In short: Faster processors, larger hard drives, people. This time MacBook Pro has got the new Mult-Touch track pad (not available on the MacBook) and the Apple Remote is now an extra, not included as standard.

The MacBook is now available in 2.1GHz and 2.4GHz, and the MacBook Pro can be fitted with a 2.6GHz processor speed. In addition, MacBook Pro includes the latest NVIDIA graphics processors, now with up to 512MB of video memory.

The new MacBook Pro features the latest Intel Core 2 Duo technology with up to a 2.6 GHz processor with 6MB of shared L2 cache; up to 4GB of 667 MHz DDR2 SDRAM memory and up to a 300GB hard drive, plus NVIDIA GeForce 8600M GT graphics with up to 512MB of video memory.

I'm making the not-really-very-bold-at-all prediction that the development kit for the iPhone will be released on Tuesday. I make this earth-shattering prediction because Jobs told us that it would be launched in February, and Apple has a habit of interpreting 'month X' as 'the last Tuesday of month X'.

So, what can we hope and expect to see? Personally, I'd be amazed if Apple hasn't been allowing very select third parties access to early versions of the SDK in order that it can have a few apps to unveil alongside the kit itself. I don't think we'll see Flash – it's too early, and besides, it's unlikely that the SDK will allow complete access to all parts of the OS – but it would be great to see a few games launched. The guys at PopCap could do wonders with Bejeweled and Peggle, never mind simple stuff like Battleships.

What about comms apps such as Skype that everyone's clamouring for? I think they'll happen, but not right away, and I wouldn't be surprised to see some restrictions being placed on VoIP apps anyway. Certainly, O2's terms of service forbid it on the cellular network – relevant clause quoted below – but there are some crude ways that even I could think of that Apple could restrict certain data types to WiFi only. I think we'll see Apple itself release iChat for the iPhone, quite possibly alongside the SDK announcement, and developments from the open source community for a multi-protocol IM app such as Adium won't be far behind.

While you can view Word and Excel attachments on the iPhone, there's currently no way to edit them; how long till we see a lightweight office suite? And what about a nimble little image editor? Are you listening Adobe? (Actually, I think we'd be more likely to see small, boutique developers such as BeLight work their Image Tricks magic, depending on what hooks are there in the iPhone's OS.)

It's likely that the apps will be sold through the iTunes Store, as iPod games are currently, and I think it likely that Apple would take a little commission. It's possible that selling through the iTunes Store won't be mandatory – devs could sell from their own sites – but the iTunes Store is a great shop window.

Now over to you: what apps do you think we'll see in the first month, and what ones for you would take the iPhone/iPod touch from nice technical exercises to must-have devices? What, essentially, is the killer app for Apple's new mobile platform?

Data and Wi-Fi excessive usage policy
Your O2 tariff for iPhone allows you unlimited use of O2 UK's EDGE/GPRS networks and The Cloud's UK Wireless LAN network, for personal internet use, email and Visual Voicemail (VVM) on your iPhone only. All usage must be for your private, personal and non-commercial purposes. You may not use your SIM Card in any other device, or use your SIM Card or iPhone to allow the continuous streaming of any audio/video content, enable Voice over Internet (VoIP) P2P or file sharing or use them in such a way that adversely impacts the service to other customers of O2 or The Cloud. If O2 reasonably suspect you are not acting in accordance with this policy O2 reserves the right to impose further charges or disconnect your tariff at any time, having attempted to contact you first.

So, I'm playing about with some video footage on my Mac. I've been using iMovie '08 ever since it came out and I really like it. The thing is I've only ever made short little clips out of video shot on my (photo) camera - an Canon IXUS. For tasks like this I've found iMovie '08 to be perfectly fine. It's even quicker to use that the old iMovie 6 HD.

Recently however I've been editing a little trailer together for somebody from higher quality clips shot on a camcorder. iMovie '08 seems to be really struggling here. I don't know if it's just my machine (a 1.83 GHz Intel MacBook with 1GB memory - plenty of free hard drive space) or if it's a problem with iMovie '08 generally. It seems incapable of smooth playback of the clips - it's like it can't keep up. So it plays things back in fits and starts, which makes it impossible to do fine editing and the whole program pretty much unusable.

I've given up and gone back to iMovie 6 HD for this project (which, incidentally, any iLife '08 owner can download for free from the Apple website here). iMovie 6 seems rock solid in comparison.

Has anybody else found the same thing, or is it just me? I'd like to explore this further in the magazine, so please email me your comments, or post them below. Thanks.

Convergence remains a buzzword in the technology industry, with iPhone aiming to be your phone, iPod and PIM. Some enterprising souls have taken things a step further, creating iBand. The group's first jam session is on YouTube, with the two iPhone users ably aided by a Nintendo DS-wielding rhythm section.

