Tag: Mac
November 01, 2009 by
Jason
The first fully-fledged Beta development milestone of the next generation of Mozilla’s open source browser is currently available for download. Testers and early adopters that have been waiting for Firefox 3.6, codenamed Namoroka, to evolve from Alpha stage are now free to access, download, install and start test driving the Beta 1 build. In addition to being the first Beta for Firefox 3.6, the development milestone offered by Mozilla is also the first example of a third-party browser to embrace Microsoft’s latest iteration of the Windows client. Just like the native Internet Explorer 8, Firefox 3.6 Beta 1 is designed to play nice with Aero Peek and Thumbnail Previews via the new Windows Aero Taskbar (Superbar) in Windows 7.
As you can see from the screenshot included below, Firefox 3.6 Beta users can now take advantage of the some of the same graphical user interface enhancements in Windows 7 as those running IE8. While Google and Opera are lagging behind when it comes down to tailoring their browsers to Windows 7, the same is not valid for Mozilla. And as Windows 7 became available for purchase on October 22, 2009, customers running the OS in combination with Firefox 3.6 will certainly enjoy the bells and whistles of the new Windows Aero GUI. Read More»
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Whether you are talking about your car, phone, dog, your favorite football player or even about trying to make the best out of your work day, speed is one of the things – if not the most important – that always come up. The same theory applies to your Mac and the way you want it to respond to your commands.
There are countless pieces of advice you can find on the Internet telling you what you can do to make sure that your Mac is as responsive as you want it to be. However, although some of those tips will show you the right path to achieve that, others have nothing to do with improving the speed of your Mac’s OS X system.
What you can do to make sure you are not doing daily maintenance work on your Mac with no effect just because someone told you that, let’s say, is to repair the disk permissions. Actually, when repairing the disk permissions, OS X will just examine files and folders on your hard drive to check if their current permissions are set the way they were supposed to be.
If the permissions are different from the expected ones, they will be changed to their correct settings. That is only one of the many suggested practices users will wrongfully perform on a daily basis when noticing that their Mac is getting a little sluggish and unresponsive. Read More»
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Say you’re doing a project for school, a presentation, or you simply need to get a hold of an application’s original (512 x 512) icon. Searching Google Images may do the trick, but you’ll often find yourself with pictures that are too small, blurry, modified or just not the one you’re looking for. This short guide will show you how to get your hands on an application’s original icon, right from within itself.
Power users should know that most Mac OS X apps (be they Apple-developed, or created by third-party devs) contain something called a “Resources” folder. This folder is mostly used by the application itself to get the images and sounds it needs to display / play throughout the course of running. Yes, you’ve guessed right: this is the place you need to be to start looking for that app’s icon set. We’ll use Apple’s GarageBand as the example for this short tutorial.
1. The first thing you need to do is navigate to where GarageBand is installed on your computer. If you have it already living peacefully in your Dock, just right-click its icon and select “Show in Finder.” Whether or not you’ve placed the music-making program in your Applications folder, you can simply fire up Spotlight (CMD + Space) and do a quick search to locate the app. Hold down the Command (CMD) key and hit Return (Enter) with the GarageBand selected in Spotlight. Congratulations! You’ve found where GarageBand is situated on your Mac’s hard drive.
Read More»
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The wait is over! Firefox 3.5 has reached the end of its development process. The gold build of the open-source browser from Mozilla, formerly codenamed Shiretoko, was finalized on June 29, 2009, and is now available for download (links are live at the bottom of this article). Mozilla is planning to ship Firefox 3.5 today, June 30, but at the time of this article the availability of Firefox 3.0’s successor hasn’t yet been announced officially. Still, the final development milestone of Firefox 3.5 has already been wrapped up and the bits went live on Mozilla’s FTP servers. It is only a matter of Firefox 3.5 being released to web, but you needn’t wait, just grab Firefox 3.5 from the links below for Windows, Mac OS X and Linux.
“The team here at Mozilla has been working hard on creating features, enhancing performance and adding other awesomeness to Firefox 3.5, and we’re very excited about sharing it with the world,” revealed Mozilla’s John Slater on June 29. Read More»
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1. Boost memory
The simplest way to a faster Mac is by installing extra RAM. Before you buy, check the maximum RAM capacity of your Mac. You can download a free program called MacTracker that will tell you the precise technical specifications of every Mac ever produced.
