Archive for September, 2008

Taking a Shot at the Genius Bar

Sep 29th

Posted by admin in iPhone

1 comment

Last Friday, my new iPhone 3G was going haywire.

  1. It got really hot even though the phone was off.
  2. The programs were running super slow.
  3. I couldn’t get ANY reception.
  4. After restarting, I got an S.O.S. emergency message in French.
  5. After restarting it a few more times, it kept prompting me to activate the phone and kept restarting on its own.

I took the phone to an Apple Store in Rancho Cucamonga without an appointment (their online reservation system said they were booked). The trick is to go there and ask to be put on a standby list. If they give you a hard time about it, just say that you live far away and would rather wait than come back another day. The standby takes about 15 minutes to an hour. If you stand in front of the bar and stare at the Geniuses, after a while they’ll notice how long you’ve been waiting and call you up.

Anyhow, they ran a quick diagnostic of my iPhone and discovered a hardware issue so I got a replacement on the spot.

It’s a Good Battery Life

Sep 29th

Posted by admin in Mac

No comments

The great thing about Apple laptops is that when you are working on one and your battery reaches 0%, the laptop turns off but goes into sleep mode instead of shutting down completely. If you plug in the power adapter soon after this occurs, you’ll be able to wake it up and everything will still be there and no work will have been lost. Hallelujah!

I use my MacBook Pro everyday and run at least 7 programs at a time. Imagine the pain if I had to open and close them every time I turned on and off the laptop! Another great thing about Apple laptops is that you rarely have to shut them down. I put mine to sleep after every use. Shutting down a laptop too many times puts a strain on the hardware and degrades performance over time. The only time I ever shut down the laptop is when I’m doing a software update or if I know I’m not going to be using it for more than 1 day (which is never).

A few weeks ago my MacBook Pro battery started acting weird. Whenever it reached about 60%, the laptop would completely die down and not even go to sleep mode. :-( I brought it in to the Apple Store in Costa Mesa and they noticed that the battery had expanded which meant it was going bad. My 3-yr. AppleCare warranty only covers the battery up to one year, and I’ve had this laptop for almost 2 years already, so I had to get a new one for $129.00… ouch! Word of advice: get a new battery - even if you don’t need one - before your 1-yr. is up.

One thing I regret not ever doing was calibrating my battery on a monthly basis. This would’ve helped prolong it’s life. Here’s an article from Apple: http://support.apple.com/kb/HT1490