In this edition of MacFormat This Week...

We've got a handful of important shortcuts every Mac owner can use, Gary Marshall shows us some hidden Mac OS X Easter Egg treasures, Craig Grannell shows us his three shareware picks for March and Trevor Middleton answers your Mac questions.

Here are your links for this week's show...

You can subscribe to the enhanced edition of MacFormat This Week through iTunes. To do this, click here.

Or you can download the files directly: For the enhanced edition of this show, click here.

For the MP3 edition of this show, click here.

If you'd like your questions answered in a future edition of MacFormat This Week, then please email machelpme-AT-futurenet.co-DOT-uk.

We'd love to hear your questions or comments regarding MacFormat This Week. E-mail us at macformatthisweek-AT-futurenet.co-DOT-uk.

So, folks, it's official: you can get BBC content on the iTunes Store. But here at MacFormat we confess to being a little underwhelmed. The selection is very limited – Ashes to Ashes, Life on Mars, Little Britain – actually, just a music video of "I'm Gay" – Robin Hood, Spooks, The Catherine Tate Show, The Mighty Boosh, Torchwood and Two Pints of Lager and a Packet of Crisps – and even within those programmes, only a few shows are available.

There are currently no options for rental, either, and while this isn't necessarily surprising given that the iTunes rental model isn't rolled out anywhere outside the US, it was after the unveiling of the rental system that the BBC originally made noises that it would put some of its shows on the Store.

And finally, the content is paid-for. It looks like it's being sold through BBC Worldwide, the Beeb's commercial arm, and though you can't necessarily use the 'we're licence payers and have already paid for this content once' argument – if only because you wouldn't presume to get DVDs of BBC shows for nothing – it does still rankle that us UK, licence-paying residents don't seem to get cut any slack.

That said, it's early days yet...

It's no secret here in the MacFormat offices that the MacBook Air can't count me amongst its fans – I've compromised how much to drop two pounds in weight? – it's still good to see it having an effect on the market. Pity poor Lenovo – which bought IBM's computer line-up and superb ThinkPad brand – though. According to this fascinating BusinessWeek article, it had its own willy-waving ultralight laptop in the final stages of production ready for a February launch when St Jobs pulled the Air out of that office envelope, thus stealing all its thunder.

In other news, how many of you have heard that expression – 'interoffice mail envelope' – used in the BusinessWeek article? It's a new one on me...

I was talking about my first month with the iPhone in our recent MacFormat This Week podcast aand I mentioned that it was the first time I'd felt like I had the future of mobile computing in the palm of my hand.

Looks like I'm not the only one who can see where the future of handheld devices is heading. Check out this article in The Times Online today.

Now that 10.5.2 is out, I can finally resurrect one of my pre-Leopard tips, so I thought I'd share it. The update allows you to pick List under the View content as section of each Stack's Options menu, so you can again access hierarchical lists of files and folders. My favourite use for this is as a application launcher. Just create folder – I call mine QuickLaunch – anywhere on your hard disk, and within that create subfolders for each type of application you use. I use CandyBar to give everything pretty icons, but you don't have to. Drag aliases of applications into the relevant folders, and remember that you can drop the alias into more than one folder if you want it to appear in more than one category. Once you're done, drag the QuickLaunch folder itself to your Dock, and pick Display as Icon and View content as List from the Options submenu.

Now you can keep your Dock clear of all but your most essential apps, and have two-click access to your 'b-list' apps and utilities.

Remember that you don't just have to include apps; drag in server aliases, URLs from Safari and even documents too.

One man's experience does not a catastrophe make, but when longtime MacFormat contributor Mark Sparrow installed the new 10.5.2 update for Mac OS X on his G5, it caused no end of problems. We're still investigating, but there seems to be a problem with Entourage and even Mail, with the SystemUIServer process hanging. Permissions repair, fsck; nothing seems to fix it. Mark is in the process of reinstalling from his Leopard DVD now. What are your experiences? Installs going OK?

For the record, I've installed 10.5.2 on my MacBook and Mac mini at home, and both went without a hitch. I can't tell you how delighted I am to have an opaque menubar and folder icons showing up properly in my Dock.

UPDATED All hail the power of the internet; turns out Marks problems were, as our commenter Sigurdur suggested, to do with FontExplorerX; there's a thread on Apple's discussion boards if you want more info.

I discovered a great little iPhone shortcut yesterday. When entering a URL, you get a dedicated button for '.com', but, like when you can hold down on a letter and have accented characters pop up, if you press down on .com, you get the option of switching to .co.uk.

This relies on you having set UK English in your keyboard preferences (Preferences > General > International), and if you pick any of the other options – French, German, Italian – you get other region-specific options from popping up the '.com' button.

