Macopinion

How to Play Poker on a Mac

The Road Warrior Mailbag + From The Archive - August 4, 2008

"Disappearing" Space On A Mac mini
Re: Why I Won't Be Buying An iPhone 3G
From The Road Warrior Archive - The Mac mini As A Road Warrior Computer

___

"Disappearing" Space On A Mac mini

From: Mark Lehrman

Hi Charles,

Greetings once again from Israel. I am hopeful that you will be able to help solve my challenge, or at least give me some direction.

My wife uses a 1.83 Core Duo Mactel mini, with 2 GB RAM and an 80 GB hard Drive. The OS is Tiger 10.4.11. The mini's drive is split between OSX and Parallels running Windows XP (at this point about 37gb).

Lately, Parallels has been hesitant to open, claiming that there is not enough disk space available. When I went to check, indeed the disk seem to be full, but it is unclear what is really taking up so much space. How in OSX can I reclaim unused space? I have deleted some applications, pictures music etc. but don't seem tho have reclaimed that much. I realize that you haven't yet migrated to a Mactel and may not have used Parallels yet, but any of your sage advice, or at least a direction, would be much appreciated.

Thanks in advance,

Mark

___

Hi Mark;

Definitely shooting in the dark here for me.

There is a handy htfreeware program called Grand Perspective for Mac OS X that graphically shows the disk usage within a file system. It can actually help you to manage your disk, since you can easily spot which files and folders take up the most space, and it might be useful in helping determine where your wife's disk space is going.

You can download Grand Perspective here:

http://grandperspectiv.sourceforge.net/

I don't know if Parallels might be contributing to this problem or not. Possible with cache or swap files? Mac OS X's swapfiles do eat up more disk space the longer you go beterrn restarts, but I doubt that is your problem here.

I hope this will be a little help.

Charles

***

Re: Why I Won't Be Buying An iPhone 3G

From ncbill

Unlimited (in practice, limited to 5GB/month) data plans from cellular carriers here in the U.S. are about $60/month (with a voice plan).

Smartphone unlimited data is around $30/month, but tethering to a computer is not allowed (on some phones it is relatively easy to get around this restriction)

There is usually not a contractual requirement for the data plan - I can call up Verizon and cut on or off the unlimited data plan on a month-by-month basis.

Insert link name here

___

Thanks for the info, Bill.

Charles

***

From The Road Warrior Archive - The Mac mini As A Road Warrior Computer

Since Mark kicked off this Mailbag edition with a Mac mini query, I've chosen a Road Warrior column I posted shortly after the mini's release in early 2005, musing about its potential as a notebook substitute.

I never did get a Mac mini, although I wouldn;t categorically rule it out. However, as I noted in the commentary, I'm a pretty convinced laptop fan. I still admire the mini concept, though.

___

From The Road Warrior Archive - The Mac mini As A Road Warrior Computer [Originally Published January 25, 2005]

I really wish Willow Design was still in business. For a variety of reasons. Willow made some of the best, coolest, most innovative computer cases and backpacks, not just for Apple portables, but for the entire Macintosh line, including desktop tower models and CRT iMacs.

I would love to have seen what Willow’s Nigel Peck and Company came up with for the new Mac mini. Back in 2001, but I bought my G4 Cube, Nigel kindly sent me a http://www.applelinks.com/mooresviews/NL29.shtml Willow Cube Case for review. It was designed to carry the Cube CPU, keyboard, mouse, power supply, and speakers, as well as having a compartment for an Apple 15-inch Cinema Display.

The whole rig, with the 11.5 pound display, weighed in at about 42.5 pounds, so it wasn’t something you would want to lug around all day, but it did make the Cube as conveniently transportable as was possible — sort of in the tradition of the the original, 17 pound, compact Macs which were available with a carry case, and many Mac-heads did carry them around to Mac User Group meetings, or back and forth to school and work. While the complete kit weighed something in excess of 20 pounds, portability was possible, and I have even seen a photo of someone transporting one on a bicycle.

I still have that Willow Cube Case, and if I eventually end up with a Mac mini, I expect that it can be adapted to carry the mini with all its peripherals and a display quite comfortably. The monitor I have in mind is the NEC/Mitsubishi 1760V 17" LCD monitor which has a detachable stand, weighs 13 pounds with stand/10 pounds without, and at 14.7" x 12.6" it should fit nicely in the Willow Cube Case.

Of course the mini can’t qualify as a real portable because it has no internal battery power, but with a small power inverter that costs about 30 bucks you can be good to go anywhere, say any car or RV, where you have access to 12 volt power.