2. Install RAM in pairs
Many Macs will give you a speed boost if you install matching RAM modules in pairs. G5 and Mac Pro towers actually require the installation of pairs of modules, though most other Macs will allow the use of an odd number, with the proviso that you won’t get the fastest possible performance from them. Crucial’s website will tell you the specifics for your model.
3. Faster drive
Installing a faster hard drive as the boot drive on a tower Mac will yield performance gains, especially if you go up to a 10,000-speed drive. On a laptop, installing a 7,200rpm drive (to replace a 5,400 rpm model) will also make things faster, though older Mac portables don’t have user replaceable hard drives Read More»
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Addressing users of an iPod shuffle (1st and 2nd generation), or iPod shuffle (3rd generation), Apple has updated its Support section with new information on how to update your player’s software.
Apple outlines that it is very important to understand the difference between “update” and “restore.” Failing to do this may result in losing all your songs, or whatever data you have stored on your iPod shuffle. Update does not affect your settings or songs, but only installs the software that controls iPod shuffle.
However, the restore action erases the disk and restores iPod shuffle to its original factory condition. According to the iPod maker, you should use the computer where music is normally synced, if you only need to update iPod shuffle. “Updating on another computer will result in all songs being removed from the iPod shuffle,” the company warns. Additionally, users should make sure to back up the contents of their iPod shuffle. Everything can be synced back to the device, if the items are part of your iTunes Library. Read More»
Posted in Mac, Windows XP | No Comments »
By default, Mac OS X has an interface that will always offer its users very high degrees of usability and eye candy. Although it is already a standard that users of other OSes still dream of, Mac users will always try to give it a little more bang.
If you do not think that the OS X GUI is one of the best-looking OS interface designs out there, just think about the high number of Windows and/or Linux users that will do anything in their power to make their OS look and act as closely as OS X.
If you are a Mac user that is not completely satisfied with how their Mac’s interface looks like and you want to achieve the full OS customization nirvana, you should know that, although you can also do this by hand (this is possible because OS X has an incredible high degree of ease personalization, if you know how to do it), you will need a set of tools to help you in your enterprise.
The tools of this trade are mostly free, with a couple of them still trying to get sold to people that still don’t trust free software or have not yet found the best free alternative. Such solutions will allow you to change almost anything you have ever dreamed of changing in OS X, and more. Read More»
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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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October 19, 2008 by
Jason While Apple’s older iMacs (Late-2006) boast an impressive pair of stereo speakers (considering the all-in-one design and their small size), the same thing cannot be said about the company’s 20-inch and 24-inch aluminum iMac (Mid-2007).
However, both Apple’s Late-2006 and Mid-2007 computers have their speakers placed at the bottom of the system, facing down. This leads to a considerable loss in sound quality, as the sound hits your desk and bounces off in all directions. Given this, some high pitched sounds (but not only) barely make it to your ears. There is a way to capture all the sound coming from your Mac’s speakers, and direct it all towards your ears.
Buy a pair of headphones! Just kidding. No headphones. You do, however, need two extra items on your desk to make this happen. A couple of ashtrays, for instance. Just place them underneath each of your iMac’s speakers. What happens is this: Read More»
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September 02, 2008 by
Jason
While Apple’s Macs running OS X are without a doubt making inroads into the territory owned by Microsoft and PC makers with Windows machines, the fact of the matter is that the Redmond company and its OEM partners still account for the vast majority of the operating system and computer markets.
As far as consumer trends are concerned, there is a palpable shift from traditional desktops to laptops, and Microsoft is not only delivering Windows Vista, an operating system tailored to a mobile lifestyle, but it is also prepared to offer guidance on the acquisition of a new computer. From the Windows Guide library, the Redmond company has made available for download the Windows Laptop Selector Buying Basics.
“GHz? MBs? SDRAM? You don’t have to speak nerd to find a great laptop. Our Buying Basics makes it simple and straightforward to understand what you need to know when looking for your next PC,” reads an excerpt from the guide. Of course that the decision to buy a new machine orbits around money. “Many people see price as the biggest factor when buying a PC. A bargain-basement price may seem tempting now, but will it give you the laptop you want for the long haul? Technology changes rapidly and even if you spend less today, you might end up paying more tomorrow just to keep up with new software.” Read More»
Posted in Hardware | 2 Comments »
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