MacAddict 110 200510

IS IT TIME TO BUY? A BETTER MACHINE. A BETTER MAGAZINE. MAKE YOUR MAC 7 transform z your Mac into a lean, mean, screamin’ machine! > Pentax OptiowP Make Panoramic Photos Palm nenueten E2- » Power Your iPod with a The Sims 2. 0 9-Volt Battery ro: sant | % EPSON AND HP 3 a > 5 cor Audio and Video PHOTO PRINTERS with QuickTime Pro IH ue 86"01 ©Micromat, Inc. TechToo! is a registered trademark of Micromat, Inc. DiskStudio and PodlLock are trademarks of Micromat, Inc. OE BES Tiger compatible... The complete Macintosh problem solving utility. Diagnostics and Repair TechTool® Pro includes options to thoroughly check various hardware components, drives, and other aspects of your computer system. One of the most important tests is the S.M.A.R.T. test, which checks for impending drive failure. Optimization This feature defragments the files on your hard drive and consolidates all the free space into one large block. Optimizing enhances the overall performance of your hard drives and simplifies file layout on the disk. c he z ® © Clock Data Recovery 2 ® TechTool Pro includes routines that can search a damaged drive 4 © Firewire and attempt to recover valid files to another location. Hence, even cs oS) if a drive is damaged beyond repair, you may still be able to save ie vac important data that had not been backed up. 2) 8 a. @© Mathematics Safety Ca ® The Safety feature can be configured to protect your drives by @ Nework automatically creating backups of critical drive directory data. It can @ ® also test the computer for developing problems and alert you, both onscreen and via email, if problems are detected. op @ Processor ic) 1 st eDrive es & me One of the most innovative features of TechTool Pro is the eDrive. Seri leo Memory ® This is a bootable Mac OS X partition containing TechTool Pro and a small copy of your system that you can use in an emergency. It is created on one of your hard drives without the need to reformat. . «fe i Also From Micromat | 1) d i DiskStudio 5 my pans PodLock —— Micromat, Inc., 5329 Skylane Bivd., Santa Rosa, CA 95403 800-829-6227 707-566-3831 info@micromat.com www.micromat.com OCTOBER NO110*VOLUME10*ISSUE10 a better machine. a better magazine. Ee ONIENIS ged fSQtUICS 16 Clean Up Your Mac Unclog caches, sweep clutter off your hard drives, kill RAM-hogging routines, and make your Mac run just like new. by Dave Hamilton | D Get rid of I background } images onts Do you sometimes wonder if your fonts are lost in the third ring of Hell? We can help you restore your faith in your Mac’s font abilities. by John Cruise and Kelly Kordes Anton 24 Frazzled by F Don’t know what to do with that file you just downloaded? Our field guide can help. by Robert Strohmeyer how to 56 Ask Us We share the secrets of Secure Virtual Memory, Single-User Mode, and smarter Spotlight searches. cAdd 58 Make Simple Panoramas with Photoshop With a steady hand—and a little help from Photoshop—you can turn ordinary photos into glorious, panoramic vistas. by Tom Lassiter 59 Make Better Panoramas with PTMac Show off your house or the view from a mountaintop by turning still photos into an interactive QuickTime VR movie. by Tom Lassiter 02 MacAddict October 2005 32 Extension University 62 Power Your iPod with a 9V Battery Is your iPod always running out of juice while you’re on the go? This hack will help keep you groovin’. by Niko Coucouvanis ‘\ 64 Make Time with QuickTime Pro Rotate movies, strip out soundtracks, insert movies into other movies, and more when you go Pro with Apple’s movie player. by Niko Coucouvanis Cover image by Oliver Wolfson ESE RIMAGE 360i CREATE. BURN. PRINT.” 04 /) CONTENTS i> abetter machine, a better magazine. 07 Editors’ Page The music industry as we know it is doomed; digital- music downloading has changed all the rules. 10 Get info \f you're waiting for the Intel switch before you buy, the new iBooks and Mac minis might change your mind. Also: Myst’s final chapter and the debut of Apple’s eons- overdue two-button mouse. 35 Reviews 40 Bryce 5.5 3D-landscape software 45 Commandos Baltle Pack action-strategy game 49 Cosmic Blobs 1.1 kids’ 3D-modeling software 54 DecoDock iPod shuffle dock 42 DeltaGraph 5.6 chart-making app 50 Disc Stakka disc-storage system 48 Flatron L2013P LCD display 52 Flexible Dock for iPod shuffle USB extender 46 Guest PC Windows emulator 51 Kill Monty action game 47 iControl GarageBand controller 52 irock Beamit 450FM iPod FM transmitter 54 iTop iPod-button relocator 44 magicolor 2430 DL color laser printer 50 MediaPro 2.6.4 media catalog 38 OptioWP camera 37 Photosmart 385 photo printer 54 PocketMac for PSP PSP utility 53 Power Game Factory game-creation kit 37 PictureMate Deluxe Viewer Edition photo printer 52 RocketFM iPod FM transmitter 36 The Sims 2 Jife-simulation game 48 Thump MP3-playing sunglasses 49 TuneJuice iPod accessory 43 Tungsten E2 PDA 55 The Hot List We'd spend our own hard-earned money on these products. QUICK TIPS FROM THIS MONTH'S ISSUE > FIND, FIND AGAIN Feeling limited by that Spotlight search box in Tiger’s menu bar? Summonr a civilized Find window with Command-F to set search locations and other limiting criteria. From Ask Us, p56. a ae 78 Log Out 78 Letters Our readers chime in with bug fixes, advice on making big bucks with blogs, and a treatise on Trusted Computing. > OUTTA ISIGHT Ifyour external drive keeps unmounting at inappropriate times, try disconnecting your iSight camera or moving it to a Separate FireWire port. From Get Info, p10, > TONER TANTRUM Don’t remove a toner cartridge from Konica Minolta’s magicolor 2430 DL until it runs out, or the cartridge is history. From Reviews, p44. 