MobileViews Blog

Category: MacOSX

  • MobileViews Podcast 340:MobileViews Podcast 340: Apple Silicon M1 Mac mini & MacBook Air first impressions – guest Sven Johannsen

    M1 MacBook Air 2020

    Jon Westfall and I are joined by guest panelist Sven Johannsen for this podcast. We discuss:

    1. Sven: 5G on iPhone 12 Pro MAX
    2. Happy 25th birthday to The GIMP
    3. M1 Mac Mini
    4. M1 MacBook Air
    5. More MacOS 11 Big Sur
      Preventing Big Sur update on my MacBook Pro so I can continue podcasting
    6. M1 compatibility and M1 apps for MacOS & iOS
      Rogue Amoeba not ready for M1 yet. So, continuing to record podcasts using an Intel-based Mac
    7. Google Chrome for M1 twice as fast as x86 binary in Rosetta 2. And, Chrome x86 worked fine, IMO, using Rosetta 2.
    8. Is Apple Silicon ready?
    9. Infinite Painter iPadOS app for MacOS M1: Use Sidecar to provide touch interface for an M1 enabled iOS app

    Available via Google Music Podcasts and Apple iTunes.

  • TIL: Amazon Echo’s Bluetooth can pair with Apple OS/X computers but not Microsoft Windows 10 PCs

    echo_osx_bt_20151213

    Amazon tells us that is Echo intelligent speaker can pair with mobile devices? But, I wondered what about desktop PCs and notebooks? It turns out that it pairs and works fine with Macs running Apple’s OS/X (I tested it with the current El Capitan release). However, Microsoft’s Windows 10 Bluetooth stack couldn’t even detect the Echo let alone pair with it.

    So, if you have a Windows PC and want to use the Echo as a wireless speaker, you are out of luck. However, if you run OS/X on a Mac, it works fine.

  • Garageband for OS X needs 180MB compatibility update for Garageband for iPad

    I’m reviewing Griffin’s Guitar Connect Pro this weekend. One of the things I wanted to test was copying a multi-track recording from the iPad to a Mac by downloading the tracks via iTunes to try to clean up my sloppy playing by quantizing the guitar tracks. Having never done this previously, I learned that the already up-to-date Garageband for OS X needs a compatibility update in order to import the tracks from its iPad counterpart. Note that the informational screen that popped up on my Mac specifically mentions Garageband for iPad. I have not tried this with Garageband running on an iPhone (which is a Universal app).

  • Sync Windows Mobile with a Mac?

    I installed Microsoft Office 2008 for Mac this weekend and have been giving some thought to syncing my Windows Mobile smartphone with a Mac instead of Windows XP (I have Vista running but don’t want to use WMDC). Unfortunately, all of the solutions have issues. Here are my options.

    Sync my smartphone with Mac OS X’s iCal (calendar) and Address Book (contacts) using Missing Sync for Windows Mobile ($39.95 download). I believe I lose the ability to sync notes and tasks. And, I definitely can’t sync OneNote Mobile.

    Sync my smartphone with Microsoft Entourage 2008 using,again, Missing Sync for Windows Mobile. Mark/Space said that Microsoft doesn’t provide a conduit/plug-in to work with Apple Sync Services. The effect of this is that all category information is lost (all categories are consolidated to the category “Entourage”). I use categories a lot. So, hmm. Everything except for OneNote Mobile should sync minus the category information.

    Install Windows XP a virtualized Guest OS using either Parallels Desktop for Mac or VMware Fusion. This means I could install Microsoft Office for Windows along with OneNote Mobile. Unfortunately, VM virtual disk drives can take up a lot of disk space. Do, I really want to dedicate a VM and its associated disk space just for syncing a smartphone?

    The last alternative is to dump Windows Mobile and buy a phone supported by Apple’s iSync. It is an interesting idea. But, I really like what Windows Mobile has to offer me (despite my disdain for ActiveSync and WMDC). So, that is not a reasonable alternative for me (although it seems to be a valid one for many other people).

    If you are syncing a Windows Mobile 6 smartphone with a Mac, please let me know how your solution is working for you. Thanks in advance!

  • IMI Tech Talk Radio Show Notes for Aug. 13, 2006

    Here’s the link to the MobileViews MobileWiki page with links to websites discussed on Tom D’Auria’s IMI TechTalk radio program on KFNX 1100am in Phoenix, AZ.

    MobileViews MobileWiki IMI Tech Talk 2006.08.13 Show Notes

    The topic Tom and I focused on was running Microsoft Windows on Intel-based Apple Macs using virtualization technology.