Being one that spends the large majority of my time online, with my career and interests focused around an array of different technologies, I hear tons of media repetition. It’s my job to stay informed about certain things and it’s my interest to stay informed about other things, namely the iPhone 4. Unfortunately, however, the media tends to feed off negativity and will stab anyone they can for traffic and ratings — including the hand that feeds them. So what am I getting at? This giant poo cloud of negative hype and its associated stabbing frenzy surrounding the iPhone 4.

Everyone is going bat-shit crazy over the iPhone 4’s current issues. So let’s all take a step back from the hype and come back down to earth, joining those of us already living in reality. Yes, the iPhone 4 has an antenna design flaw that can cause reception issues. This isn’t the first time a device, including one of Apple’s, has had some sort of hardware design flaw that was annoying. A point I’d like to make here is that it’s an annoying flaw, but doesn’t render the phone broken. This happens in technology sometimes.

So, the phone isn’t broken. If you want to use the iPhone 4 before Apple decides to fix the issue, then quit being a moron and hold it in such a way as not to force the annoyance to occur (or get a case). Great, now you can continue using your phone without complaining like a two year old until a solution surfaces.

Some people, however, are having issues with their proximity sensor. From what I’ve read, this is due to faulty hardware, which happens in technology (remember Xbox’s red ring of death?). Take it to Apple and they’ll either fix it or replace it, just like you would with any other faulty piece of technology.

The most annoying aspect of all this is that people who don’t know anything about the iPhone 4 are going around telling other people that they heard the iPhone 4 is plagued with issues and faulty hardware, which is due to the media, Apple bashers and people who love to exaggerate. Those that actually know anything about the phone, don’t feed off drama and don’t have an intense hatred for anything Apple, actually love their iPhone 4 and report that it’s quite fantastic.

I am one of those people. My iPhone 4 is a fantastic improvement over my 3GS and runs like a dream. Yes, I can cause it to loose reception by holding it in a specific way. No, I’m not an idiot and I don’t hold it that way when in use then run around and lie to people about how terrible it is. Is it unfortunate that Apple occasionally acts like a bunch of douche bags and ignores their customers? Absolutely, but that’s no excuse to act like a child. Apple isn’t the only company that does this either, though they are currently in the lime-light.

If you’re interested in buying an iPhone 4, don’t let this media hype bullshit stop you. It’s a fabulous device that you might find quite similar to that of devices we dreamt about in TV shows and movies years ago (Star Trek?). It works incredibly well, even with the minor antenna annoyance which will very likely be fixed (if it already hasn’t been) shortly.

On the other hand, if you’re part of this hype bullshit, get rid of your iPhone 4 and go get a different phone so the rest of us don’t have to hear your relentless bitching!

End venting.

I looked up the specs on the stock 320GB and obviously had lots of room for improvment. So I had to decide between performance and space. Although some of the newer large hard drives are pretty fast thanks in part to perpendicular storage and much higher density platters.

Western Digital came out with a replacement for the Western Digital Raptor 10K RPM drive which is the VelociRaptor 10K RPM drive. The VelociRaptor is faster, quiter, cooler and the drive itself is actually much much smaller. So I picked up the 150GB version since I couldn’t quite afford the 300GB version.

So once the drive showed up I took apart the iMac which was suprisingly easy. Made the drive swap which was a easy as pie and restored OS X from my backup. Overall process took about 15 minutes to swap the drive and 20 minutes to restore the backup.

The 320GB drive read speed on average was about 60Mb/s and the new VelociRaptor is over the 100Mb/s mark. I’d say this is a great speed bump. Anyway, the iMac boots almost twice as fast as well as applications. It’s quite amazing! I love it!

Anyway, I snapped a few pictures so here they are.

If you’re thinking about doing this and you have any questions, feel free to email me using my contact form or post a comment here. It was well worth the work but you might stop in at your local Apple store and have a pro do the job.

Now, you can’t really blame the newspaper because not every company can afford to buy the latest and greatest and believe me, this company does try.

As a designer though, it’s the equivalent of working without a soul…

It’s always amazing to me at just how much more inspired I am to be creative as soon as I get home and jump on my iMac, crank up the tunes (iTunes isn’t allowed at work so I use my iPod) and get into the mood Apple products inspire.

They really are much more conducive to creativity than… well, I don’t even need to say it (windows).

I don’t have Apple’s newest operating system (leopard) but tiger alone puts any version of windows to shame. I mean, I just don’t have the problems I used to have with windows, and I’m a pretty advanced user. I always manged to fix whatever arose but seriously, why deal with that? I just don’t have problems on my iMac (ok, I lie, games aren’t exactly Mac friendly).

Here are 10 reasons why people should switch and give Mac’s a shot:

• They’re conducive to creativity and fun
• They’re easy and intuitive
• Your mac isn’t going to get sick from all the viruses running around the internet
• Macs don’t come with all that extra crapware (crap software) installed that is a total pain to get rid of.
• They come with software that is useful, works and isn’t annoying.
• Macs can run anything a PC can
• Mac users are apparently smarter
  
• Installing and Removing applications is so simple a 5 year old can do it
• Everyone I know that has made the switch vows they will never go back and wished they had switched sooner.
• You don’t have to defrag macs

Those are just a few, here is a list of 50 reasons. Want 10 reasons to upgrade to a PC though?

Top Ten Reasons for Upgrading to a PC instead of a Mac:

• You enjoy reading computer manuals
• Buying parts ‘not included’ is your idea of being patriotic
• Blaming it on the PC is a great excuse… for anything
• Tech support is your idea of telephone dating
• Your favorite computer game is figuring out where your files are
• You look forward to today’s new virus (or worm, or both)
• You like listening to telephone support hold-button music
• Letting the kids play on the Mac next door frees your time (eliminates after-school kid sitters)
• You think Bill Gates deserves the money
• You have nothing better to do with all the extra time

I thought this video was pretty hilarious!