The Mac mini has most frequently been compared with the eMac and the iMac, but actually it has a lot more in common with the iBook than its desktop Mac stablemates. For instance, the mini has a laptop-type 4200 RPM 2.5” hard drive, a typical laptop array of I/O ports, a laptop-style optical drive, and the mini CPU weighs a pound and a half less than the lightest laptop Apple ever made.

So, is the Mac mini a viable laptop substitute? It depends. Not if you need a really portable computer of course. In that case get an iBook or a PowerBook. However, for the past five years or so, an awful lot of laptops have been purchased for use mainly as desktop substitute computers that spend most of their time plugged into AC power, and frequently with an external keyboard, mouse, and even an external monitor hooked up. My ‘Books go for months at a time without ever being called on to run on battery power. For mostly desktop laptop users like me, the “transportable” Mac mini presents an enticing alternative to a ‘Book.

Now, personally, I wouldn’t want to be without a real, portable laptop, but I already have three of them. A mini would be an excellent compliment to serve as a general-purpose workstation that’s still doesn’t take up much space and can be relatively easily moved around.

I’ve been down this road before, sort of. When the G4 Cube was unveiled in 2000, it immediately occurred to me that this new compact desktop Mac just might be a sensible alternative to my PowerBook. I did get a Cube several months later, but discovered that while my idea I had sounded good in theory, in practice the Cube with its satellite speakers and speaker amplifier, external power supply for which “brick” was more than just a metaphor, along with a keyboard, mouse, and display, needed about as much desktop space as my SuperMac S-900 tower. The tiny Mac mini has an internal speaker, a more reasonable, laptop-sized power adapter, and is itself about one-fifth the volume of the Cube CPU, so it should size up quite favorably compared with an iBook or PowerBook on a laptop stand connected to an external keyboard and mouse, at least provided you connect it to an LCD monitor.

I love small computers. Compactness is the essential quality of a laptop -- even the mighty 17-inch PowerBook. Light weight is also an attractive characteristic. I much prefer handling my 4.9 pound iBook to my 8 pound WallStreet.

For me, the principal deficiency of the mini he is the lack of battery power, not so much the lack of real portability, but because I live in a rural area where power outages are fairly common. This in addition to desktop real estate occupied, was one of the reasons why I never really got comfortable with the Cube as a workhorse computer. I had become accustomed to the PowerBook’s being able to cruise through power outages seamlessly, sometimes without my even noticing that there had been a power failure until the little lightning bolt charge indicator caught my eye.

The workaround would be some sort of uninterruptible power supply (UPS) and/or the aforementioned power inverter and a 12 volt automotive battery or power pack to run the mini rig off of during power interruptions. With its 2.5-inch hard drive and an LCD display, the mini should be able to run for a good long time from a portable 12 volt power source.

I haven’t said much about the economics of this concept so far, so let’s take a look. The 1.25 GHz Mac mini starts at $499, and an Apple keyboard and mouse sets you back $60. Add a 17” NEC/Mitsubishi monitor for $484 and you’re up to $1049 -- 50 bucks more than a 1.2 GHz iBook. Actually, you can probably do better than that price for the monitor by shopping around, so let’s say it’s pretty much a saw-off price wise. However, the mini has a faster system bus and a 33 percent larger hard drive, and if you want to use the iBook in comfortable desktop substitute mode, you’ll still need a keyboard and mouse, and a laptop stand.

Or add one hundred dollars to the price of the mini for the 1.42 GHz/80 gigabyte drive version, include a $75 upgrade to 512 megabytes of RAM, and for good measure, an APC BE350U 350VA UPS from Amazon.com on for $40, and you have a pretty powerful transportable computer system for forty dollars less than the price of a 1.33 MHz 14 inch iBook, but with a faster system bus, a 33 percent larger hard drive, and a display the same size (albeit not aspect ratio) as a 17-inch PowerBook’s, and according to early days benchmarking -- performance to match the 1.5 GHz PowerBook as well - a machine that costs more than twice as much. It’s pretty compelling.

So, has Moore lost the laptop faith? Not at all. As I said, if I were to be limited to owning just one computer, it would still definitely be a conventional laptop. However, the Mac mini offers as close to the laptop virtues as we’ve seen yet in a desktop computer, and really represents a crossover category - - the “transportable” computer.

Consequently, it’s on my short list for my next system upgrade, and we’ll henceforth be including the mini in our coverage focus here in The Road Warrior.

***



cmoore@macopinion.com

Note: Letters to The Road Warrior may or may not be published in The Road Warrior Mailbag at the editor's discretion. Correspondents' email addresses will NOT be published unless the correspondent specifically requests publication. Letters may be edited for length and/or context.

If you would prefer that your message not appear in The Road Warrior Mailbag, we would still like to hear from you. Just clearly mark your message "NOT FOR PUBLICATION," and it will not be published.

CM