macdownunder's Page

It's been a while between posts.

I've recently picked up an Aluminium 24" iMac 2.4GHz to replace my old Dual G5 tower as my workstation.

Since this was my first intel workstation, I decided to retire the installation that has been running since OSX.2 and had been progessively upgraded to 10.4.11. It was time to do a fresh install.

The machine came with OSX.4 and I upgraded through to 10.6.2.

It was time for a cull of applications, and only those that I use regularly made it back in. The only… Continue

As part of a weekly community radio program that I contribute to, we now run a regular vodcast of the studio during the show. Up until now one of my colleagues has been using a Netbook with some Windows software to do some basic picture in picture. Problem for me was that we couldn't include the iSight camera (in my Macbook) as part of the feed.

Problem solved! Mac software to the rescue (again). CamTwist is a wonderful freeware ap… Continue

Well, as some would know, I purchased an Apple TV late last year. I got a second hand 40Gb HDD model running v1.0 of the firmware with the purpose of using it to stream video from my G4 Xserve over a 802.11g network.

As most of my video collection was in AVI/DIVX format in order to work with my old Elgato EyeHome, I had two choices:

1). Re-encode every video file that I had (which would have taken months)
2). Hack the Apple TV to accept the AVI/DIVX format

Not having much time or processor po… Continue

Before we start.....

PLEASE NOTE: I am not responsible for any damage done to your beautiful G4 Xserve if you follow any of the information below!

Ok, now that I've got that out of the way....

Haven't had much time to do any tinkering of late. Out of necessit, however, I've done some investigating on replacement G4 Xserve blowers. You see, my G4 Xserve started making even more noise than usual recently, and shortly after that, the CPU blower died.

Given that the machine isn't w… Continue

Hi all,

Hope everyone had a great Christmas and New Year.

I've been so busy with work since October, I haven't had a chance to post. But that doesn't mean that I haven't been collecting!

Since October I've been rapid catching up with the modern era...

iPhone - OK, so I'm a little late into this party, but I love my iPhone 3G 8Gb. I'm managed to convince my boss and General Manager to get one too - and they love them (not bad for a strictly PC/Blueberry company).

Apple TV - Spl… Continue