Currently I have a Macbook Pro and also have an iMac on order – I’m a big fan on Macs. But I do know that choosing the right Mac for you can be difficult. This article should help to make the decision easier for you.

The first thing you need to think about is whether you want a laptop or a desktop computer. This depends on what you require in terms of portability. For example, if you’re going to be bringing your computer around quite a lot, it’s best to buy a laptop. If it’s going to be kept in one place all of the time, getting a desktop computer is probably the best option (As you will get more power from a desktop computer). Of course Apple are doing their best to put as much power into their laptops as possible.

Now the second thing to look at is your budget of course. The price of Apple’s computers vary quite a lot – Varying from around £500 to several thousands of pounds. If you have a lot of money to spend, you’re likely to get a more powerful computer that is much quicker. You can still get a decent computer with a small budget, though. I would recommend trying to invest as much money as possible into one of Apple’s computers as they should last you for many years to come unlike other computers.

The third thing to look at is what you’ll be using your Mac for. For example, if you’re only going to be using your Mac for basic activities such as browsing the internet and checking e-mails, then a less-powerful Mac may be the correct option for you. If, on the other hand, you’re going to complete more complex, memory-intensive tasks on your Mac such as video editing, then you’re really going to need to look at more powerful Macs. If you think that you’re going to need more power in future, it’s probably best to pay more now and buy the more powerful Mac to save you having to buy a whole new Mac in the future.

To help you out even further, below I will provide you information on which Mac you should buy depending on different circumstances.

Mac Mini
Desktop computer
Low budget
Not very powerful – Basic tasks only
Small, sleek computer
Price in USD: $599

iMac
Desktop computer
Reasonable budget
Fairly Powerful
All-In-One computer
Price in USD: $1199

Mac Pro
Desktop computer
High budget
Very powerful!
Price in USD: $2499

MacBook
Laptop computer
Reasonable budget
Reasonably powerful
Sleek design
Price in USD: $999

MacBook Pro
Laptop computer
Reasonable budget
Powerful
Great design, great display
Price in USD: $1199

MacBook Air
Laptop computer
Rather high budget
Not very powerful
Very slim design!
Price in USD: $1499

In conclusion, I hope this guide has helped you to decide which Mac computer you should buy. It all depends on whether you want a laptop or desktop, your budget and what sort of tasks you wish to complete on your new Mac computer.

I was contacted several days ago by a company who wanted my opinion on their iPad Accessories. I have now received some of their accessories and thought it would be good to give my feedback, incase you’re in need of accessories for your new iPad product.

The accessories I received were from iPad Covers and I am reviewing the Flexishield Skin and Flip Case.

First of all I will start off with the Flexishield Skin. It is made from a tough gel – It’s very flexible and feels quite strong. This should mean that it will last for a long time. It currently retails for £9.95, which is actually a pretty good price to stop the back of your iPad from getting damaged. Also, the size of it is very good as it fits the iPad perfectly.

Probably the best feature of the Flexishield Skin is that you still have full functionality when using it. This is because at the bottom of the case, there are small gaps which allows you to plug in a charger and headphones and still make full use of the iPad with it on.

In my opinion, there is only one downside to this product. Unfortunately, it only protects the back of the iPad which leaves the front of the iPad wide-open. Luckily, Mobile Fun also sell a screen protector separately which should prevent this from happening so it isn’t that much of a problem.

Now let’s take a look at the second product, the Flip Case.

After my first glance at this product, I could tell that this case was of a good quality. The case is made of a good quality leather which feels very durable. Retailing for just £5 more than the Flexishield Skin (£14.95), this is definitely the case to buy if you’re looking for one.

The case has a small magnetic strap which keeps the case closed, but once removed, the case flips open to unveil the iPad. Again, your iPad will fit perfectly into this case. It will also be very secure because of the very protective leather covering the back AND the front.

One very clever and unique feature about this case is that it provides small pockets inside of the case. You could use this to hold items such as business cards or bank cards, which is definitely very useful for those people who have more items to store.

As with the Flexishield Skin, this case also provides unrestrictive access to your iPad due to the small gaps at the bottom, which allow you to charge your iPad as well as having headphones plugged into it.

In conclusion, if you’re looking for an iPad cover or case, you should definitely consider either one of these products. The Flip Case is definitely my favourite of the two and I will be using it myself, but the Flexishield Skin is also a very good product at a slightly lower cost.

Hi everyone,

My Web Host had a server problem which lead to me losing ALL of my data. For that reason, I had to revert to an old backup made last month, which means that quite a lot of comments and posts will currently be missing.

I will do my best to retrieve the posts that were lost, unfortunately the comments will be lost, however.

If you made an important comment anytime after the 19th April 2010, please feel free to post it again.

Thanks,
Jake.

Although quite a few iPhone users may not use tethering, some people (including me) do. Tethering is the process of sending the internet connection from the iPhone to a computer (PC or Mac) for the computer to use. For example, if you’re on holiday and wish to use the internet, you could use tethering to send the 3G connection from the iPhone for your laptop to use. The main problem with tethering is that on quite a few networks, including the one I’m on, make you have to pay for it. Personally, I refuse to pay for it and thus I created this guide to show you how you can set it all up completely free of charge!

Now this method is a bit risky so be cautious when use it, and use it at your own discretion.

The first step in this guide is to generate a mobileconfig file. This is a hack file which installs on your iPhone to enable this tethering support without any payment required. Unfortunately, you have to generate one yourself since each one is different depending on your phone network. However, it’s easy to do so. Simply go to MobileConfig Generator. It’s probably best to select the option to e-mail it to you, with an e-mail address that you can access on your iPhone. That makes it much easier to install.

Once you’ve sent it to your e-mail address through that website, go into your iPhone, download your e-mails and then open up the attachment. Now you should have the option to install the profile. Install it and ignore the warnings it gives you. After you’ve done it, reboot your iPhone.

Now, this is the part when you setup the free tethering for your iPhone. Once your iPhone has booted back up, go into Settings –> General –> Tethering. Very easy to do from here, simply enable the tethering.

The final step is to prepare your computer. There are two ways you can use tethering – Via USB or via bluetooth. Personally, I prefer to use USB because it should be faster than bluetooth for obvious reasons, but I’ll explain both.

If you wish to use USB, simply connect your iPhone to your computer with the Apple connection wire. From here, your computer should detect it as a new internet network. I’m not totally sure on how it works on Windows, but at least on my Macbook Pro it managed to find it and I simply enabled the network and it started working. Once you’ve done this, tethering should now be fully working!

If you wish to use bluetooth, you need to enable the bluetooth on your iPhone first of all. You can do this in the iPhone settings. Then, you need to enable the bluetooth on your computer. Afterwards, on your computer, search for your iPhone device and try to connect to it. I can’t really give a guide to this as it’ll be different with every computer, but once you’ve connected via bluetooth, you should be able to get the tethering working.

In conclusion, if you wish to use tethering on your iPhone for free, this guide should work very well. I followed the same process and it worked wonders for me, so it should also work for you without problems.

Well it’s taken Apple a long time to finally announce the prices of their latest product the Apple iPad, for the United Kingdom. The iPad has been released for over a month in the United States now and has been a huge success, which has unfortunately led to the delay of the iPad’s worldwide launch. Luckily, it seems Apple now have enough supplies to meet worldwide demand!

On the 28th May, the iPad is to be released in nine countries – Australia, Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, Spain, Switzerland and of course the United Kingdom. Pre-orders for the iPad will start on the 10th May in all of these countries, so it’s recommended that if you’re interested in purchasing one that you pre-order on this date because demand is expected to be high to match the success in the United States.

Apple have also planned to release the iPad in more countries in July – Including Austria, Belgium, Hong Kong, Ireland, Luxembourg, Mexico, Netherlands, New Zealand and Singapore. No specific dates regarding pre-orders or the release dates have been announced for these countries as of yet.

In the United Kingdom, the prices were indeed announced. They’re fairly high prices for what it actually is. Let’s take a look at the prices:

Wi-Fi Model

• 16GB Model – £429
• 32GB Model – £499
• 64GB Model – £599

3G Model

• 16GB Model – £529
• 32GB Model – £599
• 64GB Model – £699

If you’re wanting the 3G model, you’ll also have to pay the monthly data plan from your provider. In the United Kingdom, you’ll have to choose from Orange, O2 and Vodafone – But none of them have provided pricing information on their data plans as of yet.

In conclusion, if you’re wanting to buy an iPad, you won’t have to pay exceptionally high prices but the price is still pretty big – For the same amount of money you could purchase a reasonably-powerful laptop. It does depend on what you want to use it for, though.

Recently, I managed to collect the money to buy a nice new laptop. What did I choose to buy? The Macbook Pro of course! It just arrived today so I thought I’d write a review on it, to allow you to decide whether you should buy one or not. Just to note, I am writing this review whilst on my Macbook Pro.

For those of you with curious minds, I shall list the specifications:

2.53Ghz Core 2 Duo Processor
15.4 inch Display
250GB Hard Drive
256MB Graphics

Yeah, it is the old version. I thought that the old one would be fine for me since the new ones really don’t have much changes. Also to note, this is my first Mac.

Now let’s take a look at the first aspect of it – The cost. Most people who have looked to buy a new laptop have seen the price of the Macbook Pro, scaring them off. I do agree, the price of the Macbook Pro is staggeringly high as with all of the Mac range. For most people, the Macbook Pro is out of their budget. Not only do Apple rip you off with the main product, but accessories are also very expensive. For example, my Macbook Pro came with a US charger (Since it’s American) so I had to buy an extra UK charger, which cost £60! Apple really need to review their pricing.

Secondly, let’s take a look at the design. This is definitely the best feature of the Macbook Pro. It looks very sleek and has been produced from a single block of aluminium, which has put a very smooth feel and look to the laptop. The display is absolutely fantastic too, the colours are very bright and look really good. It is very glossy, however, which could be a problem for some people. Another good thing about the design is the keyboard on it. It’s a very nice-looking keyboard which makes it easy to type quickly. When it’s dark, the keyboard lights up with backlit-LEDs to make sure you can still type effectively. There is also a trackpad with no buttons, which works perfectly, although it does take a bit of getting used to.

Next, let’s review the battery life. Apple claim to be able to offer around 7 – 8 hours of battery life for their 15 inch and 17 inch Macbook Pro’s. For their 13 inch Macbook Pro’s, it should be able to push up to a huge 10 hour battery life. This is a remarkable achievement. So far, my battery life doesn’t seem as high as that but it certainly is lasting a long time. The battery life is probably being reduced due to a lot of program installations, music, open applications and a movie being played. I’m very impressed with this aspect of the Macbook Pro.

Furthermore, we shall look at the packaging of the Macbook Pro. This is probably not the most important thing to look at for most people but I always like my products to be packaged nicely. I wasn’t disappointed. The packaging for the Macbook Pro is very small and is very easy to use – It looks very simple. In the package, you get the Macbook Pro (obviously), the charger, installation and backup disks, the manual, a display cleaning cloth as well as some apple stickers! These have all been packaged together very well.

In conclusion, if you’re wondering whether to invest in a Macbook Pro, I highly recommend it. The price tag is very high but it’s worth it. It’s a great looking laptop which is easy to use and lasts for a long time which you probably won’t have any issues with. One thing I have forgotten to mention is that I do recommend purchasing AppleCare with it. It’s another expensive addon but repairs on Macbook Pro’s can be expensive (Some even require a complete purchase of a new one) so in the long run, you may be saving a LOT of money.

Thank you for reading my review! If you have anything to say, feel free to use the comments section to drop me a comment.

With the growing popularity of both Apple’s and Google’s smartphones, Microsoft have decided to compete in this market with their new Microsoft Kin smartphones – With a main focus on social features. The Kin phones have 3 different social features aspects to them. The first one is called “Kin Loop”, which aggregates different social networking feeds such as from Twitter, Facebook and Myspace and puts them into a single portal. The second one is called “Kin Spot”, which allows users to easily and quickly share images, videos, status updates and location information by simply dragging that information to an area of the phone named “The Spot”. Finally, the third aspect is called “Kin Studio”, which ensures that everything created on the phone, such as photos and videos, are stored in the cloud, making them accessible to anything with an internet browser.

The new Kin smartphones have a slide-out qwerty keyboard with a touchscreen too, which is to be expected in this market due to the high demand for touchscreens smartphones.

What is interesting is that these Microsoft Kin phones will not be running on Microsoft’s Windows 7 Series software for phones, which is rather strange – Why wouldn’t Microsoft use their own operating system on their own phone?

Currently, there are two devices in development, named the Kin One and the Kin Two (Very creative names). Although there hasn’t been many specific information released by Microsoft, it is known that the smaller device, the Kin One, does have an impressive 5 megapixel camera whilst the larger device, the Kin Two, has an 8 megapixel – Which can take HD video. The Kin Two also has a larger screen, larger keyboard and more storage capacity.

It seems Microsoft were attempting to target the younger generation with their Kin smartphones as not only is social features the main focus of the phone, but the cameras are also developed to take good quality photos in low lighting conditions which many phones these days fail with.

Pricing information will be announced closer to the release date, Microsoft say. The release date is actually very close, with Microsoft saying that it will be available in the US market in just several weeks on the Verizon network. However, users in other countries will have to wait much longer as the Kin One and Kin Two is to be released on the Vodafone network in Germany, Italy, Spain and the United Kingdom sometime in Autumn of this year.

The big question surrounding this is whether or not the Kin smartphones will actually be able to compete against large companies such as Apple and Google. Microsoft have been in the mobile phone industry for nearly a decade but it has always failed to get a significant market share, so will they be able to manage it now? We’ll have to see. They may struggle to compete with Apple’s iPhone due to the lack of ability to download applications and games, which is a very big let-down.

Yesterday, Apple released information about iPhone OS 4.0 – Which promises to add nearly 100 new features to the already-popular iPhone and iPod touch.

This new OS software release also prepares us for the new iPhone to be released, which speculators state should be announced by the end of June 2010. Unfortunately, we iPhone and iPod Touch users have to wait until the summer to get our hands on iPhone OS 4.0.

