APM Partition Boots Intel Macs

I'd thought that if you wanted to boot Intel Macs you needed to use the recently available GUID partition table, mainly because that's what it says in Disk Utility when you format the drive. In fact, as it turns out (at least as of Mac OS X 10.5.5), using the Apple Partition Map (APM) boots Intel Macs perfectly well. It's exceedingly useful to have a partition format that will boot both architectures, particularly at the museum, where Intel and PPC Macs still very much coexist.

In fact, my Mac is a G5, but all the new hardware is, of course, Intel-based. And I'm trying to create a master build image for setting up new machines. Generally the way I do this is by making a test build on a firewire partition. I can boot into this build and tweak it until it's perfect. And when it is, I image it to an ASR disk image for NetBooting. I was worried that architecture limitations would make this painful — that booting into my test build partition would be impossible on my PPC Mac because of these restrictions. Glad to know I can just use the old reliable APM for everything and it'll do what I need.

Not sure when or how they worked this out, or why the language in Disk Utility has gone unchanged. That fact does give me pause. But so far booting Intel Macs from APM partitions has worked perfectly for me on multiple machines.

UPDATE:

More info at Apple's Secrets of the GPT Tech Note, via Jeff in the comments.

Faulty Arguments

I've been following the running commentary on Apple's decision to remove firewire from the MacBook. The latest article comes from Ars Technica, who responds to the "Steve Jobs" quote:

"Actually, all of the new HD camcorders of the past few years use USB 2."

The Ars writer chimes in, chastising people who want firewire by, essentially, telling them there's no demand. But see, what we're trying to tell you is that there is demand. We still want firewire at the consumer level. Making the argument that no one wants it won't really work on folks who do want it.

Ars and others are also equating this to Apple's ahead-of-the-pack decision to lose the floppy drive on the original iMac, when clearly this is different: Apple is now following the pack, not leading it, by Ars' own assessment:

"The truth is, FireWire—and in particular the FW400 variety—has been slowing [sic] disappearing for the last few years. Apple eliminated FireWire from iPods several years ago, since it allowed slimming down of iPods and made the nano and shuffle possible. Even external hard drives rarely have a FW400 port; FW800 and/or eSATA are the ports that are usually offered if there is anything other than USB 2. And, as Jobs says, most if not all of the consumer HD cams on the market now use USB 2."

Oddly, firewire's lack of ubiquity didn't stop Apple from supporting in the first place.

And finally, Ars backs up "Steve Jobs'" idiotic and patently false claim, stating:

"And, as Jobs says, most if not all of the consumer HD cams on the market now use USB 2."

Well, first off, that's not what Jobs said. He said "all," not "most, if not all." He said "HD camcorders" not "consumer HD camcorders." And he said "HD camcorders of the past few years," which is just wrong. In fact, the dominant consumer-level HD format for the past several years has been HDV, which is transferred over firewire. HDV cameras are still plentiful in the market, and will probably remain popular for at least another year or two. It's only been in the last year or two that AVCHD — an MPEG-4 variant with much lower bitrate requirements capable of transferring over USB — has gotten good enough to be taken seriously by anyone who knows anything about video.

Ars even makes the argument that editing video on a MacBook is no fun:

"I can also say from personal experience that trying to edit HD video on a MacBook is pretty much the worst experience ever, and I would never wish it on my worst enemy."

Fine, and I tend to agree. But the fact is, I know plenty of people who do want to continue editing video on a MacBook. They've been doing it for years, and are quite happy with it. This article seems to be addressed to people with no MacBook video experience. But those are the people who are complaining, the people who are currently doing video on their MacBooks. Telling them that they don't really want to be doing that, and if they do, to go buy a MacBook is condescending and insulting.

I'm generally a fan of the reporting that goes on at Ars. But this article has me incensed. It bothers me when big sites like Ars Technica try to tell people that their desires are unresonable, but it's a hundred times worse when their logic is faulty and their facts are just plain wrong.

Unfortunate

It's too bad. The new MacBook looks beautiful.

But, though they're still hawking Final Cut Express as a bundle option with the machine, the MacBook's lack of firewire makes it pretty much useless for video.

Not only can you not use it to digitize DV material, but you can't even use an external firewire drive to edit from. This means that the MacBook's a non-starter for anyone interested in so much as experimenting with the medium. Strange for a machine that used to come bundled with iLife. Also strange considering the machine is now more powerful than ever, and even has a 24" LED display made just for it. And annoying that the price remains the same for a far less full-featured computer.

Does the term "value-subtracted" exist yet. I think I'll coin it. Dibs!

And while I'm not personally interested in editing video on a laptop much at all, I certainly know lots of people who are. I guess they'll all be shelling out the extra $700 clams for a MacBook Pro.

Too bad.

