Mark Dalton

So with the number of jobs starting to mount up at home and winter just around the corner I decided I needed to take some time off work and generally catch up.

Well it hasn’t been an exciting two weeks per se, but I have managed to get most of the jobs that needed doing, done, and even started planning some of the big jobs that are on the list for next year.

It hasn’t been all work however and I have enjoyed a few long lay in’s, long lunches, and a few beers here and there, including a few with Gary Clarke, an old school friend who I hadn’t seen for 10 years. It was a nice evening picking up more or less where we left off and catching up with the latest gossip. It turns out that we have been working around the corner from each other for several years now and hadn’t bumped into each other.

I also managed to catch up with the jobs I had promised others I would do including building a Windows 7 tablet for my sister and finally setup a wireless network at her house that I have been meaning to do for months. I also managed to setup WiFi for my Aunt, Uncle, and cousin, and configure an old NetGear SC101 NAS box for my parents as a backup device for there two Vista laptops.

I feel rested and ready to tackle the world again next week, safe in the knowledge I only have six weeks until I have another two weeks off over Christmas. I still have a few little jobs to do but these involve shopping something I think is best done on a nice day when I can walk into town and finish in a pub.

October 26, 2009 @ 7:37 PM – The Daily Mail today is carrying a follow up story with the mothers story of what happened here.

So it has been a while since the family got together so Mum & Dad invited everybody out for dinner today at the local harvester. It was great day and William and Eleanor were both very well behaved, and a lot of fun. It was also a good opportunity to get the camera out again. Something I haven’t done for a while.

You can find the full set of photo’s either in the Photo Gallery or over on my Flickr page.

So I love my MacBook Air but after 19 months the battery has started to lose it’s ability to hold a charge and the disk is starting to show signs of ill heath.

Considering that it has travelled the globe with me and has spent much of it’s time operating in conditions that really aren’t conducive with humans let alone any type of computer I am amazed it has lasted this long, but it has, and it has become more of a travel companion to me than my iPhone.

So I started to look around at how much it would cost me to repair. I nearly dropped to the floor when my local Apple Authorised Reseller quoted me £125 + VAT for the labour plus the cost of the battery (which they couldn’t provide without the serial number of the MacBook Air itself?). I didn’t even bother to ask how much to swap out the hard drive, fearing my back manager would drop dead. To put it into perspective a new top of the line MacBook Air would cost £1,350, putting the repair easily over 10% of the price of a top of the line new replacement, let alone the entry level version.

So the thought of a new MacBook Air started to run through my mind. It was then I started to think about what I actually liked and didn’t like about the MacBook Air and started to look at the new MacBook Pro line. Now the main thing for the MacBook Air is it’s weight. At only 3 pounds you really don’t even know you are carrying it, whilst it still offers a full keyboard and a respectable 13″ screen. The major downside for me is the connectivity, whilst I have grown used to it a single USB port just isn’t enough. If I am brutally honest I would also have to say my first generation MacBook Air is under powered (1.6 GHz Intel Core 2 Duo processor, 2GB RAM, 80GB HDD). Now whilst the latest MacBook Air (entry level) comes with a 1.86GHz Intel Core 2 Duo processor and a 120GB HDD, it is not really a significant leap in my book, especially for the £1,149 price tag.

So enter the MacBook Pro. Now my introduction to the Mac was a 17″ MacBook Pro and it served and still is serving me very well, but I wouldn’t want to be carrying it around with me after using the MacBook Air. The new line up however is much improved. The new entry level MacBook Pro comes with a 2.26GHz Intel Core 2 Duo processor, 2GB RAM, and a 160GB hard disk drive and a price tag of £899.00. Okay so it’s heavier right? Well yes, two and a half pounds heavier! It has the connectivity though? Yes, it comes with an gigabit ethernet port, a FireWire 800 port, a mini display port, and two USB ports. Add to that both Audio in and out, a superdrive, and an SD card slot, you have to ask yourself what else you could possibly want, except maybe a third USB port.

So an easy decision right? Well no, not quite. It’s that extra weight you see. Now I am not doing the international travel that I was but commuting to London each day I still like to travel as light as possible. Is the trade off worth it? Well at this point in time I am thinking yes but will be popping along to the Apple store in Regents Street to hold them both in my hand at the same time, something I will add my local Apple Reseller would not let me do. I also have to think about how I pay for for the transition. The MacBook Air isn’t a lost cause, it just needs some love, but if I pay for the work to be done will I see that in the resell value or am I better off selling it openly and honestly (like there is any other way) and taking a reduced price?

So this weekend I have been the Duty Manager and therefore tied to the house, however looking on the positive side, I have a filthy cold so it probably hasn’t done any harm staying in the warm. Work has been pretty manic over the last couple of weeks and there were a few more changes going in this weekend than in previous weeks, but thankfully the weekend has gone smoothly and without any major hitches.

Other than this I have pretty much just lay on the sofa and watch TV and I must say I feel better for it. This afternoon I am going to tidy up the house and then catch up on some paper work. Exciting!

One thing I have managed to sort out is a problem I was having using my HP 7210 All-In-One unit that stopped scanning after I upgraded to Snow Leopard. A major pain in the backside as I use this for scanning in all by bills and documents.

It would appear that the functionality is now built directly into Snow Leopard, and the previous HP drivers and tools are now redundant, full details can be found on the HP Website here.

This has meant that I have had to change my work flow slightly, but I do like the fact that I can use tools that are built into the Operating System and don’t have to keep track of driver versions.