HowTo: If Apple TV refuses to play sound of HD movies

Symptom: After having updated to the new firmware 2.3 for Apple TV, self-made HD movies including 5.1 Surround Sound will play but no sound can be heard.

Solution: This problem has been discussed much in Apple forums. The solution is very simple. Apple has even stated the solution in a support document, which can be accessed via this link: http://support.apple.com/kb/HT1755. What it tells you is that all video content containing an AC-3 sound track MUST contain another AAC stereo track for the same film, otherwise no sound will play.

Now, as videos containing an AC-3 track have to be in .mov format for the Apple TV to be recognized, another AAC track (even if it’s “fake”) can be easily added. 

1. Open the affected movie in Quicktime Pro (or another app of your choice). Additionally, open a random AAC file.

2. In the Edit menu, choose Select All as well as Copy. Then go back to your movie. Now, again in the Edit menu, choose Add to Movie. If you open the Movie Properties via the Window menu, you should see that a new AAC file has been added to the film. Please deselect the tick on the left so that the sound of this track can’t be heard when playing the film on your computer.

3. As a last step, save your film. Now, the sound should play again on Apple TV.

Note: Apple intended to have a stereo and a Dolby track for reasons of compatibility. Next time, when you author or convert a movie with an AC-3 track, you may prefer to add a real stereo track for the movie instead of just a fake track.

Please note: You take full responsibility for your actions on your computer. I can never be held responsible for any damages caused by my tutorials. Errors excepted!

HowTo: Resolve error -3256 in iTunes

I have good news for all the annoyed iTunes users out there with error -3256 popping up all the time. Do you also belong to the people being prevented from streaming music over the network to your AirPort Express while maybe syncing with other devices like Apple TV?

For all the ones who are fed up with it I have a solution that might work (specifically for Mac OS X Leopard):

1. Go to System Preferences. Choose Network, then Advanced…

2. Click on the menu tab TCP/IP.

3. In the drop down list Configure ipv6 choose Off.

Also, make sure that your firewall does not block any incoming connections. If the error persists, turn it off, i.e. activate Allow all incoming connections.

Please feel free to report back here to share your success with us. Maybe you can deliver other good solutions not mentioned here.

Please note: You take full responsibility for your actions on your computer. I can never be held responsible for any damages caused by my tutorials. Errors excepted!

HowTo: Make screenshots on the iPhone 3G

Have you ever wondered whether you would be able to take screenshots with your new iPhone 3G or the early iPhone updated to firmware 2.0? Well, here you go with a simple solution:

Press the sleep/wake and the home button at the same time for about a second. The screen shortly flashes, this is the sign that the screenshot has been created. It now lies in your camera roll folder in the Photos app. 

Happy shooting!

HowTo: If Visual Voicemail doesn’t work out of the box

Here is a very simple solution to a problem I’ve recently had with my brand new iPhone 3G. I tried to use Visual Voicemail but nothing seemed to really work. Even important services like declining a call and sending it to Voicemail weren’t enabled. 

I began doing some research on the internet, called a service hotline but nothing helped. I reset the iPhone to exclude every trouble caused by a non-standard setting but even this didn’t solve the problem. Then I visited the carrier’s support page and was helped by a friendly forum user who said that it could be just the network settings, which might be corrupted. I would have to reset them. This I did and – surprise – it finally worked!

So before you restore your iPhone or ANYTHING, just try this solution, it worked for me:

Go to Settings (on your home screen) -> General -> Reset and push the button Reset Network Settings, then confirm. Done.

Please note: You take full responsibility for your actions on your iPhone. I can never be held responsible for any damages caused by my tutorials. Errors excepted!

Waiting for the iPhone… – A report

0:00 p.m. This is the time when the first iPhones will be sold in a Swisscom store in Zurich. I did not want to get in queue so early as there are plenty of other opportunities to buy one of the brand-new 3G iPhones in Switzerland. But I will certainly arrive punctual at one of the many Swisscom stores at 6:30 a.m. to belong to the first ones possessing this new device. I am very excited because I think that this is going to be a great phone with so many new features compared to the first version of the iPhone that I already bought last year. 

I hope there won’t be too many people around so that I can get one before sun sets again. I guess that here in Switzerland many people are really looking forward to buying it. I have just watched a TV report about the iPhone sale and they showed a huge crowd of people waiting in front of the only Swisscom store that will sell it at midnight.

Furthermore, there is much news around on Swiss Apple sites, as on macprime.ch They have changed their normal interface to a special iPhone report page where people can send in texts and photos about their experiences. 

