Coming from a website called Apple Really Sucks, we could tell right away this is not a love letter. But you might learn a thing or two (or in this case five things) from Nick's experience:

"First let me start off by saying that I have taken care of every ipod I have owned. Here's my story:

1st ipod. 13th birthday: Got my 30gb photo, worked great for a week, then the battery just stopped working. It would charge anymore. (We think he meant it would NOT charge anymore.)  I called apple support (even though I knew they would be able to help) and we went through all the stupid little troubleshooting tips. Ended up sending it back to apple. Took two weeks to get it replaced.

2nd ipod. 1 month later: got my package and noticed it had a gaping hole in the side of the package about 1' x 1'. The foam was all torn up inside and I could see the corner of the ipod. This ipod didn't work the moment I turned it on. Gave me the folder icon, or as I suspected a HDD failure. Tried to return this one to apple, but because of the little dent in the corner from the shipping, they would take it back and they said that it had been abused. I had to end up selling it for $137 on eBay.

3rd ipod: I bouth a 60gb photo with the money I got and it wouldn't connect to the computer. I was on the phone with apple for about 2 hours before they final said that they would let me San it in for repair. Sent it in and waited... 2 weeks... 1 month. Nothing. Called them and they said that it must had been lost in the repair center. They sent me a 60gb video to replace the photo. This one worked for around two months..... The battery died. Sent it back and still haven't gotten my replacement.

4th ipod: Got a nano to use at school. Long story short I plug it into my comp and immediately my comp freezes.... I turn it back on and remove the ipod. I get the foler icon with a the exclamation point. Take it back to best buy.

5th: A replacement of the nano: It brakes the same way as my previous one.

Now, Im sitting with a broken nano, and a 60gb video that has been at apple for around a month now. They still don't know where it is. Im trying to let everyone know that they need to aviod ipods at all cost. Every time I have called support a stupid Indian guy picks up and treats me like im an idiot. Im not sure if this is an isolated incident, but please at all cost avoid ipods."

Take a little David Letterman, add a little new Macbook customer and you get: Top Ten Reasons to Love Your New Macbook. Ms. Baker of dwblog.com recently purchased herself a brand, spanking new Macbook and is completely in love with her computer now. On the off-chance that she has to fiddle with her old XP computer, she finds it jarring and somewhat unnatural to her now.

To quickly condense how she feels about her new machine in a few paragraphs, she has listed the top ten reasons why the Macbook just kicks ass. Here they are, in order:

10. It's smooth and silky exterior.
9. Force quit.
8. The bright, beautiful, vibrant colors of the screen.
7. I can wirelessly stream iTunes from my Macbook to my stereo!
6. The calm and collected voice of 'Vikki.'
5. Spotlight.
4. Widgets! Gotta love those widgets.
3. The adjustable brightness of the screen and backlit keyboard.
2. Expose and Tabs in Safari.
(Drum roll, please.)
1. My Macbook is so photogenic and looks so cool being shown off at airports.

What do you guys love about your Macbooks?

Research and investment firm Piper-Jaffray has joined the Apple-wireless/mobile-prediction fray (pardon the pun).  The company believes that there's a 75% chance that an "iPhone" or cellphone-based product would be announced and/or introduced within the next 12 months.

Speculation that Apple would do so was ignited by an announcement a few weeks ago by iPod chipmaker PortalPlayer, which said it and wireless solutions provider CRS were going to enable Wi-Fi and Bluetooth on its next-gen chip.  PortalPlayer's chips have been part and parcel of each and every single iPod (except the low-tech shuffle) ever since the iPod's inception, and it's not too much of a conceptual jump from a so-called "Wi-Pod" to an "iPhone" - they'd run on the same technology.  

We're expecting Piper-Jaffray's announcement to fan everyone's excitement to a fever pitch.  Which is precisely what Apple would need and want in the run-up to the introduction of something this significant and risky.  Let's see where all this leads.

When Apple announced the MacBook Pro - the Intel-based successor to the PowerBook G4 - I was excited.  Finally a faster pro-level notebook from Apple.  Of all the bells and whistles it presented, I was most in awe of the ingenious MagSafe power connector.  A square magnet to hold the power cord in place?  Beautiful.  I've ruined enough power cords by yanking them out, and my wife's PowerBook was badly dented when a cord got yanked out.  This was the greatest design idea I'd seen in a  long time.

