Transfer an iPhoto book project to another Mac
My son is working on an iPhoto book of his trip to Belgium in May. It’s a great project for him, laying out text and pictures. He’s working on my iMac with my iPhoto Library. If he doesn’t finish before we go on vacation this week, is there any way to transfer the project to my MacBook?
To move a book project, you gotta transfer the entire iPhoto library to your MacBook, which just means that there has to be enough room. You can tell iPhoto to switch libraries by holding down the option key when you first start iPhoto (i.e. it has to not be running first). You’ll see a window like this:
If one ever needed to get fancier, one can download the $20 iPhoto Libary Manager.
This Apple thread has some more discussion.
At that point, I would consider the libary on your iMac to be off-limits until you get back home. That way, if you also choose to do any work in iPhoto once you’ve got it on your laptop, you can copy everything back to the iMac. Please make a discrete backup of the original library to your external hard drive, perhaps calling it “iPhoto Library old.” I realize Time Machine stores versions of your library, but it will start to delete older versions after a while, and I would prefer that you didn’t take the chance.
Completely backup iPhone
This is a nice thing to do before running an iPhone software update.
1) Click on the iTunes menu, and go to Preferences…
2) Click on Devices.
3) In the list of Device Backups, with the dates, click on each of your backups, then below, click the button called Delete Backup.
4) In the left-hand column in iTunes, right-click on your iPhone, and click Backup.
The new iPhone: to buy or or not to buy
Everybody has now caught wind of the excellent new iPhone software and hardware coming this month. All current iPhone owners will be able to download the new OS 3.0 for free on June 17.
The question I’m getting asked now is whether one should buy the new phone, or will one be happy simply updating their existing hardware with the new system?
I won’t delve into all the new features, some of which will be available to all iPhones, and some which will only come with the new iPhone 3GS. (Sidenote: I’m not going to type it “3G S”, ‘cos I think it looks stupid.) The Unofficial Apple Weblog has done a fine writeup of most of the new features, and of course you can see Apple’s pages on the iPhone 3GS and on the iPhone OS 3.0 for full lists.
Out of everything announced for the iPhone, cut, copy, and paste is far and away the most important new feature, one that most of us feel we should have had from the get-go. I’ve finally gotten to play with it myself, and it works beautifully, and solidifies the iPhone’s position as the must-have gadget of the moment. And it will be available on every iPhone in existence, and that makes us happy.
The features that are coming only to the new iPhone 3GS, the big ones at least, are faster phone operations, voice control, a digital compass (enabling turn-by-turn directions, among other things), a much improved camera, and shooting/editing/sharing video. (I just read they’ve added an “fingerprint-resistant oleophobic coating” to the screen. So maybe we don’t want to put film on this time, although I really like my anti-glare screen.)
Honestly, they had me at “speed.” I’ve been increasingly dissatisfied with the time it takes to go from one app on the iPhone to another. Apple has optimized things a little in OS 3.0 — contacts searching is noticeably quicker — but my iPhone 3G still feels sluggish. So, with a better processor and more RAM, the new iPhone holds much promise for the more impatient among us.
So, could I be happy with my current iPhone? Yes. 3.0 makes it a much, much better device.
Am I going to buy a new iPhone? Yes. In fact, YES! I am looking forward to turn-by-turn directions and voice control… although I really want to be able to say “new email to bob smith,” and start transcription, and it doesn’t look like we’re there yet.
Am I going to buy the iPhone 3GS when it comes out? Not… just… yet.
Here’s the deal: The $199 & $299 prices announced for the 16GB and 32GB models, respectively, are the “subsidized” prices, i.e. the price that you pay if (a) you enter into a new 2-year contract with AT&T, or (b) if you are already under contract, and you bought your last subsidized phone more than a year ago.
The iPhone 3G hit the shelves July 11, 2008. Today is June 13, 2009 (6 days before the iPhone 3GS release). I have confirmed with AT&T that anyone who bought an iPhone 3G at the subsidized price won’t qualify for the lower price on a 3GS for at least a month, July 13 at the earliest.
Some folks have been misled by going to Apple’s “Buy an iPhone” page, because it doesn’t give you the above information, and does give you the impression that you’re gonna pay the full $400 or $500 price for a 3GS. Unfortunately, some news outlets fanned the flames of false information.
The nice part about that wait is that I’m forced to be patient and let everybody else experience the good and the bad of the new phone. I’m sure it’ll be fine, but last year’s iPhone Day 1 was quite a mess, with the new MobileMe service and everybody activating at once, and the very buggy 2.0 software.
A final note: I just sold my 1st-generation iPhone 2G for $220 on craigslist, and there are, right now, listings for 3G phones as high as $400. Tip: An older phone is more valuable if you unlock and jailbreak it. (Call us at 210.787.2709 for assistance.) So one can potentially turn a profit in getting a new phone.
iPhone abroad
I learned something useful about the iPhone when I was out of the country recently. I wanted to use the phone’s wifi Internet, but I didn’t want to make or receive calls on it, and get charged the ridiculous per-minute rates. AT&T tried to sell me the $6/month “World Traveler” plan, in which your international roaming rates are simply somewhat less appalling. (I learned, also, that I would have paid even for incoming calls that I didn’t accept, and data rates for voicemails that I didn’t listen to. Stinkers!)
Anyway, here’s what I did:
1) Upon boarding your plane, ship, hovercanoe, what-have-you, turn on Airplane mode: Home > Settings > set Airplane Mode to ON.
2) Then, when you get to a wifi connection (and your vessel is increasingly likely to have one), go back to Home > Settings > Wi-Fi, and turn on Wi-Fi, then choose whatever network is available, for which you either have or don’t need a password.
This worked like a charm to get me email, surfing, local restaurant reviews, etc. I was only surprised that GPS didn’t work. The major BONUS was that, the day I arrived in the other country, Skype released it’s free iPhone app, so I was able to make calls back to the States really cheaply, whenever I had Internet. ¡Que suave!
Is 5GB of mobile broadband a month enough for most people?
First off:
1024 bytes = 1 KB (kilobyte)
1024 KB = 1 MB (megabyte)
1024 MB = 1 GB (gigabyte)
1024 GB = 1 TB (terabyte)
It’s hard to peg the average size of a web page (so, one person’s profile on Facebook, for example). Easy to say a range between 80 and 300 KB. (This is an interesting page: Average Web Page Size Triples Since 2003.)
Very broad and arbitrary size ranges for other kinds of files:
Photos found on the internet: 100 KB – 2 MB
Higher-resolution images: 2 – 15 MB.
Song files run between 2 – 15 MB.
A half-hour of video, maybe 150 – 175 MB.
A 90-minute movie, 500 MB – 1 GB
So, to the question:
5GB is fine for phones with internet (c.f. articles 1 & 2).
On a computer, however, 5GB may or may not be fine (c.f. article 3 is from a geekier perspective).
I go waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaay past 5 GB a month. I ain’t even going to guess a number. If you only look at static web pages — ones with no videos — and nobody sends you emails with pictures or videos in them, and you don’t download any music or audio-visual material… you likely won’t hit 5GB.
Here’s the important question for your carrier: Is there a way to monitor how much you’ve used up to the current moment in the billing cycle?
1. Beta News: Sprint says 5 GB per month should be enough for most
2. Yahoo! Answers: Is 5GB enough for a normal use on a laptop for broadband access using a USB Card?
3. Buzz Out Loud Lounge: Would 5 GB be enough for you?
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