With the release this week of Final Cut Pro X, both Final Cut Studio and Final Cut Express have been replaced by a new version of Apple’s video editing software.
In addition to a new interface and new features, Final Cut Pro X is distributed solely through the Mac App Store for $299.99, a price much lower than the previous version of Final Cut Studio Pro and only a little more than Final Cut Express. Companion applications Motion and Compressor are also available through the App Store at $49.99 each.
Reviews by Final Cut users are mixed as they get used to the new interface. Some features expected in Final Cut Pro X are not yet available and Apple has already said they expect to use Mac App Store updating to add more features soon.
So many of the games in the app store are imitations of the arcade games of the 70s and 80s. So why not play the originals? With the free Atari’s Greatest Hits app comes with Missile Command, and you can buy many different games at 99 cents for groups of four including some of my favorites like Battle Zone and Star Raiders.
The Inspector window is the key to accessing most advanced features of Pages. But you can sometimes find yourself rapidly switching between tabs in the Inspector. You can open up more than one Inspector window by holding down the option key when you click on a tab icon at the top of it. This would allow you, for instance, to see the Text Inspector and the Metrics Inspector at the same time. Or all Inspectors at once if you prefer.
“Tomorrow will be iCloudy with a chance of Snow Leopard.”
“There’s something different about his forecasts ever since we switched to Macs.”
While unlocked iPhones have been available for years in other countries, Apple has finally started selling them in America. An unlocked iPhone can be used on AT&T’s network without a 2-year plan, on T-Mobile with the slower Edge network, or taken overseas to use on other carriers. They will not work with CDMA carriers like Verizon. Other GSM carriers may also now be able to offer service to the owners of unlocked iPhones.
You’ll need to pay a premium for these unlocked iPhones with prices starting at $650. Models with a plan from AT&T or Verizon are cheaper as they have been subsidized by the carriers.
DropBox and services like it have become very important to Mac and PC users. If you have an iPhone or iPad, you can get the free DropBox app and have access to your files on your iOS device as well. You can view documents, of course. But you can also upload photos and even save email attachments.
If you are sending an email that has an image as an attachment, look at the bottom right corner of the message window in Mail before sending. If the image isn’t already small you will have options there to shrink the image before sending.
1976
Woz: “I’d be happy to give my design of the Apple Computer to HP.”
HP: “No thanks.”
2011
Jobs: “Today we announce the plans for the new Apple Headquarters, built where HP used to be.”
This week Mac and iOS developers gathered in San Francisco for Apple’s annual Worldwide Developers Conference. On Monday Steve Jobs and other Apple executives talked about the upcoming releases of Mac OS X Lion, iOS 5, and the new iCloud Service.
Lion will be released in July and sold exclusively as a download in the Mac App Store for $29.99. The new OS will change how the desktop, spaces and applications work with a new Mission Control feature that will make moving between tasks more like iOS. There will also be autosaving, versioning and resuming functions as well as an updated Mail application.
One of the most useful features of Apple Mail, often overlooked by many, is that you can reply with only a small selection of quoted text, rather than quoting the entire email. Before hitting the Reply button, simply select some text in the message. Then only that selected text will be quoted in the reply. This comes in handy when you are replying to a single question in a longer email.
Pages is great for creating and formatting documents. But when you just want to write — and really concentrate on the writing — many writers turn to a simpler plain text editor. iA Writer is that app for the iPad. You can sync with Dropbox, and there is even a special keyboard with buttons more suited for writing.
“Now that I’ve dropped it in the snow, I’m thinking it was a bad time to switch to the white iPhone.”
