All of our advertising is handled by BackBeat Media. For
price quotes and advertising information, please contact
at BackBeat Media
(646-546-5194). This number is for advertising only.
Problems viewing this page with Internet Explorer
5.5 or 6? It works fine in other browsers, including IE 7. We
recommend Firefox
for those using Windows, as it is standards based and more
secure than IE 6 (and earlier). More LEM visitors use Firefox
than any other browser.
What Gets Bigger as It Gets Smaller?
The Hard Drive
2004.02.27
I've still got an old external SCSI hard drive that was bought
from Power Max a number of
years ago. It's worked well with my beige
G3 tower -- and several other machines before it. This was a
great hard drive for storing data, but it wasn't especially fast if
you decided to boot off of it or run applications from it.
The drive itself is a full-height 3.5" hard drive, which is three
times the height of the hard drives that ship with most modern
machines. Some people might even remember 5.25" full height hard
drives that cost thousands or the external hard drives (usually 5.25"
half height) that often sat under a Mac
Plus. For about $1,000 you could get a 30 MB drive.
These days a movie trailer wouldn't even fit on there. It might be
able to hold one album of MP3 files, if that.
That 30 MB drive also most likely wouldn't fit inside a new Power
Mac, much less function correctly (though if you added a SCSI card,
it could work). Considering that these days 30 GB is considered
small, there wouldn't be much reason to install an old 30 MB drive in
a G-series Mac anyway.
Nowadays the typical hard drives inside desktop computers are
3.5", half or 1/3 height. Notebook drives are even smaller, 2.5"!
How about the tiny little hard drives in the iPods? The ones in
the first iPods aren't much bigger than the battery! I thought
squeezing 5 GB into a device of that size was amazing .
The new iPod Mini however, represents a change from the more
typical hard drive formats. The mini uses a Compact Flash size
device, the 4 GB Hitachi MicroDrive. Interestingly enough, this
drive retails for $479.95, so if you buy an iPod Mini and tear it
apart for the drive, you can save money. (Why would you want to take
apart a $250 iPod Mini when you can do the same to less expensive
Creative MuVo MP3 player, I don't know)
Technology's really come down in size in the past few years. The
4 GB SCSI drive I have probably dates from about 1997. While it
wasn't exactly the latest in terms of technology for 1997, it wasn't
necessarily outdated, either, given that 4 GB drives were
shipping with beige G3s.
Since the MicroDrive is the same size as a standard Compact Flash
card, today you can have 4 GB of storage space in a digital
camera. This, of course, allows for more pictures at higher
resolutions. Switching Compact Flash cards would become a thing of
the past. [Editor's note: There are 4 GB Compact Flash cards
-- but at $1,500, who can afford them?]
The question that still exists, though, is how much smaller can
hard drives get? A few years ago I probably would've said that a 2.5"
notebook hard drive was about the smallest that could be made. Since
we've seen that is clearly not the case, I have little doubt that
we'll continue to see even smaller drives.
Eventually, though, it'll get to a point where the drive can no
longer be made physically smaller. Perhaps we'll then turn to types
of memory for storage. In fact, some of the old 286 and earlier
laptop computers used a special type of memory as a drive.
The Outbound Laptop, a
Mac clone, also came with a built in RAM disk. It's clear that memory
can be used as storage; it's just a matter of time before we see the
hard drive becoming a thing of the past.
LA Computer Company: Specials on AppleCare, iMac's, Apple Batteries and Apple A/C Adapters. Also Great prices on Used Apple Computers. Call 1-800-941-7654 Click Here.
Options for replacing your older iPod, 11.19.
Whether you've run out of space on your old iPod or want features it doesn't have, here are your options in new and used iPods.
Leopard different, a bit buggy, but worth the upgrade, 11.02.
Leopard on a Power Mac G4 and a MacBook Pro: It runs well on both computers, but each has some odd bugs, and some of the changes are a step backwards.
Mac of the Day: 'Yikes!' Power Mac G4, Aug. 1999 - The only Power Mac G4 with PCI graphics was built on a modified G3 motherboard.
Group of the Day: SuperMacs is for those using Umax SuperMac clones.
November 21 in LEM history: 00: OS upgrades, downgrades - AltiVec vs. Pentium III - 01: Saved by the clones - Computer of the future - 02: Apple Education: Let's get to it - 03: Panther lets Macs and PCs work together, - Lombard SCSI bug - 05: 3 survivors from the 1970s - Real world battery life inadequate - Windows to Mac file transfer with Zip disks - $99 alternative to Microsoft Office - 06: Parallels 1.0 far more polished than beta
Recent Content on Low End Mac
Just Right: Papa Bear, Mama Bear, and Baby Bear MacBooks, Charles W. Moore, 'Book Value, 11.20.
Some people like small and light notebooks, others prefer huge desktop replacements, but the best value tends to be in the middle.
Leopard Runs Very Nicely on PowerPC Macs, Simon Royal, Mac Spectrum, 11.19.
Some claim that Mac OS X 10.5 is so optimized for Intel Macs that it runs poorly on PowerPC hardware. That's simply not the case.
No High Definition iTunes Video for You, Dan Knight, Mac Musings, 11.19.
The October 2008 MacBooks are preventing users from viewing some high-def iTunes content from being viewed on their external displays. Poor form!
Every Working Computer Is Useful to Someone, Allison Payne, The Budget Mac, 11.19.
Whether it's a PowerBook 1400, G3 iMac, or Power Mac G4, it could be all the computer someone needs.
3 WeatherBug Options for Apple Users, Charles W. Moore, Miscellaneous Ramblings, 11.19.
Have instant access to current local weather conditions with a Dashboard widget, iPhone app, or Firefox plugin.
Anticipating Macworld: Nehalem, Snow Leopard, and Updated Desktops, Dan Knight, Mac Musings, 11.18.
Intel's Core i7 CPU has to make it way into the next Mac Pro, nVidia GeForce graphics will drive the iMac and Mac mini, and 'Snow Tiger' will unleash the animal within.
Best MacBook Air Deals, 11.18.
New 1.6 80, $1,150 after rebate; 120, $1,744 a/r; 1.8 80, $1,794 a/r; 1.6 128 SSD, $2,150; used 1.8 64 SSD, $1,500; new, $2,200 a/r; 1.86, $2,398 a/r.
Best Mac OS X 10.0-10.3 Deals, 11.18.
Mac OS X 10.0.3, $30; 10.1, $20; 10.2, $60; 10.3 CD, DVD, $100; CD, $119; 10.1 Server, unlimited users, $58; 10.3 Server, unlimited, $150.
Best iPod nano Deals, 11.17.
Refurb 3G/4 GB, $79; new, $114; refurb 8 GB, $99; new, $125; 3G/8 GB, from $134; 16 GB, from $189. Prices include ground shipping.