In our last post about the Instagram Apps for the Mac, I sneaked in a little peek at The Piolo. There are already quite a few stands for the iPhone out there. I personally own the Glif and the Moviepeg. But when we received the delivery of this tiny little iPhone thing, I automatically set the former two aside and this became my primary iPhone stand.

The Piolo is a tiny little stand specially designed for iPhone 4. It is manufactured out of Thermoplastic Elastomer (TPE) — essentially a mix of plastic and rubber and was designed by Andrew Bond, an Industrial Designer in Sheffied, UK. The stand is very tiny, just slightly longer than an average sized key. It measures 65mm x 17mm x 7mm and has a slot in which you insert your iPhone 4. There’s even a hole given for you to hang it into you keychain — which is very nifty when you’re out and about. It has a matte finish and seems very durable as well. When on a desk, it really compliments the iPhone 4.

I’ve been using the Piolo for a few months now and I really quite like it. I carry two on me — one in my keychain for when I’m traveling and feel the need to just lay down the phone to watch something and another one that has a permanent spot on my desk.

But the best thing about the Piolo is its price. The Piolo sells for just £4 (plus shipping), which is about US$6 or €4.50. There are multiple colors to choose from, including a pack of two, three and four. They ship in tiny black envelopes and have card inserts that read “Thank you very much”. The Piolo comes highly recommended from me if you’re looking for a simple, cute, no-frills stand for your iPhone 4.

A while ago we featured the Compass iPad stand from Twelve South, an intelligently designed iPad stand. I was of course a little apprehensive about giving it my recommendation since I hadn’t used it. Well now I have. And here’s my review.

It’s reviews like this that makes me wish I didn’t impose a no-swearing rule upon writing. The Compass is an amazing stand for the iPad, so perfect in every dimension, and oh yes, it’s multi-dimensional. The first thing you experience, is Twelve South’s legendary packaging; second only to Apple. Slide the box out of its outer casing. Then pull the top cover that’s holding the Compass together. Slide it out, and you’re holding a surprisingly heavy piece of metal. Inside the box is, is a beautiful document, suggesting ways to use the compass, and ways to use the box. It certainly is a pretty box. But suddenly you’re done admiring the packaging, and onto the prize of the day.

The most obvious use, is the landscape or portrait upright position. Extend the two feet sideways, and the iPad sits there at a perfect angle. It’s tilted just right, so when it’s at your desk, you’re looking straight at it. This eliminates light refraction and produces minimal glare. The non-adjustability might pose a problem, say if you want to use it on a raised table that’s almost at eye level, but mostly, it’s just right.

The Compass is very sturdy. The thing is forged from heavy gauge steel with silicone padding. You can place your iPad on it without even thinking about it. Tap freely. The silicone pegs at the bottom hold it there, so you can press the home button without having to hold the iPad, it’s so sturdy.

Typing on this thing is amazing. The reclined angle is just perfect. Move the back leg flat down, and raise the little leg at the back. When you look at it, it appears as if the foot pegs will come in the way of your typing, a doubt raised by one of the comments on our press release. They don’t. Not once did I have the problem. There’s another thing. If they do come in the way, you can push them in and use the iPad flat on that incline. The iPad rests on silicone padding, so it doesn’t slip down from that angle.

But there’s obviously some bad stuff, right? There’s nothing bad about the compass itself. It’s a fantastic product built to perfection. It just can’t do everything; not meant to do everything, rather. You can’t use it on surfaces that aren’t flat and sturdy. This means it’s impossible to type with the iPad on your lap, which is primarily how I write most of my articles. It also has an orientation problem, where if you place the iPad on its side with the volume controls, the volume down button is activated by one of the foot pegs; you’d be left with a muted iPad. Same thing for placing it upside down—the iPad suddenly wants to shut itself off. This is not all of the time, and if you’re conscious enough you can avoid it by placing it differently or moving the foot pegs in and out, but it does happen. But hey, if holding an iPhone 4 differently is cool, so is this.

