The MacHeist Bundle – Get it Now!

You only have 2 days and 23 hours left to purchase this amazing bundle of great software. Okay, so really I bought it for Pixelmator. I don’t know how many of the other apps I am going to buy. I guess to produce the screenshot below I used one of the programs, Snapz Pro X. Anyway, this post is really going to be about Pixelmator.

Pixelmator, for those of you not in the know, is an image editor like Photoshop. I haven’t used Photoshop in, quite literally, years, so I don’t think I can rightfully compare the two. I have been using GIMP quite extensively over the past couple years though. I really like GIMP, especially considering the price tag – free. I mean, how can you beat that? You can’t. So, if you are in the market for a good image editor and you don’t want to pay, I’d say GIMP is your best bet there.

One of the main problems that I have with GIMP is its lack of a proper Mac port. See, the way it currently works is that GIMP runs through X11 for Mac, which is an implementation of the X Window System that allows X11 based programs to be run in OS X. I really don’t like having to go through X11, it is a big pain.

Anyway, I have had my eye on Pixelmator for the last little while, but like a lot of other people out there, I’m pretty cheap. I didn’t really want to spend money on it, especially when I have a program that does the same thing and I got it for free. Well, when I saw that it was in the new MacHeist bundle, I really wanted it. After an intense battle inside my brain, I decided to purchase the bundle. I really wanted Pixelmator and I was getting it for cheaper than normal and I got 10 or so other apps. Plus, 25% of my purchase went to charity (the World Wildlife Fund in my case.)

I really like it. I especially like the UI. I find it very easy to use and very powerful. I had to make some grass for a web project that I’m working on and Pixelmator was my best friend. I’m sure GIMP would have done just a good of job, but I wouldn’t have been as happy as I was in the process.

Basically, I love it and would highly recommend it. If you are in looking into the MacHeist bundle and are thinkg of purchasing, may I provide a link? Good, because here it is.

MacHeist Bundle – click me and order!

So, here is the deal. If one persons clicks above and buys the bundle, I get one extra app. If two people click and buy then I get two extra apps. After that it doesn’t really matter. Except that they need to raise $31, 739 more for charity so that the VectorDesigner app is unlocked, which I want, so you should go buy a bundle. Just think of the 25% that goes to charity.

You’re Smarter When You’re Pink

This post has nothing to do with the title, as I’m sure you’ve already figured out. I like random titles.

Before I left on my trip, I bought a new 19″ LG Widescreen LCD. I bought it the day before we left, so I didn’t really get to play with it that much. I’ve now been home for a few days and have had time to use it. I love it. It is so sharp and clear. It has a 2ms response time, so it is really fast. Overall, I’m really pleased. I’ll post a picture of my new setup when I clean up my desk, which I was hoping to do today, but I didn’t.

I started writing this post a while ago and in that time, I’ve got some other new toys. The first is my new friend Issac, a black MacBook. I upgraded the RAM to 2 GB instead of the standard 1 GB. So far, I’m really enjoying it. My old iBook was having some problems, so i decided it was time for a new one. Yuri’s DVD drive didn’t work anymore. When I stuck a disc in it would stop recognizing the drive. This made it really hard to get the disk out. I’m surprised I ever did. I think it was mostly luck. Yuri’s battery is also shot, so that kind of defeats the purpose of a laptop.

My other new toy is the Halo 3 Legendary edition. I got it last Monday night at 7 PM, so 5 hours before everyone else. It was pretty sweet. I beat the game on normal difficulty by Tuesday night. I’m now almost done Heroic. If I didn’t have a stupid philosophy project, I would have had it beaten on Heroic by now. I’ve found all the skulls and the terminals. That was pretty fun. I was really impressed with this game. The graphics are awesome! There are some really cool new features in Halo 3, like the Theater. You can go in and watch previous games, including campaign. While watching, you can fly around and check everything out. You can take screenshots and upload them to Bungie.net. You can then share this replay with your friends. It is really cool. The map editor, Forge, is also really cool. I haven’t had a lot of time to play with it, but when I did, I thought it was really cool.

I’ll post pictures of my fun new toys when I get a moment.

My External HDD Experiance

Last Friday was my grad class’s fashion show. It was a 007 James Bond theme, which was really cool. Anyway, I was in charge of a lot of the technical stuff, but mostly the video. See, we had James Bond clips in between each performance, which actually worked out quite well. They were a great transition. Anyway, I had to rip the scenes from the movies, then chop them down and add fades etc. I had this all stored on my Maxtor OneTouch III 300GB hard drive, the project files, the original scenes, the new clips, everything. The Thursday before the event, Amy and I were remaking all the store names and I started to get suspicious of my drive. I had always been a little suspicious of it because it didn’t always work and what not. Well, I thought that it would be better if I had all the clips on my internal hard drive, so I started freeing up space. I needed 15GB, and I had no more than 2 GB free. I know, I know I have a lot of crap. I started deleting and got it up to around 6 GB free. I really didn’t want to delete my pictures, but I couldn’t find another way around it. I backed them all up to my iPod just in case and them deleted them. This brought me up to the required 15 GB. Friday afternoon rolled around, the afternoon before the fashion show. I started to transfer the clips and got them all. Whew, a big sigh of relief.

