Apple Launches New Support Communities

There’s nothing quite like the feeling of cracking open the windows for the first time after a long cold winter. Many times the accompanying burst of fresh spring air inspires a bout of frantic house cleaning. While wiping away winter’s dust and recirculating pent-up musty air can leave you and your abode feeling clean and crisp, it’s important to do some digital spring cleaning too. The more use your Mac gets, the greater the likelihood you’ll eventually encounter a shortage of disk space and overall slowdown. While some file accumulation is certainly inevitable, OS X has a few nasty habits of hoarding data in places it generally doesn’t need to.

One such area is the Mail Downloads folder. Whenever an attachment is previewed with QuickLook or double clicked within a message, Mail automatically saves a copy to this folder. While this doesn’t present much of an issue for small files such as documents and low-res images, if you frequently receive high resolution photos, videos or audio files via Mail attachments there is a good chance that your Mail Downloads folder has become bloated. To wipe out the redundant files in this folder, simply navigate to: Home Folder/Library/Mail Downloads. It’s a good idea to quickly check over the contents of this folder for anything important–though most attachments either reside in their original messages or in the permanent location you’ve elected to save them. Once you’ve given this folder’s contents the once over, trash the files and empty the Trash to reclaim some disk space.

Another frequently forgotten area is iPhoto’s Trash. One of the only included OS X applications to feature a separate Trash, any photos or videos deleted from your iPhoto Library wind up here–not OS X’s main Trash. If you’re an avid photographer and use iPhoto as your primary means of image storage, it is likely iPhoto’s Trash has piled up over time. To empty the iPhoto Trash, navigate to iPhoto in the Menu Bar and select Empty iPhoto Trash–or just press Shift-Command-Delete while in the app. Again, it’s wise to double check the trash’s contents for any accidentally deleted images prior to emptying.

While the two aforementioned tips can be quickly performed by most Mac users, intermediate and advanced users should consider cleaning a bit deeper and wiping out stockpiles of system logs and caches. Terminal savvy users can accomplish this at the command line, but for the rest of us, Titanium Software’s free “*Onyx*”:http://www.titanium.free.fr/download.php utility takes care of the hard stuff. After installing this free utility, sweep your Mac using the application’s Cleaning tab. Here you can select from different system caches and logs to remove. While the space taken up by these files is minimal, you’ll notice previously sluggish apps have a new spring in their step to match the season.

Prior to trying any of these spring cleaning tips we recommend running a full Time Machine backup and throughly checking all mentioned folders and trashes for important files. Though all of these tips can effectively speed up your Mac and free up valuable disk space, you also risk data loss if you are not careful. Clean at your own risk!–a motto I’ll probably end up repeating as I break out the rubber gloves and vacuum at my apartment this weekend.

Today is Earth Day, which–this year–is themed after the Earth Day Network’s ‘A Billion Acts of Green’ campaign. This program seeks to amass one billion pledges by the 2012 UN Conference on Sustainable Development in Brazil. At the program’s “*website*”:http://act.earthday.org/ users can submit their ‘Acts of Green’ towards the program’s goal. We encourage you to visit the site and submit an ‘Act of Green’ of your own. Regardless of if it’s big or small, you’ll still be making a difference!

The environment is extremely important to us here at Small Dog Electronics. We strongly factor in Planet with People and Profit in our triple bottom line, and do our best to implement environmentally sustainable and green business practices on a daily basis. In 2004, we wanted to expand our commitment to the environment, so we began a local eWaste recycling program through our Vermont retail stores. This initiative has since expanded, and in 2007 we initiated a free recycling day in honor of Earth Day. This year, even if it’s as small as switching out a desk lamp with a compact fluorescent lightbulb, we encourage you to be as green as possible.

Last week we announced this year’s eWaste recycling events. In case you missed the announcement, this year we’re holding free eWaste events in both Vermont and New Hampshire. The Vermont event is scheduled for Saturday, May 14th at National Life Insurance Headquarters in Montpelier, VT. Our 2nd annual New Hampshire event will be held on Saturday, May 21st at the Mall of New Hampshire in Manchester, NH. Both events are completely free and are “all-you-can-eWaste!” Each event will take place between 9:00AM and 2:00PM. While the vast majority of electronics are recyclable and will be accepted, there are a few exceptions–namely kitchen appliances and air conditioners. If you plan to collate your eWaste prior to the events, double check it against the accepted materials list “*here.*”:http://www.smalldog.com/ewastevt

Grace came into the office yesterday afternoon after the Apple financial results were announced, and I said I needed a new verb to describe what Apple did to Wall Street with their latest quarterly results. She suggested “Apple paves the street” which is totally appropriate. Apple posted sales of $24.7 Billion dollars! I remember when Apple’s goal was to post $5 Billion in sales for an entire year. This quarter they posted just under $6 Billion in PROFIT! This compared to $13.5 Billion in revenue and $3.07 Billion profit for the same quarter last year. These numbers are the best results for a non-holiday quarter

Here’s some of the details:

* Apple sold 3,760,000 Macs, a 28% increase year over year and close to the all time record- this growth is contrasted with an overall 3% contraction in the PC market

* Apple sold 18,650,000 iPhones for the quarterly sales record, this is 113% growth!

* Apple sold 9,020,000 iPods representing a continued decline in iPod sales

* Apple sold 4,690,000 iPads as the iPad 2 was launched and Apple worked to meet the overwhelming demand- Tim Cook described it as the “mother of all backlogs”

* Apple will host its 1 billionth retail customer this month and retail stores are doing well.  I do not talk much about Apple retail, don’t go there–patronize your local Apple Specialist for superior service and support!

* Apple is posting sales at the rate of $190,332 a minute!

* Apple has about $65,800,000,000 in cash and liquid assets in its war chest

Apple continues to create new markets and innovative devices that seem to intuitively fit into our lifestyles. When I was in China I was simply amazed at how many iPads and iPhones people were using on the trains (which have WiFi, by the way). It used to be Dells and HPs being pulled out on the plane in business class, now it is usually a majority of Macs. Everyone who meets with me and has something other than a Mac says they want a Mac. There is no question that the most amazing story in American business history is unfolding before our eyes. The product pipeline is full, Apple continues to innovate and lead, leaving competitors in the dust. We have never been prouder to be an Apple Specialist!

Congratulations to Tim Cook, Steve Jobs and the entire Apple team for an awesome quarter!

I am heading to New York to visit the manufacturer of the electric hub motor I plan to use on my electric motorcycle conversion project. Dave Sellers and Steve Miracle will be flying down with me for the day to determine if this motor will meet my design criteria of 100MPH and 100 mile range. I’m glad to be back in Vermont, but this late April snow stuff is putting a crimp in my early season riding. Whichever of my employees predicted a late first ride is going to win that contest.

Thank you for reading this issue of Kibbles & Bytes!

Your Kibbles & Bytes team,
_Don, Ben & Kali_ (Welcome back KALI!)