There’s another issue, and that’s purely human nature, I think. This one probably relates to iPad stands. You can envision a lot of places you can use this thing other than just around your desk. Propping it up while cooking something in the kitchen, perusing through your RSS feeds while having breakfast, or having it sit on your coffee table while watching television. The problem is that the iPad is just too easy to lift off from the Compass, that you forgot to carry the stand along with you. Unlike a case, which is always on the iPad, you have to remember to carry the Compass along with you when doing all these activities. If I’m in the kitchen, and want to watch something, I’ll just prop it up against a jar of jam instead of walking all the way to my room, picking up the stand, and bringing it in. If I do carry the stand to the breakfast table, and have my breakfast, I somehow land on my work desk without a Compass to keep the iPad on. It’s a walk back to the breakfast table. Sometimes I forget where I left the damn thing. Also, not only is it too easy to pick up the iPad without the Compass, it’s a little cumbersome to pick up both. You need to use both hands while doing so, or you risk scratching the iPad’s back if you don’t hold it right. No, holding it differently doesn’t count in this case.

So while you can technically carry this thing around anywhere (they even bundle a svelte case for the stand), I think it’s more of a single location stand. If you want to carry it with you, it’s a conscious decision that you’re probably going to forget to make. But it is a great desktop stand for the iPad. It’s so perfectly angled. You can connect your dock connector cable to it. It has the best typing angle ever; I really flew through this article. And it’s so rigid you’re never afraid the iPad is going to topple over. Add to that it’s one gorgeous piece of metal. At $40, I think it’s totally worth it. Now whether you need/want/must have one, is entirely your call.

[Uploaded a few more shots, all in high resolution in this flickr set.]
UPDATE: The thing is actually forged out of heavy gauge steel, not aluminium as previously mentioned. Also, the padding is silicone, not rubber. Changed.

At around 6 p.m. around these parts, Twitter erupted with fantastic product updates released by Apple. They’ve basically given fresh new internals to almost all of their desktop related products.

Mac Pros get up to 12 cores of processing power, 32 gigabytes of memory, and a greater emphasis on using SSDs as a faster means of crunching data — you can have up to 2TB of solid state storage, though it’ll cost you. The outer body remains the same, which though six years old, still looks contemporary and fits in well with their current product lineup. This beast ships in August.

Second, is the display. They’ve replaced the 24-inch LED display with a 27-inch LED display, the same as the display on the iMac. It of course comes with the iSight camera, magsafe connector, and the sleek looks of the 24 inch monitor that it replaces. It also replaces the bigger in size — but only slightly in pixels — 6 year old 30 inch Cinema Display. It might suck for a lot of professionals who prefer to work on a matte display, because this one’s only gloss. It’s the price however that will get to you — just $999 when it ships in September (Rs. 39,000 for India).

The iMac, last updated in the fall of 2009, shows up with updated processor specs and can go up to 16GB for memory. On the 27 incher, you can now switch your hard drive with an SSD, or have an SSD in addition to your hard drive to get the best of both worlds. The iMac also brings with it the much rumoured Magic Trackpad. It’s the exact same trackpad experience as on a MacBook, but on a slightly larger battery powered surface, that fits right alongside an aluminum keyboard. In terms of pricing specific to India, the base model is now at 74,900 (up from ~64,000), with slightly higher prices throughout.

The trackpad for a desktop is an interesting strategy. I personally don’t use a notebook, and I find a mouse a much more precise tool, but just like we can get by with a soft keyboard on the iPad, a touchpad on a desktop will be better for most use cases. As Patrick Rhone notes, Apple seems to be slowly but surely edging people to use touch and gestures as a user input rather than anything mechanical. The Magic Trackpad even brings with it a new three-finger drag gesture that negates the need for the physical click — though still present. The trackpad costs $69 (Rs. 3070) that’s a separate accessory. You can build-to-order your iMac to come with a Magic Trackpad, but you can only get it in addition to your Magic Mouse, not instead of. Yet.

