Look, I know how the system works. You say anything about Apple with a negative connotation, and, for some reason, people become interested in reading about it. But I’m not looking for click bait. If that was my game, this site would have far more traffic than it has achieved over the past 19 years. I just try my best to honestly express my point of view, and let the chips fall.

It’s been a pretty good run overall.

Now over the years, I’ve had the opportunity to review lots of Apple gear, most due to getting an equipment loan from Apple. But I don’t seek them so often these days, as I prefer to concentrate on the products that I might actually buy if my credit card could support the transaction.

Continue Reading…

It should seem simple enough. You have a mobile tech gadget that needs a new battery or a repair. You take it to a shop and, when it’s ready, you pick it up and hand over your credit card. Or cash if you’re so inclined. Indeed when my son visited us from his home in Madrid during early 2017, he brought with him an well-worn iPhone 5c with a failing battery. I suggested he replace it, and the cell phone concession at a nearby Walmart offered to do the deed for $39, then $40 less than Apple’s price.

He was tempted  but opted to save his money and get a new phone when the battery stopped sustaining a charge for more than a few hours.

Now that repair shop handles all sorts of smartphone and notebook PC repairs. I’m not at all certain how well they do, other than the fact that most of these repairs shouldn’t be rocket science. A repair person from a nearby battery/bulb shop, while one of my Uber passengers, described the process of repacking an iPhone battery. It usually takes 10-15 minutes from power down, replacement to power on. “Piece of cake,” he smiled.

Except that if you want a genuine Apple part, with a factory warranty. You can’t visit one of those repair shops. They are not authorized to fix Apple gear, they do not possess Apple’s repair tools, product manuals or access to the correct parts.

It does’t mean they can’t do the job acceptably, but if the right front door of your new car was smashed to smithereens in an accident, would you want the body shop to replace it with a genuine part from the factory, or something fabricated in a third world sweat shop to reduce costs to the insurance company? Not that I have many accidents, but when I do, it’s OEM all the way.

I’m not so worried about the battery or the tires, but I’d also be concerned about such critical components as the engine, transmission and emission control system. All right, some enthusiasts prefer custom parts to soup up their vehicles, but still.

But what about your iPhone? Why can’t you have anybody replace the battery with a factory-approved part? Well, if it’s an Apple Store or an authorized dealer, you can. They have the training and equipment to to do the job in accordance with Apple’s standards.

However, an independent repair shop can’t get the same training and access unless they sign up to become an authorized Apple dealer, assuming any slots are available. If you’re not authorized, Apple doesn’t have to deal with you and, in fact, they don’t have to honor the repair warranty, which means they have the authority to void it if they want.

That takes us to a series of laws being proposed in different U.S. states called “right to repair,” which would require Apple and other tech companies to provide customers and third-party shops with full access to repair documentation, diagnostic/repair tools and parts. You got the money, they have to make them available.

California state legislators are preparing to introduce what is called, naturally, the California Right to Repair Act, thus joining 17 other states considering similar bills.

According to one of the legislators, “The Right to Repair Act will provide consumers with the freedom to have their electronic products and appliances fixed by a repair shop or service provider of their choice, a practice that was taken for granted a generation ago but is now becoming increasingly rare in a world of planned obsolescence.”

Now Apple has always had a mixed relationship with repair facilities. No problem if you deal with Apple’s factory or authorized stores. But many products are difficult and often impossible to repair, according to iFixit.com. This is especially troublesome with Macs. You expect difficulty dealing with the tiny components of a smartphone or a tablet. If it’s not a place sanctioned by Apple, you’re on your own.

But what about a personal computer, once presumed to be mostly upgradeable without much difficulty? Nowadays, the only Macs easily upgraded are the legacy 2013 Mac Pro and the 27-inch iMac with 5K Retina display — and then only for RAM. If you want a new drive on the iMac, you have to pry off the adhesive that holds the glass to the chassis. Surprisingly enough, you have to undergo essentially the same ordeal if you want to upgrade the ECC RAM on an iMac Pro. The 21.5-inch iMac is similarly hostile to RAM upgrades.

Don’t worry about replacing RAM on a Mac notebook. It’s soldiered to the logic board. What this means is that, with the few desktop exceptions above, you have to buy a Mac with the expectation that no component will ever be changed unless it needs to be repaired. To Apple, it’s just a bigger iPhone when it comes to upgradeability.