Since the upgrade to Leopard many Iomega REV drive owners have been having problems getting their drives to work on a Mac running the new OS. Well, here's some good news. Iomega has finally upgraded the REV System Tools Software to work with Leopard.

You can download a copy from here.

Dear everyone in PR

I am writing to you today just to say hi and to explain a few things about how a journalist does his job and about how you can help me, MacFormat’s readers, yourself and your client.

Y’see, it’s all really, really simple. I know you have all sorts of other things to do – campaigns to formulate, ROI to track, lunches to have; those paradigms won’t shift themselves – but me, the journo-hack, basically just wants three things.

First and foremost – PR 101 – I want you to know about the product you’re representing. I don’t expect you to know every technical detail and be able to answer any arcane question I might have the temerity to put to you, but I think it’s fair to assume that you will at least be familiar with the broad brushstroke stuff. And for pity’s sake don’t confuse ‘marketing tag line’ with product knowledge; that’s just tiresome and I’ll get curiously polite on the phone.

Second, if I request a product for review, please send it in. Soon. I might be on the borderline of deciding whether I think it’s worth our readers’ time anyway, so I’m not going to chase it unless it’s a major release or some product I suspect is crap but that folks are in danger of buying. Failing that, let me know when I should expect it. Magazines are usually pretty tightly planned, so if I know your thing won’t arrive for another three weeks, that’s fine; I’ll just plan around it. And don’t dare try to pull the ‘I’m putting you at the top of the list’ line unless you actually are.

Third; press releases. This is kinda related to my first point. I really want to hear about your products, so make sure you have my email address for press releases. But only if they’re relevant. We’re a consumer Mac magazine; what possible relevance do you think your blanket, all-points email about a new PC laptop, enterprise SAN system or mobile industry awards has for us? Ah, yes, you didn’t think, did you?

All the fun stuff that you do – lunches, briefings in exotic locations, Christmas parties – is great, but all the corporate special-edition cocktails in the world won’t make up for any deficiencies in these three basic tenets, nor will it make me ignore all the utterly cretinous dribble we have to wade through on a daily basis.

Don’t be hurt. I love working with you guys and most of you do a great job, especially with some of the tat you’re given to market.

Hugs and kisses
Chris

Get your hands on a new Mac and a fine piece of software copy of Bento by Filemaker

MacFormat has teamed up with FileMaker to offer one lucky reader the chance to win a brand new MacBook and a copy of the company's superb new personal database software, Bento.

Bento is the best attempt we have seen at creating a personal database system for a Mac that you can just sit down and use without needing a degree in IT (see our full review in the last issue). It brings together files created by youriLife apps and favourite Mac software tools in one cleanly organised place. With it you can manage your contacts and calendars, coordinate events, track projects, and prioritise tasks faster and easier than ever before.

So much of the headache of running a database is removed by Bento. For instance, this powerful program works with the same raw data as Address Book and iCal, so changes to either app are instantly reflected in Bento and vice versa.Beyond the usual contact information options, in no time you can also create media wells to hold photos, movies and even DRM-restricted AAC files from the iTunes Store. Creating new fields is as simple as dragging and dropping.

If your life is growing beyond your inbuilt levels of organisation and could use a database to handle it all, then look no further. Really. For more information on Bento and FileMaker, go to www.filemaker.co.uk.

How to enter

For your chance you win this month's prize, Simply click here. Submit all answers by 5 March 2008.

MacBook Air: hands on with the world’s thinnest laptop

We take a close look at Apple’s latest ‘thinnovation’

It’s ultra-light and ultra-thin and we got our hands on it minutes after it was announced. See what our first impression is of the latest Apple offering.

Also this month, our main feature delivers 93 timesavers, to make working in Mac OS X and iLife even easier. These ultimate tips are guaranteed to speed up your workflow.

Mac OS X has lots of hidden tricks and we show you where to find them in our feature of Easter Eggs.

Also this issue

Tutorials

Straighten up aerial shots
Sync two iPods on one Mac
Download and add fonts
Use the Mac’s hidden settings
Watch online TV with Joost
And more…

Reviews

Microsoft Office 2008 for Mac
ConceptDraw MINDMAP 5 Personal
Iomega Ultramax Pro 1TB
Revo Blik RadioStation
Micropod SE Active
And more…

Mac questions answered
Mysterious missing letters when typing; migrating iTunes from Windows; printing in Pages; Welsh language accent problems and more…

On the DVD
Three full programs: GraphicConverter X 5.9, EarthDesk 3.55 and InstallBuilder 5.30 plus shareware, games trials, hot demos and more…

It’s all in MacFormat issue 192, on sale now!

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