Today however, a flickr photoset shows some disturbing images or a severely burnt MagSafe connector and MacBook Pro port.  I suppose there's potential for this being a hoax, but I don't know the use in something like that.  Go check out the pictures, they look pretty ugly.  I'll just use this as one more reason I don't have to feel bad about not having my own MacBook Pro just yet...

In case the last one didn't extend the battery life on your 15" PowerBook, maybe this one will.  The update should be in your Software Update, but if you want to check manually to see if you're a lucky winner, Apple's provided a page to help. 

Basically, Go to the Apple Menu, and click, "About This Mac". 
Then choose "More Info".

Over at Arstechnica, Jacqui Cheng has done a nice job of reviewing the MacBook Pro against the PowerBook G4, a Dell Inspiron 9100 running OS X 10.4.4, and a iMac Core Duo in the benchmarks.

It performs amiably against the rest and, there are some surprising results that show up from the Dell. Of course the MacBook Pro wins overall, but never the less it's always interesting to see what comes out of some of the runs.

Add the built in iSight camera, which is great for those that travel, or are abroad. The down side to it is for those in the government that might not be able to take a camera in a secure area. D'oh

Also one of the newest additions is the MagSafe. Basically it's a power cord that connects to the laptop via magnets instead of the your normal plug. Pretty sweet, so say good bye to having your laptop yanked right out of your hands, or off your desk.

Conclusions:

Pros:

Significant speed bump for Apple's pro notebooks
Beautiful, bright display
Built-in iSight
Thinner than G4 predecessor
Dual-link DVI
Cons:
MagSafe comes out way too easily under imperfect conditions
Wider than G4 predecessor
No Firewire 800, only 400
Built-in iSight

Apple declares 20" iMac G5 'end of life' (EOL), more like SOL if you had a pre-order for one. Apple is canceling any orders "for which no stock is available", but you all wanted the new iMacs and Mac Minis with the Intel processors anyway, right?

Maybe this is one of those opportunities for you entrepreneurial types to hawk them on eBay. I bet they'd sell like... oh never mind.

The UK version of CNet is doing an on going test of the Apple's new Intel Core Duo Mac Mini verses  Microsoft's Media Center.

I don't know about you, but I'd much rather see a Mac Mini sitting next to my TV than pretty much any PC case I can bring to mind. Add the fact that it's practically completely silent, what more could you ask for? A TV tuner maybe? No Kidding, but Apple isn't about to put one in yet, and it's certain they have other things in mind.

Using the Mini for video recording can be solved by using a USB digital tuner. Using the Miglia TVMini tuner for recording duties will also format anything you record to fit on the video iPod; which is one thing Media Center can't do.

Both Mac and Windows software fair about the same for looks, and is called a draw on functionality.

CNet goes on to say, "It can't be understated how frustrating it can potentially be to get a Media Center PC to communicate with a TV. It's easy for the technical-minded to overlook this simple fact, but anyone who is used to a DVD or video recorder 'just working' will find that Media Center PCs are sometimes not an easy alternative. Several systems get it right, but many have problems."

And with that gives a nod to the Mac Mini for the first round.

While we listen to how well Apple's iPod and, to a lesser extent, iMacs and Macbooks are doing, we rarely hear anything on its fledgling storage market. With new numbers coming out reflecting the company's activity in that regard, it looks as though Apple is really focusing on building up its stake in the market.

According to MacNN, Apple has seen its overall storage sales increase last year; from $78 million in sales by the second quarter, to closing the year with $185 million. Its position in the market overall saw an increase from 12th to 10th.

The reason for the success for Apple is that most of its servers are much more cost-effective than some of the other solutions out there currently, that includes SCSI storage from companies like Dell and HP.

Macworld has posted some brand new images of a dissected Intel Mac mini. Nothing major has changed on the new Mac minis besides a few added ports on the rear and, of course, the new Intel chipset. They have, however, made it more difficult to upgrade by making the RAM slots less accessible, changed the hard drive to a Serial ATA 2.5" drive (from a Parallel ATA drive) and relocated the Bluetooth card.

The Intel based Mac mini's (available in Core Duo and Core Solo flavours) are available now from the Apple store from $599 US.