Digital Negative (DNG)
Be interesting to know how "open" this format really is. Adobe is not known for its charity.
An open raw image format would be valuable.
Update: Slashdot coverage was very positive about Adobe's spec. It's an extension to TIFF, basically it's a spec for metadata that describes the RAW file and a spec for embedding that metadata in TIFF. I think it might even be applicable to compressed files (JPEG2000, JPEG) wrapped up in a TIFF wrapper. It may give TIFF new life. Sounds like a real plus.
Monday, September 27, 2004
Amazon A9 search engine discount/incentive
MacInTouch Home Page: "I was shopping on Amazon today, and found a link explaining the A9 discount reported earlier. It is exactly 1.57%, chosen because it is pi/2. Amazon's explanation is that it is 'sharing the pi' it gets from ad revenue. It also mentions that you have to keep using the search engine regularly in order to continue receiving the discount (or more likely, simply use it before every Amazon.com purchase)."
Sunday, September 26, 2004
iBook, Temperature Monitor and G3 temperatures
MBS: Temperature Monitor
The most comprehensive sounding temperature monitoring solution yet. This is why it's so hard to find something that works on my iBook:
One interesting possibility is that my iBook fan stopped working because of a change in OS X! Earlier versions of the OS respected the unreliable G3 on-chip temperature readings, later versions disregard this. This may explain why a Classic utility does work on my iBook. Of course that may or may not affect whether the fan works. If the OS controlled the fan response, and it stopped tracking CPU reported temperature, the fan would never start. Of course if fan control is local (as in all PC systems) even if the OS stopped tracking CPU temperature the fan would still work.
It appears that the G3 CPU will tolerate temperatures as 105 degrees Celsius! In other words, boiling hot. Temperatures in that range would likely produce a burning smell from inside an iBook. Some Motorola chips will shut down or go to sleep near that temperature.
The iBreeze cooling stand is $30. It's starting to look better all the time.
The most comprehensive sounding temperature monitoring solution yet. This is why it's so hard to find something that works on my iBook:
The following Macintosh models are definitely supported by Temperature Monitor, because they are equipped with dedicated temperature sensors:The Temperature Monitor FAQ has some interesting information about the history of Mac temperature measurement, and how OS X has changed over time. I wonder if my iBook fan stopped working because some OS X update decided there was no way to know the temperature on this machine!
• Power Macintosh G4 (Mirrored Drive Doors)
• Power Macintosh G4 (FW 800)
• Power Macintosh G5
• PowerBook G4 (12-inch)
• PowerBook G4 (15-inch FW800)
• PowerBook G4 (17-inch)
• XServe
• XServe (Slot loading)
For all other models, there is no easy answer: Analysis of over hundred Macintosh systems shows that there is no one-to-one-relationship between model name and support status possible. Apple appears to have shipped Macintosh product lines with same labels but different hardware inside. For example, in the product series known as "Power Macintosh G4 Cube", some systems are capable of providing temperature values and others are not. The computers known as "iBook (Late 2001)" may have a PowerPC 750 cxe v 2.4, or a PowerPC 755 v3.1 inside, and so forth...
Unfortunately, this means it is impossible to predict if Temperature Monitor will run correctly on your hardware. Your only chance is to let the software analyze your particular computer.
It is very likely that your hardware is capable of providing temperature values even if it has no temperature sensor if your computer uses one of the following processors:
• PowerPC 745 (G3)
• PowerPC 750 (G3)
• PowerPC 750cxe (G3)
• PowerPC 755 (G3)
• PowerPC 7400 (G4)
Your Macintosh system is very likely not capable of providing temperature values if it has no temperature sensor and uses one of the following processors:
• PowerPC 750fx (G3)
• PowerPC 7410 (G4)
• PowerPC 7450 (G4)
• PowerPC 7455 (G4)
• PowerPC 970 (G5)
...Computers built by Apple before 2002 are usually not equipped with sensor technology and therefore cannot be supported. In a few cases, sensors are indeed available, but they are not accessible by Mac OS X. Not the operating system but a self-contained control device monitors the readings in this case. [jf: That external sensor or "control device" was apparently accessible from classic, but since Apple was discontinuing its use they apparently didn't bother to put code into OS X to access it.]It turns out that the iBook series came at a transitional time in Apple's temperature monitoring methodology, as Apple moved between its classic-oriented approach to the G4 world. A combination of sensor type and OS X release may determine support a temperature monitoring utility.