04 MacAddict October 2005, 79 Contest Make us laugh, and you could win a Stylus Photo R1800 printer courtesy of Epson. 80 Shut Down The insult that made a G5 out of “Mac mini.” > DESKTOP MOLASSES Ifyour Mac is feeling sluggish, consider dumping your desktop wallpaper—believe itornot, a fancy picture can gum up your OS. From “Clean Up Your Mac,” p16. eve SCANSNAP PAPER hag Lg 8 TRANSFORM YOUR PAPERWORK. Give your administrative paperwork new life with the Fujitsu ScanSnap™ Paper Manager for Macintosh™ Its 50-page automatic document feeder quickly transforms a stack of paper into useful, easy-to-manage electronic files. It transforms double-sided documents into FOFs with one-button ease and automatically transforms documents into email attachments for faster, surer delivery than faxing. All on @ scanner footprint smaller than a sheet of paper. Add Advance Exchange ownership protection for worry-free service. Now, that is a thing of beauty. Call 800-831-8094 ext,9489 or see it in action now at www.fepa.fujitsu.com/9489 Adobe’Acrobat: 7.0 standard-included (oe) FUJITSU Mac | de SGhiance THE POSSIBILITIES ARE INFINITE © 2005 Fujitsu Computer Products of America Ine Al ights reserved. Advance Exchango upgrade of $59 s sold soparately and isnot included in te $495 cost, Service program and ScanSnap prices are subject to change. Fujtsu and the Fujitsu logo ae rqistored rademarks of Fue Ltd, ScanSnap and Advance Exchange are trademarks of Fujitsu Computer Products of America ne Adobe, the Adobe logo and Acrobat are either registered trademarks or trademarks of Adobe ‘Systems, he. inthe United States and/or Ofer counties. Mac and the Mac go are trademarks of Apple Computer, Inc, registered in the US. end other counties, All other trademarks are the property ofthe ter respective owner. ou) Insight. Tigerirect.com PCNation,_, PCConectin Maclay 1 CONTENTS a better machine. a better magazine. ythe Cisc Looking for a diversion? You'll find it on this month’s Disc—whether you're scaring yourself silly with devilish Doom 3 mods and maps, checking out the trailer for Cyan Worlds’ Myst V: End of Ages, or designing your own distraction with Power Game Factory. We've also got PrintMagic, a utility that lets you control exactly what you print, and everything you need to complete our “Make Better Panoramas with PTMac” how-to on page 59. Cosmic Blobs demo \fyou’re terrified of 3D-modeling apps, then try the kid-friendly Cosmic Blobs—you’ll be cranking out cool 3D. artwork in no time, Guts, gratuitous person shooter. Postal 2: Share. the Pain demo violence, and ... Gary Coleman? Try out the demo of Running with Scissors’ bloody first- DeltaGraph demo Are you frustrated with your current spreadsheet app’s limited chart- and graph-making abilities? Give DeltaGraph a go. AUDIO & MUSIC INTERNET & DiskTracker (OS X) 2.3.2 PatioTunes 1.6 shareware COMMUNICATION shareware Peak LE 4.1.3 trial OmniWeb 5.1 demo PrintMagle for OS X 4.0 ‘SoundSoap 2 demo video shareware PRODUCTIVITY TechRestore demo video DEVELOPMENT DeltaGraph 5.6.1 demo e——! REALbasic 2005 R2 demo NoteBook 2.0 demo SPONSORS OmniGraffle 3.2.4 demo pas anes ee OmniOutliner 3.0.3 de una etait Gees4 deine, DLEEUE yee as ee Doom 3 Mods freeware UTILITIES OmniWeb 5.1 demo Kill Monty 1.0.3 shareware DiskTracker (Classic) 2.3.2 Peak LE 41.3 tia! Myst V: End of Ages trailor shareware SoundSoap2 demo video Postal 2: Share the Pain uleciuesiare gerne ceo demo, Power Game Factory “Outen Staff Video: GRAPHICS 8. — Gone to Turkey LS cam iolsiste aie! . What happens when PTMac for OSX 3.0 MacAddict’s editor-in- shareware : chief goes to Turkey on vacation and leaves INTERFACE his staffalone with Application Enhancer the video camera? 1.5.1 freeware You'll have to see itto WindowShade X 4.0 Istanbulieve it. shareware UPGRADE Ityou don't receive the Disc with your copy of MacAddict, you might want to consider upgrading. Each monthly Disc contains cool demos, useful shareware and freeware, and the inimitable MacAddict Staff Video. To get 12 issues of MacAddict that include this value-packed disc with your subscription (prorated If necessary) for Just $1 ‘more per issue, call 888-771-6222—the operator will take caro of everything. 