Make mine a pint

Photographs

Nothing beats a good bitter.

Though I may have brought in five successful zinfandel grape harvests from my vineyard in years past, I confess wine does nothing for me. I like the gross profit margins of the growing business but do not care to consume the product.

No, when it comes to a favorite dinner drink, a nice pint of warm English beer hits the spot chez Pindelski. This snap is from the nautically themed Crown and Anchor pub in Monterey, a town I became familiar with a while back.


Crown and Anchor. G1, f/5, 1/3, ISO400

The city of Monterey may be distinguished by some of the worst summer weather on the California coast and maybe that’s why it is such a magnet for expatriate Englishmen. I don’t miss the weather but I do miss a good pint and there are several English pubs in the town.

If you are there, make sure to check Camera West, an old line camera store just around the corner from the Crown and Anchor. If film gear is your thing, be it Leicas or Nikon rangefinders (a huge selection of both), medium or large format, there’s a good chance you will find what you want at this collectors’ emporium.

Dell 2209WA monitor

Displays

Adding dual monitor display to Lightroom.

The 24″ iMac can drive an external monitor in addition to its own. Lightroom has built in dual monitor display support so that, for example, you can have the Grid view on one and the Loupe view on the other. This makes for very easy use if you are processing a lot of pictures. The dual monitor setup is not limited to Lightroom. Apple’s OS Leopard supports dual monitors, allowing you to spread your open applications and files over two monitors. If you are a data and information intensive user, a second monitor can make a lot of sense.

I had long wanted to add a second monitor but really wanted to use the same IPS screen technology used in the iMac’s splendid display. However, the cheapest IPS display I could find, the HP2475W, runs some $525 which was more than I cared to spend.

Well, Dell has released a marginally smaller 22″ IPS display named the Dell Ultrasharp 2209WA (not the cheaper 2209W) and occasionally run discounts which can see the price as low as $210. I wasn’t that lucky but did find a new one, with 3 year Dell warranty, for $270 shipped to my home in CA. If you go the eBay route, make sure you get written representations from the seller that the warranty is a 3 year Dell one and that they will transfer this warranty, with full documentation, to you. I did, adopting the old fail safe assumption that every seller on eBay is ethically challenged.

If you think 22″ is a lot smaller than 24″, it’s not. Here are the comparisons – width, height, diagonal, in inches:

iMac 24″: 20.5 x 12.7 x 23.9
Dell 2209WA 22″: 18.7 x 11.7 x 22.0

So you lose 1.8″ in width and 1 inch in height. Not a deal breaker for me, given the almost $300 saved compared to the HP. I suppose you could always buy the Apple 24″ external display with its wretched glossy screen for $800+ but this blog is not for the insane.

I connected the monitor to the iMac using the DVI-D connector, provided, plus the DVI-MiniDVI adapter borrowed from the Mac Mini to make it fit the back of the iMac 24″. The adapter is poorly engineered as it’s non-captive (no screws to hold it in place) and runs $19 at your favorite fruit store, where it’s known as a MiniDVI-to-DVI cable. The Dell also comes with a VGA cable – obsolete and a USB cable to provide power to its USB outlets from your iMac.

Mechanical quality is outstanding. The screen clips into the stand (one button release), no tools, and the stand has a beautifully counterweighted vertical slider to permit height adjustment with no lock needed. Tilt is built in, too. Remove the stand and you have standard 100mm VESA mounting holes for a wall mount.

The Dell’s USB sockets accepted my USB card reader and worked properly. There are 4 USB outlets on the monitor – two on the side, two in back.

I work in a bright room with a window behind me, and used the Apple utility (Sys Prefs->Displays) for a first calibration – easy match to the iMac.

Brightness 82, Contrast 57, Custom RGB (R 100, G 94, B 80) – your setting will doubtless differ. In a darkened room I would turn the brightness way down.

The iMac recognized the second monitor so I could use it in dual monitor mode. I ran PixelCheck (a free download) and there’s not one bad pixel.

Here are two LR snaps – grid and loupe settings:


iMac in Grid view


iMac in Loupe view

Here’s how the cables are routed through the slot in the stand:

Here’s the dual monitor setup in use with NetNewsWire – a free and excellent news feed reader for the Mac – summary on left, detail on the right:

Text reproduced best at a Sharpness setting of 40 (the default is 50).

How does the Dell’s 1680 x 1050 compare with the iMac’s 1920 x 1200 pixels? The iMac’s 24″screen is marginally sharper but in practice you don’t notice the difference unless you have your nose in the display. Side to side and up and down light fall off and color changes are minimal for both displays – that’s the key advantage of IPS screen technology.

