Cult of Mac

This is just totally sick. The guys over at Germany’s Hardwrk have taken 16GB of DDR3 RAM and a 1TB Samsung 830 SATA III SSD bundled up in an SSD-RAID-0, slapped it into a 13-inch MacBook Pr running an Intel Core i7-2640M 2.8GHz chip.

The result? A three-thousand euro behemoth of a machine — custom-engraved and covered in a beautiful matte black covering — that they say is the world’s fastest MacBook Pro, and with a 1.7 second PhotoShop boot-up time, we’re inclined to believe them.

Best of all? They’re giving this bad boy away to one lucky winner. All you have to do is leave a comment on their post.

Apple’s Q2 2012 financial earnings call is on April 24th, and if history is any guide, it’s going to see Apple announce all new record earnings and another huge jump in stock price.

Now Piper-Jeffray analyst Gene Munster is piping in, and not only are his estimates higher than Wall Street consensus, but that Apple could have sold 33 million iPhones and 12 million iPads this quarter. Not too shabby, considering the new iPad was on sale for only two weeks before the fiscal quarter ended.

Mobile technology is playing an ever bigger role in the workplace. According to a recent study by IT training and certification giant CompTIA, 84% of knowledge workers use an iPhone or other smartphone for at least some work tasks on a daily basis – unsurprisingly email and using web-based services ranked as the most common and universal uses.

Despite that level of use, the survey – which didn’t break out numbers for corporate-owned versus employee-owned devices – found that only 22% of businesses have an official policy regarding the use of mobile technology. An additional 20% indicated that they are exploring options for mobility policies but haven’t yet completed them.

The French designer Philippe Starck, famous for both his interior design and mass produced goods like toothbrushes and chairs, revealed in a recent radio interview that Apple has been working on a “revolutionary” new product that will be unveiled within the next 8 months.

An iPad stand made from a pair of hammers, a screwdriver and some old coins and bolts. What could possibly go wrong? This amazing iPad stand was put together by Etsy makers Docks4iPods, and works just fine for the iPads 2 and 3. It will also take up more than its fair share of counter or desk space, and the screwdriver can be moved by loosening the wing-nuts and rotating it further back, letting you angle the iPad a little lower.

Apple CEO Tim Cook will announce the company’s second-quarter earnings on April 24, and according to one analyst, it will report sales of 33 million iPhone, 12 million iPads, and 4.3 million Macs. Sounds like another great quarter, but those predictions are, on the whole, a little less than Wall Street is anticipating.

It used to be that clicking on the computer name in the login window would give various bits of system information. Sadly, Mac OS X Lion has done away with this useful little feature. Lucky for us, though, there is a Terminal command that can bring back some of the same feature to Lion.

Rickshaw, the folks behind my favorite bag ever, has released a new biker-friendly reflective messenger bag which can be used to tote your 13-inch MacBook Air in addition to all your other junk. It is in fact a fancified version of the Zero Messenger I use every day.

Canon is serious about video. It’s 5D MkII was the go-to camera for low-budget indie filmmakers and professionals (like the creators of House) alike. Now, with rivals such as Nikon catching up, it has again leapt ahead. Say hello to the EOS-1D C, an SLR which can also shoot 4K video.

Unlike some of EA’s recent iOS games (I’m looking at you, Battlefield 3: Aftershock!) Mass Effect Infiltrator has become a huge success. It’s great gameplay and entertaining storyline have earned it some really glowing reviews, and it recently featured in our selection of the best Retina-ready games for the new iPad.

Today it receives a “massive” update that adds a new bonus mission, manual aiming, more optimizations for the new iPad, and more.

Paper, the ultra-simple app that turns your iPad into a piece of paper, has been downloaded 1.5 million times in just two weeks. What’s more, users have created seven million pages in that time. Not bad for an app that is distinguihed more by a lack of features than anything else.

Apple has lost an appeal against a court ruling in Germany to have its iCloud push services restored. The service was disabled back in February after it was ruled that Apple had infringed on patents owned by Motorola Mobility. While iCloud is still available, users now have to open up their Mail app and fetch new email manually, or set their device to fetch email at certain intervals.