06 MacAddict October 2005 MacAddict EDITORIAL EDITOR IN CHIEF Rik Mystewski MANAGING EDITOR Sean Molloy FEATURES EDITOR Jake Widman HOW-TO EDITOR Nike Coucouvanis REVIEWS EDITOR Roman Loyola WEB MONKEY Nick Muerdter EPONYMEDITOR Max. CONTRIBUTING EDITORS 0s Helmut Kobler, Cathy Lu, St ke, lan Shadovits, andrew Tekuda, Michele Victoria, Bur Zller ART DIRECTOR Mark Rosenthal ASSISTANT ART DIRECTOR Peter Marshutz PHOTOGRAPHER Mark Madeo CONTRIBUTING PHOTOGRAPHER Samantha Berg BUSINESS PUBLISHER Bernie Lanigan, 646-723-5405 EASTERN ADVERTISING MANAGER. ‘Anthony Danzi, 646-723-5453 WESTERN ADVERTISING DIRECTOR Dave Lynn, 969-360-4463 WESTERN ADVERTISING MANAGER Stacey Levy, 925-964-1205 NATIONAL ACCOUNT MANAGER Nate Hunt, 415-656-8536 MARKETING MANAGER Kathleen Reilly ETING COORDINATOR Tara Wong ADVERTISING COORDINATOR Jose Urrutia, 415-656-8313 PRODUCTION PRODUCTION DIRECTOR Richard Lesovoy PRODUCTION COORDINATOR Larry Briseno CIRCULATION CIRCULATION DIRECTOR Amy Leder NEWSSTAND MARKETING MANAGER Bilt Shewey BILLING AND RENEWAL MANAGER Mike Hill NEWSSTAND COORDINATOR Alex Guzman FULFILLMENT MANAGER Peggy Mores DIRECT-MAIL MANAGER Stephanie Blake DIRECT MARKETING SPECIALIST Robin Connett FUTURENETWORKUSA 150/North Hill Drive, Suite 60, Brisbane, CA 94008 wivwefuturenetworkusa.com PRESIDENT Jonathan Simpson-Bint VICE PRESIDENT/CFO Tom Valentino VICE PRESIDENT/CIRCULATION Melty KUinget GENERAL COUNSEL Charles Schug PUBLISHING DIRECTOR/GAMES Slmon Whitcombe PUBLISHING DIRECTOR/TECHNOLOGY Chris Ceetho. PUBLISHING DIRECTOR/MUSIC Steve Aaron PUBLISHING DIRECTOR/BUSINESS DEVELOPMENT Dave Barrow EDITORIAL DIRECTOR/TECHNOLOGY Jon Phillips EDITORIAL DIRECTOR/MUSIC Brad Tolinsk DIRECTOR OF CENTRAL SERVICES Nancy Durtester PRODUCTION DIRECTOR Richle Lesovey Future Network USA part of Future PLC Future produces carefully targeted special-interest magazines for people who sharea passion. We aim to satisfy that passion by creating tiles offering value for money, reliable information, smart buying advice and \Which are a pleasure to read, Today we publish more than 150 magazines Inthe US, UK, France and Italy. ver 100 international editions of our ‘magazines are also published in 30 other countries across the world Future plc is a public eempany quoted on the London Stock Exchange symbol: FUTR) FUTURE PLE 30 Monmouth St., Bath, Avon, BAT 2BW, England ‘wr futureple.com Tel +46 1228 442246 NON-EXECUTIVE CHAIRMAN: Roger Parry CHIEF EXECUTIVE: Greg Ingham GROUP FINANCE DIRECTOR: John Bowman Tel#44 1225442264 www-utureplc.com REPRINTS: For reprints, contact Ryan Derller, Reprint Operations Specialist, 717.299.1900 ext. 167, or email futurenetworkusa@reprintbuyer.com ‘SUBSCRIPTION QUERIES: Please omail medcusteerviedstulfillment com r call customer service toll-free at 888-771-6222. Volume 10, tssue 10, tecadet (SEN 188 S409 i phd monty by Fle Newark USA, foneeh Har Su 4, bree CA SA er fos postage and Canad pe S888, US. rena nds ny POSTMASTER Socaccene changes fo MacAdkset, PO. 6. Faure Hever USA ako pubes Mex and Sof i 2005, Fura Network USA, Al ighs reserved, Reproduction m whole orn part is prhibed. Future Natosk USA ot fete wih in compares or rodcls ave in MacAdoe. Rie Along encoaure in te flowing eats) BI, 82. PRODUCED IN THe UNTED STATES OF AMERICA, Pubcon ‘Aajooment #4204363 Reta: 4960-2 Walker Road, Wasa’ ONNBA BS Most music-industry suits fronting for major recording labels have more in common with tobacco lobbyists and crank cookers than they do with the artists whose work they pimp. How soul-stultifying is it to work with these guys? Well, if you can stand some off-color language, check out “The Problem with Music” by Steve Albini, musician and audio engineer, which is available all over the Web—at www.arancidamoeba.com/ mrr/problemwithmusic.html, for example. For those of you with more-tender sensibilities, here’s Steve’s thesis ina nutshell: The major iabels are as rapacious and cold-blooded as the duo of hungry lizards that stalked the kitchen in Jurassic Park. And now they want us to feel sorry for them, claiming that P2P music sharing is depressing CD sales. You wanna talk “depressing”? How about EDITORS’ PAGE / O7 Sean Molloy CREATED By COMMITTEE ‘What's your opinion of today's popular music? | can honestly say | don't even recognize eight of Billboard's ’s current Top 10 singles, but | know every ‘on there either by reputation or thraugh its—it's more about manufactured Niko Coucouvanis 84z00KA JOE ‘What's your opinion of today’s popular music? Thinking back to the last time I had an opinion of popular music (circa 1980), | bet today's pap would drive me into a homicidal rage, Jake Widman semipoPuLan MECHANIC ‘What's your opinion of today’s popular music? It sucks, of course—as | write this, Mariah Carey has the number one song in the country. But it's always that way: Ten years ago, the Friends theme song was the increasing reliance on a megahyped parade of one skanky shamteuse number one. In 1985, it was Duran Duran. In 1975, after another, rather than steady support for true artists as they develop the Captain and Tennille. Every once in a while something good into mature—and highly profitable—established stars? it’s likely