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Hear Your iDevices’ Full Potential

Wednesday, December 21st, 2011 | Author: OWC Mike H.

Grado SR60Little known and less often written about is the sound quality that the iPhone 4, iPad, and the latest iPod touch are capable of outputting. Apple must’ve upgraded something in the hardware or software design because these iDevices can output near laptop quality sound. The only thing holding the iDevices’ sound quality back is a full blown custom equalizer, like that found in iTunes, which would allow you to “tune” your iDevice to sound as good as a dedicated CD transport. (Audiophiles debate that all you want. I’ve got my iTunes tuned to match my audiophile CD transport and I could A/B test anyone to guess the wrong source.)

The main point here is if your using the original headphones that came with your iDevice you’re missing out on all that yummy sound quality, and the difference is breathtaking. Article Continues…

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Teach your Mac New Things – Keep Your Software Up-To-Date.

Friday, December 9th, 2011 | Author: OWC Chris S.

Not everybody is running the “latest and greatest” versions of software. This is extra true when it’s something like Adobe Creative Suite, which can easily top a grand each time a new version comes out. While the extra features may be worth it to some (I absolutely love Photoshop CS5′s  ”Content Aware Fill”), it may not be as useful for others, and $1000+ is nothing to sneeze at.

Sometimes, though, all  you need is an incremental update to give you the features you need. OWC Customer Robert Scott wrote in to us to relay his story of just how true this is.

Robert was running Adobe Photoshop CS4 (11.0.0) under Tiger (OSX 10.4.11) on his 2007 Mac Pro. Unfortunately, Photoshop would disable OpenGL rendering with the stock nVidia GeForce 7300GT video card, which was unsupported. He replaced the GeForce with a refurbished Radeon X1900 XT (purchased from OWC), which allowed Photoshop to enable OpenGL rendering.

This worked great for several years until recently, when the Radeon started running extra hot, causing all sorts of striping on the screen, shutting down the displays at random, and causing hardware freezes.

Apparently, Robert had had enough, and he replaced the X1900 XT with the original GeForce, while preparing to pick up a Radeon HD 5770 to replace it. To his surprise, though, he found that OpenGL was still enabled. Apparently, either the latest version of Photoshop CS4 (11.0.2), the fact he’s now running OS X 10.6.8, or a combination of the two has now added support that was not there initially.

Now, everything is running great for Robert – OpenGL rendering with no striping, freezes or shutdowns – and it didn’t involve any extra expenses.

So what’s the lesson we’ve learned here? Keep up with your software updates for maximum compatibility and functionality; you may save yourself money down the line.

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Category: Tech Tips
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Take It from a Tech: RAID ≠ Proper Backup

Wednesday, November 16th, 2011 | Author: OWC Stephen

I thought that today I would try to clear up a misconception that I encounter fairly often on the topic of data storage. I’ll start with a couple of examples:

Say a customer is looking for a RAID solution like the NewerTech Guardian MAXimus to store their important information. It’s a fantastic product and certainly a wonderful solution for your backup or main storage, but here’s the important part: when I ask the customer if this is going to be a backup or their main storage, the response I sometimes hear is, “Well it’s a RAID, so doesn’t it back itself up?”

Another scenario that I have seen, unfortunately, is this. A customer calls in because their RAID has failed, and they are extremely distraught because all of their critical information is on it—tax documents, raw footage for a movie in production, irreplaceable family photos, dissertations, you name it. I’ll ask, once again, if this was their main storage or a backup, and I’ll hear back, “Well it was a RAID. That was the whole point!” Article Continues…

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AirPort Apparently Not The Best Place For Time Machine

Tuesday, November 15th, 2011 | Author: OWC Chris S.

We’ve gotten a couple of emails from readers wondering how to get Time Machine to work with an AirPort.

Well… theoretically, getting the DeLorean up to 88 miles per hour on a long stretch of tarmac would probably be fairly straightforward. Take a base 0-60 time of 8.8 seconds, factor acceleration curve for 60-88mph, account for deceleration while swerving around the occasional 747, and you’ll need about …

… What? You meant using Time Machine via an AirPort Base Station?

Oh.

That’s something completely different – and a lot easier to talk about.

The Theory

In early 2008, Apple introduced Time Capsule, which essentially combined an AirPort Base Station and a 500GB-1TB hard drive. At first glance, replicating this setup with a AirPort Extreme Base Station would seem to be fairly simple.

First, you attach a drive (such as a NewerTech miniStack, which stacks nicely underneath) to the USB port on your Base Station. Then, mount it on your desktop like you would any other remote drive. Finally, select it as your TimeMachine backup disk and let it run. After the initial (lengthy) backup, Time Machine will mount the drive remotely when connected to the network, run its backup, then disconnect – just like with Time Capsule.

