@methodshop

Retro junkies rejoice. Speck Products just announced a top-loading iPod stereo speaker system called the SpeckTone Retro. Sure, there are hundreds of iPod speaker systems on the market. What makes this system unique is the design.

The designers of the SpeckTone Retro have succeeded in making a product that looks modern and retro at the same time. The way they've paired clean modern styled lines with the nostalgic elegance of the 1950's is very impressive. The end result is an iPod speaker system that doesn't replicate or compete with the modern, sleek look of the iPod itself. These speakers almost feel like they could be in Lucy & Ricky's living room.


The SpeckTone Retro sells for under $150 and has the following features:

• 28 watt output
• 4 inch subwoofer
  
• two 3 inch drivers
• 1/8" mini plug auxiliary input
• Sleek & Stylish Retro design
• Analog Circuitry for rich, deep tone
• High-gloss lacquered wood cabinet
• Includes 2 free iPod skins (video & nano)
• Backlit 'green glow' volume knob
• compatible with the following iPods: 4G, 5G, nano and mini

The SpeckTone Retro comes in 3 high-gloss lacquered color finishes, black, white and green, and is available from Amazon.com.

Thanks to the guys at iPastudio for turning us on to this.

As you may know, you can order an iPod from the Apple Store with a custom, laser-engraved message. However, not everything gets engraved. Apple has been rejecting some messages for editorial reasons.

The following is a collection of engravings that were actually rejected by Apple, and some that probably should have been. Enjoy!

Full Story: Rejected iPod Engravings

UPDATE: YouTube has reworked their site in response to this article. They absolutely hate us. If you get an error when trying to download a YouTube video, please try some of the plug-ins and scripts listed in step #3.

YouTube.com is a great resource. Not many sites allows users to freely upload, view, and share video clips like YouTube does. YouTube even lets users easily post videos on their blogs and personal web sites. But because anyone can upload a video clip on YouTube, copyright violations are rampant.

In an effort to prevent the widespread distribution of illegal copied video files, YouTube encodes its video files in the Adobe Flash format, which prevents viewers from downloading files and making digital copies.

Here's a step-by-step MethodShop.com tutorial on how to rip video files off YouTube.com and convert them for an iPod Video. This trick will work on Mac or PC using Firefox or Internet Explorer.

methodshop

Labels: tutorial, video

Although I love my custom engraved iPod, I abuse the hell out of it once it gets into my purse. Apparently when I'm not looking, the clasp on my wallet and my 49¢ Bic pen have been trying to shank my iPod like a couple of Oz prison inmates.

But I can't let my rejected laser engraving get scraped all to hell... I need something to protect my iPod when I'm not.

Enter the iPod Purses...

Love it or hate it, but you certainly can't ignore it. The iPod has become the ultimate style statement. Here's a roundup of some iPod inspired bags for the fairer sex.

• Groove Bag
• Delapod
• Paul Frank Tornado
• Kangaroo iPod Pouch
• Electra iTote
  

Sorry boys, maybe next time!

read more | digg story | methodshop

[Via Treblemaker]

The amazingly versatile Sony VGC-VA1 combines a PC, Hifi, Television and DVD player into one sleek and unique space saving design.

It features a powerful Intel Pentium D 820 2.8GHz processor, 1024MB RAM and a generous 250GB hard drive for all your music and photos. You can also watch and burn DVDs and CDs with the front loading double layer DVD±RW drive.




read more

According to our friends at iPastudio.com, a company called Rough Guides released a series of downloadable travel guides for 10 major cities in iPod format. These full color gudies, called PodScrolls, even come complete with pictures and page numbers for easy navigation.

Here's a blurb from the Rough Guides website:

"We've kicked off with eating and drinking guides to ten of the world's great cities, drawing reviews from our acclaimed Directions guidebook series. Best of all, we're giving these PodScrolls away for free. Bon appetit... PodScrolls work on all colour-screen iPods."

The first 10 Podscrolls are available for download now and cover the following cities: Amsterdam, Barcelona, Dublin, London, Madrid, New York City, Paris, Prague, Rome, San Francisco.

If you own an iPod and plan on traveling to one of these cities, how can you go wrong? It's free.

