Monday May 05, 2008

- Installetion troubles with AE CS3 Trial - Lionel - 22:33:01

We're quoting Branislav Milic:

ADOBE ALERT: DO NOT INSTALL THE TRIAL VERSION OF AFTER EFFECTS CS3...

This applies to the Mac platform, I have not tested it on Windows.
When you install the trial version of After Effects CS3, be aware that you will not be able to use the CS3 setup-application for adding/deleting/uninstalling components anymore. You'll have to re-install your entire Mac.
More on http://www.milic.com/indesign

Forwarned, forearmed.

[translation by xavier]

- Intel and NVidia Team Up in Parallel Programming Initiative - Lionel - 21:02:36

Source : TGdaily

While Intel and NVidia have respectively claimed that GPU are dead, and CPU have no future, they found themselves common interest in an exciting project which could, of course, serve their goals: the Parallel Programming Initiative

Indeed, even if future computer will only run with a GPU, or a CPU, having multi core processing units will not bring that much extra performance gain if software (and OSes) are not able to benefit from such raw power, in order to deliver massively multithreaded applications.

Of course, Intel and NVidia are not the only sponsors of this initiative, and AMD, Nvidia, Sun Microsystems as well as Intel, Hewlett-Packard and IBM, are also on the list. By providing hardware and financial support to university laboratories, such as Stanford’s Pervasive Parallelism Lab (PPL), those sponsors expect to boost research in developing parallel programming. However, all companies might well be willing to push their own project, with Nvidia and its Tesla stream processor cards, AMD’s GPU, AMD’s and Intel’s CPU and Intel's massively parallel Larrabee accelerator card. Such basic research might also make developers' life easier by providing a platform for native multi core support, so coding application without thinking of core management.

All those companies have a common interest: current business plan for computer industry development is based on the multiplication of the number or cores per GPU/CPU, so if such raw power can not be used, performance gain will never be really noticeable by end users.

[translation by Linathael]

- Apple Design Awards 2008 Registration till May 12th - Joe Le Boss - 20:44:38

As usual during at the WWDC, Apple will unveil the Apple Design Awards to recognize technical excellence, innovation, and outstanding achievement, and this year among the categories there will be two dedicated to the iPhone apps:

• iPhone Developer Showcase
• Best iPhone Web Application
• Best Mac OS X Leopard Application
• Best New Mac OS X Leopard Game
• Best Mac OS X Leopard User Experience
• Best Mac OS X Leopard Graphics and Media Application
• Best Mac OS X Leopard Student Product

The previous categories Developer Tool, Scientific Computing Solution and Dashboard Widget have been replaced by iPhone Developer Showcase, iPhone Web Application and Graphics and Media Application.

If you are a developer and an ADC member, it is worth participating as:

Winners in the iPhone and Mac OS X Leopard categories will receive two 15-inch MacBook Pro laptops, two 30-inch Apple Cinema Displays, one 16GB iPod touch, one 8GB iPhone, an ADC Premier Membership, reimbursement for one WWDC 2008 E-ticket including airfare and accommodations, and one 2009 ADC Macworld Expo Exclusive Marketing Package. The Best Mac OS X Leopard Student Product category winner will receive one 15-inch MacBook Pro laptop, one 30-inch Apple Cinema Display, one 16GB iPod touch, one ADC 2008 Student Membership, reimbursement for one WWDC 2008 E-ticket including airfare and accommodations, and one 2009 ADC Macworld Expo Exclusive Marketing Package.

However, you only have till May 12th to submit your application! Hurry up.

Additional information: here

[translation by Linathael]

- Issues with the Mac Pro 2008 - Cheerful - 07:30:09

Source : Apple Discussions

Most review sites have already lamented about the insufficient USB ports (currently 5) on the top-of-the-line pro systems. Certainly one was not expecting underpowered ports too. Well, apparently it happens only when one uses all the 5 ports and especially true when the ports are connected to another hub (e.g. a Dell display with a built-in USB hub etc). These hubs appears to draw an excessive amount of power which unfortunately interferes with the other ports. Interestingly, these built-in hubs (within displays) should not require additional power as they are independently powered.

The above paragraph is certainly nothing conclusive, but whatever the actual reasons may be, you know what to look out for when you are unable to mount a thumbdrive, even when it is plugged directly into the Mac Pro's USB ports.

Share with us your personal experiences by clicking here or below.

p.s. Myself, I've experienced reproducible kernel panics on a 2008 Mac Pro I recently tested by simply using the DVI port no. 2 (DVI 1 is not connected). It is a brand new system, booted from an external 2.5" HDD, Mac OS 10.5.2, stock ATI Radeon 2600. Unfortunately, I wasn't able to test if it happens with the Apple Displays.

- NAS article - QNAP, Synology and LaCie benchmarked. - Eric - 00:45:45

Here's the second part of our series of articles dedicated to NAS (part one).
The new generation of NAS devices has arrived, bringing some real performance gains, while keeping the user-friendly setup and usage interface. We have expanded our selection with two manufacturers, Synology and LaCie, thus offering more competition to the QNAP products.
Once again, we're limited to initial installation, setup, and performance of the devices, and we've discovered some surprises. For more information, click here.
In the next episode, we're gonna test how these NAS devices perform as a webserver (HTML/PHP), and FTP-fileserver.

[update]: english version of the article to come soon

[translation by xavier]