that P2P anaes trout (one eunumber BeuieniG tet eOpen music sharing has, indeed, put a crimp in the major labels’ profits, but so have the sonicrap-stuffed CDs that the majors are pushing. That said, let me quickly point out that illicit downloading of copyrighted material is theft, plain and simple. You can rationalize it all you want, but in your heart you know it’s wrong to steal music. It doesn’t matter whether such theft harms the good, the bad, or the piggishly ugly—theft is theft. What does matter is that the music industry as we know it is doomed. Even if P2P disappeared tomorrow, digital-music downloading has changed everything. The major labels’ chokehold on physical music distribution is being pried loose by digital downloads—and not only by megaplayers such as the iTunes Music Store, but also by a rapidly growing number of independent online music sites such as Bleep (www.bleep.com) that not only encourage creativity among their artists, but give them a fair cut of the online revenue. Just as bloggers are decentralizing news and opinion, small, nimble online music distributors are decentralizing music distribution. | firmly believe that most people don’t want to steal music—but they do want easy access, choice, quality, a fair price, and decent treatment of artists. As independent online music distributors proliferate and word- of-mouth promotes them, both music lovers and musicians will benefit— and that underassistant west-coast promotion man may have to go legit. Enjoy, 72 f comingsocn:november2005 Here's what our editors are preparing for the next issue of MacAddict. Roman Loyola so. our ‘What's your opinion of today’s popular music? Hmm {opens can of Nelly’s Pimp Juice], that’s a good ‘question {rolls up sleeves of Sean John sweatshirt). | enjoy pop music, but it seems to be everywhere [downloading Jessica Simpson desktop theme in background]. | get tired of pop songs easily [adjusts No Doubt beanie] and always fall back to listening to NPR [John Mayer's “Daughters” emanates from cell phone]. Hold on, | gotta take this, Peter Marshutz PLay.isten What's your opinion of today's popular music? Hove today’s music; it sounds great on my iPod at work, Mark Rosenthal mir. oveRLoaeD What's your opinion of today’s popular music? Today's popular music is just too popular—or too populous, rather. Too many bands, too many sounds. It was easier on us simpletons when there were a dozen major bands and a few little ones. At least a few bands bite it each year due to O.D.s, but that doesn't really help much. Lec | : Max DISENFRANCHISED ‘What's your opinion of today’s popular music? You probably shouldn't listan to me; | became bitter and Pome disillusioned with the industry after | lost to that phony Jessica on The Road to Stardom last season. Where does Missy Elliott get off criticizing my fashion sense? We'll show you how to turn your Mac into a superphone in our guide to Mac telephony. We'll also enable you to change how you interact with your Mac by customizing its interface and teach you where to shop for music for your iPod (aside from the iTunes Music Store). We'll also tell you how to brainwash the masses by making your own podcast, exploit your Mac’s singing voice in GarageBand, and use Photoshop to enlarge your photos without making a big, pixelated mess. Also: We review some Mac mint external hard drives, round up some iPod accessories, and tell you whether the Force is with i Aspyr’s Star Wars: Baitlefront. October 2005 MacAddict 07 = “ircticke Ol Clicks well with others AirClick Remote Control for iPod * Control your iPod, iPod mini, or computer from up to 60 feet away 1 + Uses RF signals that travel through walls for remote control use anywhere in the house Airc * Tiny remote attaches to backpack, bike, steering wheel - anywhere for on-the-ge control iTalk iPod Voice Recorder + Internal microphone and laptop quality speaker Connect external $1499 Lapel Mic Multipurpose Stereo Microphone + Passthrough jack for + Self-powered microphone headphones or additional with stereo-quality sound speaker ; + Swivel clip for easy + Connects directly to iTalk, microphone or headphones = Automatic level control for attachment iMic, or PowerWave ve perfect recordings ay y A $35 4 (“s19 f u ite aN Coe P ) gq Made for mi (2) iPod | iTrip i TuneJuice FM Transmitter for iPod Battery Backup for iPod and iPod mini = +The only FM Transmitter + Choose any empty station * Provides up to 8 hours of designed exclusively forthe from 87.7 to 107.9, and additional power to iPod iPod & iPod mini change your iTrip stations + Uses any disposable or Eeawereditromithelpod= directly from the iPod rechargeable 9-volt battery no batteries necessary + Carry emergency iPod + Works with any dockable cs . SPP wherever you go iPod or iPod mini =: learn more at www.griffintechnology.com 52033 iVault Aluminum Case for iPod shuffle + Elegant, protective enclosure for iPod shut Available in Silver, Purple, Blue and R +Four screws ensure that your iPod shi completely secure and