We bought an iBook last weekend. The 12" current middle model. It's primarily Rhonda's machine, a distinction unclaimed since I gave her PowerMac 6400 to her folks and swapped in a 600 MHz Compaq PC. Oops.
But naturally, I've been all over it installing stuff and integrating it into fourhman.home. For one, it works wonderfully with our in-home wireless network. It sensed my Linksys setup right out of the box. I've already been online from as far away as our outside deck, and I intend to see just how far into our backyard I can roam. For another, I was able to enjoy iTunes 4's amazing music sharing feature. The upstairs iMac holds our entire CD collection (for the iPod), but activating sharing allowed the downstairs iBook to see and play the entire song library. Instantly. With no pause during playback or anything. Apple's one great strength is that they make stuff that just fucking works. (Although I am pretty pissed that the new iPod software is being denied to previous generation iPod owners.)
We'll be dragging the iBook out to Origins this June. Now Rhon will be able to watch a movie or something during the boring, extended straight line drive from York to Columbus. Hurm, there's going to be an astonishing amount of gear headed to Origins. iBook, iPod, Hiptop, GBA SP, GameCube.
Last year, we were lucky enough to have a TV in the hotel room with rca inputs for the GameCube... but I don't like to take chances. (In fact, I called the hotel last year and asked if the room TVs allowed video game hookup and was told no. Liars.) So I wanted to find a way to use the iBook as an emergency monitor for the GameCube. Such is Animal Crossing's grip on me.
Matt found it for me: the MyTV2GO peripheral. He's like a rabid dog when I give him a Mac tech project. It's a plastic converter box that sends s-video, cable, or composite video into usb so the iBook can display it. Truthfully, MyTV2GO's big benefit is that it is cheap. You could pay $200+ for a consumer-use video capture box; MyTV2GO is only $70. So you can probably already guess that this isn't the greatest video-in gadget around. It's so bare bones that it's probably cartilege.
If you buy the newest model, it's going to crow about "Version 2.0 for OSX!" Well, very little about Version 2.0 actually works. I only saw actual video once out of three startups, and the crappy software interface conforms to almost no OSX standards. Plus, it doesn't record movies or screenshots at all, despite promises all over the box and support materials. The biggest problem is that the enclosed documentation isn't even for Version 2.0. The manual illustrations look nothing like what you just installed. 2.0 is all new-look brushed metal, while the printed screenshots are from the pre-Jaguar Aqua X days. But design aside, the manual shows features and controls that just aren't in 2.0 but should be.
I did a little investigation on the company website and found the previous version of the software, the one that matches the documentation. So at least I've achieved visual parity here. This version - 1.1 - works much better, and looks much better. It now captures movies fine, and it looks to be much more reliable. Although, it still has no screenshotting feature and I could not get it to play audio from my source. The irony here is that video/audio inputs used to be standard on Macs. My old 7600 was used to grab many a screenshot from tv shows and movies.
I got what I paid for. But it will be fine for my intended purpose, that being pumping Animal Crossing onto the iBook in case of emergency. But if I was intending to actually record video and audio for editing, I'd be sending that bitch back to MacMall pretty damn fast.
P.S. It's Free Comic Book Day. You know where to go.
