nates notes

This may be of use to some, especially as original Airport cards are becoming increasing difficult to track down.

There is a USB Wireless Adapter made by Asus that (sort of) works on a Mac.

However, the application that you need to use to activate and control it on a Mac appears to be exactly that, an application, not a real driver.
The application CD is labelled as coming from nortekonline.com but as the Asus adapter uses the Ralink 2500 chipset, there are a selection of drivers available.

Some useful information about other wireless adapters that use the same chipset.

My experience with this so far is that you have to activate the adapter using it's application and then an 'Ethernet Adapter' appears in the Network Preference Pane.
Unfortunately, If you sleep the Mac or restart, the connection is lost and you have to unplug the adapter, plug it back in and reconnect in the application.
I have not tried any of the other drivers yet, as I have only just found them.

This may not be of any great use considering the hoops that you have to jump through but the adapter is available for around £17 ($30)

It doesn't matter where you live or how big a garden you've got. Your life can still be blighted by those neighbours that seem to have no idea about what social responsibility is.
We have such neighbours and they have a West Highland Terrier. Now, I have nothing against the dog as it's a bright little thing that would make an excellent pet for someone, just not our particular neighbours.
I think you could count on one hand the number of times that we have seen them take the poor thing for a walk.
The result of this lack of love and attention, plus the fact that it is left outside in all weathers means that it barks for attention whenever it sees something or hears the slightest sound.

A continuous bark, about once per second, until it gets what it wants.

Despite telling them about this problem and them admitting on numerous occasions that they are aware of it, nothing has been done to improve the situation.
I have decided to take action by using this product. I will report back on how it works out.

A cautionary tale:

I advised a customer to order a Mac mini and a DVI to ADC adapter to link up to his existing 17" Apple Studio Display (with ADC connector).
Unfortunately the DVI to ADC Adapter only supports the Apple flat panel displays, not the CRTs, which is very confusing as there are a few displays named 'Studio Displays'.

Ah well, I will probably end up having a DVI to ADC Adapter to add to my collection, which may come in useful at some point in the future.

Excellent News!
Roll on for their introduction to the UK store.
...or I will bring back a suitcase full from MacWorld ;-)

A cautionary tale for all:

1) A new client orders an iMac G5 (and additional Apple RAM!) a couple of days before new versions released.
2) His old iMac then had problems which I fixed. While the Mac was 'offline' ...
3) He received the following email from the Apple store saying:

Dear Apple Store Customer,

Thank you for shopping at the Apple Store.
Today, Apple unveiled a new iMac with a variety of fantastic new features. Accordingly, we are pleased to revise your recent order and substitute the original product you ordered with the new iMac.

There are several options you may choose from. For more information on the new configuration, availability and to select your preferred option, please visit http://www.apple.com/go/transition/. You will need your web order number A12345678 and your email address to hand.

We will confirm the successful conversion of your order by e-mail within 24 hours.
If we do not hear from you within the next 5 working days, we will use our best judgement to convert your current order to the nearest configuration.
Answers to many post-sales questions can be found at the Apple Store Customer Service website: http://promo.euro.apple.com/promo/help/uk/consumer

Kind regards,
The Apple Store

4) Neither of us could do the 'conversion' as it already said that the order had been processed.
5) The client phoned Apple and the order had somehow been cancelled!!!
6) The client reordered the iMac (without the Apple RAM) and I'm pretty sure at this point he asked me if anything else. I incorrectly said No :-(
7) A friend of the client told him that the new iMac came without a modem.
8) The client called Apple and they stated that the only way that this could be resolved is to cancel the order and reorder with the modem.
9) The client then called me to check this. I said that that was the best thing to do, all the while apologising for my oversight about the modem.
10) When the client tried to do this, he was told that they couldn't because it had been despatched. Probably between 1st call and second!

This is the clincher:
He was told by AppleStore 'Any USB modem will work. Just go into PC World and pick one up'

Now unless I am mistaken, that is not the case and it hasn't been possible to do that for a couple of years now.

Why don't Apple just make it easy for everybody and sell this modem separately?
They should be available as replacements for the internal ones on older, dare I say it, Mac OS 9 Macs :-/
It's amazing how many people, out in rural areas, with these iMacs rely on dial up but don't use a surge protector!

I think this client was talking about broadband, so I will suggest that he goes for that. No point spending £35 on a 56K USB modem so that he can access his £15 a month AOL dial up account when you can get Pipex broadband for £15 per month and a Netgear DG834GT for £65!

Sending bouncing down the streets of San Francisco may seem the strangest way to advertise this tv line, but that's exactly what Danish director Nicolai Fuglsig did for the BRAVIA commercial in July this year. San Franciscans have seen some unusual things in their time, but how about 250,000 multi-coloured 'superballs'?

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You have to go out and buy the magazine or be a Time Magazine subscriber to read this on the Time.com site.
Thanks to Sebastian Meyer for the link :)

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