Top stories

Journalists Cover Microsoft, Using Macs

It’s not an easy time for Microsoft — with Steve Ballmer having to field questions about being “buffoons” and an “evil empire”  at the shareholder’s meeting (.doc) — so when they get together “the world’s most influential technology pundits and online writers” (nb: we weren’t invited) for Mobius to discuss super-secret mobile tech you’d think [...]

Guide To Black Friday Apple Bargains: Cheap MacBooks, iPods and Accessories Galore

Here’s a guide for finding the best bargains on Apple-related gear during the infamous Black Friday sales on November 27. We’ve compiled a comprehensive list of gear from leaked photos of sales flyers and descriptions of sales.
The bargains include a 2.26 GHz MacBook + $150 gift card at Best Buy for $999.99 ; a 32GB [...]

Review: Voices Is Today’s Best Thing Ever, Grab It Now While It’s Cheap

New on the App Store is Voices from the clever folk at Tap Tap Tap. You can guess what it does.

Open it up, pick a silly voice. Helium is pretty silly. A microphone appears and the app even clears your throat for you (try it, you’ll see what I mean). Now speak your brains, and [...]

Review: Sony Walkman S540 Series Video MP3 Player

Press releases, you will hardly be surprised to hear, are rarely very interesting. But one arrived in my inbox a couple of weeks ago that made me double-take.
“Sony’s S Series Walkman,” it chattered, “is a serious challenger to the iPod Nano.” Gosh, really? Perhaps the Cult had better have a look at one, then, despite [...]

Mac OS X 10.6.2 Drops Atom Processor Support

(Credit: steve-chippy/Flickr)

(Credit: steve-chippy/Flickr)

Apple appears to have frozen-out fans tired of waiting for an official Cupertino netbook, dropping support for Intel’s Atom processor from the latest build of Snow Leopard 10.6.2, according to reports. The move may signal Apple is clearing the way for its own netbook in tablet form.

For some time, Apple has dismissed the growth of small, low-powered notebook computers, refusing to join the army of computer makers producing so-called ‘netbooks.’ Apple COO Tim Cook described netbooks having “cramped keyboards, junky hardware, very small screens, bad software” and were not worthy of the Mac brand. In response to the lack of an official Apple entry, Mac fans have created hackintoshes able to run Mac OS X on netbooks using Intel’s Atom processor. Although 10.6.2 is currently only in the hands of developers, if the Atom omission is retained, the lack of support could either force OS X-based netbooks to vanish or restrict the hacked hardware to remain frozen at 10.6.1.

We may see Apple’s response to the netbook phenomena in early 2010. CEO Steve Jobs may announce Apple’s long-rumored tablet device Jan. 19, although the unit is described as being designed more to deliver media than as a general purpose computer. The Cupertino, Calif. company has always pointed to its iPhone or iPod touch as better alternatives to the netbook for Mac fans.

[Via Engadget]

About the author

Ed Sutherland

Ed Sutherland is a veteran technology journalist who first heard of Apple when they grew on trees, Yahoo was run out of a Stanford dorm and Google was an unknown upstart. Since then, Sutherland has covered the whole technology landscape, concentrating on tracking the trends and figuring out the finances of large (and small) technology companies.

Email the author | Read more posts by Ed Sutherland.

2 comments

    According to the following site a MSI Wind U100 (with atom processor) have been updated without problems to 10.6.2:
    http://insanelywind.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=10&t=161

    It seems that this rumor is not based on facts.

    As HUGE of an Apple fan that I am, it is such BULLSHIT that allegedly “Apple doesn’t know how to make a sub-$500 computer that isn’t a piece of junk ….”

    Really?
    A netbook with a 1.5GHz CPU, a gig or two of RAM & a 50GB hardrive’s a piece of junk?!?
    How so?

    A NETbook is exactly that: it’s use is supposed to be used for convienent InterNet surfing.
    Can it run “Crysis 2″ ?
    No.
    But it’s not suppoosed to, so not running highend graphics does NOT make it a “piece of junk”.

    C’mon Apple ….
    You naysayed MP3 players & cellphones and now you make the *best* of those products.
    Give us a netbook.
    In different colors.
    In January.

    Pretty please.

Add your comment

Name(Required)

Mail (required, but not published)

Website

Comment

Buy Inside Steve's Brain Buy from Amazon.com Buy from Barnes & Noble