Apple announced this past week three new Power Mac G5 models all of which sport dual processors. This is the first revision to the G5 line since it was introduced nearly a year ago and they now come in dual 1.8, 2.0 and 2.5 GHz configurations. While these fall short of the 3 GHz processor speeds that Steve Jobs promised would be available by this time, they are still very impressive machines in their own right.

Each Power Mac now comes standard with an 8x DVD burning SuperDrive and the dual 2.0 and 2.5 GHz models come with three PCI-X slots running at 133 MHz. The frontside bus stays the same for the 1.8 and 2.0 GHz models (900MHz and 1.0 GHz, respectively), and blazes along at 1.25 GHz per processor with the dual 2.5 GHz model. The 1.8 and 2.0 models come standard with the NVIDIA GeForce FX 5200 Ultra video card with 64 MB of memory, while the 2.5 GHz model sports an ATI Radeon 9600 XT with 128 MB of memory. You can fit two 250 GB hard drives in each Power Mac. The dual 2.0 and 2.5 GHz models can fit up to 8 GB of RAM, where the dual 1.8 GHz model can only accommodate 4 GB of RAM - if your budget allows for it, we recommend against this model.

The full details are available at Apple's website.

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In our previous issue we shed some light on the first major security vulnerability discovered for Mac OS X. Since then a lot has happened; the least of which is Apple fixing the holes. If you haven't done so already, we recommend that you use Software Update to upgrade your system to 10.2.8 (if you're still running Jaguar) or to 10.3.4 (if you're running Panther). At the same time install all the Security Updates Apple has released (currently 2004-05-24 and 2004-06-07).

Because security is such an important issue and necessitates a timely response, we've created a special section on our website at macmedics.com/security. Upon visiting the Security section, in addition to viewing current information on any known vulnerabilities and how to protect them against exploits, you have the option to sign up for a Security Bulletin. This is a free service of course, that lets us send you emails about security issues when they arise - so you won't have to wait for the next Infosource to come out.

Visit the Security Section of MacMedic's website.

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We'd like to apologize for last month's delivery of Infosource, as we realize that some of our readers received two copies in their inbox. We appreciate that your time (and bandwidth) is valuable. The mistake was due to a new version of our newsletter generator, and has since been corrected.

Apple this week has opened the iTunes Music Store to England, France and Germany, with plans for the rest of the EU by October. Speaking of far away places, we have been receiving an influx of PowerBooks damaged by airport security opening them improperly. Many screeners will understand if you ask them nicely to 'be careful with that' or will accept your offer to open the PowerBook for them.

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Here's a quick tip for all our clients that are hassled by unwanted applications opening certain document types. An example is that every time you download a PDF to your desktop they end up with the 'Preview' application icons by default - when you double click on the file it opens in Preview. However, many of our clients prefer to view PDFs in Acrobat instead. A simple way to change this behavior is to click on the document once and then press the 'command + i' (or go to the File Menu and select 'Get Info') key combination to 'Get Info' on that item. One of the panes in the Info window is 'Open with:'. Expand the tab, and with the drop down menu you can select Acrobat instead of the default Preview. Click the 'Change All' button and you're done. Now your downloaded file should have the Acrobat icon and open in Acrobat. You can do this with any file format provided you have another application capable of opening that file format.

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Last week Apple announced two new products: Airport Express and AirTunes. Airport Express is a very small wireless base station (about the same size and shape as the power bricks that come with Apple's laptops). You plug it right into the wall and then plug an ethernet cable into it. It also has a USB port for printer sharing and an audio out port (both analog and optical/digital) for connecting to your sound system or a pair of powered speakers. AirTunes is included in iTunes 4.6 (available now for download from Apple) and will detect when speakers are connected to the Airport Express module and stream your music from your computer to them.

Airport Express tries to be a 'Jack of all Trades.' As a wireless router it has a 10 user capacity and is compatible with both the 802.11b and 802.11g standards - transmitting data up to 54 MB/s. It can also act as a wireless repeater, extending the range of existing wireless networks. With the USB port, Airport Express can become a print server, allowing a compatible printer to be accessible to any computer covered by your network. The audio port turns the Express into a music server of sorts, letting you stream music from iTunes on your computer to any speakers hooked up to it. If you have multiple Airport Express stations set up and connected to speakers you can select from a drop down list where you want your music to go from inside iTunes.

The bottom line is that Airport Express is an affordable wireless base station that has the added benefits of streaming music, print serving and being extremely portable.

For more information on the Airport Express, take a look at NotebookReview's technical write-up.

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This issue's special offer is for all our clients that haven't implemented a backup solution yet. This is an important matter - especially this time of year (see last month's issue on power surges). So as a way of saying thanks for subscribing we're offering a LaCie D2 160 GB external firewire drive with Retrospect backup software together for 10% off our normal pricing. This is a simple and cost-effective way to back your data up regularly. Combine this backup solution with an UPS (uninterruptible power supply) and a surge protector with an ethernet port (both readily available from your local electronics super store) and you can rest easy in this season of thunderstorms.

Contact us today for pricing.

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e-mail: dcinfo@macmedics.com

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Phone: 866-MAC-MEDICS
e-mail: info@macmedics.com

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