Some older G3 or G4 systems can be equipped with processors containing a so called "Thermal Assist Unit (TAU)". This is a technique to acquire temperature values directly on the chip die and compute it by the processor itself. However, this technology is very inaccurate and only works correctly if each processor is calibrated. Motorola specifies that the readings supplied by such processor types can be off by 12 degrees Celsius (21,6 degrees Fahrenheit) from the actual values. For IBM G3 processors there can even be a difference of 20 degrees Celsius (68 degrees Fahrenheit) between the measured and the true values. Due to this problem, the processor manufacturers have disabled the TA Units for later product generations. Up-to-date versions of the G4 series no longer support temperature measurement on the chip die. Here, real sensors have to be used.
... If your computer contains a processor with TAU but is not displayed by the application as software sensor with the name "Mach Kernel", Mac OS X has detected your processor as being "not capable of providing temperature readings". The application has to respect this information and cannot change this.
After an operating system update the CPU temperature is no longer displayed. Is this an application error?
No, in this case you are using a processor with TAU. Because - as mentioned before - this technology is very inaccurate, Apple has tightened the checks in the latest operating system versions whether the processor is capable of measuring temperatures or not. If you update to such an operating system, Mac OS X might qualify your processor as "not capable of providing temperature readings" although it was accepted in earlier versions. The application has to respect this information and cannot change this...
I have measured a high reading x. Is this normal?
Apple doesn't publish any specifications for the temperature values measured at individual sensor locations. In most cases however, the answer is "yes". All up-to-date Macintosh models automatically shut down or enter sleep mode if one of the readings exceeds a critical limit. For this reason it is impossible that your computer can be damaged in an overheat condition.
Regarding concrete temperature values the following facts are known:
For computers with G5 processors, the design limits for temperature and fan speeds can be read out by using the MPU information panel of the application. The maximum on-chip temperature for the PPC 970 is 85 degrees Celsius (158 degrees Fahrenheit), for the PPC 970FX it is 105 degrees Celsius (221 degrees Fahrenheit).
The cooling system of the "Power Mac G4 (Mirrored Drive-Doors)" is designed to hold the temperature of the processor board in a range of 58 to 60 degrees Celsius. Under full load the values can go up to 70 degrees Celsius (158 degrees Fahrenheit). After that point, the critical limit has been reached.
Most older G3 or G4 processors are designed for a maximum operating temperature of 105 degrees Celsius (221 degrees Fahrenheit).
G4 processors of type 7455 or later (typically used in Macintosh systems with 867 MHz and above) are designed for a maximum operating temperature of 65 degrees Celsius (149 degrees Fahrenheit). This limit applies when directly measuring the on-die temperature. Because the sensors are often mounted in some distance from the processor and measure cache memory temperature at the same time, the displayed value can be higher than the value measured at the actual chip die.
One interesting possibility is that my iBook fan stopped working because of a change in OS X! Earlier versions of the OS respected the unreliable G3 on-chip temperature readings, later versions disregard this. This may explain why a Classic utility does work on my iBook. Of course that may or may not affect whether the fan works. If the OS controlled the fan response, and it stopped tracking CPU reported temperature, the fan would never start. Of course if fan control is local (as in all PC systems) even if the OS stopped tracking CPU temperature the fan would still work.
It appears that the G3 CPU will tolerate temperatures as 105 degrees Celsius! In other words, boiling hot. Temperatures in that range would likely produce a burning smell from inside an iBook. Some Motorola chips will shut down or go to sleep near that temperature.
The iBreeze cooling stand is $30. It's starting to look better all the time.
Thermograph Classic and ThermographX: measuring iBook CPU temperature
Thermograph
I'd hoped to measure the temperature of my iBook CPU -- esp. since the fan seems to have become stuck, immobile, dead, defunct, etc.
Unfortunately ThermographX doesn't support the iBook. I couldn't find any OS X utility that does. However, the old Thermograph does! Unfortunately it requires booting into classic, and there's nothing I can run in classic that stresses my system at all. So my CPU in classic reads out at a happy 20-25 deg C.
I'd hoped to measure the temperature of my iBook CPU -- esp. since the fan seems to have become stuck, immobile, dead, defunct, etc.
Unfortunately ThermographX doesn't support the iBook. I couldn't find any OS X utility that does. However, the old Thermograph does! Unfortunately it requires booting into classic, and there's nothing I can run in classic that stresses my system at all. So my CPU in classic reads out at a happy 20-25 deg C.
Saturday, September 25, 2004
Xbench: Diagnose performance issues with OS X
Xbench: Comprehensive Macintosh Benchmarking
Free and very nice. I found my iBook had an xBench score of about 35.1. After running the test I clicked submit, and was able to view my results in context. They turned out to be quite typical -- so my slow performance at times is probably related to application issues rather than hardware or global OS issues.
By comparison the G4 iBook scores about 2.5x as fast as my 600 MHz G3. A nice gain!
