Both Dell and Apple had issued a recall for their defective batteries as a response to the never-ending saga of the exploding batteries these past month.

For Dell, a recall of notebook batteries for models which includes Latitude D410, D600, D610 and D620. Under rare conditions, these batteries could possibly overheat, and are being replaced by Dell. As for Apple, they confirmed that a number of lithium-ion batteries containing cells manufactured by Sony Corporation of Japan pose a safety risk that may result in overheating under rare circumstances. The affected batteries were sold worldwide from October 2003 through August 2006 for use with the following notebook computers: 12-inch iBook G4, 12-inch PowerBook G4, and 15-inch PowerBook G4.

However, the next issue would be how long before these battery replacements arrive? One customer with a Dell D810 and an Apple Mac Book Pro commented that Apple was able to deliver the battery replacement less than 3 days after the request was filed (considering the request day was a Sunday). Not too bad. But he can't say the same thing with Dell. The guy is still waiting for the replacement. It's been 16 days or so since he filed for a request.

We wonder how long it took before other affected laptop owners receive their replacement batteries - or are they still playing the waiting game?

Good news for Power Mac G4 users, you can now upgrade your CPU with your choice of single or dual processor with configurations up to 2.0GHz, thanks to Newer Technology (NewerTech).

NewerTech has released their new MAXPower for Power Mac G4 CPU upgrades. These new upgrades are available in single-processor 2.0GHz configuration (which sells for $399), dual processor 1.6GHz ($449), dual 1.7GHz for $529 and a dual 1.8GHz for $599.

The new MAXPower uses FreeScale PowerPC 7447 processors and are compatible with Â?SawtoothÂ?-era Power Mac G4s up to the Â?QuicksilverÂ? models. The upgrades are also compatible for use with all the current hardware and software that run on Mac OS 9.2.2 or Mac OS X v10.3.5 or higher.

Overblown as the story may be, affected people are still concerned about their immaculate-white MacBooks getting inexplicably stained (for a range of reasons, from "I bought a white MacBook, and it should stay that way," to "I wouldn't want my girlfriend to think I'm an unhygienic slob" or something to that effect).  So someone else decided to recount his story of MacBook discoloration, and how he resolved it. Not with water, soap, nail-polish remover, cleaning wipes, 3M Magic Eraser, iKlear, white paint, the Invisible Shield, sending the notebook back to Apple, or trading it in for the black-case MacBook Ultimate (the "Blac"Book is a beaut, though), or stealing someone else's immaculate-white MacBook and leaving MacStained in its place.

He peeled it off.

The MacBook owner says that his notebook had suffered major discoloration, partly because he works in a rather dirty  environment. He was about to take the unit back to the store to remedy the stains when he noticed that the plastic skin of his casing was "fraying." Intrigued, he did something that would probably shock Apple's customer support team: he started to peel the skin off, to reveal the immaculate white that he knew and desired.

(Here we must post a warning: we do not know if peeling the plastic skin off as had been demonstrated by this article will impact your warranty. Hence our "shock the customer support team" comment. We are posting this for information purposes only.)

The owner explains that his MacBook had been running hot for quite a while, which probably caused the peeling. He had tried other methods of cleaning the casing before, but he found it odd that the skin decided to peel off just recently. After the MacBook had cooled, the peeling stopped. The owner does not know, either, if what had happened was that the plastic he peeled off was a protective coating, or simply a temporary protective skin someone forgot to peel off at the store, or if the discoloration was limited to the plastic skin or could occur at the casing itself beneath that skin.

Neither do we. But this story, seen in the light of our previous reports on the MacStains, probably implies that the discoloration is native to that clear plastic skin that coats MacBooks. The story we had on Apple replacing stained cases noted that the plastic in the new cases (and newer MacBooks) were smoother than the previous ones. But that's speculating.

Design boo-boo over at the Microsoft Security webpage, folks!

Steve Jobs must be having a laughing fit on this by now: a PowerBook being advertised as "clean" on a Microsoft Security webpage? I couldn't help giggling. Well, we're not surprised that Microsoft proves once again that they're a cop-out.

Well, in the design industry, it's pretty much of a given standard that most companies (including Microsoft) make their creative designs on a Mac. But when Microsoft itself accidentally slips up and admits that they use their major competitor's products, you got an instant recipe for Apple fans bashing Microsoft.

