In a month which saw PCWorld celebrate 50 Million visitors, Apple finally revealed their tablet device putting an end to the endless rumour mill. During January I wrote about a retro LG CRT TV, Google’s Nexus One phone, CES rumours and of course the iPad. Check out my posts for the month of January below:

• iPad: IPS Screen Technology Explained
• Oops! McGraw-Hill CEO Lets Apple Tablet Confirmation Slip
• LG Goes Retro, Introduces New CRT TV
• Corsair’s New Dominator XMP RAM Is World’s Fastest
• Dell’s Mini 5 To Be Powered By 1GHz Snapdragon CPU
• Fox News ‘Confirms’ Apple Tablet, iLife 2010, and Next iPhone OS
• Nokia Shares A Glimpse At Symbian 4
• Samsung’s New 64GB Flash Chip Is Ideal for Mobile Devices
• Want 12 Hours of Battery Life from a High-End Laptop? ASUS Can Help
• Google’s Nexus One Torn Apart In iFixit Teardown
• Rumor: MSI To Show Dual-Screen E-Reader & 3D Laptop At CES

The GeekTech blog is also now on Facebook, so be sure to fan the team up over there!

I finally joined the masses and grabbed myself a 32GB iPhone about two weeks ago. Ever since then I have been hunting around for the best apps and downloading a fair few, especially game and utility apps.  I will probably do a round-up post detailing the apps I have soon, offering my recommendations.

However, this blog post is to ask the question - Is there a way of running a diagnostic on my iPhone while at home? The reason I’m asking such a question is due to a recent problem I had with my new phone:

I recently took the phone out of my pocket only to find the device was turned off. This struck me as odd, as not only does the iPhone require a button hold in addition to an on-screen action in order to turn it off, but the battery was also showing a 60% charge around two hours prior to this happening.

After several failed attempts to power up the device I was somewhat concerned. Luckily, I was in Liverpool for the weekend visiting family, and an Apple store was close by. I popped in to seek advice and was told by the stores staff that the new phone “looked fine” and that I should try plugging the device into one of the many charging stations in-store. Having done this, and failing an Apple employee repeated the process in another charger, this time to some success. The device powered up, however it took over 3 minutes to reach the home screen, it had worryingly also lost around 30% of it’s charge.

The helpful Apple staff at the Liverpool One branch suggested that a rogue-app may have been the cause of the problem, adding that if this (currently isolated) issue was to happen again that I come in to have the iPhone checked.

So do any of you guys know of a way to run a diagnostic check on the iPhone, at home? I would like to see if any of my apps are sapping away my battery or causing my phone to crash. Any comments or emails on the issue would be highly appreciated.

Earlier this month I landed a writing position over at PCWorld.com. I was reccomended for a position at the sites Geek Tech blog by fellow writer and friend Daniel Ionescu.

Below is a small handful of articles I have wrote for the site since my first article went live, be sure to check them out, and leave your thoughts:

• Unseen Apple Mac Prototypes from Harmut Esslinger
• Bill Gates Leaves Facebook, Says Its To Much Hassle
• iPhone App Helps Drunks Walk The Line
• First USB 3.0 Motherboard On The Way
• Awesome Wall Chart Turns PC Parts into Geek Porn

These are just a few of what I have wrote so far, no doubt I will keep this blog updated with my postings over at Geek Tech. You can follow Geek Tech on Twitter.

MacHeist are well known within the Mac community for offering amazing deals on a range of third party software for Apple computers, and their most recent offer is no different. The third MacHeist software bundle, once fully unlocked, will offer over $900 of software value, all of which can be yours for an amazing $39 USD.

The latest bundle includes the following software:

• iSale – eBay manager
• Picturesque – Image editor
• SousChef – Cooking assistant
• World Of Goo  – Puzzle game
• Phone View – iPhone history
• Little Snapper – Image sharing
• Acorn – Photo editor
• Kinemac – 3D animation
• WireTap Studio – Recording utility
• BoinxTV – Video production
• The Hit List – Task management
• Espresso – Web development

In addition to all of the above great software, the first 25,000 thousand customers will get Big Bang Board Games too! And to make this deal even more sweeter 25% from every sale goes to charity, and you get to choose which charity see’s your cash. So if you are using a Mac, be sure to check it out.