The biggest feature announcement that was made in the conference yesterday was the ability to multi-task. This is something that many users have been waiting for for a long time and should have been implemented from the start. It’s great that we finally get to use this – Well, some people do. Only iPhone 3GS and the latest iPod Touch users can handle multi-tasking, which means users like me with the iPhone 3G cannot use this great new feature. Very disappointing.

There are two other surprising announcements from Apple – First of all, they announced the iAd advertising platform. Apple are now trying to become a massive mobile advertising player with this network, whether it will succeed or not is another matter. The next surprise addition is the Apple Game Centre, which some people are comparing to the likes of Sony’s Playstation Network. However, can Apple really make an effective gaming network on devices such as an iPhone or iPod Touch?

Another nifty feature is the ability to group applications into folders. For example, if you want to categorise applications together – Maybe in groups such as games, social networking, tools etc… then you can now create folders for these to make it much easier to find the applications that you wish to use, saving you from having to scroll across the many pages of applications on the iPhone or iPod Touch.

The features mentioned are just a small fraction on what is to be changed in the iPhone OS 4.0. There was quite a lot of decent updates in this release and that’s what I like to here, but still, it is disappointing that Apple are trying to “leave it’s older models behind” by removing some functionality in this release. I of course will be updating, though.

The Flip MinoHD has now been released in the United States for several months and has proved to be quite popular. However, the Flip MinoHD has only just been given a release date for here in the United Kingdom. First of all though, let’s take a look at some of the specifications.

The Flip MinoHD has a very sleek look like the rest of Flip’s products. It’s also very simple to operate – Simply turn it on with the power button and then press the red button to start recording HD video and press it again to stop recording. That is about as simple as it gets, which really helps if you aren’t the best at using cameras and just want something that is quick and easy to use.

It also has a data storage capacity of 4GB, which means that you can get around 60 minutes of video recorded. That isn’t a lot if you think about it but then again, the quality of the video that the Flip MinoHD can take is fantastic. For example, it records in 720p HD at resolution 1280×720 pixels, which is much much higher than most small HD cameras. It’s very impressive for a small gadget like the Flip MinoHD.

It of course does also have a zoom feature. It can zoom up into 2x, which isn’t really recommended because you can see a huge difference in quality by doing so. For this reason, it’s probably best if you just try to get closer to the place you’re trying to video record, if you want a high quality video.

One thing we have yet to mention is the screen size. It’s only 1.5 inch  which is really quite small and can make it difficult to playback your videos and watch them whilst still on the MinoHD – But you can still have a quick look through the videos and delete the low quality videos. You should probably wait until you can get access to your computer so you can transfer the videos over if you want to watch them properly.

The final point to look at with the Flip MinoHD is that it is quite similar to the iPhone in a way – The battery cannot be removed and it must be charged by USB. This is quite frustrating, because you cannot charge the device if you don’t have access to a computer. What most people prefer is to be able to charge it through an ordinary power plug which would allow them to use it much more frequently.

In conclusion, despite the annoying charging problem, the Flip MinoHD is a very good quality camera. It will be released in the United Kingdom on April 8th 2010 for around £180 so I recommend that if you’re looking for an easy to use camera that is both affordable and of a good quality, you should definitely consider purchasing the Flip MinoHD. You won’t regret it.

If you’re currently in the United Kingdom, the highest connection speed you can currently get is through Virgin Media. They offer 3 different packages – 10Mb/s, 20Mb/s and 50Mb/s. They already have plans to release a 100Mb/s connection by the end of the year, which will blast all of it’s competitors out of the water.

This 100Mb/s connection has and is currently being tested in specific locations in the United Kingdom. I believe Kent is one of the chosen demo’d locations. Unfortunately, I don’t live there and so haven’t been able to test it (I’m on the highest package available publicly, 50Mb/s). I’m not sure what the people of Kent think of it so far.

However, they just announced today that starting tomorrow, they will be testing out an even quicker connection – 200Mb/s! This is a huge improvement and will provide ultra quick internet! Once again, it’s only going to be demo’d in specific locations until the public release. The chosen destination for the demo’ing of the 200Mb/s internet is Coventry, I believe. Unfortunately, Virgin Media couldn’t give any details on when this package would be available to it’s consumers around the country.

It’s really quite amazing at the speed that internet is increasing at. In the United Kingdom at least, Virgin Media seem to be leading the progression. I’m not quite sure on the speeds people are able to get around the world, but I do believe that places such as the United States and Japan may already connections at this speed. Lucky you.

The Government in the United Kingdom are also considering funding the development of internet connections to try and give up to 90% of the United Kingdom access to the internet. Whether the funding will actually help this or not is another matter, however. What I can see firms doing with it is either taking it into their pockets or just spending it on making their internet speeds quicker to make packages more competitive, instead of spending it on trying to reach further parts of the countries.