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News Archive for: Monday April 12, 2010 Goto Current News Page
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| Sonnet announces 'Edge' Flush-Fit eSATA Expresscard (3132 based apparently) |
| (Updated - see my notes below on driver/chipset.) Sonnet sent a press release on their new Tempo SATA Edge ExpressCard/34 (single port) that fits flush in the expresscard slot. Their suggested retail price is $49.95 US. Compatible with OS X 10.3.x and later including Snow Leopard as well as Windows XP/Vista/Win7 and support for FIS-based Port Multipliers and hardware RAID cases such as their Fusion series. (See the "Technical Notes" at the bottom of product page for info on compatible enclosures/bridges which includes a note "external hard drives with USB 2.0/eSATA dual interface based on the Oxford Semiconductor OXU931DS storage controller chip may not be compatible with Mac OS X when connected via SATA... These incompatible drives include, but are not limited to Western Digital My Book Premium ES Edition and Seagate FreeAgent Pro.")
FYI: I was interested in one of these and had written them earlier tonight to ask about chipset used, if any OS X drivers were required, if 64-bit Snow Leopard was supported, etc.. (Wasn't in the PR and didn't see answers on the product page tonight.) I swear I didn't see the Edge listed on the Sonnet drivers/support page earlier today, but it is listed there now (this page). And it has the same drivers as their earlier 3132-based card - v1.1.11u from Oct. 2009 is the latest there as of almost midnight tonight. (Silicon Image released the v1.1.11u drivers last Oct. as mentioned here back then.) And as a FYI for anyone that does buy this card (or has any other 3132 based card) and missed the post here several months ago - there are later SI3132 drivers from SI, which also added 64-bit Snow Leopard support. I posted a note on the 3132 drivers v1.2.3.0 several months ago in the news page and added it to last year's page on Cheap eSATA PCIe and ExpressCards w/OS X Snow Leopard.
And for anyone with a Unibody MacBook Pro that missed the past reports on this, although most every eSATA card vendor lists Windows support, that's been a problem with eSATA expresscards working in Unibody MBPs running windows since the UB models were released. I and several readers have not found any eSATA expresscard that worked in bootcamp/windows with the Unibody MacBook Pros in the past. Some readers tried 6 or 7 cards - all gave the 'type12' / resource error in Windows. I posted another FYI on that last fall (when Windows 7 was first released - same issue) on the Expresscards page here - I saw the same thing with 2 different eSATA expresscards I tested with my early 09 17in MacBook Pro. This was not an issue with pre-Unibody MBPs reportedly. It's not the fault of the card, just a conflict in the memory map I think.)
And speaking of flush-fit Expresscards, as I mentioned in the Jan 8th news page, I've been pleased with the flush-fit Sonnet Media Reader/Writer Adapter. It doesn't accept CF cards of course (due to size) but it has been well worth the $27 I paid for it.
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| OS X 10.6.3 Combo Updater v1.1 (client and server), revised Apple doc about it |
| A new version (1.1) of the OS X 10.6.3 Combo updaters were released today.
Apple also revised the doc About the Mac OS X v10.6.3 Update to include this note:
"Additional Information
The Mac OS X v10.6.3 combo update also includes improvements provided in the Mac OS X v10.6.1 Update and Mac OS X v10.6.2 Update.
In order to receive all the improvements listed above, some systems require the Mac OS X v10.6.3 Supplemental Update, which is available via Software Update.
Tip: If you don't see the Mac OS X v10.6.3 Supplemental Update in Software Update, you don't need to install it.
Note: The Supplemental Update is for any system that was updated from Mac OS X v10.6 using the Mac OS X Update Combined v10.6.3, build 10D573. It is not needed on systems that were updated from Mac OS X v10.6.1 or 10.6.2, and it is not needed on systems that were updated from Mac OS X v10.6 using the Mac OS X Update Combined v10.6.3, v1.1."
To confirm the above, I ran software update today in OS X 10.6.3 on 2 macs I'd updated from 10.6.2 to 10.6.3 using the original combo updater. Neither show any Supplemental Update in Software Update.
FYI - I didn't reapply the v1.1 combo update, but Eddie did and said it's 10.6.3 build 10D578. I realized they may bump the build for the missing earlier updates (based on the comments) in the original combo updater but being 5 build numbers later than the original 10.6.3 release it almost makes me wonder if there's other changes. (I know some readers are hoping for an update that fixes graphics card driver issues noted here last week.) I downloaded the v1.1 combo updater but not applied it. (Yet at least, as I've not seen any issues with my 2 Macs updated with the original Combo updater.) But if anyone sees any pros or cons from the v.1.1 combo updater (or Supplemental Update if you applied 10.6.3 combo over 10.6.0), let me know the details.
BTW: A reader (John M.) wrote he had updated a 10.6.0 MacBook Pro using the original 10.6.3 Combo updater and tonight applied the "10.6.3 Supplemental Update v1.0" that appears in Software Update in those cases. He said his OS X 10.6.3 build after the update is still the same (10D573)
Apple also revised docs on OS X Server v10.6: Invalid S/N alert with multiple network interfaces and About the Mac OS X Server v10.6.3 Update.
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