.  I had the kids help and do a spot check to see if I missed anything.

I also need to get the 10,000+ photos on my Mac organized.  I’ve decided that the website, my Mac, and my new external NAS are all going to be one project.  Right now they are all located inside iPhoto 08.  I don’t like that they are all stored in one big bundle.  I also can’t nest them.  Nor can I adjust specific colors (I.E. red for dive photos).  This is a big limitation in my eyes.  To solve this I bought Aperture.

Time Machine was designed to work with locally attached storage or storage attached to either Apple’s AirPort Extreme or Time Capsule products.  That said, it’s not that hard to make it work with any old NAS solution.  Here are the steps from a terminal window:

1. Enable support for unsupported disks via: defaults write com.apple.systempreferences TMShowUnsupportedNetworkVolumes 1
2. Create a SPARSEBUNDLE.  To do this, you need to create it on your local volume.  The command is: hdiutil create -size XXg (XX = size in GB) -type SPARSEBUNDLE -nospotlight -volname “Name of your Backup” -fs “Case-sensitive Journaled HFS+” -verbose ./Computername_MACaddress
3. To find out the MACADDRESS just use: ifconfig en0
4. Copy the bundle and all of it’s subdirectories to the root of the NAS share.

Once you point Time Machine to the share, it will find the SPARSEBUNDLE and use it for backups.

I decided to finally replace my alarm clock.  In a perfect world I wanted to dock my iPhone 3G, have it charge, and play my music.  There are really two options right now, the iHome IP99BR and the Sony ICFC1iPMK2 Speaker Dock and Clock Radio with iPod Dock (Black).

I choose the Sony as it was $50 less and got a good review at the iLounge site.  I like the fact that I don’t have to create a custom playlist for the iPhone to run with the alarm.  Whatever playlist I am using when I shut it off is what the alarm uses.  Some things that I did like about the iHome was the 7-5-2 type alarm settings.  You could set the alarm to be 7 days a week, mon-fri, or sat-sun.

Yes, there is an App available to do your Wordpress posting via the iPhone.  I just used the app to post our visit to the Clearwater Marine Aquarium.  I was even able to add pictures that I had on the iPhone.  It’s a great app and it’s free to boot.  I can’t wait to see what the next version adds.

Last night I finally got around to try tethering my iPhone to my Macbook Pro.  I first tried to do it via an SSH tunnel.  It mostly worked but I seemed to be experiencing the DNS BIND issues that the iPhone has.  Take a look at Jay Freeman’s article on the subject.

I finally tried the 3proxy method and it seems to work. Here’s a link to cre.ations.net which is one of a couple sites that have outlined the process.  Like others have experienced, it really SUCKS the battery dry :)  I also had a bad and I mean bad crash that took three hard boots and about 15 minutes to get my phone running again.  This is the cost for being bleeding edge and yes version 2.0 of the iPhone software is REALLY buggy.

Tonight I decided to try to jailbreak my phone.  I’ve got to say that it’s not that hard thanks to a dedicated group of people known as the iPhone DEV Team.  I used the Lifehacker site for guidance.  I’ve since added the NES Emulator to the phone and have been able to ssh into it and poke around.

I downloaded the free AOL client for the iPhone today and gave it a spin.  I must say that I’m disappointed in what AOL delivered.  I think that part of the problem is due to Apple not having the infrastructure in place to handle the background notifications.

Things missed from the 1.0 version:

• Background Notifications - I.E. getting notices when you’re not in the app when someone sends you an IM
• Not logging you out of the service if you’ve been idle for 5 minutes or so.
• Being able to delete people from your buddy list
• Logging into multiple accounts

I had to take Rebecca to the airport for a 10:40 flight.  Later, I had to pickup Jonathan at 15:00.  As you can guess, it would be easier to just stay at the airport.  I.E. not having to visit the Southwest ticket counter twice and also pass through security twice.

No problem, I had a plan.  I’d get 5 hours to really play with my new toy and not have to worry about anything.  Sounded like a good plan, was a good plan.  Well, one small detail was missed.  The battery of the iPhone is rated for 5 hours of surfing, chatting on the phone, etc. running off a 3G signal.  I can say that I got the 20% low battery warning and even hit the 10% warning before 5 hours.  I stopped using the web, etc. at 4 hours.  I chatted a bit on the phone but was worried I’d run the battery dry before I got out of the airport.

I should have brought a charging cable with me or at least had one in the car.  I’m not sure how much more I would have gotten out of the phone had I pushed it but the big battery with the small sliver of red left sort of made me pause