I love my iPhone

My god I am becoming an Apple convert!  Well actually I am not but I do love my new iPhone.   I have not been a great fan of smart phones in the past as I felt they didn't have any clear purpose; also their design seemed to be haphazard.   The iPhone has changed all that.  I just love it.  It is so easy to use and fulfills my needs.   I was looking for a compact unit that was able to provide easy internet usage on the move.  I have to say that the iPhone does just that.

There are things that are annoying, such as the keyboard which I find to be fiddly.  If only they would use graffiti from my old Palm it would be so much better.  I know that Apple got burnt badly with handwriting recognition with the Newton but things have moved on and I, for one, would much prefer to write something than use the keyboard.

This being said it is so bloody easy to use that i can forgive it these little niggles.  An example would be that happened to me this morning.  I went into town to buy a bread maker for my wife.  The shop didn't have it stock and so my wife and I went for some coffee.   Whilst I was waiting to be served I was able to find the product on line and order it - and it really wasn't a long queue!  Simple and superb.  

I am not sure what Apple can do to improve the machine - I suspect that they will try and improve the camera and give you more storage for the ipod - neither things I am interested in as I have far better products already.  

Ever tried to focus in the dark? and some sad news

Focusing in the dark.

It's my own stupid fault.  I should know better and as my late father would have said, "...you're old enough and ugly enough to know better..." but I didn't.  I tried to focus in the dark.   For those of you who have never done this before it involves using a manual focus lens,  yes such lens made are still made, and then trying to focus on a particular object.   It is next to impossible!

So why was I doing this contorted and near impossible thing?   Well I was playing around with my Tilt and Shift lens of course.   I was not trying to correct perspective but rather to use the distortion of focus that is produced by the lens.  Now usually I have no problem making this happen but in the dark it was a different case.  Perhaps I should try and use the lens always in the dark and I wouldn't have any problems.  In the end I managed to make this photograph.  So I suppose all's well that ends well.

Some Sad news.

I received some sad news of the passing of a treasured member of Ian's, a colleague on the course, innermost circle.   His Mac G4 is to be replaced.  I spoke to him Wednesday about this impending departure and tried to console him and I think I did I managed to cheer him up a bit with my anecdotes of the anarchy that is running Windows Vista, still can't get the internal CF drives to work! and in the end I think this worked as he was able to pass some comments about Windows that you would expect a dyed in the wool Mac fan to say. Ian has sent all colleagues on the course an email lamenting this passing and I passed on my condolences in the only way that I know how, by pointing out how out of date Apple technology is compared to the latest Windows PC and it is just a shame that Apple are always having to play catch up and you pay through the nose for the privilege.  I think this will lift his spirits.

Now for any passing Mac fanatic that might think that the last item was some serious views please don't.  I love Mac's design and if I was starting out from scratch I would no doubt go down the Mac route.  It is just that to do so now would be too expensive in time, effort and money.  The only thing I would say is that I have used both and I don't really find there is much difference between the two when using Photoshop - so for me this is an added point.   There I have said it.  I too love Macs but not enough to replace all the PC's in the my house.

Install Continues

The install of software, backup etc continues.   One or two problems have arisen due to the fact that the operating system is 64 bit and the printer is on the network running 32 bit.   I am sure I will be able to sort this out tomorrow.   I have just tried to install my ancient copy of Visual Basic and this has failed,  fortunately I am able to write software fixes to overcome this.  Again this is more irritating than anything else.   I just wonder how easy it would have been with an Apple - perhaps the 32/64 bit conflict may not have arisen although I am not so sure.  

I am currently rebuilding my Lightroom catalogue.   I decided to take this opportunity to rationalise my under lying structure.  This should help in the long term.

Platting Fog

GGARGGHH! This is turning into one of those days. If I were paranoid then I would think it was caused by me bad mouthing Apple computers (perhaps it is some form of virus that is spread by Jobites across the world). Anyway, after announcing to the world that I had bought myself a new computer I then fell foul of well meaning financial security constraints. Cutting a long story short I have just spent the past hour or so ring different companies to smooth the way for my purchaise. Finally, it has been sorted out and I have to say that the one person who should be praised in all this is the account manager at Dell Srilekha Bhattacharya. She was more helpful that you can imagine and well worth a mention (although how worth being mentioned here is is another question!)



Anyway, I now have the documentation to prove it. My new Dell should arrive just before Christmas and all is good in the world. The only thing is my head is so thick at the moment that I am having difficulty thinking straight - indeed everything does feel like I am platting fog....now where is that Lemsip???