Last, and certainly not the least, is the Apple battery charger. An odd product out of Apple, it’s everything you’d expect from a battery charger from Apple — save for the price. For just $29 (Rs. 1140), you get a sleek battery charger, with six rechargeable batteries. I should remark that Apple either knows how to make really good looking batteries, or how to present them.

All in all, a splendid hardware upgrade. Can’t wait for the software.

Would you look at that. Another product out of Twelve South and it’s as brilliant as the ones before. Twelve South, in case you didn’t know, is an accessories company that strives to create 12 products a year, designed specially, and exclusively, for Apple products. Headed by Andrew Green, their products like BookArc stand, Backpack, and previously reviewed BassJump, have that superior product quality one would expect from an Apple product.

Compass is just one of those intelligent designs that make Twelve South who they are. Here 7 inches tall when folded, you can split the legs to have it stand upright in portrait or landscape, and even have it lie flat on the surface to provide a slant for typing. The FAQ says the stand is made from gauge steel, so it’s going to be sturdy enough for all kinds of touch related activities — you’re going to have to take their word for it. Knowing their product quality though, I would take their word for it. That’s $40 a piece for the Compass stand, which comes with its own little case.

[via Viticci]

[tweetmeme]Apple dropped an unexpected bomb today. As the Store went down earlier this day, everyone assumed it was to facilitate iPhone 4 pre-orders. Apple landed a huge bomb, in the form of a brand new Mac mini.

This is practically the Mac mini you’ve been waiting for (if you have been waiting for one).

First of all, a redesigned enclosure brings it on par with the latest silver and black looks of the rest of Apple’s product lineup. It’s built from the same unibody manufacturing process, allowing for a seamless body, all amounting to 1.4 inches in height. The bottom of the Mac comes off, allowing free access to RAM and other components, so you can upgrade easy. And it includes a host of ports at the back, including an HDMI port for a direct connection to your HDTV. The new body also comes with a built in power adapter, so “goodbye power brick”, as Apple says.

On the hardware front, the Mac now sports up to 2.66Ghz Core 2 Duo—No i5 love for the smallest Mac, it seems—with 2.4Ghz for the $699 base model. It’s also got the better Nvidia 320M graphics, the same chip that powers the lower end MacBook and MacBook Pro models. And while it comes with 2GB of memory standard, you can bump it up to 8GB, which will come in real handy for those using this as a dedicated server. Which reminds me, if you get the $999 Server edition, they give you dual 500GB hard drives and forgo the SuperDrive. That is one hell of a deal.

Unless Apple has blinded us with product shots, I can’t think of one thing they’ve done wrong with the new Mac mini.

It wasn’t until about a month ago I got word of Twelve South’s Book Arc for iPad which was also the occasion I first learned of startup Twelve South. Strange that I hadn’t heard about Twelve South until that point because they had been pushing out some awesome Mac accessories for over half a year. With the intention of creating twelve unique Mac accessories each year, Twelve South has already kicked off with over half a dozen kick-ass accessories to your Apple products from items simplistic yet ingenious to things with a little more oomph.

I myself love some decent audio, and I’m not afraid to pay a little more for a decent pair of headphones that pump some bass or cough up an extra 30 cents for a tune from iTunes Plus. Despite this fact, I’d still sit on the lowest end of anyone labeled an audiophile. When I stumbled across the aforementioned BassJump from Twelve South I knew I wanted it; I was getting it. Sure, the MacBook (Pro) drives out some pretty high decibels for a laptop however it doesn’t do anything close to justice when laying down the beats on the low end of the scale. Luckily that’s where BassJump jumps in, and does a damn good job too.

