January 12, 2009 by
Jason
Most of Connected Internet’s readers are PC users. PC users don’t have too much of a problem finding an application for a specific task. Usually a quick Google will turn up a solution to a pressing problem. The only drawback to Windows’ prevalence is that there is an exponentially greater amount of commercial software, so PC users may have to dig a little to find a freeware solution to the task at hand.
Mac users enjoy a healthy commercial software community, but also free software is quite prevalent. Maybe it’s the unix influence, you know, free software and all that. I’m not complaining. As a Mac user I have a choice between a commercial solution, scouring the vast freeware available, or falling back to a unix solution when all else fails.
Following are ten applications for working with video, graphics and audio files that I have found to be indispensable. I see enough posts of the variety “What Mac app should I use for…” on various Mac web forums that I hope someone will find these recommendations useful. Read More»
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January 04, 2008 by
Jason Natively, Windows Vista supports a wide range of formats and standards, allowing users to streamline file management to a maximum. But, there are scenarios in which Vista, in the configuration it ships by default, is unable to handle some file formats. Case in point: camera RAW file formats. Professional photographers will tell you that universal standards, such as JPEG, do not even come close to satisfying the need of capturing and having available as much information as possible in a single digital photography. This is where RAW comes in. The RAW file formats are proprietary standards, intimately connected with SLR cameras (varying with make and model) that offer superior image quality to mainstream formats. Read More»
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February 03, 2007 by
Jason Microsoft raves about how Media Player plays DVDs. But that’s a lie. Windows XP can’t play DVDs right out of the box. See, even though you’ve bought a Windows XP computer, a DVD drive, and a DVD, you need something else: special software called a decoder. This bit of software, called a codec because it converts one format to another, enables your computer to translate numbers on a disc into videos of galloping horses on the screen.
Unfortunately, Windows XP doesn’t come with a DVD codec, so you must pick up one somewhere else. Where? Well, most computers with DVD drives come with DVD-playing software — a little box with its own little controls. That software installs its own DVD codec in Windows, and Media Player simply borrows that. But if you don’t have DVD-playing software, there’s nothing to borrow, and Media Player ignores your DVDs.
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