Mac Rumors seems to be the most apt place to keep hearing about this... though we do wish Apple would make make a definitive announcement. WWDC 2006 came and went, and we still have no official word on the mysterious Merom CPU and whether it will make an appearance on the newest MacBook release.

According to Mac Rumors and their linked report from Reg Hardware, Asustek is supposed to be making new MacBooks with the new CPU, instead of the previously used processor, known as "Yonah." All that we know so far are vague ideas of the specs of the Merom: it is supposed to go up to a max clock speed of 2.33 GHz and be a Core 2 Duo, which is meant to be more powerful than the Core Duo CPU, "Yonah."

It's genius how they're keeping tight-lipped about it and making the rumors spread to intrigue others, but too much silence is just as annoying as being wishy-washy over details and decisions.

Let's hope Apple makes up its mind and gives us all an answer soon, shall we?

WWDC is a conference for Apple developers that gives the company a chance to show them some love while disseminating important information about the next-gen hardware on Apple's launch horizon. There is no live stream coming from the event floor, so minute to minute coverage (complete with pictures) is all there is until Apple makes the footage available after the event.

Mannymix03, a member of our forums, has been kind enough to make up to the minute posts about the event to keep us all informed about the latest happenings at WWDC 2006. So far, so much information has come out of the event that it would be impossible to detail it all here. I will do my best to give you a brief rundown of the important finds that have been discovered thus far.
 
In his usual style, Steve Jobs kicks off the conference with his enthusiastic rundown of what Apple has in store for us in the near future. He began with his usual optimism by quoting record sales figures and mentioning the unprecedented level of penetration that the company is experiencing in the OS market.

After stroking the developers egos by detailing how much of their work Apple sold the previous year, Jobs goes on to discuss the move to utilize Intel chips and the upcoming move into the next generation of Intel chips known as Core 2 Duo. While all the information about new chips and the smart architecture of the new Mac Pro kept folks interested, the news that kept many on the edge of their seats was about Apple's upcoming OS.

After giving Microsoft some of the spotlight by highlighting the ways the Redmond-based giant has appropriated technology from Apple in the past, the details about the OS (Leopard) were released. Along with 64 bit compatibility at the UNIX layer, meaning you can run both 32 and 64 bit applications smoothly and without the aid of emulation, there was mention of a built in backup feature for the OS called Time machine that backs up "everything" in real time. This new feature is not as cut and dry as it seems however. Apparently, with Time machine you get a robust backup system that is capable of full system restores as well as an ala carte system that allows you to bring back just the files that you need.

When integrated with the Finder disk searcher, we are one step closer to having all of our information stored in a searchable database that is backed up in real time. So now you can search for, and find, a file even if you have already erased it! Wonderful! Even I couldn't lose data if I had a set up like this! One of the things that I found a bit surprising was the fact that every copy of the new OS will ship with Time Machine, Bootcamp, Photobooth and Front Row and Spaces. Each one of these modules provides functionality, like a virtual desktop (Spaces), photo editing and sharing (Photobooth), music, video and other media (Front Row), that is not included with other operating systems like Vista.

Spotlight, Core Animation and Universal Access are additional applications in the works at Apple. Spotlight allows you to search the drives of all of the Macs in your home from any one of them. Core Animation is a powerful program that allows you to deconstruct media into its various parts (video, music,ect) and manipulate it into a new creation. Universal Access is designed to allow all people, whether blind, or otherwise disabled, to use their new Mac with ease. With all the new software being developed and hardware changes galore happening at Apple, you'd think that they would be the ones with all the delays and shoddy releases instead of Microsoft!

Mail, Dashboard and iCal have also been updated and changed! Stationary, Notes and To Do's to mail have been integrated into the new email system that will come with the new OS. Dashboard has over 2500 widgets and with Dashcode users can easily create their own customized widgets. With Web Clip and Dashcode you can turn any part of a website into a widget that will update every day keeping you in the know with your favorites on the web. Then there's iChat and iPhoto, which are integrated and will offer multiple logins, invisibility, animated buddy icons, video recording and tabbed chats.

This is near information overload here so I suggest that you digest this as quickly as you can then can come back and get some more! The conference is more than three days long so you can be certain that Jobs and Co. will continue to hit us with surprises well into this week!

