Google’s CEO Eric Schmidt has stepped down from the board of directors of Apple. He has been hodling the position since last three years but it seems that Google is increasingly finding itself in competition with Apple. We can’t help but relate this development with the rejection of Google Voice app for iPhone a week ago.

In a press release Steve Jobs states that “Eric has been an excellent Board member for Apple, investing his valuable time, talent, passion and wisdom to help make Apple successful.” He further adds that ” Unfortunately, as Google enters more of Apple’s core businesses, with Android and now Chrome OS, Eric’s effectiveness as an Apple Board member will be significantly diminished, since he will have to recuse himself from even larger portions of our meetings due to potential conflicts of interest. Therefore, we have mutually decided that now is the right time for Eric to resign his position on Apple’s Board. ”

This official statement makes it pretty obvious that Apple is increasingly finding itself pitted against Google. Google Android and Google Chrome OS are certainly taking Google into the territorry only owned by Apple and more importantly Microsoft. All in all this makes sense. On a humorous note these are some more reasons why Eric Schmidt might have stepped out.

Apple Introduces Revolutionary New Laptop With No Keyboard

Apple’s last MacWorld has just started in San Francisco where for the first time ever in the history of MacWorld Exhibitions, Steve Jobs won’t be showing up. It is being speculated that Apple will be holding its own events from next year so that it could have better hold on the media and the information that spread out through it.

Meanwhile The Onion has tried its bit to make the last MacWorld for Apple memorable by making a hilarious video about a launch of what it calls MacBook Wheel. Please watch the video to know more.

Do you idolize Steve Jobs? If yes, then I believe you will thumbs up this story on StumbleUpon while if you hate the man then please submit your name and address so that we can meet you personally.

Okay some Steve Jobs fan has created this amazing art , I am calling it Mac Art for now(in this anticipation that it might become a real word someday) where the artist has made a Steve Jobs image out of Apple products.We couldn’t find who is the artist behind this but we found the image here.

 

There is a news that Apple is in the process of unveiling new Macbook Pro but now there are some images  to prove it. Some user at modmyi has submitted the images of what appears to be the new Macbook Pro. The Macbook Pro was updated this year in the month of February and any new development is although unlikely but there were rumors about a possible launch of an updated Macbook while these images certainly put more weight to the rumors.

Some of the features that arebelieved to be present in the Macbook Pro are:

• The ‘Touchpad Dock’ rumor is false
• A new magnetic opening/closing system is in place
• The top of the ’shell’ is gloss, similar to the iPhone and the bottom is aluminum.
• The iSight is hidden nicely in the glossy frame
• The keyboard is similar to the MacBook Air keyboard

The source of these images and the related info claims to be on the Apple DesignTeam and he goes by the name of ‘Technominds.’

Time will tell whether this is real or just what it should be taken as for now: rumor.

Rumors are thick in the blogosphere that Apple will launch the fourth generation iPod Nanos on the 9th of September. We don’t usually talk about rumors on this blog but the events that have happened in last week and the fact that there is a tradition of Apple launching new iPod models in September has added some weight to the particular rumor.

Some images of this alleged iPod nano also reached my inbox as they were being circulated on web since last few days. It might come as surprise but the source of such rumors have been some Chinese websites which even more surprisingly have given accurate information in the past. Such websites have been the front runner in leaking the images of mobiles phones like the latest N79 and N85 as well.

It is further being alleged that this new iPod nano will have silicon cases. We will keep our eyes open on this one.

Apple released iTunes 7.7.1, no major change to it but a small update to fix the media playback purchase and iPhone sync tool. But as I did it it caused troubles, itunes could not locate music files. And after many trials, I was able to add files but while I tried to play some music, iTunes could not find a specified file and it just froze. Soon I realized that this is a typical side effect of this update, for many who upgraded to it.

I found a fix to stop the Freeze when connecting an iPod/iPhone If this problem manifests, try deleting the following files from ~~/Library/Preferences/ (your user library preferences folder):

• com.apple.iTunes.eq.plist
• com.apple.iTunesHelper.plist
• com.apple.iTunes.plist

Austrian luxury designer and jeweler Peter Aloisson has release a Aloisson designed iPhone which is the world’s most expensive iPhone. The phone derives its name from the Princess cut used on 138 of the 318 diamonds on its surface.