only comes out of the iVault when you want it to ‘includes 36" USB cable for connectivity while your iPod shuffle is protected anes | iMic | USB Audio Interface * Adds stereo audio inputs and outputs to any USB equipped Mac or PC | + Includes everything needed to record albums and tapes to make MP3s and CDs +Plug-and-Play simple, no install required SightLight FireWire Light for iSight + Custom-designed Fresnel-based lens | diffuses light to even out shadows | i } amount of ambient room light and adjusts its output accordingly | + Shares the iSight's FireWire connection | | | | + Auto setting automatically senses the { i RoadTrip FM Transmitter, Charger, and Cradle + Power and charge an iPod or iPod mini from any 12-volt cigarette lighter + RoadTrip transmitter module works separately as an FM transmitter for your home computer “Transmits on a full range of frequencies | | from 88.1 to 107.9 } = S Dock400 &Dock800 | Dock Cables for iPod “Take advantage of the FireWire 800 or FireWire 400 port on your computer— | no more unplugging another device to sync your iPod + Charges and syncs your iPod or iPod mini = Connects to iPod or iPod Dock learn more at www.griffintechnology.com time-shift recording + AM/FM radio for your Mac or PC | + Record your favorite programs | while you listen or schedule recordings for later * Easily transfer recordings to iTunes + Pause and resume live radio or scroll back in time and record PowerMate USB Multimedia Controller Knob + Eliminates repetitive keystrokes * Great control for iTunes, iMovie, and GarageBand + Programmable for any application + Now in Brushed Aluminum and Black Invisible Laptop Stand + Keeps laptop cool with maximum air circulation + Raises laptop screen to the perfect | height and creates room on the desktop | for an external keyboard and mouse | i | «Fits all Apple PowerBooks and iBooks LITTLE MACS New iBooks and Mac minis: wortha look even without Intel inside. Apple continues to improve its consumer products, but with Intel around the corner, will anyone be buying? fter Apple’s bombshell Intel announcement back in June (“Change Is Good,” Aug/05, p10), many assumed that Apple would just let its current Power PC— based product line go stale—but that’s not the case, Recently, Apple upgraded the PowerPC-based iBook and Mac mini lines; and while the upgrades aren’t groundbreaking, they’re compelling enough to tempt a lot of current iBook owners. And for waffling Mac mini shoppers, the upgrades could be just what you were waiting for. iBook. The iBook tine shrinks from three stock models to two. The top- of-the-line 14-inch iBook ($1,299; the previous top-of-the-line iBook cost $1,499) is now outfitted with a 1.42GHz G4 processor, up from its predecessor’ 1.33GHz G4. With a 142MHz frontside bus, the 14-inch iBook also comes 10 MacAddict October 2005 with 512MB of RAM (up from 256MB in the previous model); as before, a RAM expansion slot lets you add an additional 1GB of RAM for a maximum of 1.5GB; and as of press time, the additional 1GB of RAM adds $500 to the price. You also get a 4,200-rpm, 60GB ATA-100 hard drive and a single-layer SuperDrive. The 12-inch iBook ($999) now uses a 1.33GHz G4, a change from the 1.2GHz it used to have. It also uses a 133MHz frontside bus and comes with more RAM (512MB) than before—and like the 14-inch iBook, it has an additional RAM slot so you add another gig. The 12-incher also comes with a 4,200-rpm, 40GB ATA-100 hard drive and a combo drive—not a SuperDrive. The graphics subsystem in both *Books has also been upgraded: A 32MB ATI Radeon 9550 replaces the old Radeon 9200. The 9550 is a newer- generation graphics chipset that has one main feature that the 9200 didn’t have-it’s listed as one of the cards that supports Tiger’s Core Image technology (more on this ina moment). Three of the new features that debuted in Apple’s recent PowerBook upgrades (see Reviews, May/05, p38) have found their way into the iBook as well—a new trackpad that lets you scroll documents by dragging two fingers (the more we use it, the more we like it); a Sudden Motion Sensor designed to park your hard-drive heads in the event of a fall or sudden movement, preventing them from banging against the disk platters; and built-in Bluetooth 2.0+EDR (Enhanced Data Rate) support. Mac mini. Apple now offers three stock configurations of the Mac mini instead of two, but the changes to the minis aren’t really a whole lot to shout about; the major change is that the mini now comes with a stock 512MB of RAM (up from 256MB). Since the stock configurations for the Power Mac, iMac, and the high-end eMac (how’s that for a contradiction in terms?) already went Up to 512MB earlier this year, it was only a matter of time before the Mac minis followed suit. Other than the RAM boost, the $499 1,25GHz Mac mini hasn’t changed at all. The $599 1.42GHz Mac mini now comes with AirPort Extreme and Bluetooth 2.0+EDR, but gone is the 56-Kbps modem. (You can customize your order to get the modem, but it’lladd $29 to the