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.Mac Update on Jan 10th

.Mac Bandwith

Some people have been talking about iDisk being too slow, and if feature length films will be added and using iDisk to transfer them, way too slow. But if you all recall, about 4 days ago in the .Mac acount settings it said that the bandwith had been raised to some outrageous amount, and then about 1 hour later it went back to how it had previously been. Well, someone probably goofed up and that wasn't meant to be up until the 10th. They are probably gonna make the bandwith much faster after MacWorld so this can be done with long video clips. They will all probably increase the size of iDisk so it can hold Movies, or possibly there will be an option for a larger iDisk for holding movies, music, pictures, and any other type of large files.
 
spyderracer393 said:
Some people have been talking about iDisk being too slow
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Yup, forgetting bandwidth for the moment, if I use iDisk syncing (as in keeping a copy of the iDisk on your computer), I get huge delays whenever a save prompt scans the computer. Annoying, as i'd prefer to use it that way.
 
Been a .Mac user for 3 years now.Any improvement will be good!

And Welcome all you Newbies!! Haven't seen so many users in quit a long time..

This is what happens when Apple goes Intel eh?
 
Yvan256 said:
That's one thing I hate about .Mac... Why can't two (or more) machines sync themselves together without some external help? :mad:
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Software needs to be written to handle and store the indexes and perform conflict resolution. Not only that, the two machines need to be on and accessible to each other.

Also, when I'm away from home with my PowerBook, I like being able to update my address book, calendar, etc., and synching right away, knowing my Mac at home will automatically pick up the changes when it synchs. I don't have to open a firewall and leave my home machine on to perform the sync and I don't have to remember to do it when I get back home.

But anyone who thinks it should be easy, why doesn't one of you write a synching utility and sell it as shareware. You should make a lot of money if it really is a desired feature.
 
The new Apple Mail Beta?

This means nothing but I thought it was funny - In the Yahoo keynote speach they have this cheesy user testimonial video at 5:35 seconds in and the guy screws up and says "The New Apple Mail Beta..." He was supposed to say "Yahoo" but he clearly says "Apple" - I can't believe the editor didn't catch that! Please tell me I miss heard, but I listen to it like 5 times because I couldn't believe it. Right after he says this they also have screen shots of Safari, which also means nothing...but you tell can tell what is REALLY on everyone's minds :D

here's the link to the keynote it is second one down.

http://www.pcmag.com/category2/0,1874,1907609,00.asp#
 
Nooo!

I thought the Keynote was on the 9th, I got all excited, this happens to me every year...I always get the dates messed up, ugh! >_<!!

And for .Mac to be down that long...come on that's crazy!! I mean 2 hours while they fix one section is one thing...but, everything?! Down for 5 hours? Oh that'll be fun...Not checking my e-mail or accessing my iDisk will be horrible. I don't know why it has to take this long this is crazy...I guess I'll have to wait until the 9th...err....10th, to see what changes they made are worthwhile...:rolleyes:
 
spyderracer393 said:
Some people have been talking about iDisk being too slow, and if feature length films will be added and using iDisk to transfer them, way too slow. But if you all recall, about 4 days ago in the .Mac acount settings it said that the bandwith had been raised to some outrageous amount, and then about 1 hour later it went back to how it had previously been. Well, someone probably goofed up and that wasn't meant to be up until the 10th. They are probably gonna make the bandwith much faster after MacWorld so this can be done with long video clips. They will all probably increase the size of iDisk so it can hold Movies, or possibly there will be an option for a larger iDisk for holding movies, music, pictures, and any other type of large files.
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Well bandwidth is one thing, having a speedy enough connection to access your iDisk is another. I have a cable modem and most of the time it's alright but, due to Cable Modems being the only high-speed connection option where I live it's flooded with users and can slow to a crawl at random anytime of the day. Even if you have Cable or DSL iDisk transfers can still be slow, if your upload is only 300-400k it won't make any difference what bandwidth your iDisk has, it'll still take a long time to upload files.

A lot of internet companies (mostly cable ones, although they almost never admit it) cap your maximum speed if they see that you've been downloading or uploading a lot of content. This is crazy and I can go on about how this is wrong for hours but, the main point is the iDisk could be faster if the iDisk servers were quicker and if our home broadband connections had a better upload speed. So upgrading the bandwidth is nice but, there's still a lot to be improved.
 
Finally!!

