Built-in audio variations

In light of Apple’s removal of the 3.5mm jack (for which there is an excellent analysis), I must say that there is something to be said for the inconsistency of analog audio output from built-in audio devices in laptops. Apparently there is quite a bit of variation that I hadn’t realized.

I ran this test using two sets of fairly wideband headphones and got results that were consistent across headphones but different between an HP laptop and a MacBook. The headphones were rated, respectively: (1) 15 – 20,000 Hz, 47 Ω input impedance; and (2) 15 – 24,000 Hz, 35 Ω input impedance. On the HP laptop with “IDT High Definition Audio” (92HD93 chip), I could hear a range from 30 Hz to 18 kHz. On the MacBook Pro with mid-2014 hardware, I could hear a range from 20 Hz to 16 kHz. I was quite surprised at the magnitude of this difference. A headphone amplifier (e.g. one built into the headphones) driven by digital input would eliminate this difference.

The non-existence of Android backup and restore

People change phones. They want their programs and data to show up on their new phones. Apple has solved this problem. Somehow, Google has not. As explained here, settings can be synced through Google’s sync API. It is however useless except for Google’s own apps and whoever uses their API (maybe nobody).

But as far as full-system backup and restore options go, you either have to root your system and use Nandroid or Titanium to backup to the phone storage itself, or you have to rely on adb backup. adb is Android Device Bridge, something that is accessed through the Developer Mode on Android. It feels like Google has given up on this feature midway through and just left it flopping around, because it simply does not work. Although I haven’t had trouble getting backup to work (‘adb backup -apk -shared -all -f [file]‘), I could not get restore (‘adb restore [file]‘) to work automatically because of this bug (which incidentally is also obsoleted).
(Read the article)

Disable Apple Mail attachment defaulting to inline

Did you know that Apple Mail does the presumptuous thing of sending all images (and maybe other attachment types) as inline attachments, no matter what options you choose in the program, like attaching at the end of message, like making it “Windows-friendly” (as if it’s a Windows problem),…. Nor does any of the very typically low-quality “solutions” you’ll find by misunderstanding Apple users online help, like changing message type to plain text or running that one silly line on the command line

defaults write com.apple.mail DisableInlineAttachmentViewing -bool yes

Just look at that and think about what it does! None of those do anything at all.
(Read the article)

“It presented with” the Macbook Air

A hilarious video that slams PC users, Apple, and “unboxing” videos all at the same time.

WHAT?? You can’t take the battery out? What? I do that all the time… Like most users, I switch the battery in and out all the freaking time.



And the comments on Youtube are clearly Mac users parodying themselves, since no one seems to get the joke.