After a couple weeks of contemplation on whether I wanted to toss out 80 bucks on what more or less seemed like a sad 5 inch USB-powered subwoofer I finally went ahead and picked this puppy up from the Apple Store. Normally I would be the first to say that detailing my unboxing experience is kinda lame, but damn, Twelve South does not fail to impress. Neatly packed in a a two-piece box, Twelve South does away with cheap industry standards of flimsy cardboard or industrial plastic requiring a Sawzall to open. Lined with foam padding and made with a snug fit you know you’ve just paid for quality before you even get a good glance at the product inside. Lifting out this slick subwoofer measuring five inches wide both ways and just over two and a quarter tall I was almost surprised to see the clever Twelve South logo instead of a half-eaten apple on the side of the beautiful aluminum casing. Digging deeper through the careful packaging you’ll find a mini-USB to USB cable measuring about two and a half feet with a pure white coating like any USB cable you’d see from Apple, as well as a slick neoprene carrying case with a wrist strap so your BassJump is nearly as portable as your MacBook. The carrying case has the annoying issue that accompanies any Incase sleeve which is the unprotected zipper teeth eager to gash lengthy scratches along the beautiful aluminum finish. Luckily you can fold the lips of the case back as you slide your unit in to this soft enclosure. The case is a little loose which is honestly my only disappointment with this product, but I can’t blame them as already it’s fairly snug sliding the BassJump in. As I pass over three hundred words detailing the packaging I feel it would be a shame to leave out the Apple-esque ‘thank you’ pamphlet with a quick and straight-forward note about downloading the accompanying software and a final insert with 12 honestly good ideas for re-purposing the slick casing.

After taking a moment to install the lightweight driver software the BassJump Sound System inserts itself as as a pane hidden away in the system preferences with quick access through the menu bar. Proving to be as simplistic as the device itself, the preferences pane is loaded with a simple On / Off toggle and a few default combinations of the BassJump volume and crossover frequency for the type of music you’re listening to with the option to set them both yourself. There’s no need to work with two different volume levels non-stop either, BassJump is integrated right with your system volume controls as it creates a beautiful harmony between itself and the already powerful system speakers.

BassJump featuring alongside a 17-inch MacBook Pro

Plug in the BassJump via the included USB cable (remember, no additional power!) and a couple seconds later BassJump begins dropping some heavy beats to your music. In all honestly when I first plugged it in I sat with a ‘this is it?’ impression somehow expecting the internal 3-inch wide subwoofer to make my windows rattle. I immediately threw up the system volume and that of the BassJump to maximum heights and still kinda sat with disappointment as I was convinced I should see the water in my glass in rings. I continued to listen to music for another 30 minutes searching for some bass-heavy tracks with the BassJump plugged until I decided to go ahead and turn it off. Whoa. A difference indeed, a distinct difference. The BassJump really is one of those ‘you don’t know what you’re missing’ kind of experiences.

Sure, the MacBook does have some great sound, but it could be even better. At 80 bucks it’s not one of the easiest justifications to make, but if you’ve ever used or considered getting some external speakers for your MacBook, get the BassJump instead. It gives you ‘surround’ kind of feel, in fact turning off the BassJump speakers will make your stereo speakers sound mono. This is definitely a product I’d recommend, especially so if your MacBook or MacBook Pro (or, uh, Air) is your main computing device. I have an iMac as my main machine with a pretty decent speaker system, but that didn’t stop my from buying the BassJump to carry along with my MacBook Pro. Whether it’s a presentation where you really need to give the viewers an accompanying audio experience that is far from below par or a get together where you don’t want your music to sound like it’s being played through a 3 inch tube, then the BassJump is for you. It’s 80 bucks; available online or at an Apple Store. And even if BassJump is not your cup of tea, peruse through the rest of TwelveSouth’s products. At least one of them is sure to grab your attention.

Although it’s pretty much given reading an Apple-centric review site, the BassJump is Mac only (as are all Twelve South products) as the driver isn’t available for other OSs.