By Darren Rolfe:
I’ve been on a podcast free diet for the last few weeks. Yes, nil by ear.
You see my very expensive ear buds had to go back to the manufacturer for replacement under warranty. Not a problem, or so I thought. I’ll just dust off my regulation apple ear buds and use those for a few days. They’re about as much use a chocolate fire guard. I’d forgotten how bad those things are.
So I reluctantly put my iPod Touch on extended vacation and scratched my head. I needed to get some alternative entertainment for my daily commute and fast.
Now for Plan B. A book. Perfect. No batteries, small, light and portable!
So I trotted to my local library in search of something vaguely technological and hopefully Macintosh flavoured. I know what you’re thinking. What a cheapskate. But to be honest in the town where I live the local bookshops have an even worse selection of Mac tech titles than the library. Plus I was desperate!
Perhaps it was sheer luck. But now I’m convinced it was destiny. If the sunlight hadn’t struck the cover at that precise moment in time, and caught my eye I wouldn’t be recording this review now. So there it was glistening at me. A brand new copy of iPhone Fully Loaded, “Get more out of – and into your iPhone than you ever thought possible” Also covers iPod Touch , by Andy Ihnatko. What better way to pass the time on my daily commute than by reading a book all about my absent friend.
Mr. Andy Ihantko. Now that should be a name familiar to any self-respecting, fully paid up, Mac fanboy. To quote the spiel on the book…
Andy Ihnatko is one of the best-known Mac experts and author of the critically acclaimed The Mac OS X Tiger Book as well as iPod Fully Loaded. He has written for nearly every publication with ‘Mac’ in its name and is currently technology columnist for the Chicago Sun-Times.
He’s also a regular contributor to another popular Mac podcast.
The book is broken down into four main sections.
1. The Basics of Content
2. The Real World
3. The Internet
4. The Office
Each section is then broken into several chapters. And at 250 pages that’s quite a chunk of reading.
Technorati Tags:
apple, iPhone, ipod, mac, Wiley Publishing, Andy Ihnatko
Overall, the book is very well layed out and there’s definitely no shortage of colour examples. Dotted amongst the text are oodles of pull-out tip, tidbits and technique boxes.
Andy starts with the very basics, configuring your iTunes and such like. This did grate with me a little. As I would like to consider myself fairly mac savvy. But then he started spurting out tips left, right and centre on stuff that I thought I’d known best about.
The book progresses and gradually he starts to move on to more adventurous subjects. He touches on jailbreaking and he also vents his anger at Apple for not opening up the iPhone to 3rd party developers. Ironically I’m putting the finishing touches to this review on the very same day the SDK has been announced! Yes, back when this book when to print the SDK was still a twinkle in SJ’s eye. Roll on June.
This book was also printed prior to the iPod Touch software update. But, if you’re able to install the software update, then I think you’re more than capable to work out which sections of this book are now applicable to you.
I hate to be party pooper, but I think it would be unfair for me to pass on Andy’s tips verbatim. But I will give you a few teasers. He includes tips on:
• Making 8 gigs seem like 80!
• Turning your DVD’s into playable movie files
• Downlaoding FREE music and getting away with it
• Turning your emails into podcasts
• And, finally probably the best tip in the whole damn book!
But there are a load more tips. And one important thing to note is that most of Andy’s tips involve software or services that are FREE or are very inexpensive! I really, really like the way Andy writes. He has a friendly, informal style and on numerous occasions is plain, laugh out loud funny.
Andy’s modus operandi is to ensure that you’re fully equipped with the tools and techniques to stuff your iPhone or iPod Touch to within an inch of it’s capacity. And, to be honest I think with this book you’ll find that very easy.
I honestly didn’t think to look at the cover price, until I was almost three quarters of the way through. But when I did, I was flabberghasted to discover that it was only $19.99.
It’s true things have moved on a lot since this book hit the presses. But even though there are some exciting prospects on the horizon this book still has some great, relevant content at it’s core. If you’re an iPhone or iPod Touch fanatic who wants to raise their game. Without having to trawl the internet looking for odd random snippets. Then I can’t recommend this book highly enough.
One small thing to note: Oh and it does cover the P.C. side of things very comprehensively! As I mentioned iPod Fully Loaded has an R.R.P of $19.99 but I’ve just checked this title on Amazon.com and they are currently selling it for $13.59.
Hey I’ve got a great idea. Why not head over to macreviewcast.com and click on the Surf-Shop link in the top left. That will you take to the MacReview Cast’s very own Amazon affiliate store. Then the MacReview Cast gets a small percentage of the purchase.
Product Details
* Paperback: 246 pages
* Publisher: Wiley (December 10, 2007)
* Language: English
* ISBN-10: 0470173688
* ISBN-13: 978-0470173688
* Product Dimensions: 9 x 5.9 x 0.6 inches
