DIY – Jonathan Y. H. Sim

Change the Logo on Your Macbook

This only applies to the old series of MacBooks (the ones with the glowing Apple logo, i.e. 2015 and before).

Are you bored of apples?

Well, here’s an easy way to change the little glowing Apple logo on your Macbook!

Let me show you what I’ve done:

Here’s a close-up (with the glow):

Illuminate the Way!

Another close-up (without the glow):

An unintended effect of what I’ve done is that my logo has a 3-dimensional appearance.

This isn’t the first time I’ve done such a mod. I did it once back in 2011 and used it for 3 years.

Out of boredom, I switched back to the original apple logo.

But once more, it was boredom that led me to change the logo again.

There aren’t that many designs out there with special meaning for me. So I returned to the Dao, since it is significant to me as a Chinese philosopher. The ancient Chinese thinkers were constantly searching for the Dao, and to make it known (illumine it) to the rest of the world.

Anyway, in this post, I will show you an easy way to change the glowing logo on your Macbook to something else.

What you need

1. A Macbook Pro or Air with a glowing Apple logo. You can’t do this if you got the newest Macbooks that don’t have a glowing apple.

2. A hard shell casing for your Macbook (you can get it cheaply for about $20-30 at Sim Lim Square or Funan Centre). I recommend getting a dark colour as it can help to hide imperfections in cutting.

3. A piece of paper with your design printed on it. (More info about the paper and design below)

4. A small piece of thick card or very thin cardboard (about 4cm x 4cm), or any other material capable of blocking the light from the glowing Apple. Please test the material first by putting it against the Apple, and set your screen brightness to maximum. You know the material is suitable if light doesn’t shine through.

5. Glue

6. A pen knife

7. Clear tape

What to do

Step 1: You will need to print your (black and white) logo onto a piece of paper and trim the paper down to size.

The logo should be less than 3.4cm in diameter. We will be cutting out the bits coloured in black, so it is important to note that the black bits will be the parts that you want glowing.

Also, unless you are very very good at cutting with a pen knife, it is important to bear in mind that the more complex your logo, the more tedious (and possibly difficult) it will be to cut out the black bits later.

Paper size is a bit tricky.

If you have the 11″ Macbook Air, you are in luck! A4 paper is almost perfect in size. The paper’s length fits the length of the Macbook Air. You will, however, need to trim the breadth of the paper to fit the breadth of the Macbook Air.

If you are using any other size, you will need paper bigger than A4. You can print your logo on A3 paper, and trim it down to size.

When trimming the paper, Make sure that the logo is aligned with the Apple logo.

Step 2: Glue the thick card or thin cardboard onto the paper, just behind the logo.

Step 3: Using a pen knife, cut out all the black bits on your logo.

If parts of your logo isn’t connected to the rest of the cardboard you can keep it in place using clear tape, like this:

The back side of the paper, with clear tape to hole parts of the logo in place.

After cutting, your paper should now look like this:

Ready to shine!

Step 4: Next, you will need to round the corners.

Thankfully, the rounded corners don’t have to be perfect. It is hard to see the imperfections underneath a dark-coloured cover.

You don’t need to cut it perfectly as the dark coloured casing would hide the imperfections.

You can put the paper over your Macbook to see if the rounded corners align with your device.

Almost perfect alignment!

There is no need to glue or stick the paper onto the Macbook. The hard cover will keep it firmly in place.

Step 5: Before putting on the cover, make sure your paper (and logo) is in the right side up.

Step 6: Install the cover onto your Macbook and you’re done!

Voila! Now you have a new glowing logo on your Macbook! No more apples!

The best part is, you can always change the logo in the future if you get bored with it.

Have fun!

How to Make Your Own Swiss Army Inspired Key Holder

I’ve always hated the idea of keychains. They make noise when you run, it’s bulky, and worse of all, the keys scratch everything in my bag.

Then I learnt of a key holder that’s designed like a Swiss Army Knife. You can insert keys on both ends of the key holder and unfold each one out just as how you would unfold a blade from a Swiss Army knife.