I think I should turn in soon in order to be fully awake next morning and to enjoy the shiny new iPhone without the wish to sleep. Wish me luck…

See this Flickr group with photos of the crowd waiting in Zurich: http://www.flickr.com/groups/iphone-day/pool/

 

UPDATE:

There was really a huge crowd waiting in front of the store. And the worst was that they had very few iPhones in stock. For example, there were only 8 (!) black 16 gig iPhones around. I had to wait about less than 2 hours after they opened the store for the first customers. The activation, which had be done in-store prolonged time for shoppers waiting. I was very lucky to belong to one of the first standing in queue because when I left the shop again there were about a hundred people waiting!

HowTo: Get PowerPC apps working again (on Intel mac)

This tutorial* explains a method that helped me get my PowerPC apps running again after they have started crashing immediately at launch (I am running the latest Leopard upgrade Mac OS X 10.5.2). I thought I’d share it with you to save you from all the trouble I went through lately.

Symptom:

You are on an Intel Mac. PowerPC (that means non-native) apps are always crashing immediately when you try to open one.

Before you proceed, you might want to have a look at the log file of the specific app after the crash. In the crash dialog, click on Report… and then on Problem details above to see what was put into the file. If you see a process called translated you have good chances to get it working again with my method.

If there is nothing like “translated”, please scroll down and try a simpler method from Apple’s support website first (although that didn’t solve my problem).

Solution:

The problem lies behind the Rosetta application, more precisely, a process called translated. This process is also a file in the system responsible for PowerPC apps to run properly. Somehow, this file must have gotten corrupted. But don’t ask me how, I am not an expert. 

1st step: Look for your Leopard Installation DVD (the disc that was delivered with your Mac or the one you bought in-store for upgrade).

2nd step: First finish your work and save it. Then restart your computer. Now put the DVD into the computer.

3rd step: Now, in Finder, click on Go to… and then Go to folder… In the new window type in (case sensitive!): 

/Volumes/[OS X disk image name]/usr/libexec/oah/

where OS X disk name stands for the name of the DVD you’ve just inserted (you can see its name on the desktop). Now you should see two files. One should be a folder with the name Shims and the other one our wanted file translate. Now copy ONLY the translate file.

4th step: Open again the Go to folder… dialog. Now type in:

 /usr/libexec/oah/

Again, you should be able to see the folder and the file translate. Before you paste the copied file here and replace the other file you may want to backup the existing translate file from here. Do this first if you want to play it safe! (Maybe you have to type in your user password once; this is nothing special for important system files as these)

5th step: Now close all open windows and do not touch any files in the system anymore! Afterwards, restart your computer.

Now everything should be working again as usual. Congrats!

CRASHING OFFICE APPS (PARTIAL SOLUTION): Visit the following Apple support page to see another solution for crashing PPC apps (especially Microsoft Office) but with a different cause: http://docs.info.apple.com/article.html?artnum=303677 

Additional advice: Please see comments below!

If everything suggested didn’t work, search Google or Apple discussions.

*Please note: You take full responsibility for your actions on your computer. I can never be held responsible for any damages caused by my tutorials. Errors excepted!

The iPhone SDK: Hit or miss?

The iPhone Software Development Kit is revolutionary for Apple. When the company put its device on the market a year ago, they forbade anyone to develop third-party software for it. Maybe they had too much all the security issues in mind or they wanted to prevent competition with their carrier partners. Many users regarded this aspect of the iPhone as a drawback and not helpful to make it a truly unique and advanced mobile device.
Now Apple has finally listened to customers’ demands and dared to bring out an intuitive, easy-as-usual, software kit for developers around the world. But what is its need?

Some arguments speak against it: Too many restrictions, monopoly situation with the App Store, etc.
Of course there are also many positive aspects: OS layers are fully usable now, clear guidelines for programming, there is no need to hack the device anymore (except for those who live in “non-iPhone countries” like me or those who don’t want a data plan)
Now if you are a developer you certainly want to code something as revolutionary as the iPhone. Nevertheless you should stay in between the defined restrictions, that means: No download of the software from your own server; some apps may not get approved for the App Store because of guideline violations, content problems may arise, e.g. VoIP (restricted for the use with the provider network) and the like.
Will developers accept the App Store as their channel of distribution? Or will they go on hacking the device by using the SDK on the one hand and hacking the device on the other hand (of course they will)?