That nice stress-free feeling didn’t last long. I had made the order into a playlist in iTunes and was just going to do it all through iTunes. I switched the location of all the files and was ready to roll. I proceeded to watch some of the clips and it was then that my stress level skyrocketed. The clips were extremely choppy and definitely unwatchable. I tried copying one of the worst ones again. It turned out the same. I was really freaking out. I thought for sure that the clips were ruined and I was done for. I tried many different things, all with the same result. I tried to phone Amy and Hailey to ask how they would feel if there just wasn’t video. I really didn’t want it to come to that, but I was preparing for the worst. I tried some more things, each with the same stupid result. My hair was coming out in chunks now. I then thought to myself that if I could open the project files and remake the movies, except go straight to my internal drive, I might be able to recreate them. I tried that with the same output settings as I had originally had. Same result. I then tried just High Quality. It worked.

Now I just had to go through and redo all the video clips in the new format. I was a little scared that my hdd would crash at any second. I slowly got them all remade and was very happy. It was then that my next problem appeared. I opened up iTunes and my library was gone. I was able to recover most of it, minus about 200 songs (of which I mostly got back now). I had lost all my playlists and everything. I would have to start my Fashion Show playlist again. I realized that iTunes doesn’t like .dv files, and then started to stress again. What was I going to use? I decided to try VLC and found it had a playlist function. I was saved. I recreated my playlist, this time in VLC and was now ready to roll.

I rushed down to the school, as I was supposed to be there 2 hours earlier and quicky set up and tested everything. It worked great, in fact, it looked better than it had before the fiasco. Fashion Show went off without any major hitches. One group was a little late, but other than that it was phenomenal.

Well, I know this is pretty long, but whatever. Oh, and I was pretty mad at my hdd because it meant that I would lose 300 GB of stuff. I have now recovered most of the important stuff and it is still under warranty. I’m going to get everything off that I can, then ship it back to them for a replacement. I ran a diagnostics test and it says it is toast but that it is a manufacturer’s defect. Hopefully, I will get it back ASAP because I need it. I depend on it.

Not So Dead USB Ports

So, I was already to phone Apple today. I thought I’d give the Support section one last hurrah, in case I missed something. I found a few new things to do, and tried them. It turns out that all I had to do was reset my PMU, and now they work. However, my USB key doesn’t. I think I am going to see about sending that one back. Anyways, just a simple update on the situation.

EDIT: I think I figured out what is going on. When I put my Data Traveller 2 in, it still didn’t work. But then, when I plugged my iPod into that same port right after, it didn’t work. I reset my PMU, and it works again. So I figure that my USB key is causing issues.

Dead USB Ports

Okay, so here is the deal. My two USB ports are dead. The one died like last week sometime, and took my USB key with it. The other one just died today. Now, I can’t update my iPod. I could if Apple wouldn’t have dropped the FireWire support. Anyway, so I go to the Apple site to fire off an email, so I can get this fixed ASAP, and I can’t do it anymore. Either the link is like hidden or they have taken it off. When I had iPod troubles, it was easy. I just sent them an email, and all was well. Now, I am going to have to phone them, which is going to cost me, as I am no longer in the 90 complimentary support window. I am thinking of getting the APP, and then I would be warrantied for another like 3 years too. Plus, then when I phone, it doesn’t cost me. Hopefully, I will get this issue settled quickly.

HTML Editors

Well, with my new Mac I need a new HTML Editor. I am currently in search of a good free text based editor. Currently, on my Windows machine I am using HTML-Kit. I love it, but there is no version for Mac. I got Taco, but its not really what I want. I may end up having to buy one, but I would really perfer not too. So, if any of you readers out there, anyone who actually reads this, whether a regular or a just happen upon reader, have any suggestions please post. Hopefully, someone out there will have something for me to use. If not, I guess Taco will have to do.

My New Apple iBook G4

Well, last Saturday I did it. I finally did it. I know I have been talking about this for years and years, but I finally did it on Saturday. I got a laptop. Not a Windows laptop, but a Mac. I love it!!!! It is amazing!! Its my own computer, and it can go anywhere! It was rather expensive, but we’re not going to dive into that pool.

Anyways, I know I got it last Saturday, and I am only posting this now, but I have had a really busy week. Anywho, back to the matter at hand, the Mac. I got an Apple iBook G4 1.42 GHz complete with DVD RW and 512 DDR SDRAM. I got the 14.1 inch screen. I considered a Powerbook, but that was a little to pricey. I am really enjoying it. I have included some pictures for you folks out there at home who have yet to see it, or will never see Maple’s Mac


There is some more on My Photostream over at Flickr.