#512 pixels

[kpointofview]

$300 Book Designed by Apple in a Video Check out this YouTube video from 512 Pixels showcasing Apply Book with actual products, saving you $300 Hope you enjoyed the video, do not forget to give a Thumbs Up to the video... Cheers K

[macdailynews]

First impressions of Apple's flagship iPhone 6s Plus

First impressions of Apple’s flagship iPhone 6s Plus

“I’ve enjoyed my iPhone 6 Plus since first realizing #MykeWasRight and trading in my small, junky iPhone 6 for a nicely-sized, amazing iPhone 6 Plus back in the spring,” Stephen Hackett writes for 512 Pixels.

“Like many of you, I pre-ordered a phone a couple of weeks ago, and today it came: a 64GB Space Gray iPhone 6S Plus,” Hackett writes. “Here are some initial impressions…”

1. It’s…

View On WordPress

[geektees]

512 Pixels

Printed on Teespring Premium and available for $20.

[joecaiati]

I wrote another guest post for the great 512 Pixels. Many thanks to Stephen Hackett for -- again -- allowing me to write for his awesome blog.

[joecaiati]

As the father of the iPod moves on to other projects, the iPod itself doesn't seem to have the brightest future.

[joecaiati]

512 Pixels is a website that I've admired for years. Its author, Stephen Hackett, has built an online presence that connects with Apple enthusiasts and tech-fans around the world. In addition to his site, he's co-founded the Relay FM podcast network and is the Editor-in-Chief of The Sweet Setup. (He's involved in some pretty cool stuff.)

Stephen has been kind enough to let me write a guest post for 512 Pixels.1 It's about increasing the life of your aging Mac and I think you will find that it's thorough and informative.

I am very proud to contribute to 512 Pixels and I hope you find that my piece adds value to Stephen's already valuable website.

Readers of 512 Pixels may also notice that the site has received some design changes today that I think you'll like. ↩︎

[shiningparadigm]

Stephen Hackett recently wrote about the confusing state the iPad lineup is in currently, speculating that Apple might be "thinking out loud" and that "this year's iPad lineup is being used by Apple as an experiment." I agree.

Read his post before coming back to my comments, as I'll just be building on what he's already said.

Currently, for a 16 GB Wi-Fi only iPad, you have 5 options:

iPad mini ($249)

iPad mini 2 ($299)

iPad mini 3 ($399)

iPad Air ($399)

iPad Air 2 ($499)

These price points don't make a lot of sense, especially with the iPad minis. 

For an extra $50, you can jump from an iPad mini to an iPad mini 2 and get a Retina Display with twice as many pixels per inch, and an A7 Processor that's 2 generations newer (the iPad mini uses the same A5 Processor found in the iPad 2 from 2011).

For an extra $100, you can jump from an iPad mini 2 to an iPad mini 3 and get Touch ID and the Gold color option. Everything else is the same.

I'm leaving the Gold color option out, because that shouldn't be a deal-breaker. You have 3 huge features here: Retina Display, A7 Processor, and Touch ID. In my opinion, they're all equally as important. (I might say the A7 Processor might be the most important because it's the first 64-bit processor and will be supported for years to come, but someone else might say the Retina Display is the most important feature because once you go Retina you can't go back (which is also true), and another might argue that once you use Touch ID on your iPhone, you immediately want it on your iPad. So we're just going to weight them equally.)

So if we're weighting them equally, it doesn't make a lot of sense to get the iPad mini 3 then. For $50 you get two huge features, and for an additional $100 you get one huge feature. 

Let's throw the iPad Air in there now.

For the same price as the iPad mini 3, you get the iPad Air. It has the bigger screen, but loses Touch ID and the Gold color option.

For an extra $100, you can get the iPad Air 2 that's lighter than the iPad Air, thinner than all other iPads, has a laminated, antireflective display, Touch ID, a much better Camera, an A8X Processor (that's much faster than the A8 Processor found in the iPhone 6), and Touch ID.

That's when all this stops making sense. $100 in the iPad mini lineup gets you Touch ID, but $100 in the iPad Air lineup gets you a crap-ton of new stuff.

But how does Apple fix this lineup issue, you ask? Well, I can't answer that, but here's what I would do:

Drop the iPad mini. I know Apple wants to hit that all-new $249 price point, but it's not worth it when that device is just so bad compared to the rest of the lineup.

Bring the iPad mini 3 down to $349. The price difference between the iPad mini 2 and the iPad mini 3 should only be $50. It's the only thing that makes sense, given all you're getting is Touch ID.

Bring the iPad Air down to $349. It doesn't make sense to sell the iPad Air at just $100 less than the iPad Air 2 when it offers so much less. It also wouldn't make a lot of sense if the iPad Air was $50 more than the iPad mini 3.

So, to sum up, here's what my proposed iPad lineup would look like:

iPad mini 2 ($299)

iPad mini 3 ($349)

iPad Air ($349)

iPad Air 2 ($499)

It'd cost $50 more to go from an iPad mini 2 to iPad mini 3 and you'd get Touch ID, or you can ditch Touch ID in favor of the bigger screen and get the iPad Air, or you could pay $200 more for the iPad Air 2 (compared to the iPad mini 2) and get the best Apple has to offer.

Unfortunately we're probably going to be stuck with this lineup for another year, so this is all pointless speculation. I do hope Apple simplifies the lineup next year though and finally ditches all the 16 GB models for 32 GB ones.

