I can see replacing my 13″ MacBook with the iPad and using my iMac to do the heavy lifting.  I can see using Dropbox and Evernote even more.  I can see converting all my current OOo [OpenOffice] documents to iWork which means that it easily justifies the expense [not that I consider iWork expensive].  In fact, I think that I could buy 1 iPad for each of my family members and then set up accounts on our iMac as the kids get older.  This would allow my boys to each have one for online games and Apps and their own music selections.

While my personal transition to eBooks has been slow, this may entice me to make that move.  I am using Stanza on my iPhone & it isn’t really a compelling experience.  I also don’t have a lot of reading time and find that Audible is a better resource for me right now.  I hope that this iBook software allows for marking and notes because that would be a big failure right out of the gate if it wasn’t included.  I hope that Amazon gets on board like Audible has with Audiobooks available via iTunes; especially if they can keep the books at the low cost they already are for Kindle owners.

I think this beats the NetBook model hands down even if it isn’t quite what I thought it would end up being. Now, a few weeks ago I published my own predictions for the iPad.

I predicted that Apple would release a multi-touch device similar to the JooJoo [aka CrunchPad] that ran Apps, eBooks, with WiFi/3G, iTunes, a built in battery, Lala, and the content aspects of the Sports Illustrated Tablet demo.  I was right on some items and we could still see Lala become part of the service package MobileMe [I was not the first to suggest this].  I will admit that I am still blown away.  I love the device and look forward to heading into town in 60 Days and testing one out.  I think I will have to get a sitter & take the wife to a movie to justify the whole thing.

I know that many people will not get it until they see others using it and that I can understand.  It was the same way with the Kindle and other devices.  I didn’t get the iPod until I owned one.  Yeah, until I owned one and then I felt dumb because I had not invested in it before then.  It was a mind blowing music experience and since then, I have bought a couple dozen albums.

New Prediction, iSlate with Inkwell for writing with a finger or 3rd party stylus.  This will be more like the Axiotron ModBook.  It will be slide between the iPad and MacBook.

iron wil

The capabilities are a whole different ball-game.  I am curious what they will deliver.

iron wil

Hosts: Leo Laporte, Kevin Rose, and Dwight Silverman

Chrome OS, Firefox 3.5 flaw, Amazon + NetFlix, Google Design, Twitter hacked, and more.

Show Notes

MacBreak Weekly 150: Prove It

Hosts: Leo Laporte, Alex Lindsay, and Scott Bourne

Quarterly earnings, tablet rumors, AT&T, Big Kindle is watching, Microsoft retail stores, and more.

Show Notes

Security Now 206: Security News Updates

Hosts: Steve Gibson with Leo Laporte

Security updates in Windows Office, IAS, Virtual PC, Virtual Server, msvid control, and more.

Show Notes

Windows Weekly 116: Bring On The Bugs

Hosts: Paul Thurrott and Leo Laporte

Windows 7 RTM, Windows 7 E, Home Server Power Pack 3, Chrome OS, and more.

Show Notes

iron wil

Hosts: Leo Laporte, John C. Dvorak, and Brian Brushwood

Amazon vs. sales tax, some IPTV ads cost more than equivalent TV, Windows 7 Pricing, Yahoo stockholders meeting, and more.

Show Notes

MacBreak Weekly 147: I Lost My Handy

Hosts: Leo Laporte, Alex Lindsay, Andy Ihnatko, Scott Bourne, and Don McAllister

China blogging, iWeb, AT&T iPhone exclusivity, hot 3GS, Steve back at work, and more.

Show Notes

Security Now 203: Boyer and Moore

Hosts: Steve Gibson with Leo Laporte

Steve tells of the Bob Boyer and J Strother Moore algorithm for finding a substring in a buffer.

Show Notes

Windows Weekly 114: Rob Greenlee

Hosts: Paul Thurrott and Leo Laporte

Rob Greenlee from Microsoft chats with Paul and Leo about podcasting.

Show Notes

iron wil

Hosts: Leo Laporte, Patrick Norton, Jason Calacanis, Brian Brushwood, Dr. Kiki, and Catherine Hall

Swine flu, Microsoft revenue drops, Apple poo-poos netbooks, The Pirate Bay, and more.

Show Notes

MacBreak Weekly 138: All Things Conditioned

Hosts: Leo Laporte, Andy Ihnatko, and Alex Lindsay

NAB, iPhone hardware add-ons, hackintoshes, Amazon/Stanza, a billion apps, and more.

Show Notes

Security Now 194: Listener Feedback 65

Hosts: Steve Gibson with Leo Laporte

This mailbag episode covers Conficker, Windows process control, NeXT, Ironkey, and more.