Finally, for those with short attention spans, here is a brief list of the key innovations that were revealed this morning:

• 64-bit
• Core animation
• Universal access
• Enhanced parental controls (who cares about that?)
• iCal
• The complete package
• mail
• Spotlight
• Dashboard
• Web Clip and Dashcode
• Announcing Xcode 3 at the afternoon session
• Spaces
• Time Machine
  

Keep an eye out for updates to follow. For those who got their appetites whet and are looking for ways to satisfy their "Apple" craving, check out the video of the conference's Keynote Address delivered by Apple top honcho, Steve Jobs.

Here's a company that doesn't want to end up like Dell.

Apple has initiated a worldwide battery exchange program for certain rechargeable batteries that were sold for use with 15-inch MacBook Pro laptops from February 2006 through May 2006. The company recently discovered that some 15-inch MacBook Pro batteries supplied to Apple don't meet their standards for battery performance.

The affected batteries have model number A1175 and a 12-digit serial number that ends with U7SA, U7SB or U7SC. To check if your MacBook is equipped with the batteries in question, just take out your MacBook's battery and check the serial numbers located above the battery's barcode. If you've recently bought an extra battery for your MacBook Pro, check the serial numbers on those babies too.

An exchange form is available in the Support section of the Apple website. You can exchange up to three batteries using the form, and if you need to exchange more than three batteries, you can call Apple. Contact numbers are also listed in the website.

This exchange program is free of charge.

From the Nimble company blog comes the story of an employee that used the Microsoft line of operating systems from the very beginning of his career only to make the switch to OS X after the years of frustration became too much for him to bear.

From DOS 2.1 to Windows XP he continued to suffer through instability, insecurity and lack of functionality. Finally, after losing one too many machines to a build up of malware, he decided to go Mac and not look back!

I may have been exaggerating his suffering (in a poor attempt at humor) but the underlying problems that pushed him away from Windows are real and cannot be ignored. The Nimblogger goes on to detail some of the differences between the two operating systems, along with some of the deficiencies that he found in Windows.

Many of the negative points that he makes about XP are legitimate but, he seems to have developed a permanently hostile stance toward Microsoft that cannot be changed. Although most of his assertions are common knowledge and their validity is not in doubt, some of his assertions simply express his now soured opinion of Microsoft.

The number of viruses floating around in the wild facing XP users, the level of style and design savvy apparent in the machines and the "it just works" factor are but a few of the reasons the author gave for making the switch.

Having been a Mac and a PC owner myself, I can attest to the fact that Macs actually do work out of the box better than PCs, and the Nimblogger seems to agree with me. Either way you look at it, more operating systems would benefit everyone; prices would likely be lower, consumers would have more systems to chose from and the competition would foster advancements in technology.

Regardless of what OS you use, learning about the causes behind an experienced computer users decision to switch operating systems can give you more to think about the next time you need to decide on a platform to use.

Worried about who has access to your Mac and its files? While there are several software solutions to this conundrum, here's a novel, potentially fool-proof hardware answer. WARNING: performing this on your MacBook will VOID THE WARRANTY. DO NOT ATTEMPT THIS unless you have an exceptionally steady hand and a very high "geek quotient."

That said, click on any of the images to get a better look, if necessary.

STEP 1: Cut a hole in the casing on the right as shown below. A high-speed precision drill like a "Dremel," using a cutting attachment, is best for this task.

Check out the Full Article for the rest of the procedure!

When the infamous MacBook Pro was released to the masses back at the start of the year, it was housed in a very fetching aluminium case, gained somewhat from its predecessor. When the MacBook was released recently, that too supported a 'newish' case, which gained popularity thanks to its slimline appearance, and its choice of white and black. We have now learned that the new release of the PowerMac will be housed within a newly designed case.

The new case will be different enough to allow instant distinction between the PowerPC and Intel Core Duo variants. Together with the cases, there will be a few choices on which processors to adopt. The new Intel Core Duo will be available for the PowerMac with 2 chips, A.K.A. Quad-core platform. It is not known whether the PowerMac will adopt the soon-to-be released Core Duo 2 chip, codenamed Conroe. The mobile variant is not expected till Fall.

The MacBook Pro will also have a new case for its range. However rumour has it that this will not be released till the system adopts the Intel Core Duo 2 chip, codenamed Merom. We would hope that issues are fixed in the new case release including heat expulsion.