Tired of all the drama and entertainment shows offered on iTunes? Feel like iTunes isn't informative enough? NBC and Apple apparently feel the same way.

Apple has officially made NBC the first news organization to offer their content in the iTunes Store. Previous news related offerings from other networks were only available as Podcasts.

As of this morning, Apple added the following NBC News pages to iTunes:

• NBC News Specials - a mix of big news events
• NBC News Time Capsule - older news from the NBC archives
• Tom Brokaw Reports - several of the special reports Brokaw has done since leaving the Night News anchor chair
• Meet the Presidents - interviews with presidents and world leaders from Meet the Press
• Dateline: Crime & Punishment - kidnappers, serial killers, and psychopath... Oh my
• CNBC Specials - Mad Money with Jim Cramer and CNBC documentaries
  

Interesting stuff from NBC and Apple. Will it sell well on iTunes? Are people hungry for news content on their video iPods? Time will tell, but kudos to Apple for trying.

The rocket scientists over ReallyRocketScience.com have come up with a clever way to promote their blog - free rocket launch ringtones. They combined a launch "countdown" with actual audio of an Atlas rocket liftoff and converted it into a mobile phone ringtone.

In case you are curious, the countdown heard in the ringtone wasn't recorded live. There were too many other voices and static to get a clean recording at the time. So while in the studio for the ASTRA 1KR launch last month, Don "The Voice of Atlas" Spencer sat down and recorded a clean countdown for the ringtone, which was later combined with actual liftoff audio.

The ringtone is actually pretty funny. The next time your cell phone rings, you'll feel like you only have 10 seconds to get it before it launches into voicemail.

You can get your free rocket launch ringtones at ReallyRocketScience.com.

Artcoustic speakers offer excellent sound quality from their speakers which are hidden behind a painting or an artwork. The speakers also matches the decor and interiors of the house.
Artcoustic hand-picks artists from around the world and invites them to create exclusive artworks for the Artcoustic Artist Portfolio. The Artcoustic Artist Portfolio is available for viewing at all specialist Artcoustic dealers. Each artwork design is produced as a digital print and hand made into a screen.

Boff, Bonk, Pow, Plop, Kapow, swa-a-p, whamm, zzzzzwap, bam... Are these the sounds of your kitchen exploding or a typical 1960s Batman fight scene?

Remember the visual sound effects on the 1960s TV version of Batman starring Adam West? Everytime someone got punched, kicked or hit during a fight scene, a giant Pow or Bonk graphic was sure to follow.

Many people found these graphics a little corny, but fans of the 1960s Batman TV show might want to check out the Batmania website. They have made it their mission to collect and catalog screenshots of every fight scene graphic and how many times it was used during the run of the show (1966-1968).

These fight scene graphics served a dual purpose. They helped tie Batman back to its comic book origins while covering up the terribly choreographed fight scenes (most punches never landed on the body of the intended victims).

Some common phrases used on the show included BAM! BLAM! CRASH! POP! POW! but here's the top 5 most used fight graphics according to Batmania:

Top 5 Most Used Batman Fight Graphics

• Kapow 50 times
  
• Pow 49 times
  
• Boff 43 times
  
• Zap 42 times
  
• Sock 41 times

TRIVIA NOTE: Initially, the title shots like POW! were placed over a scene so you could see both the actors and graphic. But because it cost too much money to create these title pages (combination of camera work and artwork), it was decided that just the POW!, for example, would fill the screen, thus saving on the budget.

read more | digg story | methodshop

Did Apple just bring back the failed Power Mac G4 Cube?

According to AppleInsider, construction workers haven taken the cover off the 32-foot glass cube entranceway in front of Apple's new Midtown Manhattan flagship retail location. Inside the glass cube is a giant backlit Apple logo that appears to float in the middle of the structure.

The combination of the cube shape with the giant Apple logo immediately brings to mind the failed Apple Power Mac G4 Cube released in 2000. In July 2001, Apple posted this press release saying that production of the Power Mac Cube was being put "on ice", but the product was not being officially discontinued. Is this new glass structure Apple's way of bringing the Cube back to life?

There are thousands of glass cube images on flickr but Cult of Mac blogger Leander Kahney found a great aerial view on Boingboing.

