It's hard for me to remember what year it was, but I must have been around 10 years old, when my dad brought home our first Macintosh - the Mac 512K or "Fat Mac" as it was called. We were already an Apple household, having an Apple IIe which my brother and I used from the very beginning of memory. But the Mac was different and incredible – and in my case, life changing.

Intel's new Thunderbolt I/O technology has been crashing through Apple's product line like a… well, you know. The promise of 10-gigabit/second data transfer speeds has creative pros shakin' in their sleek, well-aligned boots. However, at this writing, only one Thunderbolt storage product has shipped: Promise's Pegasus RAID, a 4-drive array that starts at a cool $999. It's wicked fast, but at 15 pounds it's not exactly portable...

This is the new ToughTech Duo QR from CRU-DataPort.

But the good news is that for now, you can avoid it.

The current Mac malware you may have heard about is called MacDefender (alternative names include MacProtector and MacSecurity). They pose themselves as anti-virus software, but are really rooting for credit card and personal information.

If you haven't heard of Lightspeed and you're involved in retail, you should make your way to your nearest web browser and look them up.

Lightspeed is a Point of Sale and inventory management software made by XSilva. It combines the traditional Macintosh visual "wow factor" with a powerful relational database backend. Lightspeed uses a familiar iTunes-like interface for its one-click purchasing screen, and allows beginners to quickly delve into drag-and-drop inventory management and reporting. If you've ever used a Mac, you've already taken the first few steps to learning this powerful program.

LightSpeed is the complete retail Point of Sale solution for single or multi-store operations that combines Mac innovation with powerful backend business tools, a streamlined POS interface for fast front-counter sales and a tightly-integrated Web Store for selling online.

Tech Superpowers is now a LightSpeed Point of Sale Reseller. Not only do we sell and support the LightSpeed, but we use it too, in our new Patriot Place Retail Store.

A 100% Mac solution, LightSpeed enables a complete Point of Sale experience, including cash drawer, card swiper, and even the new LightSpeed Mobile, based on the same handheld hardware that Apple uses in its Apple Stores. It even has e-commerce features and close integration with the easy-to-use Mac OS.

Written by and posted on the behalf of Stephanie Zelman, Co-Founder, Forgirlsake (Tech Superpowers client)

When a girl in a developing world receives an education, rather than live with her children in poverty uneducated and unemployed, she becomes an active member in her family and her community and helps raise the economic productivity of her nation. When a girl stays in school she delays marriage, has fewer children, and reduces her chances of contracting AIDS. Maternal mortality also drops due to fewer pregnancies and a more mature body to bear children. When a girl is educated, she has more ability to start her own business and more control over how funds are spent in her family -- a very good thing, for when women have a voice, child health and nutrition become a priority. And she is more determined to send her own children to school, which breaks the cycle of poverty in her community.

You might have received an e-mail like this recently:

Court-ordered Notice about the NVIDIA chip in your Computer
If you purchased certain models of notebook computers containing an NVIDIA graphics processing unit or media and communications processor, you could be entitled to benefits under a class action settlement.

Pretty intense, man.  Enough to make you worry about the safety and reliability of your computer.

Learn from the best in the industry, share your wisdom.

As you may know, Mike Oh and I attended the 2010 AIGA Boston Fellow Award: Matthew Carter event on September 24th. While we were there, we decided to host our own little competition centered around typography.

Join TSP as we assist AIGA Boston in honoring legendary type designer Matthew Carter. As a long time partner of AIGA, and having worked with Matthew Carter as a client since 1999, Tech Superpowers is proud to be a part of this year's AIGA Boston Fellow Award event.

Via AIGA: