The Macbook Pro Retina is a an amazing computer – an unreal screen, a very nice form factor, and extremely fast. But these good qualities come with a major Achilles heel – in order to hit this form factor, Apple had to remove anything that was more than just a few millimeters in height. That means no DVD, and no standard-size drives. And, of course, the same is true with the Macbook Air. So what is the MBPR or MBA owner to do to increase storage capacity? Well, there are three choices, and one possibly-useful alternate. Read More
How Much Ram Can I put into my Macbook Pro or Mac Mini?
This post grew out of a comments conversation that occurred in another post.
Something people may not realize is that Apple’s published specs are often not accurate when it comes to the maximum RAM one can put into a given Macbook, Macbook Pro, or Mac Mini. This may be due to the specs being published upon release of the computer, but before higher-density memory is available on the market, and then the specs never being updated. Regardless, the specs are often out-of-date, so the following is some updated information for your information.
The short and sweet answer is this: if you have a unibody Macbook Pro with a CPU of a intel Core 2 Duo 2.4Ghz or higher, you can use up to 16GB of Ram. If you have a Mac Mini that’s unibody (so all-aluminium), you can install up to 16GB of Ram. Now, this doesn’t mean they all use the same memory, because they don’t, so let’s get a little more specific.
Finding out which version your computer is
All Macs will tell you what they’re model number is by simply clicking the Apple logo in the upper left corner of your screen, then selecting “About this Mac”. A pop-up will appear. Select the “More Info” button, and then “System Report”. You’re looking for the “Model Identifier”, which is always something like “MacbookPro 8,1″, or “Mac Mini 4,1″, for instance. You need to know which specific model you have, so that you know which specific RAM to order for your computer.
For more modern Apples, any Macbook Pro model 7,1 or higher, and any Mac Mini model 5,1 or higher can use up to 16GB of RAM, which run under $100 on Amazon.
What’s the Cheapest Reliable Mac Keyboard?
Let’s face facts – Apple keyboards are good, but they’re damn expensive…but the $12 keyboards you find on Amazon have issues – they may not operate after waking a Mac from sleep, usually don’t have the right key labels (if that matters to you), etc. So what’s the cheapest reliable Mac keyboard? It’s this one from Macally. Is it Apple quality? Definitely not. But for $20, it works, and it’s less than half the cost of anything from Apple.
Looking for better quality? The Macally Ice has a huge following at under $30.
What’s the Biggest Hard Drive You Can Fit in a Macbook Pro?
Perhaps you’ve got…ahem…150k photos to tote around, or you’re a active gamer, or maybe you’re just a major pirate…either way, most people who keep a computer for more than a year or two are likely to want to want to upgrade the hard drive sooner or later. So the question becomes, “Just how much space can I fit in that machine?” And the answer is, “It depends upon how badly you want it.”
Read more …
How to cancel Hulu Plus Subscription through iTunes – even if you signed up via Apple TV
This is a bit of a PSA since it took me forever to find a way to do this, and for whatever reason Hulu couldn’t find my plus account via my email address on their site. To cancel Apple’s auto-renewal of Hulu Plus, open up iTunes and log into your account. At the bottom of your account screen, under “Settings”, you’ll see the last item is “Subscriptions”. Click the “Manage” link to the right and you can cancel your Hulu Plus subscription.