On Tuesday, Apple announced their new consumer laptop called the MacBook (prosumer users should check out the MacBook Pro). This new laptop features an Intel Core Duo processor and a 13" inch glossy widescreen display.

But what really has people excited about the MacBook is a new user replaceable hard drive feature. According to Apple Insider.com, MacBook owners will find that upgrading or replacing the computer's hard disk is as simple as adding more memory. Just flip over the MacBook and pop out the battery. You will immediately see the RAM slots and the MacBook's hard drive. Previous Apple laptop models required the skilled hands of an authorized service provider to perform a hard drive replacement. Now, any savvy MacBook owner (with some guts) will be able to upgrade their laptop's hard drive without completely disassembling the computer.

Beyond the replaceable hard drive feature, the stats for the new MacBook are great. Take a look:

• 13" inch widescreen; 1280x800 display
• 2 colors: sleek black and bright white
• 1 Firewire 400, 2 USB 2.0 ports
• Built-in iSight camera
• Integrated Intel GMA 950 graphics with 64 MB shared graphics memory
• mini-DVI with extended display support
• Airport Extreme + Bluetooth 2.0 (EDR) Standard
• Front Row (remote control media center)
• 512MB 667 Mhz DDR2 SDRAM (PC2-5300)
• Intel CoreDuo chips: 1.83 - 2 Ghz
• Gigabit Ethernet
• Low prices: $1,099 - $1,499

The new Intel MacBooks can be purchased directly from Apple's website.



BeSocial: digg it | methodshop.com

Labels: apple

Sony employee Masayo Endo displays a new high-performance in-ear headset called the MDR-EX90SL in Tokyo on May 1. The product has a diagonal earpiece with a large 13.5-millimeter driver unit to deliver smooth bass and clear treble sounds. It will hit the market May 10 for $104.

MORE TO FOLLOW WHEN PRODUCT IS RELEASED

read more | digg story

Need a reason to pull your records out of storage? A company called ION has created a USB turntable called the iTTUSB. The company claims that this is the world's first USB turntable.

The iTTUSB allows you to convert your old vinyl collection directly to CD or MP3 with the included recording software (Mac/PC) and is a must have for people who don't want to deal with clumsy adapters or mismatched audio formats.

The iTTUSB comes with Audacity, a recording application that works with both PCs and Macs, as well a trial version of Bias Soundsoap 2 to clean and restore vinyl recordings.

As an alternative, the turntable also works with any other software that supports USB audio input sound cards. Once connected, the turntable transfers both 33-1/3 rpm albums and 45 rpm singles to digital formats in mere minutes.

The iTTUSB is great for all those obscure releases that never made it to CD.

More info on the iTTUSB:

• iTTUSB on Amazon
• iTTUSB homepage

Apparently toys are off the menu when it comes to promoting Disney movies in McDonald's Happy Meals. The two companies are ending their 10-year, $1.3 billion cross-promotional deal at the end of the 2006 summer movie season.

What ended the relationship? Disney board member Steve Jobs doesn't care much for the food at McDonald's and wants to stop using it to promote Disney/Pixar films like Finding Nemo and Cars to kids. According to the LA Times, Steve Jobs expressed his uncertainty about using Happy Meals to help promote films in a conference call last year. Jobs, Apple CEO and Pixar Animation Studios chief, is now Disney's largest shareholder after Disney's recent purchase of Pixar.

Steve Jobs is a pescetarian (a vegetarian who eats fish), but his distaste for McDonald's isn't without basis. According to nutrition information posted online, the average US McDonald's Happy Meal contains 670 calories, with 26g of fat and 4.5 g of trans fat (cheeseburger, small fries and Sprite). This isn't exactly a healthy kids meal considering about 19% of American children under age nine are considered overweight.

Despite contradicting reports, Fox has put several of their TV shows in the iTunes Music Store.

You can now purchase episodes of 24, Prison Break, Unan1mous, Stacked, and several other "Fox Television Classics" including Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Firefly, and Lost in Space for $1.99 each. However, several Fox cartoon standouts like Family Guy, The Simpsons and Futurama are missing from this current offering.