Show Notes

Windows Weekly 105: Paul’s Itties

Hosts: Paul Thurrott and Leo Laporte

Windows 7 Release Candidate, Windows XP Mode and Windows Virtual PC, Windows Vista and Server 2008 Service Packs, Zune Rumors, and more.

Show Notes

iron wil

I got these in the mail & charged them right away.  It was very easy to connect the A125s dongle to the BT620s headphones, once I understood that order to do things.  They headphones were light enough and had full over the ear coverage.  The sound was rich and deep, my only problem is that they made my ears hot.  The other problem that I constantly faced with them was intermittent connection.

I know that Bluetooth is not the same as wireless, but I expected a lot less interruption in the connection.  If I turned my head or if I got just 5 feet away from the iPod & dongle, the music would start to drop off.  I didn’t experience any problems when sitting in front or beside my MacBook or iPod.

The BT620s also functions as a headset for phones or computers, think Skype, and that worked well with good sound quality.  The built in controls worked very nicely and even paused the music for incoming calls, as advertised.

I sold them for 2 reasons, the padded full covered ear muffs and the broken connectivity.  I would give them a high rating if you are just going to be using them at your desk.  The BT620s would be a great headset for VOiP applications via a computer.

iron wil

Hosts: Paul Thurrott and Leo Laporte

New economics, Gmail goes offline, IE8 RC1, Windows 7 UAC, iTunes Plus, and more.

Do More with Less: How to Survive in Today’s Economic Reality

• A Microsoft marketing mantra becomes a life mantra for all of us
• Stretching PC/technology lifetimes
• Saying no to new gadgets … Every time we peddle something people don’t need, we lose a slice of our soul
• Reassessing what it is you really need to get work done
• Paul’s “28 Days Later” concept: Revisiting things Paul’s reviewed or recommended: Do they stand the test of time?
• Next “Everything Must Go” event: Late February
• Not just about spending less – decrease tech life’s overhead as well
• v. small ex: Paul doesn’t install/configure any Firefox add-ons – 7 less things to do on reinstall

Related: Gmail goes offline: Long expected, but this is a game-changer

Internet Explorer 8 RC1 release

• Near-final, “platform-complete” version of Microsoft’s next browser
• For XP, Vista, 2003/2008 not Windows 7
• A few new functional changes but mostly about performance and fit and finish

Is Windows 7 UAC dangerous … or just useless?

Rafael Rivera and Long Zheng have discovered that the dumbed-down UAC in Windows 7 is easy to bypass and could be used to compromise PC

Also in Windows 7 news…

• Windows 7 public beta set to end February 10
• Rumors of a Netbook SKU

iTunes Plus goes a la carte

• Previously, you had to upgrade your entire collection in order to get DRM-free 256 Kbps AAC tracks. Now you can pick and choose
• iTunes now a first-class choice for online music w/ Amazon MP3 and Zune Marketplace

News: Dell will sell a smartphone based on either Google Android or Windows Mobile. Paul’s advice: Don’t

Tip of the week: More Windows 7 theme packs … many are based on Mac wallpapers

Software of the week: Gladinet

Many readers have recommended this: It lets you access SkyDrive from Windows Explorer (and other things).

Audible picks of the week: The Ultimate Cheapskate’s Road Map to True Riches: Enjoying Life More by Spending Less and Elsewhere, U.S.A.: How We Got From the Affluent Society to the Home Office.

Check out Paul’s blog at the SuperSite for Windows for more information.

get yours here.

iron wil

Hosts: Paul Thurrott and Leo Laporte

Windows 7, Office 14, Zune rumors, MSDN, Software Wars, Roku, and more.

