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What to do about SMART errors in OS X

One error you might run into when attempting to install OS X on your computer is a claim by the installer that the hard drive has SMART errors and will not allow you to install to the selected drive. When this happens, the system will claim the drive cannot be repaired and recommend you back it up as soon as possible and replace the disk.

Self-Monitoring, Analysis, and Reporting Technology (aka, SMART) is a feature built into hard disks to monitor the heath status of the drives and provide the system with a method to detect an impending failure or … Read more

How to upgrade a Mac's hard drive

There are a couple of reasons--besides replacing a broken drive--why you might consider swapping out your Mac's hard drive. One is to increase your available storage capacity, and another is to better the performance of your drive. While most Macs ship with 500GB to 1TB drives that should be adequate for most home purposes, you can now get up to 3TB of data on a single drive, and the standard 7,200rpm mechanical drive crawls in comparison to the performance of some SSD drives these days.

Generally if you are just looking to increase the storage capacity of your … Read more

The 404 594: Where we live to 100 (podcast)

Jeff's unwavering pessimism and general distaste for life might finally take a turn in his favor, according to research that claims grumpiness is good for you. If that's true, then Jeff will definitely outlive all the cockroaches in New York and New Jersey, combined.

An experiment conducted by an Australian psychologist suggests overly-pessimistic personalities are more prone to attentive, careful thinking as a result of examining issues from all possible perspectives--but mostly the negative ones.

Yesterday AT&T announced a series of new data plans for its smartphone and tablet devices that could generate savings for the … Read more

ATA Airlines detains passenger for using iPhone in 'airplane mode'

Apparently putting your iPhone in airplane mode is not the digital equivalent of returning your seatback to the upright position.

A flight attendant for ATA Airlines recently asked a flier watching a movie midflight on the way to Hawaii to shut off his iPhone, not for the perfectly reasonable reason that the man was watching the inane Jennifer-Love Hewitt vehicle I Know What You Did Last Summer, but because you're not allowed to use cell phones inflight. Casey, the iPhone user, told Consumerist that he tried several times to explain to the flight attendant that the iPhone was in &… Read more