MacFest

Sat, 21 Jan 2006
Skilz Digital Arts Experience Centre, Bangsar Shopping Centre
8:00 - 10:00pm

Report : Azul Adnan
Photos : Azul Adnan

A new year means a new venue. Well, the old one at Ikano was no longer available so MacAsia was kind enough to allow us to gather at their new training centre in Bangsar called Skilz Digital Arts Experience Centre.

As Macworld Expo 2006 had just ended the previous week, this MacFest was very much focused on all the new announcements & products that were highlighted during the expo.

Shah did most of the talking. Firstly, he covered the issues relating to running OS X on an Intel machine - he demonstrated this by running Tiger on a Compaq!

Then he briefly went through a demo slide show of iWork '06. After that he demonstrated the apps of iLife '06, going from showing the new features of iPhoto to demonstrating Themes and audio manipulation in iMovie. Shah also demonstrated the new addition to the iLife suite: iWeb, a cool application which allows you to very quickly and easily create your own website or blog. Finally, he showed how easy it is to create your own podcast with the new GarageBand.

After Shah's presentation, I showed a video clip of the scenes at the Macworld Expo. Then I quickly demonstrated a new software called Docktopus which adds badges to the items on the Dock. After that I showed another short video, this time of 3 products which were given "Best of Show" awards by Macworld magazine.

Before the lucky draws Ian demonstrated how we can run Front Row on our 'Books via a Bluetooth hand phone.

The lucky draws were won by TK, Fikri, Ethan and Capt Zul. Congratulations, gentlemen!

After the event, around 13 of us hung out at Austin Chase for coffee. We were a right noisy bunch!

Thanks to the prize sponsors: Miglia, Peachpit and O'Reilly; and to MacAsia for providing the venue.