Apple’s on their way to having sold 1 billion apps (!) from the iPhone/iPod touch App store and they are holding a contest where you could win a $10,000 iTunes Gift Card, an iPod touch, a Time Capsule, and a MacBook Pro. Each time you download an app, you are entered but you can also enter without having made a purchase by going here and giving Apple your information. You can actually enter up to 25 times a day — an easy thing if you’ve got a program like 1Password to fill in all your details automagically!

Make sure to check the official rules to make sure that you are eligible before filling out the form 25 times.

Apple’s got a big keynote speech today in San Francisco where they’ll be announcing new software/hardware to the world. Follow along at some of our favorite sites:

• Macrumorslive.com (currently hacked and annoying)
• Engadget.com — Great photos and coverage
• Gdgt.com — Similar to Engadget (former Editor of Engadget, Ryan Block, runs gdgt.com)
• Ustream with Chris Pirillo — if you want to listen to the keynote and watch a nerd’s reaction, this is the stream for you.

So far, a new version of the iLife suite, iLife ’09, has been announced. Expect a new version of iWork to follow, along with possible updates to iMacs, Mac minis and maybe AppleTV? What else are you hoping/expecting to be updated?

This ol’ laptop (Dell) of mine is slowly dying (CMOS battery, CD drive is dead, other wonky stuff). So, of course, I’m pondering getting a MacBook before I head back to Africa in February since I’ll be gone for four months. I guess my biggest question is MacBook vs. MacBook Pro (I like the glowy keyboard in Pro) … but for a basic/average user, do I need what the Pro version has to offer and is it worth the extra cost? I guess the other thing I wonder is would you recommend a refurbished one from the Apple website or stick with a new one?

I’d say that most people really only _need_ the MacBook. Especially the new (as of this posting, October 2008) models. Unless you’re desperate for the larger screen. For the price, I think the MacBook is the way to go these days.

The major feature that it’s lacking is a firewire port which is what you’d use to hook up older (and some current) tape-based video cameras. Pretty much anything else will be able to hook up through a USB port.

There’s this comparison page Apple has for their MacBooks. There is also a great guide over at macrumors.com that can walk you through most of the features on both the MacBook and MacBook Pro models.

The refurb store is just as good as the “new” store. You get a 1 year warranty with most purchases and the machine has been checked out by Apple to be good as new. Although I don’t think they have any of the new (October 2008) MacBooks in there yet.

I haven’t installed anything new. I haven’t added any large files to my computer. But I keep running low on hard drive space! How do I find out what is taking up all the room on my iBook?

Apple’s Finder doesn’t cut it. It’ll tell you how much space is left on your hard drive, but it doesn’t give you a bird’s eye view on what is taking up your hard drive space.

Enter Grand Perspective. This free application gives you an interactive, graphical “tree view” of your Mac’s hard drive.

Step 1: Download and install Grand Perspective.

Step 2: Select the hard drive of concern:
Step 3: Wait a few minutes for Grand Perspective to scan your hard drive
Step 4: Be overwhelmed by the graphical representation of your hard drive. (FYI, the largest block is my iPhoto library)
Step 5: Mouse over the larger blocks to find out what they are and how much space they’re taking up, then click on the blocks you don’t think you need, then click “reveal” to see where it is in the Finder
Step 7: Delete and repeat!

This is an awesome free app and I know it saved Alexa a huge headache; she found out that Azureus was taking up 7.5GB of space. Needless to say, she deleted Azureus and is now using Transmission and enjoying having almost 1/5th of her hard drive back!

note: There is a rhyme and reason behind the colours and groupings of the squares that Grand Perspective uses: Files in the same folders are grouped together, then folders that are in the same folders, etc.

I bought a new drive and am partitioning it to limit how much Time Machine uses. How big should I make the partition?

Short Answer: I’d say around 25% larger than what your computer’s hard drive size.

Backing up is SO important, and Apple’s new operating system includes a very powerful and easy to use application called Time Machine. All you need is an external drive to backup to, and you’re good to go!

To understand how much space you need, you should know how Time Machine works. The first time you backup, it backs up your whole hard drive. From then on when it backs up your computer, it only backs up what you’ve changed. Once your backup drive is full, you can set Time Machine to delete old backups.

My lappie’s drive is 120GB and my 160GB backup drive is EASILY big enough!

If you aren’t deleting/adding tons of files on a daily, or even weekly basis, a backup drive that’s slightly bigger than your hard drive, like 25%, is more than enough. That being said, hard drive space is CHEAP, and you’ll never wish you bought something smaller — A 500GB USB 2.0 drive from Future Shop is only $119!