It’s a pretty cool idea. The keys don’t scatter all over the place, and they certainly won’t scratch your things.

But there is one problem with this design. It looks too much like a Swiss Army knife!

You have no idea how nervous people get whenever I’m in the lift with them, taking out what looks like a swiss army knife from my bag and grasping it in my hand. For the next couple of seconds, the atmosphere gets really tense in the lift. People would just run out the moment the lift door opened, out of fear for their lives.

I since stopped carrying the KeySmart key holder to avoid any misunderstanding.

Since then, I set out to make my own. I loved how the keys were held tightly in place, and covered, so that it would scratch the items in my bag. But I needed one that didn’t look like a swiss army knife.

Here’s what I made in the end:

20160328_060446000_ios — This is the key holder that I made for myself.

Turns out, this is really easy to make.

Here’s what you need:

20160328_060611000_ios

1. A strip of leather, or any other lovely material that’s not flimsy. (You could always recycle a worn leather bag)

2. A screw rivet. The length of the rivet depends on how many keys you wish to insert. I got one that’s about 1cm long from ArtFriend.

3. Keys, they should all be flat at the head.

Assembly:

Step 1: Cut the leather strip to an appropriate size. I cut mine 16cm x 3cm.

Step 2: Punch two holes on each end of the leather strip. I punched the holes about 1.5cm away from each end.

For symmetry, you should fold the strip into half and mark out the position of the two holes, to ensure that the strip is aligned later.

Step 3: Insert one end of the screw rivet into the first hole, and insert the keys.

20160328_060811000_ios — Step 3 would look like this.

Step 4: Fold the leather strip over, insert the other side of the screw rivet, and screw the two ends of the rivet together tightly.

20160328_060941000_ios — Voila! You’re done!

You now have an elegant leather, Swiss Army-inspired key holder!

I’ve been using this for almost a year, and it has been great.

If you have a lot of material on hand, feel free to explore other designs.

If you have very sturdy materials, you may consider making a double-sided key holder as well.

Have fun!

How I Recently Upgraded My 5 Year Old Macbook Air To Last For The Next Couple Of Years

I’ll be furthering my studies in August this year. And though my trusty Macbook Air has been with me for about 5 years now, I don’t see a point in buying a brand new laptop.

Despite its old age, it still works performs very well. I can still edit videos and photos, write papers, and watch videos. I don’t really play games, so there’s really no need for me to get better hardware.

However, the life of a graduate student will be more active than that of one stuck in an office. This change of lifestyle will bring a fresh set of challenges which my old laptop may not be able to handle.

As it is, I’ve been struggling with 3 minor problems. But these three problems with be exacerbated when I’m on the move. And I do prefer to work on the go as I tend to think and work better in a library or cafe than when I’m at home.

Problem #1: The Lack of Disk Space

This has been a problem that I’ve been struggling with for some time. My Macbook Air has a miserable storage space of 128GB. For five years, I’ve been plagued with this problem. I’ve tried ways to work around it but with little success. For example, I’ve had a 1TB external hard disk plugged in whenever I have to work with huge files.

That works quite well when I’m in the office.

BUT, I tend to work on the go, i.e. on the bus or train (and sometimes on the bed). And the external hard disk tends to get disconnected, or drops onto the floor in the process.

Last month, I tried searching the Internet (once again) for a solution.

And as it turns out, the great thing about having an old laptop is that you can get upgradable parts for cheap. In the past, a 1TB SSD (solid state drive, i.e. a hard disk with no mechanical parts), would cost almost SGD$1k. But now it only costs SGD$600.

I figured, it makes a lot more sense to simply upgrade the storage than to buy a new laptop.

Without much hesitation, I placed an online order for the OWC 1TB SSD, and it arrived in 3 days.

Installation turned out to be a breeze. The website I ordered from had instructions on how to install it.

