Ladies and gentlemen, we finally have a brand new version of Safari, and this time I think I'll give the Windows version a first try...but let's keep it simple and leave Windows aside, for now. No matter what some people might say, test proved that Safari 3.1 is the world's fastest browser on Mac and Windows - but that doesn't mean it's also the most secure or the one with a feature set that makes its competitors cry - after all, nothing is perfect, don't you agree?


When talking about speed, Safari 3.1 is loading HTML pages 1.9 times faster than IE 7, 1.7 times faster than Firefox, and almost 6 times as fast as Opera, but when it comes to JavaScript, Safari 3.1 crushes its competitors, being up to 6 times as faster. I know, you all have a question - what about compatibility and security?

Since security is not my field, I will get to the compatiblity part, and run all 3 Acid tests available at this time. The results are the following - Acid 1 and 2 were completed successfully, and the result for Acid 3 is an impressive 74/100, better than the current development build of Firefox (71/100), and almost as good as Opera 9.5 beta, that reached a score of 77!

Other than the above, you get enough features, including a built-in RSS reader, but the feature set can be easily extended by using additional plugins, just as it happens with every serious browser out there.

To download Safari 3.1 and get more information about the features available, as well as other interesting details, simply go to the official page, here. Good luck!

Working as a team on an article can be a tough challenge, especially since it can take some time for everyone to do their own research and writing, then link all the parts together. Synchronization can also become a problem, especially when the members of such a team are not located in the same office, so collaborative editing is a very interesting and useful alternative to try, and SubEthaEdit 3.1 introduced exactly this feature for Mac users!


According to its producers, SubEthaEdit is "the only collaborative one you can actually use", including advanced features such as overhauled printing, exporting to HTML, both with collaborative metadata, completely customizable syntax highlighting, as well as a feature that some advanced users will be very pleased to see included - a UNIX command line utility.

SubEthaEdit 3.1 requires at least Mac OS X 10.4, and a license is priced at about $44. Since you can easily see other people connected to a certain document (this is what "friendcasting" is all about), as well as interact with them using iChat, if you're using Leopard, of course, I think a lot of you will be pleased to find out about SubEthaEdit.

...oh, yeah! A free 30 days trial version can be downloaded from here.

How far would you go when driven by your love for technology? Would you switch from your regular church to a "techno-church"? I know a lot of people may call this "blasphemy", but "The Church of Mac" does exist, and some interesting things are happening there...


"The Reverend Doctor Bobby Newton", the head of this church, published the first "iPodcast" on the 26th of February, and it seems this podcast is currently ranked on the 66th position, out of over 100,000 podcasts available on the iTunes Store.

Now, I am sure this is more about having fun than actually having a new church rising up - just read this "We sing the praises of the Mighty Spirit that is Mac OS X. We love our blessed devices, great and small, from the Goliath Mac Pro, to the David iPod Shuffle. We strive everyday to walk in the path of our beloved teacher and leader, Steve Jobs." Pretty cool, don't you think?

You don't have to be a religious person to subscribe to The Church of Mac on iTunes, and even if you're a religious person, I don't think this may overlap with your current beliefs. You can do this by going to this page and click the Subscribe button, of course, but don't forget to get back here and share your opinion about this whole thing with us, OK?

Despite the fact that the MacBook Air or the iPods are more popular than the Apple TV, this one may have a hidden potential, estimated to be huge by the analysts. I guess you probably heard about this already, but let me remind you that Apple's latest digital video recording patent filling is boiling hot, as we speak. Do you see the link?


Basically, the third generation of the Apple TV is expected to have DVR capabilities, so for only a small difference in manufacturing price, Apple's niche media hub business may turn into a solid source of revenue, some say it may worth even a few billion dollars annually!

American Technology Research analyst Shaw Wu said the DVR features that may arrive in the next generation of the Apple TV can help moving from just a "hobby" to serious business:"We estimate AppleTV to be a very minor contributor today at ~0.3-0.4 percent of revenue or $100-125 million annually. We believe adding the ability to watch and record live TV could turn this into a billion dollar, if not multi-billion dollar business."

Since these are only rumors based on a patent filling, there's still a pretty long road to the DVR-enabled Apple TV, but I think this must happen by the end of the year. If you have a different opinion, please feel free to share it with the rest of us, don't be shy!

Some time has passed since the iPhone was launched officially on the US market, as well as in a bunch of other countries, but there are still plenty of places in this world where you can only get it on "the black market", or you have to wait until it arrives the right way. This week, Austria and Ireland are going to join the other countries where the iPhone is officially available, with subscriptions to Apple's preferred local carriers, of course.


Austria and Ireland are the first countries to receive the iPhone in 2008, and the carrier for Austria has just been officially confirmed - T-Mobile, while O2 was already known to be the exclusive carrier in Ireland.

The two service plans available for Apple's phone from T-Mobile are a €39 Classic plan(1,000 minutes calls to any network, Visual Voicemail, up to 3GB data transfer per month, and €0.25/SMS) and the Supreme plan, priced at €55(unlimited calls and text messages, while maximum data transfer per month remains the same). Unfortunately, a 2-year contract is required...

At last, O2's service plans for the iPhone go from €45 to €100 per month, with 175 to 400 minutes call time, 100 to 250 included SMS messages, and 1GB data limit, while you are required to sign for at least 18 months.

The prices of the iPhone models in both countries will be the same - €399 for an 8GB model and €499 for a 16GB version, but there's a little difference here - while Austrians can get it through T-mobile or online stores, Irish customers can only get their iPhones through O2.