Apple has been forced to pay a couple in Tokyo, Japan, ¥600,000 (approx. $7,400) for medical fees and pain and suffering after their first-generation iPod nano spontaneously burst into flames, causing burns to the hand that took more than a month to completely heal.

Lonely Planet guides are a great way to make sure you spend your vacations sharing hotels and restaurants with cheap, filthy backpacking hippies. And now, in addition to various iPhone city guides, the company has just launched a range of country guides.

The U.S. Department of Justice recently accused Apple of conspiring with book publishers to thwart Amazon’s power over eBook pricing. Today Apple has responded saying that “the DOJ’s accusation of collusion against Apple is simply not true.”

Disclaimer: Some of you may find this material offensive — you’ve been warned.

Jon Stewart gives us his take on last week’s most talked about tech news: Google’s glasses and Facebook’s purchase of Instagram for 1 billion dollars. It’s classic Daily News humor that includes ball-licking dogs, time-travelling cock-blockers and illicit drug innuendo. If that sounds like your kind of humor, head on past the break to watch the video. Cheers!

Remember Lodsys? Many of you may recall how the patent troll sued App Store developers left and right last year. Apple tried to step in and release its blood-thirsty Cupertino hounds (code for “lawyers”) on Lodsys, claiming that its third-party developers were legally covered from any patent infringement claims.

Apple has finally been granted access to intervene and crush Lodsys once and for all, according to a new report.

Apple has just released an update to Java for OS X that effectively removes any traces of the notorious Flashback trojan from an infected system. The update can be downloaded now in Software Update on all Macs running Snow Leopard through Mountain Lion.

Have you ever wondered what the back of your favorite iPhone app icon looks like? Some icons are so well designed nowadays that they almost have a 3D look. Such is the case with the extremely detailed Instagram icon. Professional photographer and designer Cole Rise thought it would be interesting to envision the rear of the Instagram icon’s camera, so he threw together a beautiful concept.

One of the best things about iOS is the search function. Whether you have too many apps like I do, use it as an app launcher in its own right, or just need to find a specific email or contact, Spotlight is the way to go. However, you might not ever need to search your devices calendar app, or you might not have any podcasts, audiobooks, or voice memos to search, either. If so, today’s tip is for you.

With all the retro photo-filtering apps in the App Store, it might seem redundant to take the time and effort to actually fire up Photoshop Touch and do the dirty work ourselves. But as it is a rainy April afternoon here at Cult of Mac’s Spanish HQ, I figured why not? After all, the whole point of this stuff is to have some fun, right?

So here we have it: How to make Instagrams the hard way.

Do you like Chair Entertainment’s blockbuster iOS game, Infinity Blade II? A beefy new update has just hit the App Store, and it adds new content for ClashMob, the game’s awesome social battle mode. In addition, the new update adds over two dozen new items and fully implements iOS 5.1 support. while Chair promises that an expended single-player campaign is coming soon.

Have you checked your email today? How many times? I bet you’re itching to check it right now, aren’t you?

We spend a lot of time in email when we should probably be doing something more productive. Yet we still check it…all the time. It’s kind of insane, isn’t it?

This is where the latest Cult of Mac Deals offer comes to the rescue…with SaneBox. But this deal ends at the end of the day, so you’d better hurry and git it while you can.

There are no shortage of gadgets out there that allow you connect your guitar to your iPhone, putting the power of The App Store at your guitar’s disposal. But if you’re looking for the best of what’s around (see what I did there?), Sonoma Wire Works’ GuitarJack ($150) has a mixture of beauty and talent you’d do well to consider.

Intel’s upcoming Ivy Bridge update are scheduled to be officially announced and made available on April 23rd, and they will most likely be immediately used to build updated, Air-like MacBook Pros including second-gen Thunderbolt controllers.

But could the next MacBook Pros also have HiDPI, Retina-ready displays? It’s conjecture at this point, but we know Apple has been interested in moving to Retina quality displays in its Mac line for quite some time, and now a recent comment from Intel VP Kirk Skaugen confirms that Ivy Bridge makes it possible for PC makers to make retina display laptops and computers, “if OEMs choose to use it.”

In other words? The next MacBook Pros might not just have slimmer footprints and ditch the optical drives, but pack four times the pixels. Swoon.

[via 9to5Mac]