Finally, someone who can actually add up the values of what .mac really does, and agree that $8.25 a month is not really all that much to pay for it, if they are features you actually need! I own a web development company and still use .mac for my personal email and everything else it offers. Of course new features are great, but the current deal is pretty fair, especially if you do the family plan!!

tny said:
OS X is great for n00bs, but just with enough skill and knowing where to look, and what BSD libraries to compile and how to fiddle with window manager widgets, creating your own OS X-like operating system from existing free tools is fairly easy enough to do. I recompile apps every few weeks, so it's not that hard at all!

In all seriousness, $99/year (what, $8.25 a month) for synching built into the operating system, a backup program that can use up to 1 GB of online storage, webmail, web-based calendaring, easy to use web publishing, and a WebDAV-based file transfer point is a pretty decent deal. I pay it, and I also have separate webhosting ($25/month) for multiple domains and offsite storage of 6 GB ($14/month) from another vendor. It's all cheaper than my time: setting up synching between my Macs alone without .Mac would take at least long enough for me to earn back that $99 by doing job-related tasks.

That said, anyone who uses .Mac as their primary business communication channel is at best a hobbyist. $12/month for a decent hosting service is pretty easy to find, and if your business isn't earning you enough money to justify spending $12/month, you probably don't have enough volume to worry about your .Mac email being down for a few hours.
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Stella said:
If .Mac is going to be used for full length content then Apple had better increase the speed of iDisk, otherwise such content will be unplayable, or, wait a week and the content may just have downloaded to your local machine.

iDisk is so unbelievably slow, don't even think about the iDisk Sync feature - I gave up using that the day they announced it. Sad thing is, Apple have done nothing to improve performance.
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I gave up on iDisk Syncing ages ago. Apple Support sincerely tried to help me, but for whatever reason there were errors syncing they couldn't figure out and I just gave up. It was really slow as well. Hopefully a major upgrade will mean better performance.

adamfilip said:
well.

regardless of what time its done.. its night somewhere in the world and regular business hours too.

the US isnt the centre of the universe. even tho apple is based there
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Last time .Mac was down for an extended period, it was during business hours in Asia. I remember a lot of people complaining. Now it'll be during business hours in the Americas. I guess this shows that Apple doesn't (always) think the US is the center of the universe.

highpass said:
Unimportant i know, but whatever happened to the promised .Mac widgets?
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Apparently we're the only two people who care about this anymore. The .mac site clearly promised exclusive widgets, but they never came out with any. I think they had no idea widgets would be so popular, and probably the widgets they had in the works were quickly made by some third party and done better than what they had in store.

I personally think after the announcements on the Intel Mac mini, the Intel iBook, the Plasma displays, the new iPod shuffle, iLife with iWeb, Leopard, Asteroid, and iPod invisa all available for immediate purchase :eek: :D the "one more thing" will be "We FINALLY have a new .Mac exclusive widget as promised." :p

PS Then again, we were promised 3 GHz Power Macs how long ago... ;)
 
autrefois said:
I personally think after the announcements on the Intel Mac mini, the Intel iBook, the Plasma displays, the new iPod shuffle, iLife with iWeb, Leopard, Asteroid, and iPod invisa all available for immediate purchase :eek: :D the "one more thing" will be "We FINALLY have a new .Mac exclusive widget as promised." :p

PS Then again, we were promised 3 GHz Power Macs how long ago... ;)
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"oh yeah - I almost forgot - even another one more thing - 3lb 15" Intel PowerBooks w/ built in iSight and 16x SuperDrives"
 
Norse Son said:
Another thing that I'd love to see in .Mac is the ability to boot from a MacOS X Tiger "image" on Apple's servers, so that I can perform some repairs & maintenance on my Mac - I know, that's what your startup DVD/CD is for.
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I don't think that's technically possible with current hardware. NetBoot only works on a local LAN.
 
boombashi said:
here's the link to the keynote it is second one down.

http://www.pcmag.com/category2/0,1874,1907609,00.asp#
Click to expand...

can't get the keynote to play, tried 3-4 times and it freezes at same stage in the introduction. this is always frustrating when the experts can't make work the systems the rest of us are looking forward to.

at least one of the other segments, though, loaded and played correctly--the daily news report.

terry
 
I sure hope Apple doesn't tie a feature-length film digital download service to .Mac (as has been rumored). If they do, they should provide some way of using a free .Mac account for that purpose alone. I don't want to pay $99 (or even the rumored decrease to $69) to use .Mac. I did use iTools before it became .Mac, but because it was free.
 