Well I've gone and done it

City of London 

After sitting on my hands for weeks I have finally taken the leap and replaced my trusty desktop computer.   For some time I have been toying with the idea of moving over to Mac but unfortunately  technology has moved on and the latest Mac's don't appear to be using it at the moment.  (I am sure this will be addressed in the future but I am replacing my machine now.)

Two questions, what new technology and why now?  The first is the new intel chipsets Core i 7.   I am not going to claim I know the technical specs about this new chip apart from the old trusted PCPro gave the thumbs up and I have always found their reviews to be very reliable.   New technology comes along all the time why replace the desktop now?  

Over the past few months I have started to work a lot of the time with very large digital image files (3oomb +).  This is because I have started to experiment with HDR panoramic images.  Needless to say when you work with files this size then it very quickly consumes resources and my trusted desktop was starting to run out of puff.  I have increased the size of the RAM to the max for 32 bit windows processing and this helped but nonetheless it was becoming apparent that I needed to boast the machine and the most cost effective way was to upgrade my machine.

When I came to compare any comparable Apple with Dell I found that the Apple machines just didn't have the latest technology.   This, of course, is not the only reason why I didn't go with an Apple and I have explained this in the past.  I am also sure that when Apple does implement this technology, some time next year by their usual model release cycle, then no doubt it will be well integrated into their system.  The bottom line is that the amount of processing power comparable with the model I have bought would have been almost twice as expensive.  Lets just hope that the results are worth the expenditure.

Entering the Lions den - should I convert to a MAC?

This really is one of those areas that you tread with trepidation - the Mac's v PC battle.   Both sides have powerful arguments to convince a customer to buy their product.  This of course is a misnomer as there no such thing as a PC side in the same way as there is a Mac side.  Only Apple makes Macs whilst virtually anyone can make a PC.   These are both the strengths and weakness of each product.   Because the Mac is essentially a closed system, i.e. only Apple built products running Apple operating system they tend to be far better coordinated and far less liable to vagaries of the PC world's wonderful driver set up.   To an extent this is now becoming less of a problem but it is still there.   This being said the Macs are more expensive to buy and the software tends to be more restricted and at times slightly more expensive.

So both sides have their pros and cons which leads me to why I am writing this.   I am in the process of replacing my PC.   It is starting to show its age and I am now demanding more and more of it as I deal with larger and larger digital images.  I have put some fixes in to help prolong my system but it is no longer cost effective to carry on this piecemeal  approach.   I am going to replace my PC.   So the question is do I replace my PC with another PC or a Mac.  I asked a colleague from the course his views about using Mac's and I think it is safe to say he is a very keen Mac user.  For him a Mac ticks all the boxes and this certainly gave me some food for thought.   However, having reflected on what was said and then my position I cannot see any sense moving to a Mac.   This does not mean that PC's are better than Macs but rather given my circumstances it is not a cost effective way forward.   The arguments behind this are twofold:

Hardware Costs:  Put simply the cost of a Mac is not competitive with a similar PC (You can say this this now even more so as the many parts within a Mac are the same as a PC.   I know that this is not the totally equation as to why Mac's are more expensive but it is a good place to start.)

Opportunity Costs:  (By this I mean the amount of time I would save and therefore give me the opportunity to do something else than tinker with a computer)  are greater with a Mac than PC.   Let me expand on this a little.   I have been using a DOS based operating system for over 20 years.   I therefore have a significant knowledge base of how PCs work.   This means I understand their little ways a lot better than I do a Mac.  I will give you one small example.   Right Click.   Now this has been a feature with PCs for years and has only more recently become a feature with the Mac.   This means that Mac users tend to use the keyboard and mouse together compared to the PC users, i.e. me.   This is but one example of how the small things make a whole lot of difference.   To a Mac user this is not an issue. To me it is.   This is the problem.  I would have to learn new skills.   These are only small points compared to the system integration that I would have to undertake.   I have written several bespoke programs for myself.  they are vital to the way I work and the thought of having to rewrite these is not worth contemplating.

So having given the matter some thought I cannot see the financial advantage of using a Mac compared to a PC.  This doesn't mean that Macs are bad and PCs are good it just means that for me the cost of moving to a Mac is just too high.

Let the sky fall in on my head.

On final thought.   The browser I use most of the time is Safari.  I think it looks great and most of time works fine.   However, there are times when a web site doesn't work with Safari.  When this happens guess which browser I use.   Microsoft's Internet Explorer (IE).   It is perhaps not as beautiful as Safari but always works.   The reason for this is really quite simple.  When you are developing a web site you have to optimize them for different browsers and guess which one is the default - IE.  This doesn't mean I like this it is just a fact of life and I am not that bothered about computers to do anything about it.

Few that felt better!

One final final thought.  I love the ways Mac look, I think they are beautifully designed - almost a work of art.