All I had to do was do unscrew the base, unplug the battery, replace the SSD board, reconnect the battery, and screw the base back. Voila! I was done in less than a minute!

screen-shot-2016-03-17-at-9-33-13-pm — The new SSD is the blue colour board in the middle with the sticker. This photo isn’t mine. I got too excited installing the SSD that I forgot to take photos. Screen shot of video taken from http://eshop.macsales.com/item/Other%20World%20Computing/SSDA116K960/.

I reinstalled Mac OS X, and in less than an hour, my Macbook Air was as good as new.

screen-shot-2016-02-23-at-11-56-41-am — My Macbook Air now has 1TB of disk space!

Very nice…

So that’s Problem #1 solved.

But here’s the funny thing. The problem about fixing problems is that once you get started, you can’t just stop.

I felt a great need to find solutions to other problems.

There’s a certain sense of urgency now, as I’m in the final months of being employed on a full-time basis. At least I’ll have the money to make costly purchases to keep my laptop going strong and well for the next few years. I don’t think I’ll have that much financial flexibility when I switch to a full-time studies.

Problem #2: A Charger Cable That’s Going to Break

The next problem I needed to fix was the fact that the power cable on my Macbook’s Magsafe Charger was going to break. The cable is fraying very badly, and in time to come, it’ll just snap off.

Sure, the solution is simple: buy a replacement! The problem? The original Apple 45W Magsafe Power Charger costs SGD$100+!!! No way am I going to pay so much for a charger.

I did a simple search on the Internet and was very pleasantly surprised to find third-party Macbook chargers selling for only SGD$28!

What a deal! I bought one to test.

Here’s the original and the third-party charger, side by side:

20160317_121946000_ios-1200x675 — Can you tell which is the original Apple Magsafe charger?

They look very similar.

Thankfully, the third-party one works pretty well. I’ve been using this for a few days now, and there’s no problems at all. It works as well as the original.

If anything, the third-party charger has a slight design modification to ensure the cable doesn’t fray and break as easily as the original Apple one. So, if you are looking for a charger replacement that will last longer than Apple’s, this might be worth getting.

I’m happy.

So, problem #2 solved!

Problem #3: Not Enough Power Sockets Outside

This is truly a first-world problem.

As I mentioned earlier, I work better (and think better) when I’m outside, be it at the library, cafe, bus or train.

Having been a student before, I am well aware of the difficulty of find a power socket to charge my laptop.

Don’t get me wrong. My Macbook Air’s battery still works great despite its age (there’s no immediate need to replace the battery). I can work non-stop on it for 3 hours. 2 hours if I turn on Wifi. 1+ hour if I’m listening to music while I work.

The problem is that I tend to work longer than 3 hours. I can spend a whole day out, and that can be quite problematic when all the power sockets at the library or cafe are used (or unavailable).

I end up wasting time and mental energy frantically trying to find a power socket to keep my laptop going.

After searching for weeks, I finally found this solution:

20160317_121032000_ios — Behold the battery pack!

It’s the Romoss eUSB sofun 9 portable laptop external battery, capable of holding 23400 mAh worth of charge. That’s FIVE times the battery capacity of my Macbook Air!

I got this brand in particular because it is one of the few laptop battery packs that have a cable that’s compatible with the Macbook’s Magsafe connector. (I had to top-up a little bit more for this cable.)

20160317_121539000_ios-1200x672 — The special eUSB to Magsafe cable.

Wow… If it can hold five times more charge than my Macbook Air battery, then theoretically, with this, I could work for about 15 hours (no Wifi) non-stop, or 10 hours (with Wifi), or even 5 hours (with music playing as well).

In real world terms, this battery pack can really keep my Macbook going.

This is incredible! I’m no longer bound to a power socket anymore!

Problem #3 fixed!

And with that, I think my 5 year old laptop is now ready for the nomadic life of a graduate student, who wanders from place to place, from library to library, cafe to canteen, bus to train, to research and write.

I’ve more than enough disk space and power to keep me going.

I hope that with this, my Macbook will be capable of lasting for another 3-5 years.