The Dell’s screen is, if anything, slightly more matte than the iMac’s – a minor difference and in the right direction. Some users have complained about the polished inner bezel on the Dell – mine is matte. The box says ‘REV A01 – Assembled in Mexico’. The screen puts out a little more heat than the iMac (which has massive external auxiliary cooling to stop it from frying) but as the Dell is separate from the rest of the computer that should not matter.

Last, but not least, here’s one thing you definitely will not be doing with your iMac display – I’m using Leopard 10.5.7 – text is slightly less clear in this mode but it’s a nice party trick, I suppose:

OS Leopard allows this trick thanks to a setting in System Preferences – Displays.

Highly recommended based on my brief use – reliability can only be gauged over time, but that three year warranty helps. Adjustments are by easy to see and use buttons on the bottom right of the matte black bezel. I think I’m right in saying that this is the least expensive IPS monitor on the market right now.

Proper calibration of this monitor is discussed here.

Update May 2014:

In the event I got 5 happy years from my three Dell 2209WA displays, until they ceded desk space to two magnificent Apple 30″ Cinema Displays. You can read about that here. The Dells were perfect when I sold them.

The HackPro – Part I

Hackintosh

With thanks to FU Steve.

Having earlier explained how he hacked an MSI Wind netbook for portable computing (“The netbook Apple will not make”), the pseudonymous FU Steve touched base with me last week to mention that his iMac 24″ – a late-2006 white model, like mine – was beginning to show screen artifacts which indicate imminent failure of the graphics card. I mentioned that Apple wanted $900 to repair mine, a ridiculous sum, and that put FU over the top. He decided to build a Hackintosh. More specifically a machine to equal the performance of the ridiculously overpriced MacPro, naming his ‘build’ the HackPro.

Here are extracts of the interview I held with him.

TP: I understand you are getting all the parts for your HackPro. Could you share the details with my readers?

FU: Glad to. By the way the machine will run Snow Leopard and because all the components can be shipped overnight and come with a three year warranty, if something goes wrong I can simply replace a faulty part in 24 hours, rather than losing my machine to Apple for weeks. The single costliest component is the CPU at $220.

My component list excludes a monitor but includes a keyboard, mouse and hard drive, but if you have these already, the cost obviously drops. I’m including the long form descriptions below so that there is absolutely no question about the parts used.

  • EVGA GeForce 9800 GTX+ Video Card – 512MB GDDR3, PCI Express 2.0, SLI Ready, (Dual Link) Dual DVI, HDTV
  • Antec Sonata III 500 Quiet Super Mini Tower ATX Case (Black)
  • Antec TriCool 120 3-speed fan for HDD cooling
  • Intel Core 2 Quad Q9550 Quad-Core Processor, 2.83 GHz, 12M L2 Cache, 1333MHz FSB, LGA775
  • Gigabyte GA-EP45-UD3P LGA 775 Intel P45 ATX Intel Motherboard
  • Sony AD-7240S-0B Optiarc DVDRW Drive – DVD+R 24X, DVD-R 24X, DVD+RW 8X, DVD-RW 6X, DVD-RAM 12X, SATA
  • Sony Multi-Card Reader/Writer MRW620-U1
  • 8gB (4 x 2gB) Patriot Extreme Performance Viper Series 4 GB PC2-6400 DDR2-800 Dual Channel Desktop Memory Kit nVidia EPP Certified – PVS28G6400ELK
  • IOGear USB 2.0 Bluetooth Micro Adapter GBU421
  • 1.0TB Samsung Spinpoint F3 7200RPM 32MB Cache SATA II HD
  • Apple keyboard and mouse – both wireless
  • Arctic Silver thermal paste

All told that lot ran me $930 without a monitor. The only tools you need are a Philips screwdriver and a modicum of grey matter. Between the Antec case and the motherboard you have all the connecting cables you need. You could do without the Sony Card Reader if you already have a card reader, but installing it in the box cuts clutter and the cost is only $18. Likewise, you don’t need 8gB of RAM (though Snow Leopard can use all of it) as the speed increase in Lightroom is some 8-12% compared to using 4gB, but RAM is now getting so inexpensive, especially if you watch out for rebate deals, that it’s not a lot more if you use 8gB. There is faster (and costlier) DDR3 memory available, but you trade speed for stability. Not good. It never does to be at the bleeding edge of technology if you are paying for hardware with your own money.