The original G5 is about 5.5 times as fast at 175. There are no scores on the G5 iMac, but I'd guess it's only 30% faster than the high end G4 -- say 120. So 3-4 times as fast as my G3 iBook.
Free and very nice. I found my iBook had an xBench score of about 35.1. After running the test I clicked submit, and was able to view my results in context. They turned out to be quite typical -- so my slow performance at times is probably related to application issues rather than hardware or global OS issues.
By comparison the G4 iBook scores about 2.5x as fast as my 600 MHz G3. A nice gain!
The original G5 is about 5.5 times as fast at 175. There are no scores on the G5 iMac, but I'd guess it's only 30% faster than the high end G4 -- say 120. So 3-4 times as fast as my G3 iBook.
Rescuing a wrecked iTunes Library -- one approach
Usenet: Larry Bickford
Ok. I REALLY vaporized my iTunes Library. Miraculously, I was able to recover it. As bad as the following sounds, I did have good backups and could have recovered by other means, but because of my peculiar setup I went ahead as though I didn't have the backups.
My peculiar setup
1. I have two iTunes Libraries. The music files for each libary are located in separate folders on a Win2K machine. (Primary home file server.)
2. One iTunes Library is managed by iTunes/PC. Another is managed by iTunes/Mac (primary library).
3. In the past I've created references to the iTunes/PC files in iTunes/Mac by first disabling the "move imported to folder" advanced option then dragging and dropping the folder holding the iTunes/PC files to the Playlist of iTunes/Mac. This works and does not move files or create duplicates of existing entries.
The disastrous Act
In the process of debugging some iBook performance issues I created a new User, ran iTunes and pointed iTunes to my iTunes/Mac SMB mounted library. Oops. The Playlist and library was now empty! I returned to my regular user account and mounted iTunes. Uh-Oh. Playlists were out of date (curiously, not empty) and the tunes count was low. I knew I had about 2000-2100 tunes on the iPod, there were only 1984 in the library. Even this list was not correct, many were "dangling references" that could no longer be resolved. (Error message: not in library)
The diagnosis
I'd overwritten the XML file on the SMB share containing the Library metadata. I suspect some data is also stored in my user Library on the iBook -- that would be incorrect as well.
The initial recovery
I restored the XML files at the root of the SMB iTunes/Mac share from a backup that was about 12 hours old. I could have also tried using the backup XML file iTunes keeps around, but restores from my hard drive backups are very fast and easy.
[As is shown below, this didn't work as well as I'd expected it would. It took sometime to figure out what had happened. Retrospect lists its "snapshots" in order of oldest to most recent, and I took the top snapshot on the list! So my backup was a month old, instead of the copy that was 12 hours old. That explains why I had to go on to more involved repairs as noted below. SAD!!]
The residual problem
Ok, Now I had 1984 tunes listed in iTunes. I'd had over 2000 on the iPod however, so I knew I still had a problem. Furthermore, when I did sync to the iPod I received messages that some tunes could not be found by the Library. So the Library had a reference to them, but the reference was wrong. These showed up with an exclamation point next to the song name in the library; unfortunately one cannot sort a library on these first row "error icons".
iTunes/Mac did list an example of a missing tune, and I was able to see it was still safely in my PC SMB iTunes library folder. I just couldn't get to it.
The resolution?
First I did and drag and drop to refresh my iTune's Mac's copy of my iTune PC maintained library items. That added a few references.
Then, based on the above usenet post and my past experience, I navigated to the SMB share holding my entire iTunes Library. I dropped it into an empty area on my Mac iTunes Playlist menu. The iBook ran through all the files and then initiated a "copy". I was curious what would happen, since it would be "copying" back to a folder where the physical files existed. In fact it did NOT create any duplicates, and, based on the execution speed I was quite sure no copying occurred. Instead it added 53 new Library entries. So I was back up to 2037 tunes, which felt right. Evidently it added entries only for the Tunes it couldn't match on the server. The old "dangling" references were still there (exclamation points in column 0), but so were valid entries for the same tunes. I searched on Date Added to figure out what had been added, then sorted on name and filtered by album. That was I was quickly able to find and delete the danlging entries. I added ratings and other minor data that are not stored in the Library XML files.
But is it all resolved?
Well, not quite! After sync I had 2076 songs on my iPod and 2037 in my Library! Hmm. More detective work needed!
Update: After syncing again the iTunes/iPod gap shrunk to about 7 items. I painfully isolated the "dangling references" (later I found an AppleScript that does that automatically! -- See Doug's AppleScripts). I ended up with 3-4 more tunes on the iPod than my iTunes collection. Someday I'll clean the iPod totally and reload it.