Cubert said:
I sure hope Apple doesn't tie a feature-length film digital download service to .Mac (as has been rumored). If they do, they should provide some way of using a free .Mac account for that purpose alone. I don't want to pay $99 (or even the rumored decrease to $69) to use .Mac. I did use iTools before it became .Mac, but because it was free.
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What if you got unlimited movie downloads (up to 1TB) AND the current .Mac services for $99 a year? Now that would be a deal...
 
autrefois said:
What if you got unlimited movie downloads (up to 1TB) AND the current .Mac services for $99 a year? Now that would be a deal...
Click to expand...

The thing that worries me about this idea is that it suggests that Apple is moving toward a subsciption service for movies; why is a pay-once-listen-forever model good for iTunes, but a subscription service (or worse, pay-per-view) better for movies?
 
tny said:
The thing that worries me about this idea is that it suggests that Apple is moving toward a subsciption service for movies; why is a pay-once-listen-forever model good for iTunes, but a subscription service (or worse, pay-per-view) better for movies?
Click to expand...
Your analogy is flawed. If it followed the iTunes model your account would be charged every time any accessed your iDisk, every time you emailed, every time you accessed a dotMac group, etc... (assuming this is the movie through .Mac rumor).
 
I think the only reason they are doing it at the same time as the Keynote is because it will be something good and fairly significant. If they try to do this early, things like iWeb get leaked, even when they show up for a nano second on the web. If they do it later, Jobs can't say available now.
 
Diatribe said:
The last time it was down that long, they added a huge amount of space.

So I'm guessing at least more space. Combine that with the rumored price drop to $69 and you have yourself a nice upgrade. Though I still think more is coming.
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what about current users who paid the $100, do we get a refund.. :(
 
rtdunham said:
can't get the keynote to play, tried 3-4 times and it freezes at same stage in the introduction. this is always frustrating when the experts can't make work the systems the rest of us are looking forward to.

at least one of the other segments, though, loaded and played correctly--the daily news report.

terry
Click to expand...

They use Windows Media Player - of course it doesn't work correctly :D
 
bignumbers said:
Putting aside whatever features they might be adding, a five hour downtime window during regular business hours for much of the US is a very bad thing
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Yeah, if I was ever thinking of getting a .Mac account this decides it for me. They don't know how to sysadmin their .Mac cluster.

Yvan256 said:
All I ask is to be able to sync my PowerBook from my Mac mini, go on vacation, work, get back home and sync my PowerBook back to my Mac mini. That's far less than what .Mac does.
Click to expand...

Funny that Windows can do this but .Mac is still pay-for-service. That's ballsy on Apple's part.

adamfilip said:
well.

regardless of what time its done.. its night somewhere in the world and regular business hours too.

the US isnt the centre of the universe. even tho apple is based there
Click to expand...

It's a matter of inconveniencing the smallest number of users.

If they were smart they'd group their users on servers by either mailing address or statistically based on their usage patterns (best). Then they can upgrade servers to minimize user disruptions.

Assuming they even care - I guess I'd rather assume they don't care than they're incompetent.

hayesk said:
I don't think that's technically possible with current hardware. NetBoot only works on a local LAN.
Click to expand...

Only because it relies on a DHCP reply to tell it where to look up the boot server information.

A firmware update to hold down A during boot could pre-populate those numbers, assuming a DHCP reply on local net with an addr. so it can route out.
 
ALoveSupreme said:
Hi,

although it is a bit off topic, here is the link to the earlier metioned Yahoo CES keynote....And the guy in the video does indeed say "the new apple mail beta"...
:eek: :D
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Yeah, I know I originally posted that off topic but let me bring it back on topic - what if this guy IS actually a beta tester for a new iWeb mail .mac application that is designed to compete with gmail, and yahoo mail...everyone likes the webmail applications, although I havn't used .mac mail in forever, I'm sure it doesn't have as much functionality as gmail - make it better and give it away, pleeeeease...sorry for the people that paid for .mac, but maybe they will give you a refund.
 
Important Question

Does anyone thing that with these upgrades that they will change the price of .mac. I'm not currently a member and I'm wondering if I should "get in" before htey up the price and services. I only have a powerbook and haven't found a enough benefits to be a .mac member in the past so what do you guys think?
 
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