Although the $50 price tag might deter some people, die hard collectors are sure to scoop these up while they’re available. And I’m sure that if they sell enough there will probably be a second line coming out in the future.

Here’s a sneak preview from the MGSTouch Air Jacket site:

Related posts:

1. Metal Gear Solid Touch App for the iPhone
2. Metal Gear Solid Ninja Tribute
3. Metal Gear Solid Fan Art – Stealth Attack

I’m extremely jealous of anyone who is able to get this.. I may have to go out and buy an iPhone right now… The app is currently selling for $7.99, so pretty darn reasonable. Check out the official site for more info.

Do you have this app? Please leave your review of the Metal Gear Solid Touch app in the Comments Section. 

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1. Metal Gear Solid Touch Air Jackets Look Awesome
2. Metal Gear Solid Ninja Tribute
3. Metal Gear Solid Fan Art – Stealth Attack

This is a continuation of the Mac Issues series of posts, you can read Part 1 here and Part 2 here.

I was having a problem with the Mail app on my Macbook Pro. The problem was that Mail wasn’t working at all, and I had to force quit every time I opened it. When the app would launch, the viewer window wouldn’t launch with it. I knew all of my information was correct with my SMTP setup, as it was showing I had a strong connection to my account, so I knew it had to be something with the install.

After checking thoroughly on the internet, I called up Apple support and found out that there is a bug with the newest version of Leopard (10.5.6) for anyone upgrading from Tiger. What happens is that the Mail program installs incorrectly for some reason, so here’s what you have to do if you’re having the same problem:

Close all running applications, then go into your ~User/Library/Mail/ directory and move everything with a white paper icon temporarily to your desktop, leaving all files with folder icons in the directory. Restart your computer and then open Mail and you should be at the “Import Your Messages” screen. Go through this section and when you’re done Mail should open up and be working.

Update: Once you can confirm that Mail is working and you are able to send and receive messages, you can delete the white paper icons from your computer.

I’m not a support guy, but this trick worked like a charm for me. It was so simple that I’m surprised that Apple doesn’t say anything about it on their support site, especially since they know about it. Also, I’d like to just put a disclaimer out to everyone to use at your own risk, this is a trick that worked for me and I can’t be held responsible for anything that might happen if you try it yourself (though I’m sure there isn’t really a risk at all…). 

It’s stressful to have computers that aren’t running correctly when you have so much work to do, so I’m really thankful that after 2 weeks of torture things seem to be on the up and up. Hopefully I won’t have to worry about another hard drive crash any time soon, but if it happens I know that I’ve got a Time Machine on my side.

So ends the saga “Mac Issues”, at least I hope.

Related posts:

1. Mac Issues, Part 1: Upgrading to Leopard After Drive Failures
2. Mac Issues, Part 2: Installing a New Optical Drive in a G4 PowerMac
3. Direct Mail Launches PRO Version

I went to Best Buy and picked up a Pioneer 20x Internal Double-Layer DVD±RW/CD-RW Drive after reading recommendations for a similar model as being compatible with a G4. I was running out of steam at this point, but I made time to install the drive and plugged everything back in. 

The install went smooth, initially. After my computer was back up and running, I went to test the drive to see if it was working, afraid it might not be and that I may be facing a bigger issue. Upon hitting the Eject button, I heard a sound but the tray wouldn’t come out. I pushed Eject again. Nothing. It was then that I realized that the sound I was hearing was actually the drive tray trying to come out, but it was being blocked by the rounded edges of the drive slot on the case of my G4. Okay, so how was I going to fix that issue? If the tray of the optical drive was too large to come through, I would either have to modify it or drive all the way back to the store and pick a different drive. All the way back. 3 whole miles. What did I do? I modded it, of course.

I found a page that spoke about removing the lip of the tray on the drive so that the tray would fit through the drive door on the G4, so I thought I would try that. At that point in the day I was getting so frustrated that I no longer cared about the warranty of the drive, or the fact that if I ruined it I would be out sixty bucks. I was desperate for a solution, and I was going to figure it out no matter the cost.

For about half an hour I cautiously examined the drive, trying to find ways to remove the tray’s lip without breaking the drive or causing any damage to it. After that half hour I decided to have some fun, so I stuck my flathead screwdriver in and under the lip of the tray and tore it out. I was impressed when I finished the install and booted up to find that the optical drive worked perfectly, and I continued installing software that I had lost in my hard drive crash. 

I know that there are a few people out there who are still trying to figure out how to do this the dainty way, and I’m just posting about this so those people know not to be afraid. Bust that lip off and move on with your life. 

Here are photos from my experience:

Be sure to read the conclusion to this epic saga, Mac Issues, Part 3: Mail Issues Upgrading from Tiger to Leopard.

 
 

Related posts:

1. Mac Issues, Part 3: Mail Issues Upgrading from Tiger to Leopard
2. Mac Issues, Part 1: Upgrading to Leopard After Drive Failures
3. Handgun Triple Threat makes Wordans Main Page

Needless to say, I was scared of losing some of my valuable files and information. 

After running for eight days straight, DiskWarrior allowed me to pull all of my info from the crashed hard drive and then I buried the thing in the backyard. R.I.P.

My first thought after all of this happened was that I should have been using Leopard’s Time Machine feature to constantly back up my files, so I went down to the Apple store and grabbed a Family Pack to put on my machines. I also grabbed a 1TB FreeAgent XTreme from Best Buy, which has a Firewire 400 port and is pretty rad. 

I got home and set everything up, installed Leopard on both machines, and all was good in the world. Or so I thought. 

Although most everything went well with the update, I soon realized there were a couple of things that were very wrong, one on each computer. I noticed the error on my G4 first, as I was trying to reinstall all of my applications to get back up and running. The problem is that my disc drive wasn’t mounting any discs that I was putting in, so after much searching online and many tests and upgrades of firmware I realized that the poor thing was probably shot from running DiskWarrior for 8 days as well as installing the new OS X.

I needed to get up and running as soon as I could and I didn’t have the car at home that day (wife had it). So, what other options did I have? I did some searching on the net and found something that saved my sanity that day: Macworld’s article on how to borrow an optical drive from another Mac using a Firewire cable. Using this method, I was able to install my entire system again using my MacBook Pro’s optical drive as the source of the install. This was especially helpful in helping me get my Adobe Creative Suite back up and running, because by golly I had work to do!

So how did I get my optical drive back up and running in my G4 PowerMac? Read Mac Issues, Part 2: Installing a New Optical Drive in a G4 PowerMac.
 
 

Related posts:

1. Mac Issues, Part 3: Mail Issues Upgrading from Tiger to Leopard
2. Mac Issues, Part 2: Installing a New Optical Drive in a G4 PowerMac