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Macworld Best of Show

Well, here is the official list of “Best” products according to the Macworld editors. I agree with many of them and actually blogged about several myself:

My favorites that I actually checked out at the show:
BusySync (iCal sync)
Guitar Hero III (so fun!)
Photoshop Elements (big upgrade v6)
MacBook Air (duh)
Dictate (speech recognition)
OmniFocus (my new favorite to-do app)
Parallels Server (Server virtualization that took a while to grasp but now I get it and love it)

Also on the list are Eye-Fi, a cool Wi-Fi SD card; Flow, a neat idea for content management for designers; NEC 30inch monitor and VectorDesigner, a program that wants to compete with Adobe Illustrator and might well be a part of MacHeist. If you don’t know what MacHeist is, you should… and soon. It’s a package of great shareware tools worth almost $500 for only $49. Check it out at www.macheist.com

Macworld | Editors’ Notes | Macworld Expo Best of Show award winners

http://www.macworld.com/article/131642/2008/01/bos.html

thinnovation

macworld is over and I'm back in LA but I wanted to post a final
obligatory shot of the MacBook Air.

apparently Apple actually drilled through these (previously) working
prototypes to create this awesome photo op.

MacBook Air: what it is and isn’t

As much as I hate this fact, the MacBook Air is not for me. But it is for some people… many people… business travelers for example… SWITCHERS… I’ve known this from the moment I laid eyes on it, and Jason O’Grady has put my thoughts down very well in a column that is well worth reading… check it out…

» Why does the MacBook Air make so many so dumb? | The Apple Core | ZDNet.com

http://blogs.zdnet.com/Apple/?p=1196

I want this!

oh man, this $150 beauty looks to be what I've been looking for to run
my mac mini and projector setup!

it works like a wiimote because you can wave it around to control the
mouse… you can set it down to use it on a surface, it has good range
with a 2.4ghz transmitter, it is programmable and looks really cool!

it still requires a keyboard for text input (so I might be more into a
Bluetooth keyboard with a trackpad)… and is really expensive, but I
want one!

The MacBook Air

So I guess I have to talk about this, the biggest announcement of Apple’s at the Expo. I haven’t actually laid my hands on it yet, and I’m sure there will be a gushing post about that tomorrow… but after checking out the specs online there are many great things:

13.3 inch screen… that’s bigger than expected…. no smaller than a MacBook!

Backlit keyboard… oh how I’ve been wanting that forever… and it’s always eluded me!

SO thin, and only 3 pounds… of course, it’s TINY.

2 gigs of RAM standard… that is way cool and way unexpected. That must be because it’s not expandable. wow.

DVI out…. well, “micro dvi” anyway. That’s good enough for me and was a huge requirement.

5 hours of battery life and super new LED screen… this thing is very environmentally friendly.

BUT….

The deal killer for me getting it… NO FIREWIRE!
 Oh, man, please don’t tell me that this means Apple is abandoning the standard that they invented and that is still far superior to USB. PLEASE. They already took it out of the iPods and iPhones, but now it’s missing from a Mac and that’s a first. I simply cannot have a mac that doesn’t have Firewire. The missing optical drive I can live with and even forget about, but Firewire is so essential to my everyday workflow that I will NOT give it up. 
 Do you hear me Apple? No Firewire, no me buy.

Check it out for yourself…

http://www.apple.com/macbookair/specs.html


illicit iPhone application development!

I read somewhere that this journalist wanted to do a story on iPhone
app developers and whether they had the balls to exhibit at
macworld… and well it turns out that at least one of them does!

pretty cool stuff they make, too.
check them out at polarbearfarm.com

unfortunately you still have to be using iPhone software version 1.1.1
to install these illicit apps but I'll be looking to these guys when
apple officially supports them in February.

until then, know that you CAN get search on your iPhone and even a video capture program… wild!

classical and guitar music composition software

just stumbled across the booth that has very cool software for
classical composers called Notion and a guitar oriented package called
progression.

I could see this as a phenomenal tool for a non-techie musician to
quickly and easily get they ideas down and then share them and expand
upon them with incredible flexibility