Gizmodo: extended

Jump Ship On Sprint ETF-Free Through March 15th

Sean Fallon — Fri, 06 Feb 2009 13:40:00 EST

The period that Sprint customers can escape from their contracts without paying early termination fees has been extended to March 15th. Although, you might want to hold tight with the Palm Pre on its way. [BGR]

Windows XP Gets Another Six Months to Live: Will Not Go Gently Into that Good Night

Dan Nosowitz — Sat, 04 Oct 2008 10:00:00 EDT

According to a leaked email from a PC OEM, Microsoft has officially extended the life of its now-beloved Windows XP, moving the date of planned obsolescence from January 31, 2009 all the way to July 31, 2009. In the wake of its very expensive ad campaign promoting (in a roundabout way) Vista, the move is a bit surprising. Essentially, Microsoft is trying to let users skip Vista completely, moving directly from XP to its forthcoming OS, Windows 7. The deadline for OEMs to include Windows XP recovery discs has been pushed back a couple of times already, and apparently some Microsoft hardware partners want it even further in the future than July. XP has become the Bill Clinton of OSs (stay with me here): yeah, it was great at the time, but it's showing its age and its enthusiasm for the new guy is sometimes suspect. Windows 3.11 in 2008! [The Register UK]

FastMac TruePower MacBook Extended Batteries

Jason Chen — Fri, 09 Feb 2007 15:20:04 EST

We loved FastMac's TruePower MacBook Pro batteries at CES and MacWorld, which kept us going long after the standard MBP battery would have given out. That's why we recommend these FastMac MacBook batteries MacBook owners that need backup power for the road.

They come in both white and black models to fit your color, and run only $99.95, $30 less than the $129 the standard one costs. You can pre-order now, which will ship in about 30 days. There's nothing like popping in a freshly charged battery when you're low on juice and hearing, "Sir? Please, your wife's having a sonogram and I think that's interfering with our systems." – Jason Chen

White [FastMac]
Black [FastMac]

FastMac TruePower Laptop Batteries: Gizmodo's Mission Critical CES/Keynote Gear

Jason Chen — Tue, 16 Jan 2007 14:00:19 EST

How do you manage to liveblog a two-hour Macworld Keynote while using EV-DO to constantly upload pictures without stopping to change your batteries once? FastMac's TruePower is how.

Thanks to FastMac's extended batteries, we were able to post live from Macworld and CES without having to run back to the press room all the time to charge. Available in 15-inch MacBook Pro and PowerBook G4 models, these fit in snugly just the way the originals do. And at the price of $99.95 with a complete 1 year warranty, you can't go wrong.

The next time we do CES, we're going to buy at least two each. – Jason Chen

Product Page [Fastmac]

Renew Your iPod: Fastmac iPod Batteries

Jason Chen — Wed, 20 Dec 2006 13:15:04 EST

When our 3G iPod was getting only two to three hours battery life from a charge, we decided that it was time to try one of those third party iPod batteries people have been talking about for years.

They said the iPod was fairly easy to pop open the iPod and change the battery despite the lack of any physical openings. Well, whoever "they" are, they totally didn't account for our lack of manual skills. It took us a total of an hour and a half and two people to get this thing open.

The problem comes from the fact that the metal back and the plastic front to the iPod are flush, so there's no easy way to pull the two apart. The Fastmac battery kit comes with two blue prying tools in order to do so. Because these tools are plastic, and thus, wear down easily when shoving it up against the iPod's metal, if you don't get the iPod open on the first few tries, your tool becomes less and less useful. You wouldn't want a metal tool, because it'd scratch up your precious MP3 player's finish. Thus, it takes a long ass time to get the iPod open.

Once that was done, everything else was cake. Take out the hard drive, disconnect the cable, and replace the battery. You'll have to exercise a bit of care, as the connectors are pretty fragile, but nothing you can't do in less than four minutes.

The new battery got us about seven or eight hours of battery life, around the same as the original battery. An iPod as good as new—save for all the dirt and scratches from years of use—for just $19. Definitely a good deal.

Be prepared to set aside a block of time in order to get your iPod open if you're not quite so handy. And don't be afraid to use a lot of force when prying. – Jason Chen

Product Page [Fastmac]

Image courtesy Apple Links