Being able to download the latest episode of 24 (that your TiVo forgot to record) is an awesome convenience for fans of the show. 24 has a major presence on underground P2P networks like BitTorrent [tutorial link] and Fox needed to make a legal download option for the show ASAP. However, for older shows like Firefly, you might want to shop around before buying episodes on iTunes. The Firefly DVD box set can be found for $20 at some places. Think about that before spending $28 for the iTMS versions.

Link: Fox shows on iTunes

The battle of the two Apples is over.... for now.

Apple Corps, The Beatles record label, lost their ridiculous court battle with Apple Computer over its iTunes download service on Monday. The Judge ruled that Apple Computer used its logo in association with its store, not the music, and was not in breach of an earlier 1991 agreement between the two companies. If Apple Computer had lost today's court battle, iPods and iTunes products would no longer be able to carry the Apple name and logo.

If you aren't unfamiliar with the Apple vs Apple saga, the two companies have been in legal battles since the 1980s. Apple Corps believes that there is consumer confusion if both "Apple" companies are engaged in audio or music related business.

Part of the lawsuit involves a disagreement in the similarity between the two "Apple" logos. Let's take a look:

Apple Computer Logo:
Apple Computer was founded in 1976 and helped launch the personal computer industry with products like the Lisa and the Macintosh. The Apple Computer logo is an abstract apple with a section removed from the right side. The Apple looks like someone took a physical bite (or maybe a byte of data) out of it.



Apple Corps Logo:
Apple Corps was set up by The Beatles in 1968 and is represented by a green Granny Smith apple (without a bite). The Apple Corps logo was designed by Gene Mahon and based on a Rene Magritte painting owned by Paul McCartney.

Honestly, Apple Corps is a joke. Koo Koo Ka Choo. They are a small time record company founded by The Beatles in 1968. The Apple Corps website is nothing more than a single page placeholder with a phone number on it. When you hear the name Apple, who do you think of... iPods or The Beatles? There is no consumer confusion over Apple Computer products and Beatles CDs. This lawsuit was just about greed and the judge made the right decision.

If only The Beatles could just "Let It Be."

Japanese audio manufacturer, Onkyo, has jumped back into the high-end audio ring with a stunning new loudspeaker that has them scratching their heads. Not bad, not bad at all.
For now, you'll have to visit your local high-end audio store to get a peek at these. But you can find tons of great Onkyo products here.

On a personal note, I learned a great tip from Kari Nevalainen, the author of the review:

"Orchestral music from the middle ages performed with authentic instruments is the ultimate test material for choosing speakers. The timbres of the instruments are rich and often hard to reproduce. The sound in general can intensify up to nasty aggressiveness. No cottony-voiced crooners here. A speaker that passes the test must be revealing enough and retain the aggressiveness of the sound, and yet not make it unpleasant. Sufficiently competent all-round speakers frequently do well in this type of test, and so did Onkyo D-302 E."

Based on that advice, we recommend testing ANY speaker with any of the following:

• Fischer-Dieskau Edition
• Limited Edition Beethoven Box Set
• Chopin: The Piano Works

American Wired's Conclusion

"Is Onkyo D-302 E a musical speaker? If being a musical speaker means possessing sonic properties that help to carry the listener closer to music’s message what ever that is, and contribute to musical satisfaction, then yes, D-302 E is a musical speaker. But it’s not a euphonic speaker. Its strategy is more subtle. It serves music by being a quick-moving reproducer, by having a pure and distortionless sound, and by exhibiting certain sonic sophistication and class not common to this type of speaker.

Onkyo D-302 E may not be a fantastic speaker but in many ways it is a fabulously good one. Had the sound been more effortless and open, and less opaque, just a little bit, it would have been almost perfect."


read more | digg story

UPDATE: The miners were rescued at approximately 9PM US EST [May 8, 2006].

If you were trapped underground for a few days, what would you want more than anything in the world? Probably not to be trapped underground... Anyway, to help relieve the extreme boredom of two trapped Australian miners, rescuers have given them iPods.

According to The Age, two iPods and some food were slid down a plastic PVC pipe to these poor guys while rescuers try to come up with a rescue plan.

