A little while ago I purchased a refurbished iMac i7 to replace my aging iMac 20-inch. My last four Macs have been refurbished models. The 27″ screen is amazing. The size allows me to have two full page windows open and viewable at the same time. I only have 4 GB of RAM for now, which should be plenty for what I do, but 8 GB couldn’t hurt.
I initially was using the wireless small keyboard with the Magic Mouse, but have recently changed back to a more traditional set-up. I now use a wired Apple full-size keyboard and a Logitech M500 corded mouse or a Kensington Expert Mouse trackball. I prefer the full-size wired keyboard with number pad. The Magic Mouse works great, nice feel and responsive to Multi-Touch but was a bit twitchy at times on some web sites I visited and would occasionally lose the bluetooth connection. Battery life was not a big deal since I used rechargeable AAs and would monitor remaining charge. But I did grow tired of that and wired components don’t bother me and I never have connection issues.
Current: iMac i7
Past: iMac 20-inch
See a more complete computer history under About tab.
Activation of my new iPhone 4 was extremely easy online through iTunes. I gave my now de-activated iPhone 3G to my father to use as an iPod Touch. He is still new to touch screen technology.
As expected the 4 is much faster than the 3G.
I got my iPhone 4 today, which is a week earlier than originally expected.
Recap: I pre-ordered on June 15th at 7:00 pm online. The initial ship date was July 2nd.
Shipment Travel History
Jun 29, 2010 10:09 AM
Delivered
Jun 24, 2010 5:16 PM
Picked up
SHENZHEN CN
Package received after FedEx cutoff
Jun 24, 2010 1:54 AM
Shipment information sent to FedEx
Well, my iPhone 4 left China on the 24th and now has arrived in Anchorage, AK today. According to FedEx tracking information my iPhone 4 is still due to be delivered by the 29th, although on apple.com it states the 30th.
This will be a greater change for me than most since I’m upgrading from an 8G iPhone 3G not a S model.
I got an email with tracking number showing that my iPhone 4 has shipped TODAY.
I placed my order early evening on June 15th with Apple and my confirmation stated that my iPhone 4 would ship by July 2nd with an arrival between the 6th to 8th. I had read that some iPhones had shipped early. Since then I have been checking multiple times a day to see if my ship date got moved up. It did. So basically, I will get my iPhone 4 a week earlier than expected.
Apple handled the iPhone 4 ordering excellently. They gave a reasonable initial ship date in order to cover their demand. Once things were sorted out and initial exceptions were being realized Apple SHORTENED the ship date. This of course make customer happy. Not like other vendors that cancelled confirmed orders and increased ship time. This demonstrates that Apple does know how to judge demand with a new product. Having good balance between customer expectations and actual quantity to manufacture is difficult and risky.
I upgraded 2 products to the new OS, my 2G iPod Touch 32G and 3G iPhone 8G.
First was my iPod Touch. I synced it with iTunes 9.2 and initially iTunes stated that the OS was up-to-date. After pressing the check for update button I was then asked if I wanted to upgrade to iOS4. I selected yes. First iTunes downloaded the update then asked me if I wanted to install, yes of course. iTunes backed-up my Ipod Touch then installed the new OS. Then restored my settings from the back-up. This process took 90 minutes. After it was done my iPod Touch was not longer connected to iTunes and iTunes was frozen. I had to force quit iTunes in order to get things back up again. Before re-syncing with iTunes I checked out the operation of the iPod Touch. Everything appears to be working as before. The new Mail app is much better with the choice of handling multiple email accounts.
Next I upgraded my iPhone 3G (no S). Once connected iTunes 9.2 immediately told me that a new OS was available. I selected yes to all appropriate menus. First iTunes downloaded iOS4, next backed-up my iPhone 3G, installed new OS, then finally restored my settings from the back-up. Same process as my 2G iPod Touch. Except for the time. The iPhone upgrade took over 3 hours. I had the same frozen iTunes after all was done making me force quit iTunes again. My Phone 3G appears to be working as expected. No problems. I really do like the new Mail app. I have not tried using folders yet.