Asking myself these questions, I am seriously anxious that the whole project could eventually get out of hand. What if developers won’t follow the guidelines and use carrier networks for huge data transfers and therefore force the breakdown of it? Also, viruses or trojan horses could find a quick way to spread out in the iPhone world and harm stability and security of a network. Apple really has to set the security aspect as their number one on the priority list. If not, they risk a loss of their image and a decrease in iPhone sales.
I am not pessimistic at all, because I see a huge chance in this SDK: There will certainly be many qualified developers who know what they’re doing and create fun apps. I wouldn’t go that far to say that it is a hit but Apple is on the right track to something powerful on the mobile market.
The future will show where the hick-ups and advantages of this SDK and the new iPhone firmware 2.0 are.
In that sense: Let’s be pirates and dive in…

Problems in iTunes 7.6

Some weird things happened after updating to the new iTunes version, which was released at the Macworld keynote. I’ve never experienced this issue, but now when playing songs in my library over the AirPort Express station, which is connected to the Airport Extreme, iTunes suddenly interrupts and stops playing them. What is more, during that time, I cannot connect to the internet anymore, even with other computers connected to the network. The only reason for this problem I can see at the time is the new update of iTunes because with the earlier version it worked flawlessly. It’s getting really annoying…
Now I want to ask you, bloggers and visitors of my page: Do you also have the above described or similar problems? If yes, do you know something like a work-around? Any comments on the topic are highly appreciated.

UPDATE OF JANUARY 27:

Strange as it seems, after a reinstall of iTunes 7.6 (I tried to install 7.5 again with no luck) it now works without any problems (no interruptions while playing). This is the situation for the German version of iTunes running in Switzerland. I will keep you updated in case I encounter new problems.

Another great song to be introduced by Apple (MacBook Air)

I’ve just watched all the keynote activities going on in San Francisco. Apple brings out – as I predicted – the new, ultra light MacBook Air. When I first saw this, I said: Wow, isn’t that thing cool? (Although the price only allows me to dream of it) And I wanted to know something more about it on Apple’s webpage of course. There, I’ve seen that nice ad about a paper enveloppe, where the new MacBook fits in perfectly. As usual, Apple is delivering high quality and the picture is very clean. What is more, they always pick gorgeous songs relevant to the ad itself. This time, they’ve taken a song by Yael Naïm. It’s called “New Soul” (btw: available through iTunes). Don’t ask me who the singer is, because I’ve never heard of her. But now I think I gotta add another great artist to my iTunes library… (Aren’t they clever?)

Watch the music video on YouTube: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-YUxbDEPFiM

Watch the Apple ad on apple.com: http://www.apple.com/macbookair/#ad

Pre-Macworld thoughts

As every year, Apple invites to its great event in San Francisco, where Mac enthusiasts from all over the world participate. Of course, the highlight of the event will again be the great keynote held by Steve Jobs, who is known for releasing innovative and revolutionary products. And people have already begun speculating months before what this year’s sensation(s) could be. Because everyone is writing a let-me-tell-you-what-I-predict article, I will not. The only thing that I can do is write about reliable rumours of the online press so far.

1. New thin subnotebooks with the name MacBook Air (with flash memory, maybe?). Could it be that Apple is going to add a subnotebook to its MacBook family that is ultra-thin and relies on EDGE and Wifi, as it does the iPhone. Because of its lightness it should get the name MacBook Air?

-> A good indication might be the banners with “There’s something in the air” inside the Moscone center, which where hung up there recently:
http://www.macrumors.com/2008/01/11/macworld-san-francisco-theres-something-in-the-air/

2. New version of the iPhone (software). What is certain at the moment is that Apple will bring out a new iPhone firmware with number 1.1.3. This will fix some minor issues and bring improvements. You can now drag icons around on the menu screen as you wish because developers are able to code third-party apps with the new SDK they got at the MacWorld.

-> Screenshot gallery at GearLive: http://www.gearlive.com/gallery/category/C51/

-> Icon-drag-around evidence video at Gizmodo:
http://gizmodo.com/338948/iphone-firmware-113-video-and-evidence-confirms-update-is-real-breaks-unlock-third+party-apps

There are also some rumors going on here in Switzerland that Apple might release the iPhone in February here, this time with 3G inside and the ability to watch TV on-the-go (with the help of the new SDK). This would then mean, that Apple is going to release the new iPhone throughout Europe and maybe not restricted to certain carriers.

3. New iTunes offers in Europe (including new iTunes software): In a new release of iTunes, you would be able to download movies in whole Europe, finally. Offers would vary from buying a movie or just renting it for 24 hours. (Maybe Apple will sell HD movies as well (or just with a higher resolution), but this will take a while as they have to prepare their servers for the rush.)

Another feature could be a YouTube video section directly in iTunes, where you can watch the movies and download them afterwards to your iPod or iPhone.

4. A new, improved Apple TV (therefore the indication “air” = Wifi on the banners). For all the new offers in the iTunes store, a new device has to be created to cover all needs. Many have complained about Apple TV because it was either too limited to certain video formats or there was a lacking internet connection as it is known on PS3 or Wii devices. They would have to rely on the more expensive Mac Mini. Apple could bring out a faster, more compatible Apple TV. Key features would be the seamless integration of iPhones (as remotes or something else) and the internet as an information source for weather information and RSS feeds and the like.

So, maybe I’ve not mentioned all of the ongoing rumors but I’ve certainly picked out the most reasonable ones because the keynote cannot last forever.