• Windows 7 Beta Fallout
  There is almost universal praise for the Windows 7 public beta which was released on January 9, 2009. After impressive demand for the new beta Microsoft has suspended its previous policy which would place a limit on the downloads to 2.5 million and will allow people to download the beta until January 24, 2009. Paul recommends re-arming rather then activiting to save your license keys. Windows 7 also runs great on netbooks, lower end notebooks designed for portability and low power usage. Paul describes a good experience on a 1.6GHz Atom system with 1 GB of RAM and 16GB of harddrive space. The only big question is: will the positive reviews of Windows 7 be enough to get XP users to upgrade?
• What about Office 14?
  With Windows 7 coming out in mid-2009 many are wondering if Office will quickly follow. Microsoft just started a limited beta test of their server offerings, but there is no news about the client. Sources say that we will have to wait until late 2009 or early 2010 for the new Office.
• Zune rumors
  Rumors abound that Microsoft may be exiting the portable media player business by discontinuing the Zune. However, Microsoft recently stated that rather then discontinue the Zune they are going to be expanding the product line. With Apple offering DRM free downloads from it’s iTunes music store, Microsoft may have their work cut out for them.Paul is going to try to get Rob Greenlee of the Zune Insider podcast on a future episode of Windows Weekly to discuss the Zune in more depth.
• Keith Curtis
  Keith Curtis is a long-time Microsoft employee and the author of “The Software Wars,” a book which states that open source software, not Apple, is the real future competition to the Windows operating system. GNU/Linux has been all but dismissed as a possibility on the desktop, but Keith disagrees and he may have a point. He will appear on a future episode of Windows Weekly where he will discuss his book and his ideas in detail.
• Roku Digital Video Player
  • This just in: Roku Digital Video Player adds hundreds of HD movies and TV shows via Netflix, plus 40,000 movies and TV shows from Amazon On Demand. The latter is coming in a few weeks
  • Netflix HD content
  • Office, 30 Rock, Heroes, Star Trek, plus movies like Elf, Ace Ventura, etc.
  • An amazing list of Windows 7 tips published by a Microsoft engineer.
  • Free Battlestar Galactica webisodes on Zune Marketplace In Season 0: A 10-part episode, Face of the Enemy, that bridges the gap between the last season and the next, plus two specials, “Recap” and “Catch the Frak Up”

A Message From Paul Thurrott”This week I’m going to be in Reston, Virginia on Friday for the ‘D.C.’ edition of the MSDN Developer Conference held at the Hyatt Regency Reston. It’s sort of a mini-PDC that’s going around the country. In DC to visit with Rafael. But drop me a line if you’ll be at the show.”

Tips of the week

• Software of the weekWindirstat: Excellent disk usage viewer for Windows – surprised I haven’t had this one in here before. Thanks to Greg Martin for the tip. See the discussion page for other similar free programs.

• Audible pick of the week: Cross Country, Unabridged, by James Patterson, narrated by Peter J. Fernandez and Dion Graham.

Check out Paul’s blog at the SuperSite for Windows for more information.

get yours here.

iron wil

Hosts: Paul Thurrott and Leo Laporte

I see dead Zunes, Windows 7 Beta, HP MediaSmart Servers, Windows Live Essentials, and more.

The day (some of) the Zunes died

• Zune 30 had a date-related software glitch
• Devices shut down for one day (Dec 31, 2008), are back up now
• Related: Xbox 360 flaw that causes discs to get deep scratches.

Windows 7 Beta arrives … for some

• Tech beta testers should get it soon … public sometime in January
• Not much has changed post-M3 but its feature complete

Next-gen HP MediaSmart Servers announced early

• Paul really likes them
• Windows Home Server
• Mac compatibility (Time Machine)

Holiday season – sales supposedly horrible

• But were really down just 2 percent year over year
• Amazon had ‘best ever’ season (again) but its unclear what that means
• Laptops are now (barely) outselling desktops – MS tells me that “businesses are still buying desktops, but individuals are overwhelmingly choosing portable computers

Tip of the week: Windows 7 users: Make the new taskbar work properly

Software of the week:

• Windows Live Essentials
• Near-final version is now available
• Only Movie Maker is still in beta

Audible pick of the week: The Audacity of Hope: Thoughts on Reclaiming the American Dream, Abridged, By Barack Obama, Narrated by Barack Obama.

Check out Paul’s blog at the SuperSite for Windows for more information.

Google Chrome, set-top box wars, Xbox 360 price cuts, PicasaWeb, and more.

• Chrome: Google’s full frontal assault on Microsoft
• Xbox 360 price cuts
• Office Live Workspace users reach one million mark; software and services vs. cloud computing
• Battle of the set-top boxes: Apple TV, Media Center Extenders, Roku (Netflix), Popcorn Hour, and New Xbox 360 (60 GB)
• Amazon Video On Demand

Tips of the week:

• Using Chrome for Web applications
• Standalone gMail and Google Calendar (also, PicasaWeb, etc.)

Software of the week:

• Google Picasa 3 Beta (and Picasa Web Albums update)
• Roboform
• Microsoft AutoCollage 2008

Audible pick of the week: All the President’s Men, Unabridged, By Carl Bernstein and Bob Woodward, Narrated by Richard Poe. For a free audiobook, visit Audible.com/windows.

Check out Paul’s blog at http://www.internet-nexus.com and the SuperSite for Windows http://winsupersite.com for more information.

get yours here.

iron wil