As for battery life , maybe a little more. The current battery life before re-charge seems to be very low to me. Starting with a full charge in the morning, I check email and read news on a break at work thats about 15 minutes. Then on lunch I check email again and read more news and sometimes play a game, that lasts about 30-45 minutes. When I get home and check battery life I am down to less than a quarter of life left. Basically I get about 2 hours top between battery re-charge cycles. That seems to me to be way to low. SInce I carry multiple battery rechargers for back-up when I am way from home I am not concern yet. Of course I will be getting a new iPhone 4 next week. We will see how that goes.
Since I was awake at 1:30 AM June 15th, I decided to checkout the Apple Store website. At first I was not thinking about pre-ordering an iPhone 4, I was actually checking if there were any iPod classics available on the refurbished site. Well, the Apple Store was down for maintenance.
After that I thought I would check with AT&T wireless website about upgrading information for the iPhone 4. The iPhone specific page loads with a big iPhone 4 ad with an pre-order select button. Pressing the button takes to a log-on screen for your account for upgrading. I entered required information. The response tells me that I am eligible NOW to upgrade my iPhone 3G (No S). Until recently I was due to be eligible on 21 June. Next page fails. There was a warning that AT&T is unable to process my inquiry. So that was that off to bed.
Next try, 7:30 AM. Same thing with both Apple and AT&T. Off to work.
3rd try, 7:00 PM. AT&T same response still. Lucky for me the Apple Store is up and running. I selected iPhone 4 32G pre-order and checked the appropriate upgrade path. Next Apple checked my AT&T eligibility. Information came back showing my current AT&T phone, messaging and data plans with an option to keep current ones or change. I kept old plan for now.
Next step was a choice on iPhone 4 delivery method. Either ship to or in-store pick-up. The in-store pick-up option stated that there were no reservations available but I could go to my local store and get an iPhone 4 on a first come basis on June 24th. I had not chosen an actual local store at this point. That option was too iffy, especially since I would be at work until 6 PM. Who knows what in-store availability will be like the first weekend, probably not good.
I chose the ship to method. The page stated that the iPhone 4 will ship by July 2nd. Yes July 2nd. My confirmation reaffirms this and adds delivers by July 6th – 8th by standard shipping.
Hopefully these dates won’t be extended. This will give two weeks to read and here all the comments from those who got the iPhone 4 on the first day.
I had my first real talk with an Apple Genius today about my failing 20” iMac. It went very well compared to my last drop-in visit. I described my problem and got the answers I expected. I was told that Apple will only replace the internal hard drive with the same size it already has. Strange since I was told last time that they would replace it with any size which would vary the price. Anyway, for a 320GB drive replacement I am looking at $500+.
It was suggested that I could take the iMac into a different authorized service provider in order to get an upgraded hard drive replacement. I did email and call the two local non-Apple authorized service providers but got no response after multiple tries over a week.
Essentially, that is just too much for me especially with only a 320 GB drive. My flakey internal optical drive appears to my a dirty or bad lens so to replace the internal optical drive would cost $300+. $800 to repair an over 3 year old computer is too high, so I opted for complete replacement – 27” iMac i7. Once I get my new computer up and running then I will buy a 1 TB drive from OWC for the 20” iMac and replace it myself.
Well, I finally got around to replacing my old 20” iMac 2.4 GHz (mid 2007). I have been living on borrowed time since the internal 320 GB hard drive in my 20” iMac is failing SMART. It could totally fail anytime. I do have multiple backups, so I am not worried when the time comes.
I briefly asked an Apple Genius a few weeks ago what the cost would be to replace the internal hard drive to a 500 GB model. After some confusion on their part not understanding what model I was describing and that I have NO warranty, I was told over $500. I made an official Genius appointment for tomorrow in order to ask about this in detail. Additionally, the internal optical drive is flakey. The drive does not always recognize disks, usually DVD movies I get from Netflix.
Next week after I receive my 27” iMac i7, I will replace the hard drive in my 20” iMac myself. There is plenty of videos and HD pictures available. OWC has 1TB drives for under $100 plus a tool kit. Since I was a tech in the military, taking apart the iMac is not too much of a hassle after watching some video procedures.
Update went smooth and quick.
I have learned from the past two Mac OS X updates to NOT use ‘Software Update’. Instead I just download the Combo update. Then after first repairing permissions, I install the update. There was no major noticeable difference after restart in performance or appearance.
Get the Combo update from Apple’s downloads page > here < or these two great software sites.
Just search 'Apple Mac OS X – 10.5.8'
MacUpdate – specific page > here <
VersionTracker – specific page > here <