price.) The third configuration, priced at $699, is the same as the $599 Mac mini except it has a SuperDrive; the other two configurations come with plain ol’ combo drives. You could have added a SuperDrive for $100 before; Apple’s just made it an off-the-shelf option, Consumer video. The RAM boost across the board is nice—we’ve been arguing that OS X needs 512MB of RAM for a while—but now we've found a new issue to champion: video support. Tiger’s Core Image technology can do amazing things (see “The Future of the Mac: 2005,” Nov/04, p16), but the new Mac minis don’t meet its hardware requirements. When 0S 10.4 (Tiger) sees that the graphics card isn’t compatible with Core Image, either the CPU winds up doing processor is supposed to (resulting ina performance hit), or the graphical effect doesn’t happen at all. For example, the cool ripple that you see when you call up a Tiger Dashboard widget won’t appear on Mac minis. That’s a sacrifice we think you shouldn’t have to make —you should get all of the features of an OS you paid for. It’s only a matter of time before the cost of video chip sets fall and Core Image-compatible video makes it into the Mac mini line. When that happens, we hope that Apple also decides to up the amount of video RAM included; Core Image’s minimum requirement is 32MB of VRAM—and the more VRAM, the better the performance. Why buy? With Intel Macs coming soon—and with the conventional wisdom that Intel chips will first show up in the minis and laptops—wouldn’t it be smarter to wait? Depends. First off, these new iBooks and Mac minis are cheap—at least in computer terms. Of all the new upgrades, only the 14-inch iBook breaks the $1,000 barrier. Plus, there will be plenty of software to use for at least a few years—remember, Apple is providing developers with tools to create universal binaries so apps will run on both Intel- and PowerPC-based Macs. If your current machine is starting to feel underpowered, do you want to live with it until the intel Macs are out? If you’re still not convinced, there’s certainly nothing wrong with waiting until next year. all the work that the graphics Roman Loyola ‘he improbable has It may not look like a happened again: Apple multibutton mouse, but we finally released a multibutton swear it is, mouse. Really. It’s true. And it’s called the Mighty Mouse ($49, www.apple.com). Seriously. No joke. At first glance (or even second glance), the Mighty Mouse looks like a one- button mouse, but there are actuaily two separate touch- sensitive buttons beneath the mouse’s seamless surface. That small dot in the middle? A Scroll Ball that provides 360 degrees of scrolling movement. HERE IT COMES TO SAVE THE DAY You can use the Scroll! Ball to scroll up and down ina document, shift left and right in a timeline, orpan in any direction in Photoshop. The Mighty Mouse also comes with a pair of programmable side buttons. One glaring omission: Bluetooth capability. Currently, only a USB version is available. Look fora full review next month. —Michelle Victoria 4 NEW STUFF > DUAL DOCK iDuo $59.95 www.atechflash.com Available: Now This iPod Dock from Atech Flash Technology pulls double duty as a flash-media reader. It’s compatible with 10 different types of flash media: CompactFlash Type | and Il, Microdrive, MultiMediaCard, xD, SmartMedia, Memory Stick, MagicGate Memory Stick, Memory Stick Pro, and Secure Digital. it’s a’Pod dock! It’s a card reader! Wow! File Edit Controls Visualizer Advanced WindowShade x fills in the features missing from Exposé. v WINDOW DRESSING WindowShade X 4.0 $0 www.uinsanity.com Available: Now The latest update to Unsanity’s window-organizing utility offers even more ways to keep track of your Mac’s windows. You can now assign a hot key to any WindowShade action; WindowShade X 4.0 % Disc also adds support for Spotlight’s search- WindowShagek40 | results windows. Chagall, dogs playing poker, family pics— whatever suits you. > FRAMED! PhotoVu PV1S45 $999 www.photovu.com: Available: Now This 19-inch digital-picture frame uses a wireless connection to display images, slide shows, and even iPhoto albums from your Mac. You controt the PV1945 through a Web browser, and the frame can be customized to match the decor of your room. October 2005 MacAddict 11 | GET INFO ~ the ni the month in bite-size chunks DROOLWORTHY ‘Sexy Stuff We Can’t Wait to Get Our Mitts On Minimalist Storage - Imation’s USB Micro Hard Drive ($159 for 2GB, $189 for 4GB, www.imation -com) uses a Toshiba 0,85-inch hard drive, which currently holds the Guinness World Record for the world’s smallest hard drive. The Micro Hard Drive itself measures 1.61 by 0.66 by 3.3 inches and comes with a USB 2.0 connector. "Pod Your Ride Harman Kardon’s Drive + Play ($199.95, www.harmankardon.com) is an iPod docking system for your car. The mushroom-shaped controller lets you command your ’Pod, while the 4-by-2.5-inch LCD lets you see what tunes you're selecting. Now Playing Playlists IMAGE COURTESY OF HARMAN KAROON 12 MacAddict October 2005 GET