The Reality

Article Continues…

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Category: Tech Tips
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OWC Options Address Hard Drive Shortage

Friday, November 4th, 2011 | Author: OWC Chris S.

Over the last week or so, we’ve talked about the flooding situation in Thailand and how it will likely result in a widespread shortage of platter-based drives. In the wake of all this, a question has arisen: if you’re running out of room, what does one do instead of trying to purchase a possibly non-existent hard drive or deleting files? After all, you need to store your files somehow.

Yes, this shortage is certainly inconvenient, but it helps if you look at it like this: it’s not about what you can’t get; it’s about making the most of what you already have.

Fortunately, a solution may be sitting in your basement, that bottom desk drawer or the old storage unit. If you’ve been a computer user for more than a few years, there’s a good chance that you have an older hard drive or two laying around unused. Sure, they’re not the multi-terabyte, super-fast drives that we’ve been seeing recently, but in a pinch, 80GB is 80GB.

Connecting the Drives

The trick is, of course, mounting those drives on your desktop, so you can transfer files over to them. Fortunately, OWC has a number of different options for using those older drives externally with your current system. Let’s take a look at the different options. Article Continues…

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Category: Product Spotlight, Tech Tips
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Sometimes, “Recommendations” Are Actually “Requirements”

Friday, October 14th, 2011 | Author: OWC Grant

About a month ago, we talked about how MacBook Pro EFI Firmware Update 2.2 “secretly” resolved problems that 2011 MacBook Pros were having with 6.0Gb/s SATA performance.

Since we posted about the fix, we’ve been hearing from customers that some firmware updates are not fully completing… even though it appears that it is. These failed updates offered no indication that the update didn’t complete.

So a bit of sleuthing on our behalf turned up the culprit. When installing the update using Software Update, the installer informs you that it is recommended that you plug in your MacBook Pro to working power source while installing. This makes sense – the one time you don’t want your battery to go out is when running a firmware update.

However, if you download the update via its Apple KnowledgeBase page, though, the description there states that you must have your MacBook Pro connected to the power connector for installation.

From all the reports we’ve seen, it would appear that the KnowledgeBase instructions are the more accurate or at least more specific. Connecting the power supply while updating your firmware isn’t a recommendation; it’s a requirement.

Taking that requirement mindset even further is that when installing any firmware update on any Mac notebook, make sure you have it connected to its wall outlet power adapter before you start the update. Then, after running the updater, check the Hardware Overview screen in System Profiler and see if the the correct new Boot ROM or SMC version number for the update you’re running is present. If you still have the old version, then you will need to run the update again.

Naturally, this connect to power requirement is already solved for desktop machine users. But if you can think of a way to update a desktop machine like an iMac, Mac Pro, or mini without being connected to power, we’d like to hear about it!

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Category: Tech Tips
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Upgrade Your 06-08 Mac Pro’s Internal Bays to SATA 3.0

Friday, October 14th, 2011 | Author: OWC Chris S.

Most of the time, your average Mac has a longer useful life than its PC counterpart. Unfortunately, the fast evolution of technology means that, after a while, that older Mac may seem a little slow and may not be able to take full advantage of current tech.

Such is the case for earlier Mac Pros. As they currently sit, they only move data at SATA 2.0  speeds, roughly three gigabits per second. If you wish to put the drives in to a RAID array, you are limited to either a mirrored RAID 1, losing half your capacity, or a RAID 0, which is faster, but increases the risk of data loss. On top of that, those RAID levels are all software-based, which can reduce overall performance.

Fortunately, if you happen to have a 2006-2008 Mac Pro, you can improve the performance in those bays, with only one small thing to lookout for. Article Continues…

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Category: Product Spotlight, Tech Tips
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When Slower Is Actually Faster

Friday, September 30th, 2011 | Author: OWC Michael

With all the talk on new Solid State Drives and the drive transfer speeds they offer, it’s easy to overlook the time-honored, platter-based hard drive. The fact remains that there is still no better price per gigabyte when it comes to storage than going with the traditional hard drive.

The advances in technology on platter-based hard drives are keeping them as viable data storage devices and, while it may be hard to fathom, today’s 5400RPM drives are even faster than 7200RPM drives from a just few years ago. Why? Spin speed is no longer the single determining factor on platter-based hard drive performance. With the advent of PMR, the areal density of today’s drives is increasing and head movement is faster because the distance to data points is shorter. That probably sounds like a bunch of gobbledygook, so let’s break it down some more… Article Continues…

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