Related Reading

"The iPad Air 2 (And a Few Cursory Words Regarding the iPad Mini 3)" by John Gruber

"Review: iPad Air 2 and iPad mini 3" by Jim Dalrymple

"On the 2014 iPad lineup" by Stephen Hackett

[shiningparadigm]

Revisiting The Past

It’s been a slow Apple news week so I thought I’d revisit some of my favorite posts on Shining Paradigm. I narrowed it down to just three:

Why I buy exclusively from the Mac App Store

Case for the iPod touch

The 128 GB iOS Device

I’m very proud of those three posts, and it’s been interesting looking back at them with a couple of years’ perspective. I’m also fascinated by how much my writing style has changed since.

Why I buy exclusively from the Mac App Store

[ Original Post | Linked on The Loop | Date: August 24, 2012 ]

This post was linked to by Jim Dalrymple of The Loop in August 2012, making it (by far) the most visited post on Shining Paradigm.

It started when I read Matt Gemmell’s discussion about releasing apps on the Mac App Store. It was an exhaustive list of pros and cons, but it missed the one reason I bought exclusively from the Mac App Store at the time:

At least in this part of the world, buying from the Mac App Store isn’t a preference. It’s the only way.

I was talking about in Ghana where we don’t have Credit Cards. I, like many others I know, used to stock up on iTunes Store Gift Cards to buy apps from the App Stores on Mac and iOS, and this hasn’t changed.

Even now in America, where I have and actively use a Credit Card, I still buy my apps exclusively from the Mac App Store because it’s become a habit and I love the convenience of having my entire Purchase History in a centralized place, amongst the other reasons Matt mentioned.

Back to top

Case for the iPod touch

[ Original Post | Linked by 512 Pixels | Date: September 05, 2012 ]

This post started when I read Stephen Hackett’s roundup of the current state of the iPod. In particular, I was unsettled by the bit on the iPod touch.

I started to remember my initial exposure to iOS devices: I had an iPod touch back when I couldn’t get the iPhone in Ghana because Apple didn’t sell it unlocked, and it really warmed me up to the Apple and iOS ecosystem.

From 2008–2010, I used an iPod touch (first the 2nd Generation, then the 3rd Generation) because I couldn’t yet afford an iPhone and it was definitely out of the budget my dad set for me. (Remember, I was 13 at the time, and there weren’t any Factory Unlocked iPhones around so getting them to work Ghana was a hassle).

In 2010, my iPod touch was stolen. I was planning on replacing it, but then Apple announced the iPhone 4 before any plans could materialise. My dad was away for business in Hong Kong, so I checked and noticed they were being sold Unlocked there. I made sure I had enough money saved up, and then asked my dad to get me one.

I also got myself my first Mac when I got the iPhone 4, and the rest is history. I’ve had every iteration of the iPhone since, three iPads, and I’m typing this on a maxed-out MacBook Pro with Retina Display. I’m unarguably fully-entrenched in the Apple ecosystem now, and it all came about via the Halo Effect instigated by the iPod touch.

Unfortunately, that post went out in September 2012 and since then the iPod touch has gone from the A4 to the A5 processor while the iPhone 6 currently sports an A8 processor. Apple’s already killed the iPod Classic and with the iPod lineup representing so little of Apple’s revenue these days, it’s no wonder the iPod touch hasn’t been getting any attention whatsoever.

However, I still hold on to my original argument:

Apple have an advantage here with the iPod touch: a lot of kids who are too young to own an iPhone, Android phone or a Windows 8 phone might get the iPod touch instead to satisfy their other needs (Music, Apps, etc.). There aren’t any mainstream Android or Windows Phone 8 devices that do that, so these kids are undoubtedly going to get an iPod touch. It’s their introduction to iOS; maybe even to Apple, and with the level of competition in the market today it’s in Apple’s best interest to make that initial experience as appealing as possible, so these kids opt for iPhones (and other Apple devices, following ‘the Halo Effect’) when they grow up.

I mean, it’s what happened to me…

Back to top

The 128 GB iOS Device

[ Original Post | Date: October 11, 2012 ]

I posted this in October 2012, 5 months before Apple released a 128 GB iPad. Back then, I wanted a high-capacity device for 2 reasons: my Music Library, and my Camera Roll.

Music Library

I’ve always preferred to have my entire iTunes Music Library on my device. I obviously don’t listen to all my music all the time — I have well over 10,000 songs — but it’s more a ‘you never know when’ sort of thing.

These days I use iTunes Match so I still have my entire library on my iPhone (and iPad and Mac) but very little is actually stored on the device- it’s streamed from iCloud. Even better, if you listen to a song a lot then your phone automatically caches it so you can listen to it when you’re offline without using up your data allowance.

iTunes Match syncs my Music, Playlists, Play Counts, etc. automatically and seamlessly, and I couldn’t be happier with it.

Camera Roll

Back then my Camera Roll used to take up the other half of my storage but with the rapid improvements Apple has made to the iPhone camera, those hi-res pictures alone can fill up your storage.

I had a 64 GB iPhone 5s last month and although all my music was stored in iCloud, it still had no space left thanks to the 20–30 GB of photos sitting in my Camera Roll. I could back this up to my Mac, of course, but I gave up on manually syncing stuff long ago. (I have literally never connected my iPhone 5s or iPhone 6 to iTunes on my Mac.)

At WWDC this year, Apple announced iCloud Photo Library which should store all your pictures in iCloud. It takes up your iCloud storage so I don’t expect everyone to use it (since you only get 5 GB of that for free) but I’ve already bought 200 GB iCloud storage in anticipation. If I could have all my pictures freed from my device and placed in iCloud, joining my music library, I could theoretically get by with a 32 GB device (even though those don’t exist anymore).

As it stands, both my iPhone and iPad are 128 GB. If all goes well, by this time next year, I could make do with a much smaller one and save a few hundred bucks along the way.

Back to top