INFO yan Worlds is closing the book on its epic adventure saga with Myst V: End of Ages. Picking up years after Myst IV; Revelation, End of Ages reunites you with Yeesha (daughter of Atrus, one of the series’ main characters) and introduces a new character, Esher, an elder of the ancient D’ni people, Myst V will be the first game in the series to be fully 3D, giving you full free-roaming, first-person-shooter- style control mixed with traditional point-and-click interaction. You'll no longer see other characters in live-video cut scenes; instead, the characters will be rendered in 3D, and you'll interact with them within the game itself. The camera and journal system will make a return, but your new best friend will be a small drawing tablet—using the mouse, you'lldraw (PMA otitis symbols that you see in the game onthe Price | TBD tablet to communicate with creatures. Draw Available | September the symbol forwater, forexample, and they'll MOciRUs) www.cyan.com fetch you some water.—Matt Osborn I'M THE GUY WITH THE SWORD > Fable isn’t just about hacking up monsters—it’s also about growing up and growing old. In the magical world of Albion, everything you do has an effect on your appearance, your skills, and how people in the world react to you. Will you follow the path of a warrior and earn the people’s respect? Will you traverse the dark alleys of the thief and strike fear in their hearts? Or are you a goody-two-shoes wizard who just wants to help? You can actlike a chicken to make people laugh, or roar at them to make them cower. Fable: The Lost Chapters the Last Chapters Ps uay can vested is one-third largerthan last year’s Xbox version, Price | TBD to Anaheim? and itadds extra quests, more-detailed graphics Available | TBD 1 He was such a mild- and character expressions, hats, and the ability el MORN | WARCRAFT FEST mannered lad. to import your own tattoo designs.—MO- > Calling all Diablo, Warcraft, Starcraft, and World of Warcraft freaks: 3 Blizzard is throwing + a convention just for youl It’s called BlizzCon (www.blizzcon.com), and it’s going to be held GOOD TIMES IN THE JUNGLE VINES > Unlike other Tycoon-esque games, you don’t build a park or railroad to rake in the dough in Wildlife Tycoon: Venture Africa; instead, you try to build a thriving ecosystem in the Serengeti. Dr. William Willoughby and Miss julia Carrilou guide you (in rhymed verse) through the game from their hot-air balloon. When you complete challenges, you earn Combo Jewels that on October 28 and 29 Wilalie Tyee: you can use to create rain or quicken E e s in Anaheim, California. Venture Africa plant growth. And when your ecosystem The sweet voice of Elton John Attendees will be able goo Price $20 needs a little divine intervention, you whispers in the wind. | to meet the World of ‘Available | November can take direct control of your animals— | Warcraft developers, try Pocketwatch Games just jump into the body of a roaming wildebeest, for example, and | out Blizzard’s newest title, wwwwildlifetycoon.com wander into a pack of hungry lions for instant population control._MO } Starcraft: Ghost (not yet | announced forthe Mac), | compete in tournaments, buy stuff, and more. You ‘Sunday school was never =| DOOM 3 MODS like this. . >» When Aspyr updated Doom 3 to version 1.3, it improved | might even meet some of compatibility with game mods. If you're not interested in | the real faces behind the hunting for them yourself, Macologist (www.macologist | characters on your World ON THE .org) has compiled some of the best mods of Warcraft server. Only » DISC and maps available in the Doom 3 Map 4,400 tickets are available, (Haayep ed Collection and the Doom 3 Mod Collection. and admission costs Boneyard’s Gownward | We've even included a couple samples on | $125—that’s U.S. dollars, SoraDomel__] this month’s Dise.-MO not Azerothian gold.—MO October 2005 MacAddict 13 l4 Z| GET INFO > the news of the month in bite-size chunks INTEL 102 In “Intel 101” (Sep/05, p32), we gave you the lowdown on some of the jargon you'll hear from Apple as it moves into the Intel era—but you didn’t think that was the end of the Intel technobabble, did you? Recently, Mac-rumor Web sites and the mainstream media have been abuzz about a video iPod (shouldn’t that be iPod video?), so you may have heard talk of XScale, another Intel thingamabobber that does some really geeky stuff. Here’s what it’s all about. XSCALE Whatit is: A mobile processor used in PDAs, portable media players, and smartphones. What the Apple equivalent is: Apple actually doesn’t use PowerPC chips in its iPods (that would be one hot lil’ Pod); they use PortalPlayer ARM processors. (Bonus trivia to stump your friends: The iPod shuffle uses SigmaTel’s D-Major STMP 3550.) Why you should care: Speculation is that if Apple does indeed release an iPod video, there could be an XScale processor at its heart. We already know that an XScale can handle video: It’s used in Creative’s Zen Portable Media Center and iriver’s PMC-100 series of multimedia players. (Both are Windows-only devices that can display photos and play video and music.) So it seems logical that XScale could find its way into new ’Pods from an Intel-ified Apple. But keep in mind that this is purely speculation—it’s entirely possible that PortalPlayer or some other semiconductor company could provide Apple with a processor that can keep its cool while providing enough oomph to play your vacation videos.