The rest of the 180 diamonds on the phone are brilliant cut and it has 17.75 carats of diamonds set in 18k white gold around its rim. All diamonds used are of the finest quality.

This iPhone Princess Plus has a price tag of €120,000 ($176,400 USD) its first customer is a Russian businessman who had pre-ordered it in October 2007.

Apple have released Aperture 2, which is being seen as the next major release of its groundbreaking photo editing and management software that sports over 100 new features making it faster, powerfull and easy to use.

With a streamlined user interface and entirely new image processing engine, Aperture 2 also introduces new imaging tools for highlight recovery, color vibrancy, local contrast definition, soft-edged retouching, vignetting and RAW fine-tuning.

Users can directly post their portfolios on the .Mac Web Gallery* for viewing on the web, iPhone, iPod touch and Apple TV. At a new low price of $199, anyone can easily organize, edit and publish photos like a pro.

Aperture 2 is available immediately for a suggested retail price of $199 (US) through the Apple Store. Apple’s retail stores and Apple Authorized Resellers.

Owners of previous versions of Aperture can upgrade to Aperture 2 for just $99 (US). Full system requirements and more information on Aperture 2 can be found at http://www.apple.com/aperture.

I knew from long time that I can use my iPod as Voice Recorder, but I seriously didn’t try it out. In last 2 days I felt the need to do so, mainly because I wanted to record some important telephone conversations in good quality.

I have the 80 GB video Apple iPod (this technique doesn’t work on Nano, and Shuffle ipods), my ipod has this inbuilt. The software that makes ipod capable on doing this is called Voice Memos application.

The additional accessory that is required is a microphone. Actually you can use any standard audio microphone which has a 3.5-millimeter plug that goes with your IPod, The one that you can use is Belkin’s Universal Microphone Adapter priced at about USD30.

Another one available is Griffin Technology’s iTalk which is approx USD40. This is highly recommended gadget as this features a mic, a small speaker and headset.

There is a Wireless Phone Recording Controller from RadioShack which you can get in USD20, You will need to plug the RadioShack controller into your landline telephone headset jack. Then attach your telephone headset into RadioShack controller.

After that you will have to plug in the Belkin Universal Microphone Adapter, which needs to be connected with IPod. When all these connections are done, go to the Voice Memos utility on the iPod and start recording.

The recordings were high quality and it solved the right purpose.

On an average battery usually performs lower than the officially quoted value, for example MacBook must give 4.5 hours of time. This is dependent on many factors, mainly on how you are using your notebook. There are few things which can help you save your Macbook’s battery life.

Make Best use of the Battery life settings.
You can go to your battery settings, click on Energy Saver Preference. Choose Battery and set the optimization for Better Battery Life. This would automatically put the display to sleep when it is inactive for more than a minute and this may reduce your processor performance. Your MacBook will not run quite as fast, but get to save more battery power by doing this.

Power down your hard disks
By Powering down your hard disks, while you don’t need them also helps in saving energy To do this you would need to go to Energy Saver Preferences and enable the Put “Hard Disks to Sleep When Able”, option.

Lower down your screen brightness
By Lowering down your screen brightness you can save your battery’s life immensely. To do this go to the Displays Preferences pane on your Macbook and then adjust the screen brightness down a bit. Also remember to disable Auto Adjust.

Turn off Side Applications
By turning off Applications that you don’t require while working on your macbook, also helps. If you do not need Airport, Bluetooth when you are not using them, please turn them off and you will notice that battery is giving longer life to you.

Lessen the Widget Load
By closing Dashboard you can save battery life, with no widgets turned on, it saves some power.

Batteries die out eventually and with time their efficiency also goes low. To increase life of your battery, follow small tips from above and also for sake of a regular monthly maintenance. Just once in a month you must run your MacBook on battery until it puts itself to sleep, indicating the battery is empty. Then plug it in and recharge it completely.

The battery life on Macbook is greater than other laptops I have used. OS X has plenty of different settings while your are using battery power, the energy saving mode clocks down CPU, you also have normal and performance mode. Apple has officially quoted 6 hours of battery life if you are using it without Wi-Fi enabled and on the energy saving mode, with lowered brightness.