... from the iTunes Help menu comes this info: 'If you throw away the iTunes Music Library file, your songs will no longer show in your library even though the song files are still in the iTunes Music folder. To make your songs appear in the library again:
Drag your iTunes Music folder (by default, located inside the iTunes folder in your Music folder) to your library in the Source list.' (They mean, to the open window where the songs used to appear)
'You will see the songs in your library again, but you won't see any of your original playlists (playlist information is stored in the iTunes Music Library file).'
Ok. I REALLY vaporized my iTunes Library. Miraculously, I was able to recover it. As bad as the following sounds, I did have good backups and could have recovered by other means, but because of my peculiar setup I went ahead as though I didn't have the backups.
My peculiar setup
1. I have two iTunes Libraries. The music files for each libary are located in separate folders on a Win2K machine. (Primary home file server.)
2. One iTunes Library is managed by iTunes/PC. Another is managed by iTunes/Mac (primary library).
3. In the past I've created references to the iTunes/PC files in iTunes/Mac by first disabling the "move imported to folder" advanced option then dragging and dropping the folder holding the iTunes/PC files to the Playlist of iTunes/Mac. This works and does not move files or create duplicates of existing entries.
The disastrous Act
In the process of debugging some iBook performance issues I created a new User, ran iTunes and pointed iTunes to my iTunes/Mac SMB mounted library. Oops. The Playlist and library was now empty! I returned to my regular user account and mounted iTunes. Uh-Oh. Playlists were out of date (curiously, not empty) and the tunes count was low. I knew I had about 2000-2100 tunes on the iPod, there were only 1984 in the library. Even this list was not correct, many were "dangling references" that could no longer be resolved. (Error message: not in library)
The diagnosis
I'd overwritten the XML file on the SMB share containing the Library metadata. I suspect some data is also stored in my user Library on the iBook -- that would be incorrect as well.
The initial recovery
I restored the XML files at the root of the SMB iTunes/Mac share from a backup that was about 12 hours old. I could have also tried using the backup XML file iTunes keeps around, but restores from my hard drive backups are very fast and easy.
[As is shown below, this didn't work as well as I'd expected it would. It took sometime to figure out what had happened. Retrospect lists its "snapshots" in order of oldest to most recent, and I took the top snapshot on the list! So my backup was a month old, instead of the copy that was 12 hours old. That explains why I had to go on to more involved repairs as noted below. SAD!!]
The residual problem
Ok, Now I had 1984 tunes listed in iTunes. I'd had over 2000 on the iPod however, so I knew I still had a problem. Furthermore, when I did sync to the iPod I received messages that some tunes could not be found by the Library. So the Library had a reference to them, but the reference was wrong. These showed up with an exclamation point next to the song name in the library; unfortunately one cannot sort a library on these first row "error icons".
iTunes/Mac did list an example of a missing tune, and I was able to see it was still safely in my PC SMB iTunes library folder. I just couldn't get to it.
The resolution?
First I did and drag and drop to refresh my iTune's Mac's copy of my iTune PC maintained library items. That added a few references.
Then, based on the above usenet post and my past experience, I navigated to the SMB share holding my entire iTunes Library. I dropped it into an empty area on my Mac iTunes Playlist menu. The iBook ran through all the files and then initiated a "copy". I was curious what would happen, since it would be "copying" back to a folder where the physical files existed. In fact it did NOT create any duplicates, and, based on the execution speed I was quite sure no copying occurred. Instead it added 53 new Library entries. So I was back up to 2037 tunes, which felt right. Evidently it added entries only for the Tunes it couldn't match on the server. The old "dangling" references were still there (exclamation points in column 0), but so were valid entries for the same tunes. I searched on Date Added to figure out what had been added, then sorted on name and filtered by album. That was I was quickly able to find and delete the danlging entries. I added ratings and other minor data that are not stored in the Library XML files.
But is it all resolved?
Well, not quite! After sync I had 2076 songs on my iPod and 2037 in my Library! Hmm. More detective work needed!
Update: After syncing again the iTunes/iPod gap shrunk to about 7 items. I painfully isolated the "dangling references" (later I found an AppleScript that does that automatically! -- See Doug's AppleScripts). I ended up with 3-4 more tunes on the iPod than my iTunes collection. Someday I'll clean the iPod totally and reload it.
iBook 500 - Disassembly and hard drive replacement Instructions
iBook 500 - HD Replacement Instructions
I may need to clean out my dual USB white 600 MHz iBook -- and see if the fan is stuck. This page and
http://www.bluap.nl/mac/ibookdual.php
provide some guidance. Might be a chance to replace the HD too ...
I may need to clean out my dual USB white 600 MHz iBook -- and see if the fan is stuck. This page and
http://www.bluap.nl/mac/ibookdual.php
provide some guidance. Might be a chance to replace the HD too ...
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