UPDATE (I'm all about the updates lately):

Apparently, iLife still comes bundled with the MacBooks:

Sure, nothing about iMovie specifically requires firewire, but many video workflows — especially at the consumer level that the MacBook is aimed at — still use firewire for video capture. iLife apparently does support capturing newer formats (I didn't think it did):

I suppose Apple expects new MacBook owners to use these new formats — in particular, those formats that have a low enough bitrate to work over USB — so it follows that USB capture support is there (I didn't think it was). But there's no mention (that I can see) that you won't be able to use DV equipment with your new MacBook, which I find misleading. But more to the point, it just seems premature to kill DV off as a viable format — and firewire as a viable protocol — especially on consumer-level Macs of all places. There is still a lot of DV out there, and its users really just can't get a new sans-Pro-MacBook at this point.

Not to mention all the other cool stuff firewire has all over USB. I mean, not only would it be slow as shit, but "USB 2.0 Target Disk Mode" just sounds lame.

UPDATE 2:

I'm glad I'm not alone in decrying the lack of firewire on the new MacBooks. Sounds like a lot of folks are up in arms. One meme I've seen a few times, though, is the idea that you can get a USB to firewire adaptor. While this may be possible, it doesn't fix the DV problem. Adapting USB to firewire will still only allow USB data transfer speeds. And USB 2.0 is just too slow for capturing DV video. It's also too slow to use as an external drive for editing said video. So, if you're wondering, this is not a fix.

UPDATE 3:

A co-worker informs me that the Leopard's USB drivers are much improved over older versions. He speculates that this might give USB enough throughput to at least be capable of editing DV from a USB drive. He also thinks you can do Target Disk Mode over USB, but I think he's wrong on that one, at least for now.

UPDATE 4:

More on MacRumors about the lack of firewire, with lots of valid complaints in the comments. The rumor quotes someone claiming to be Steve Jobs saying:

"Actually, all of the new HD camcorders of the past few years use USB 2."

While this is plainly false, what I'm more curious about at this point is not what camera Steve Jobs thinks I should go buy if I want to use a MacBook, but rather what the thinking was behind the removal of firewire from the machine. Did it enable them to keep the cost down? The weight? 'Cause frankly, the only reason I can see is to gouge folks who need or want firewire into paying for a MacBook Pro when it might otherwise be far more machine than they need.

UPDATE 5:

Still more from TUAW, including an excellent dissection of the purported Steve Jobs quote. Looks like this issue has legs. Glad to hear it's not just me.

Go firewire!

UPDATE 6:

I've posted a response to Ars Technica's article on the matter. Another, rather thoughtful piece with some additional info appears at Apple Insider.

Capacity, Not Memory

When talking about cell phones and MP3 players with flash-based internal storage it's become commonplace to refer to the device's capacity as "memory." Even Walt Mossberg and other respected tech writers — the very folks who are supposed to make technology easier to understand — are guilty of this practice:

"The G1 also has much less memory than the iPhone."

This is technically acceptable, I suppose, as the flash mechanism used for data storage inside these devices is more similar to memory (i.e. RAM) than it is to a hard drive, but it's a pretty confusing use of language.

When talking about computers, the term "memory" refers to RAM, which is a temporary, non-user accessible space used by applications to boost the performance of certain types of operation. The term "disk space" is often used to talk about the amount of data storage available on the computer. Referring to the amount of data storage on a cell phone as "memory" is just plain confusing. But calling it "disk space" would be equally confounding.

The proper way to refer to the amount of data storage is "capacity." This term is device- and mechanism-agnostic — i.e. it means the same thing no matter what storage medium or device you're talking about. And it's completely accurate and specific — no one will ever wonder what you mean when you say "capacity;" it can only mean one thing.

So folks, please, stop calling it "memory." It's capacity. Period.

Geez!

iPhone 2.1 Goodness

One of the things that's been immensely frustrating as I transition everything in my life (my job, my home, my site) to a new version of everything in my life has been the sudden and drastic drop in reliability of a device I've come increasingly to rely on for damn near everything. That device is, of course, my iPhone. Your primary phone is not ever a device you want to go without for very long. Phone service has become so crucial that I can't think of anyone anywhere that could really do without it for any stretch of time. It's more ubiquitous — and certainly more important — than television, or even, dare I say it, The Internet (though I might hasten to point out that when it's working well my iPhone does all three). So when your primary phone begins behaving erratically, it's more than a bit of a pain. And when that lack of reliability occurs during major transitional periods of your life, well, the expression I like to use is: frickin' annoying as shit. I'm telling you, since updating to version 2.0 of the iPhone software — a plunge I honestly wish I'd waited on — I have been tempted numerous times to chuck the damn thing — the phone I've had a love affair with for the past year, this phone of phones — clear across the room, after which I would pounce upon it and tear out and feast upon its touch-sensitive insides. Seriously. It's been bad.

I'm happy — no, unbelieveably thrilled, actually — to report, however — and this is the actual purpose of this post — that the latest 2.1 iPhone dealie-o really does fix all the crap they said it would. The new(ish) iPhone 2.1 firmware, as promised, fixes all the problems I've had over the past month or so. The infuriating slowdowns and maddening drop-outs seem to be truly gone. It's like I'm running version 1 again, which is to say, glorious. Oh, iPhone! I can't stay mad it you!

Figures, though, they fix it right as I'm getting settled. I guess when it rains it really does pour.