ExpertsUpdate.com

MacHeist is giving away free copies of the Mac program, Squeeze. Now, normally Squeeze is available for a price of $9.95, but thanks to MacHeist, it’s free! This is quite a neat and handy program to have on your Mac.

Here’s what it looks like:

Now as you can see, it’s pretty simple looking. If you have a certain folder that’s quite large, let’s say your movies folder. You would simply drag or add that folder in, and that’s it! It will decrease the size of that folder.

Now, your Mac will read that folder exactly how it is, it basically just condenses it. How do you tell how much space you saved? The program will actually show you directly from there!

This was a folder that had about 15 pictures in it, and by adding it to Squeeze, it condensed it, and saved me around 1.46mb of space!

This is defiently a program worth giving a shot. After all, it’s free! So why not try it out for yourself. Available again from, MacHeist.com.

Apples newest addition to the Apple Store arrived today. Aperture 3 was introduced. Now, most Mac users are probably quite familiar with the previous version of Aperture, and will most likely be happy to hear the new features that were incorporated in the Aperture 3. Those new features include…

Faces: If you’re familiar with iPhoto ‘09, you’re most likely familiar with Faces. It is a way for you to tag your friends and families faces. By doing so, iPhoto will automatically detect them for future photos. It works along the same lines in Aperture 3. From there, you’re able to sort them in different projects to narrow down who’s who.

Places: Again this was a big feature that shipped with iPhoto ‘09. Places will let you geotag your items. This is essentially tagging where the pictures were taken from, their exact GPS location. Nice to see that it’s now available in Aperture 3!

Brushes: Apple has now incorporated so many new and neat effects in Aperture 3. With Brushes they’re now 15 set brushes that are set to do the most common tasks, such as correct skin imperfections, reduce saturation, etc.

HD: Aperture 3 now supports HD video clips for using in all of your projects. Nice to see this finally!

There is a free trial available for unsure users to “try out”. The full version is available at a price of $199. And of course, you’re able to upgrade from Aperture 2 to 3 for a price of $99. Nicely done!

After months of speculation and rumors, the Apple iPad is finally here! Now I have to say, this is one pretty impressive product. For one thing the weight, 1.5 pounds for the Wi-Fi model, and 1.6 pounds for the Wi-Fi + 3G model. That’s excellent for a device of this size, considering the tech specs and the power that it holds. Now when I heard news of this new product, the first thing that came to mind was the processor. I was always curious as to what processor Apple would include. They ended up putting their own 1Ghz Apple A4 processor. And the display is simply beautiful. It features a 9.7-inch LED-backlit widescreen. The resolution on this is 1024-768 pixels!

Now as far as capacity, the iPad will be available with three different sizes, 16Gb, 32Gb or 64Gb. I was also very happy to see that you could have all of the sizes with Wi-Fi only or Wi-Fi + 3G. I was happy to see that they didn’t restrict it. Another simply amazing addition to the iPad is the battery life. Apple is claiming ten hours of battery life WITH Wi-Fi. Now we probably won’t see the full ten hours, but rather 7-8 hours I’m guessing. Still that’s amazing for a device of this size!

I do love the fact that there are two models for this device. Wi-Fi and Wi-Fi + 3G. When I first heard this I was thinking “oh no, ATT” but what got me off that thought was seeing that there are no set contracts. It’s pay as you go (monthly). I love that! This was a very good move on both Apple’s and ATT’s part.

The external controls look very similar to the iPod touch or iPhone. Meaning that it has the side speaker/volume switch on the side, the of/off button on top, a mute button and of course the Home button on the bottom.

Now with no surprise, people were disappointed. Now before I state why, I would like to include that with this device you can’t really be all that disappointed. With no doubt this item was over-hyped big time. There was no official confirmation that this device was even going to be introduced until the final days before the event. So really, there is no reason to be that disappointed. Now, I can see why people are upset about the device lacking some features, mainly a camera. It seems that Apple has left out the camera on the new third generation iPod Touch, and now the iPad. Whether they’re planning on saving that for the next generations of these products, it’s hard to say. But this was surly one big feature lacking.

Also another thing that I was disappointed in was the OS. I was certain it would be a version of OS X, maybe “watered down” a bit, but never really thought that it would be just a slightly different version of iPhone OS. I also thought that if they might incorporate multi-tasking in this device, but doesn’t look like it. This was again a let down to most folks. I do like the fact that you can add and change backgrounds. Apple didn’t decide to go with another plain black background, as seen on the iPhone and iPod Touch. I also love how they plan to have the eBook store. Could we be saying goodbye to the Amazon Kindle?

Overall this is one great device! Sure it may not have been completely what people were expecting, sure it lacks some features. But hey, no matter how you look at this, it’s a fantastic device. I also think it has some major potential as far as apps go. With the new screen real estate, developers will have a lot of fun!

What are your thoughts?

Comments welcome.

If you follow me on twitter, then you know that my main machine [a MacBook Pro], went down for the count last week. The problem started while I was on Christmas break, but I had no clue. It started while I was reinstalling iLife, I kept getting an error. I should have suspected something right there, but It worked while on the phone with Apple, and I let it go.

Issues 01

Everything was peachy until I dual-booted Ubuntu, and eventually uninstall it. I deleted the partition Ubuntu was on, and Decided to reinstall Snow Leopard. I tried a few times, getting the “Could not copy support files” error each time. I then knew something was wrong. Suspicious of the DVD drive, I tried my Leopard disk a few times. The last time I tried Leopard, It got to one minute left, then failed.

Apple phone support was of no help, telling me I was out of the phone support time frame for my MacBook Pro. The man was nice enough to direct me to an Apple certified technician. He pointed me to Digital Sunrise, 5 miles away from my house.

issues 02

The guy at Sunrise was very polite, and professional. I explained What I thought was wrong, and he went listened to me fully. After he took my MacBook Pro into the shop [5 day waiting list], I played with the 27” iMac and Mighty Mouse. The 27” iMac was awesome, the Mighty Mouse wasn’t as awesome. My mom agreed that the price was worth it on the 27” iMac, which brought me to giggles. Reluctantly, I went home to my Dell PC.

After using my PC for a few days, I really wanted my MacBook Pro back. It’s not that I hate PC’s, it’s that I hate Vista. Well, to my pleasant surprise, Sunrise called two days later and told me I could pick it up. All smiles, I went there and picked it up to find out it was some bad RAM. I could have kicked myself for not thinking of that, it makes so much sense! The best part is that it got fixed for free! If you know how an OS installs, then you know that the RAM is important to the install process. Now I am on my MacBook Pro, all smiles.

issues 03

Note:  The “issues” links are links to youtube videos where I go into more detail.