Here’s the cool part- when I heard Snow Leopard (SN) was being released I was a bit saddened. Why? Because I wanted the latest and greatest OS, but I didn’t really want to spend a couple hundred bucks for something I didn’t really need. However, Apple (being the super-cool company they are) decided to release it for $29! Yup. $29. Or in our case, $25 for each John and me because we bought the family pack for $50 and shared it. As I was checking out in Apple, the guy assisting me said I was the first person he’d ever sold to that paid for an Operating System in cash.

Smart move Apple, very smart. I forked over $50 like I was paying the tab in a restaurant. No thinking involved, it was a no-brainer.

So now, was it worth it? Well, I’m going to say ‘yes’. As with all of our Apple purchases we have no regrets. HOWEVER, it doesn’t really make a huge visible difference as far as I’ve been able to tell over the past week of using it. What was worth it is the extra GB I got back since Snow Leopard has a smaller footprint. Apple had touted that SN would free up 7 GB of space. I got back 11! So I see it as spending $29 (actually only $25 for me and John each) to get 11 GB of space back on my hard drive. Even if it didn’t do anything else, it was worth it. Unfortunately, John doesn’t know how much space he reclaimed, but a friend of his reported getting back 30 (!) GB when he installed Snow Leopard.

SN has a bunch of features that personally I don’t really understand, or need. If you’re a techie type person, you’ll be happy to know about the transition from 32-bit to 64-bit. This makes your computer handle processing faster, makes your applications more secure against hacks and malware, and gets you ready for the future (when all Operating Systems will be 64-bit). This is just one of the many ‘techie’ improvements Apple has made with the release of SN. It seems to me that most of the improvements are behind-the-scenes. I can definitely appreciate that my computer is faster, more secure, better optimized and overall more powerful. Even if I don’t SEE it.

Here’s what I do see;

1. The pop-up menu on the dock is now black and transparent. Nicer looking.

2. I use the ‘All Windows” Hot Corner setting and now when I see all the open windows on the screen, the one I hover over is outlined in blue.

3. Expose is right in the dock. This means if I have 7 images open in Fireworks, I can click & hold the orange Fireworks icon in the dock and all 7 of my images will open side by side on the screen. This makes it easier to see what you have open and find what you need to work on next.

4. Backups to Time Capsule are faster (80% faster according to the Apple website)

5. Faster shut down and wake up. This one I see a big difference. I can restart my MacBook in no time!

Features I haven’t tried yet, but are improved;

1. QuickTime. A new, uncluttered interface lets you edit quickly, capture audio or a still image from your computer’s built in microphone and camera, upload easily to YouTube, and stream videos faster and smoother than before.

2. Improved video in iChat. Now you only need 1/3 the bandwidth to have a video iChat, and the resolution is better.

3. Safari is faster, more reliable and less susceptible to crashes. John and I both use Firefox, but I’m thinking of making the transition to Safari. It sounds like it might be the superior browser available today. Safari 4 allows you to see all of your favorite webpages in a gallery view and even alerts you if there is new content since your last visit. You can also flip through your browsing history in a cover-flow format like in your iTunes. Safari is faster, more secure, crash resistant and kid-friendly.

Okay, that’s not even half of the new improvements to SN. I encourage you to take a look at Apple’s site if you’d like more info.

*As a final note, I wanted to mention that John has a Neat Receipts for Mac scanner that he has used for about 8 months now. Yesterday he went to use it and it didn’t work, so I called the company, Neat Co., to talk to tech support. It was one of the best experiences I’ve ever had with a company. I was on hold less than a minute, and I spoke to a guy who was pleasant and intelligent. He knew instantly that my issue was related to installing Snow Leopard. He informed me that they had just released a new update of their software to integrate the scanner with Snow Leopard, and he sent me an email with easy steps to install the update. John had his scanner working again in no time! I’ve found Neat Co. to be very receptive and easy to do business with. I wish I could find more companies like them, and we would definitely recommend their ‘for mac’ scanner to anyone using a mac.

To sum up, as usual John and I are very pleased with Apple and continue to be loyal customers. Check out Snow Leopard for $29! It is worth it!

-Amy Stevens Adams of Cape Cod Branding

I used it as my first real opportunity to try out the video feature on my new Apple iPhone 3GS (other than taking a couple random videos of the cats at home, that is). Here are my initial thoughts on the iPhone video feature;

1. No ability to zoom. While you can focus, the lost option to zoom makes it less than ideal if you’re planning to use the iPhone for important videos, such as vacations and holidays, etc.

2. Steady picture. I was impressed that my outdoor-fireworks-watching-atmosphere didn’t result in a shakier, blurry mess of a video- but it didn’t. Good job Apple!

3. Good sound quality. As it should be since this is an iPod and a cell phone, I would expect nothing less than clear sound and Apple delivers.

4. Battery life was good. I recorded a total of 6 clips, totaling 4:10 minutes. This was AFTER my phone told me I had only 10% of battery life remaining. It never died and I still got to make a phone call afterward.

All in all the video feature was great to use, although a zoom feature would have been a welcome addition. Below you can see a 22 second sample of my video from this evening. You’ll see we had an ‘Awesome’ spot right behind a tall tree for the fireworks display.

For more reviews on the new iPhone 3GS, refer to my previous article; “Apple iPhone 3GS-First Impressions”. On Monday I’ll be posting a quick how-to for adding a YouTube video to your WordPress blog.  Enjoy the remainder of your Independence Weekend!

-Amy Stevens Adams of Cape Cod Branding

From there I tried out playing music by voice control. This didn’t go too well. When I asked it to “Play Vampire Weekend”, it played Aerosmith. Asked it to play Blink 182, it played U2.  Asked to play Modest Mouse, it played the Clash. Metallica, and it called Paul. Asked it to play Muse, it told me “music is already playing”. etc etc etc

I had John try it out to see if it was just my voice it couldn’t recognize, but he had the same result.

I gave up on Saturday night and tried it again today. I had the same luck. I tried the feature to have it play similar songs. I would say “Play similar songs”, it would play Spoon. Very frustrating. I went into Apple’s page on Voice Control and watched the video. Here’s the catch, you have to say the command exactly like they have it in the video. Once I learned that, the voice control worked (about 90% of the time). Here’s a rundown of the exact commands;

1. Play songs by [group name]

2. Play more songs like this

3. Play album [album name]

I still can’t get it to play individual songs. Example, I ask it to play song ‘Walcott’ and it doesn’t recognize the command. If I ask it to play Walcott by Vampire Weekend, it will play songs by Vampire Weekend. So as far as I can tell, for right now you can only play an album or group/singer, but not a specific song. Maybe this is something Apple will correct with a future update.

Another thing to note, the Voice Control has to be activated each time you want to use it. It seems like it would be more useful to be able to turn it on and have it work continuously until turned off. This way I could drive, garden, cook, etc and just call out orders to my phone for my music requests. Again, maybe that will come in the future.

For now, I’m still very pleased with my iPhone 3GS. There will always be room for improvement, and if I know Apple, they will always be improving.

-Amy Stevens Adams of Cape Cod Branding