The miners are trapped inside a Beaconsfield gold mine in northern Australia. A cave in trapped the two men beneath several meters of rock and killed a fellow miner. The two surviving men, Todd Russell and Brant Webb, are trying to keep their spirits up. They have been trapped underground since April 25th. Matthew Gill, the mine manager, had this to say in a statement; "They remain in good health and have now received iPods so they can listen to their favorite music..."

So what would you put on their iPod playlists? Here are a few suggestions from an iTunes iMix.

• Home Sweet Home - Motley Crue
• Above Ground - Norah Jones
  
• Baby I Just Wanna Go Home - Kevn Kinney
• Come On Home - Franz Ferdinand
• Theme from "Shaft" - Isaac Hayes
• Coming Home - Cinderella
• One Last Breath - Creed
  
• Let Me Go Home - Camera Obscura
  
• Mama, I'm Coming Home - Ozzy Osbourne
  
• Safety Dance - Men Without Hats
  
• Down Under - Men At Work (Colin Hay)
  
• Staying Alive - Bee Gees
  
• Every Breath You Take - Police
  
• New York Mining Disaster 1941 - The Bee Gees
  
• Working In a Coalmine - Science of Sound feat. Lee Dorsey
  
• Trapped In a Box - No Doubt
  
• Digging the Grave - Faith No More
  
• Mine Shaft - The Truffauts
  
• Coal Miner's Daughter - Loretta Lynn
  
• Don't Fear The Reaper - The Blue Oyster Cult
  
• Canary In a Coalmine - The Police
  
• Gold Digger - Kanye West
  
• Down In a Hole - Alice In Chains

First Lauren Weiss gave men an inside look at the world of women. Now 3 Men and a Little Gravy let you eavesdrop on the disturbing things that go on in the minds of men.

Patrick Walsh, Josh Shurtleff and Ian Friedman cover such diverse topics as Pat's spelling bee race scandal, Josh's humiliating fitness test, and Ian's sadistic view of relationships. Send your kids to bed, grab your headphones, and get an audio podcast assault from these 3 Men and a Little Gravy.

There are a few ways to subscribe to this podcast (iTunes is best, but you don't need it just to listen). See below:

1. iTunes users: Open iTunes, go to the iTunes Music Store. Search any of our names: Josh Shurtleff, Ian Friedman or Patrick Walsh. You should find a podcast labeled patrickwalsh.blog-city. Click and subscribe.

2. No iTunes or too confusing? Go to Patrickwalshblog - and subscribe in the top-right corner. You can subscribe using iTunes or Yahoo Music.

3. Or, go to http://patrickwalsh.blog-city.com and download the mp3s - no iTunes necessary.

The 3 Men and a Little Gravy podcast is like NPR, but with dick jokes. Enjoy!
[WARNING: Explicit language and topics]

Do you have an iPod that is unresponsive? Occasionally an iPod may freeze or fail to respond to your commands. There are a few things you can do to troubleshoot this.

Here's an email from a MethodShop.com reader about an unresponsive iPod:

"I'm using a 40GB click-wheel iPod in Windows 2k. It is unable to fully boot up. When I turn it on, the Apple symbol comes up and the hard drive sounds like it begins to spin, and then it stops. Occasionally it gets to the folder w/exclamation point screen and then the hard drives stops and then starts again, going back to the apple screen. The iPod update application either doesn't detect the iPod or it freezes my whole computer. I have tried resetting, and since Windows/iPod update don't detect it, I can't restore either (even in disk mode). I have been unable to get the disk scan working." ~ dan

You most likely dropped your iPod or hit it pretty hard. This happened to a friend of mine (Bill) when he threw his backpack on the floor. His iPod was inside the backpack and the jolt from hitting the floor physically damaged the iPod's hard drive.

Unfortunately, if your hard drive is physically damaged, there's only one way to fix it - get it replaced. If your iPod is still under warranty or you purchased extended AppleCare for your iPod, then have Apple replace or repair your iPod. If your iPod is out of warranty, there are several third-party companies that can fix your iPod like these guys.

But before going through the hassle and cost of sending your iPod off to be repaired, try these free iPod troubleshooting tips first. Good luck!

BeSocial: methodshop

Labels: ipod