I last posted about my MacBook back in December of 2007 when I had troubles with the Magsafe power adapter. Today I wanted to post about a problem which has been an issue on more than one occasion, and you may have guessed what from the post title.

Since owning my MacBook (which I bought in January of 2007) I have now had my laptop in for repair three times, two of those times were for the case of the MacBook cracking. It seems to be somewhat of a common problem, as a simple search on Flickr shows, and having just recently had it repaired I thought I ought to share my frustration towards the problem.

Those who buy a new all aluminium enclosed MacBook will not face these issues due to the laptops unibody structure, but it’s the old (still available) white models which face the problems, and it seems not much can be done about it. I came to the conclusion it was the magnets in the laptop which made the case to crack, and have often wondered if the magnets could be made weaker, but this of course would then effect the laptops ability to close. When at the Apple store last week I questioned an Apple employee as to what could be done to solve this happening again, and he assured me that the repair would be done using ’stronger plastic’, now as to whether that is true is down to the test of time so we shall see.

Beyond all of this it is worth noting that despite me being out of warranty Apple did carry out the repair free of charge, and it was all done overnight, free and fast. I have it back now, and the case looks all shiny and new, but how long will it last?

Have you experienced this issue, what have you done to solve it, can you share any handy hints? Do feel free to share in the comment form!

O2, the UK mobile network that holds the rights to sell Apple’s iPhone finally revealed a few days back the price for the upcoming Pay & Go (no contract) version of the popular device. Personally I think the price point is pretty steep, especially considering those on Pay & Go are usually on the simplier service for one of a few reasons, be it no ties, lack of constant use, or general savings.

The 8GB version of the iPhone will retail for £349.99 while the 16GB version of the mobile will sell for £399.99. For those of you reading stateside, the 16GB model will roughly cost just over $700. The Pay & Go option will be availble from the 16th of September, and will include one year of free web/data use.

Do you think the price point is two high, or is it justified considering the technology within?

Last week I posted about how my Mac’s Magsafe cable had broken, today during a train journey I had some spare time to burn while in Birmingham so I visited the Apple Store in the Bullring, booked a session with an Apple Genius and told them my problem.

Despite me calling an Apple store earlier in the week and being told that the cable would need to go to a repair centre the Apple employee swapped my old cable for a new one (the new model) right there in store. Convenient!

Still, the cable should not have broken in the first place, so Macbook owners be weary of the cable and keep an eye out for any changes in it’s appearance.

This post comes to you from my Macbook.

A little personal post today about something which is bothering me, and that Macbook owners should be aware of.

In January I bought myself a Macbook as I was long overdue a laptop. Since then me and my mac have enjoyed a great relationship, where it worked, and I was happy. In fact I am so impressed with the Mac OS I find myself on my PC less and less, but that’s another story.

Over the past few days my ‘Magsafe’ Power adapter has been giving me problems, initially upon plugging in the charger it charged…but only for a few minutes, then charged again. This intermittent state of charging was random, unsatisfactory and more than anything concerning. Last night this problem revealed it’s true side.

The cable had melted, and the inner wire was visible. I stopped using the cable immediately as I would prefer not to burn down my home. After a brief period of research online, I discovered that this was a common problem many Macbook owners were experiencing. Just check out this Flickr set for examples.

An example of what my cable now looks like.

Despite me being under warranty I still checked out the Apple site to see what the going rate was for the power adapter. Unfortunately it was, to my disgust, £59.99 (Which works out at about $120).  I am going to call Apple later today to try and get a new cable. It seems a revision has finally been made to the cables, as seen in this picture from Flickr, so hopefully I will receive one of these newer models.