If you prefer to use a wired keyboard and mouse you can delete the IOGear Bluetooth adapter ($18), but may need to add USB A-to-A extension cables if your monitor does not have any USB sockets, as the Antec case will likely make its home below your work desk. That can be a bit of a stretch. Either way, you will need to borrow an USB wired keyboard and mouse for the setup. Your system will be unable to recognize bluetooth wireless devices until …. you have accessed the system, and you cannot access the system without a keyboard! It’s a Catch22.

If you feel spendy, you can upgrade the CPU to a 3.0gHz (Q9650) Intel Core2 Quad for $50 more, but that seems a lot to pay for so modest a speed increase – 23% more for a 6% speed bump doesn’t solve, in my book.

TP: Do you have preferred vendors?

FU: (Laughing). Yes. Anyone who is cheap and charges me no sales tax! I used Amazon and Tigerdirect.com. Both are easy to deal with in the event a faulty component needs to be replaced. Those residing outside CA may prefer Newegg.com which charges sales tax to CA residents.

TP: But the MacPro uses the Intel Xeon ‘Nehalem’ CPU (i7 socket) with 8 cores whereas you are using the older 4 core ‘Yorkfield’ (LGA775 socket)?

FU: Yes. The key advantage of the 8 core in the MacPro is faster video processing. My primary use is with Lightroom and Photoshop – I am a still photographer – so the added cost of the 8 core makes no sense as these applications do not take advantage of it.

TP: Don’t you have to be an engineer to build this thing?

FU: (Laughing). You have to be kidding me! A 12 year old could put this together – it’s easier than Lego. All the connectors are keyed so you cannot get it wrong. You install the motherboard in the case which already has a power supply installed by the manufacturer, plug the memory and graphics card into the motherboard, connect the power supply, graphics card, HDD and dvd burner cables to the motherboard and plug in the fans. There are no fewer than four fans, by the way – GPU, CPU, power supply and case. And the case one is no less than 4.5″ in diameter – quite a change from the toy ones in the iMac. You can add a fifth to cool the HDD for all of $15 if you use several hard drives – the case will accommodate four HDDs. And the whole thing is dead quiet. And did I mention the removable, washable air filter?

TP: Ok, so the assembly is easy. How about the software part?

FU: Just Google for the fix. It’s super easy and the installation allows fully automated system updates. I bought my Snow Leopard update disk from Apple for $29 and that’s what I used.

TP: Legality?

FU: Look, Apple has stolen from me for years. Every single piece of Apple hardware I have owned has broken after two or three years and proved impossible or uneconomical to fix. How on earth can Apple’s false advertising (“It Just works”) be any more legal than what I am doing? That should read “It Just Breaks”. And now my iPhone consistently drops calls – in San Francisco of all places – because Apple’s and AT&T’s greed has resulted in so many sales that AT&T’s systems are simply overloaded.

Apple maintains that its OS can only be run on Apple branded hardware but that has yet to be tested in the courts. Further, the fact that Apple has not gone after the hacker community suggests they have concerns that they might not legally prevail. And I paid them for their software, many times over, if you look at all the hardware failures I have suffered over the years.

No, given that the little guy like me has no possible redress against Apple’s consumer fraud, it’s more than a little ‘holier than thou’ to argue the legality case here.

TP: So what’s the performance like?

FU: No idea as I haven’t assembled everything yet. But I can give you some meaningful predictions. Geekbench on my iMac (2.16gHz, ATI7300, 3gB RAM) reports a reading of 2850 and I expect that the HackPro will come in at 6000 or so, so roughly twice as fast on CPU intensive tasks like converting RAW files. On video I would expect a similar performance increase as the nVidia 9800 GTX+ card I’m using is a rebadged GT150. The current HackPro uses the GT120 which is a rebadged, and more modest, 9500GT. More Apple and nVidia spin. So the HackPro will be better as regards graphics capability. The card has dual DVI outputs, by the way, meaning it can drive two regular 24″ or smaller monitors or one 30″ dual-DVI display at full 2560 x 1600 definition.

I could overclock the CPU and GPU and get even more performance, but I’m conservative by nature and prefer to trade speed for reliability.

TP: And the case?

FU: Can you say elegant? No boy racer looks or neon lights here:


Antec Sonata III case

Antec has been making high quality cases for years and this one is as good as they get. HDDs slide in on rails and there are several externally accessible bays behind the top door for things like DVD burners, card readers, etc.

TP: Thanks, FU. When can we expect results?

FU: Give me a couple of weeks or so. One final thought. For Windows users, this machine will run Windows with no hacking, and will run it faster than all but the costliest gaming machines.

The results can be seen in Part II here.