Now Right to Repair doesn’t mean that more Macs will become upgradeable. That’s a design decision. What it does mean is that anyone who cares to take on the task will be able to do such repairs using genuine Apple parts, tools and instructions. Obviously if you fix it yourself, you’ll be responsible if you break something, and independent repair shops will have to guarantee their own work; Apple will only be responsible for its parts.

But it may equalize the playing field and allow you to get more useful life out of your tech gear, not to mention reduce your repair bills. However, it won’t encourage Apple to design Macs to be more amenable to upgrades. Clearly enough customers aren’t complaining for that shortcoming to be dealt with.

Apple has made a huge amount of progress overcoming common impressions of the company over the years, and the unexpected continues to happen.

At first, there was a computer named Apple, but a different product, the Mac, had the staying power. in the early days,. the use of a graphical user interface was considered controversial at a time when a PC operating system was text-based. Only when Microsoft delivered a mostly usable version of its Mac imitation, Windows 95, did GUIs become acceptable.

By 2001, Macusers were wondering about the first release of Mac OS X when Steve Jobs introduced us to “1,000 songs in your pocket,” the original iPod with a tiny hard drive. Cute and overpriced at $399, I didn’t expect much from it. But one day a new version appeared that was compatible with Windows. Before you knew it, the iPod was the number one digital music player on the planet. In the space of a few years, Apple had turned itself into a consumer electronics powerhouse.

But things really took off when the best iPod ever, the iPhone, arrived in 2007. It wasn’t too many years before the iPhone was everywhere and other mobile handset makers had to scramble to give up old fashioned features such as physical keyboards and embrace touchscreens.

It certainly makes sense that, to many, the Mac has become an afterthought, even though it’s a hugely profitable platform and Apple promises its ongoing commitment after giving it second shrift for a while.

As more and more companies bought into the iPhone, and iPad, Macs gradually became acceptable to the enterprise. A deal with its former rival, IBM, resulted tens of thousands of Macs and other Apple gear being sold to IBM’s employees and customers. The mind boggles.

Not long after, there were reports of corporate conquests everywhere. Delta Air Lines has them. Walmart has them. HP is leasing Apple gear as part of its new subscription program. It’s adding up.

On a personal note, I took my wife to an eye doctor this morning. While the office PCs consisted of the usual nondescript boxes, the receptionist handed out 9.7-inch iPads for patients to complete their profiles. No more pens and scribbles, not to mention the time saved in processing the data for their medical records. Now if they could only convert the traditional computers to Macs, but it’s one step at a time, right?

Certainly, the iPad is an excellent tool for a medical practice, a legal practice and even a car dealership. I recall when luxury cars makers were apt to include iPads containing the owner’s manual. At least they’d be read.

The superb integration of Apple’s ecosystem makes a compelling case for growing business use. To think that the enterprise was, to Apple, once a dirty word. That’s also before the boss would routinely bring in an iPhone or a MacBook Pro, and demand that the IT people hook ’em up.

The Apple Watch took an interesting but predictable turn as it became more and more successful. Don’t forget, it is the number one wearable on the planet, and with estimates of over 50% sales growth last year, it’s not as if it’s going to lose its luster soon.

At first, the Apple Watch appeared to be meant as a piece of fancy electronic jewelry, with one model, the Edition, selling for $10,000 plus a line of fancy watchbands. But you could use it as a fitness tool and, integrated with Apple’s HealthKit for iOS and watchOS, its main purpose is being realized.

Indeed, the focus on fitness may entitle you to a free Apple Watch courtesy of your health insurance carrier. So it is reported that UnitedHealthCare is going to include the Apple Watch Series 3 in its Motion program. By meeting a set of minimum fitness goals, you’ll be credited up to $1,000 off your insurance premiums to cover the price of premium fitness gear, such as the Apple Watch.

The goals are labeled F.I.T.:

• Frequency: complete 500 steps within seven minutes six times per day, at least an hour apart;
• Intensity: complete 3,000 steps within 30 minutes; and
• Tenacity: complete 10,000 total steps each day.

For an insurance company, it’s enlightened self interest. If you live a more healthy lifestyle, you aren’t apt to get sick as often or for as long. you’ll keep your weight under better control, and thus the insurers will pay out less money for you in benefits and thus return some of the benefits to you for to cover the cost of your new Apple Watch. At roughly $4 per day to meet the goals, you can get one with a fancy watchband, or acquire two.

Other insurance companies offering similar discounts include Aetna and John Hancock.

Now large insurance companies may have tens of millions of members, and these particular programs appear to be strictly available in employer-based health plans. It’s unfortunate that there’s no word about it being offered as a benefit to those covered by the Affordable Care Act’s Exchange, but I suppose that could happen someday if the government doesn’t succeed in killing it first.

I can also see the value of companies offering Apple Watches and other gear to encourage their employees to live healthier lifestyles. It doesn’t have to be done as part of an insurance company program, and it may fuel the sale of tens of millions of Apple gadgets. Secret Sauce indeed!

For years, I thought vinyl was dead. But as a street kid in Brooklyn, New York. my tiny record collection was built on 45s and LPs. As much as people adored vinyl, I resented the imperfections, the ticks and pops and the inner groove distortion,  the need to replace them if you played them too much. I was so happy to ditch them when CD came along.

Sure, CD wasn’t perfect at first. Mastering engineers had to learn how to handle the new digital medium and not make them sound shrill and harsh. I remember the first CD demonstration I heard at an audio show near New York City in the early 1980s. A CD version of a Bill Joel album was being played, and it was just plain awful.

CD was promoted as “perfect sound forever,” and I didn’t believe a word of it. Ever hear of “CD rot?” Or maybe that was just a myth.

Anyway, recording and mastering techniques improved. CD quality improved, and remastered versions of vintage recordings were common. If you had the coin, you could buy many versions of your favorite Beatles or Elvis Presley recordings. The music companies were only too happy to take your money again and again. So even though you didn’t have to replace a worn LP, there was always a brand new digital mix with improved audio, alternate takes and even artist demos. No longer did Ringo’s unique drum arrangements always fade into the background.

The Beatles are my faves, but the surviving artists and estates are only too happy to have you buy their recordings over and over again to listen to something you may have missed the first 10,000 times. Don’t forget that the original fab four albums were actually recorded on mono, and the stereo mixed was rushed out later for the U.S. market. So wouldn’t you prefer the mono version of “Sgt. Pepper”?

In recent years, there’s been a sort of  vinyl resurgence. Maybe it’s partly about today’s too slick recording techniques, but some regarded digital audio as sterile, unemotional, and wouldn’t you prefer the wonderful warm, honest sound of vinyl?

Now it’s true that the reason vinyl sounds different is a matter of distortion not accuracy, but if you like it fine. But the vinyl of the 21st century wears as quickly as the vinyl of 1968.

In 2009, Steve Jobs sort of jumped on the vinyl bandwagon, but with enhanced digital recordings, fuller liner notes and other doo-dads. He introduced iTunes LP, announcing, “Some of us here are old enough that we actually bought LPs.” It meant you could order a special version of an album with the extra stuff for more money.

Evidently the idea didn’t quite catch on. So Apple is reportedly phasing out iTunes LP. Evidently people prefer “real” LPs, like the vinyl kind.

At one time I was even convinced that most people would prefer to own music rather than rent it. Clearly tens of millions of Apple Music and Spotify subscribers do not agree with me. Computerworld’s Jonny Evans, the “Apple Holic,” suggests it may be about eventually developing AR versions of music. So if you think music is moving to the background, there will be exceptions.

Besides, vinyl hasn’t gone anywhere.

You still see people in movies and TV shows lovingly placing the needle on the groove of a spinning disk, the soft background noise heralding the beginning of the music.

For the past 12 years, vinyl sales have actually increased worldwide. In 2017, some 14,32 albums were sold. The top ten listings consist of recent material and classic rock.

Number 1 and number 2? It’s almost 1969 again, with two Beatles albums in their proper locations at the top of the charts. “Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band” followed by “Abbey Road.” Another perennial best-seller, Pink Floyd’s, “The Dark Side of the Moon” is number eight, and Michael Jackson’s Thriller is number ten.

All right, the quantities are far lower. “Thriller” sold 49,000 and “Sgt. Pepper” sold 72,000.

On occasion, I wonder if I shouldn’t consider buying a combo player which includes LP, CD, AM and FM, or just a plain turntable. Crosley, the modern successor to an old-time audio company, is still building vintage gear with classic designs for prices that start at just shy of $90. Many are Mac and PC compatible with USB cables and even Bluetooth. There are a few old fashioned table radios and classic rotary phones in the lineup.

Over the years, I’ve actually contacted Crosley about getting some review gear to test, to bring back some pleasant memories of the past. But they don’t routinely send out many samples.

But one thing is certain: The Night Owl may be old, but I’m not in the least eager to buy into vinyl once again. Once digital sound found its way, I happily gave up on vinyl, surface noise and wear and tear. The CD may not have exactly been “perfect sound forever,” but it was a lot closer to the music than LPs. I still have some of older discs on hand that are over 30 years old. Not a spec of CD rot on them.