—Roman Loyola GO: MacFixit ‘Troubleshooting Solutions for the Macintosh Bug ofthe Month DISAPPEARING EXTERNAL DISK ver find that one of your external hard drives has spontaneously unmounted? Here are a few things you can do to solve this problem. NEW FIRMWARE Try updating your external hard drive's firmware, which is available from your drive manufacturer’s Web site—or just use VersionTracker’s (www.versiontracker.com) search function to find it. Be sure to back up your data before applying the update, and carefully follow the manufacturer’s instructions. OUT OF iSIGHT If you’re using an iSight camera while you’re using a FireWire drive, the camera may be interfering with the drive’s ability to stay mounted. Try temporarily disconnecting your iSight and moving it to a separate FireWire port. Ifyou have multiple FireWire devices, try using a FireWire hub, such as Belkin’s FireWire 6-Port Hub ($59.99, www.belkin.com) or Kensington’s six-port PocketHub FireWire ($49.99, www.kensington.com). POWER PROBLEM A faulty power adapter could be causing your drive to unmount. Your drive may not be getting enough juice to stay on, causing the drive to turn off and thereby unmounting it from your Mac. Alternately, the power adapter may not be providing a steady amount of power, causing your drive to turn on and off. Try replacing the adapter. If you can’t get a replacement adapter from the hard-drive manufacturer, try your local electronics store. Just make sure the adapter you choose has the same connector and input/output voltage. You can find the input/output voltage on the adapter itself. 14 MacAddict October 2005 ILLUSTRATION BY JAMES F. KRAUSS Belkin’s TuneTalk for iPod ($29.99, www -belkin.com) is an omnidirectional mic for recording directly into your iPod. © Clickwheel 1.1.3 ($11.95, www .clickwheel.net) lets you download digital comics and view them on your iPod. It also supports RSS to help you find comics. * Newer Technology’s 900mAh iPod Replacement Battery ($29.99, www.newertech .com) can be used with the iPod photo and fourth- generation 40GB iPods. Itcomes with tools and installation instructions. ¢PumpPod ($19 to — $49, www.pumppod Your pocket yoga com) is a personal- instructor. Mat training app forthe not included. iPod photo. It shows you how te properly perform exercises through series of pictures displayed on your’Pod. © Digital Lifestyle Outfitters’ TransPod for iPod shuffle ($59.99, www.dlodirect .com) mounts in your cat’s 12-volt socket. It can transmit what's playing on your iPod to any FM radio frequency from 87.9MHz to 107.9MHz. © Tunewear’s Tuneclip ($9.95, www .tunewear.com) is a ree!-shaped headphone-cable winder that clips to your shirt. © Targus’s RemoteTunes Wireless Remote for iPod ($49.99, www.targus .com) is a wireless remote control with a range of 150 feet. © Tivoli Audio’s iSongBook ($329.99, www .tivoliaudio.com) is a portable AM and FM stereo for any iPod or iPod mini. It also comes with a remote control. Ten Technology’s naviPro eX ($49.95, www.tentechnology.com) is a wireless remote control with a built-in iPod stand. There’s also a version forthe iPod mini.—Michelle Victoria KKK MONS JEU/\ SaIlNOSS490V 7 Sddv dod! @ ONTHE 4ypdisc Chickwheal 1.1.3 GETINFO SS ]5 SHAREWARE PICK eee | tea ) ase Save Std ate bee Party Shute | OF THE MONTH ‘echt fe acemy Added Recently Payed “Top 25 Most Played Ay Top Rated PEE vww.mindolacom $15 ‘Ausiobooks Beach Stu Danelt New Age Mippe Sut Wau got your Mac hooked up to your block-rockin’ home eed cee speakers, and iTunes is running x The Heavy seer jo Tha Nees I as a jukebox—now wouldn't it be a coment Mindota cool ifyou could remotely control iTunes from another computer on @ Launch PatioTunes on your iTunes-running © Now you can choose playlists from the your home network? PatioTunes “jukebox” Mac. A window pops up with a URL. pop-up menu. lets you do just that, from any Write it down. eee browser on any computer—even Faveiunes E Sot one running I< > ifelt+} JD Push It | Static-X | Wisconsin Death Trip fy ONTHE | Windows | Besse Amaia —eay Yabo! tows f : : 4 y DISC : thee ee a qa | PalloTunes 1.6 ilies ‘ep tr | Ay Ty = : Tokuda mw | aaa | Lam | | west Of T | cuED aD Windola mC © open a Web browser on your “remote © By clicking on the Artist icon to the controt” Mac (or any other computer on your left of the pop-up menu, you can display network—PCs included) and go to the URL from albums and tracks from a particular artist. step 1. A page opens displaying the PatioTunes You can even control playback and volume control panel. from here. APPLE DEFINES iPOD CASE OF THE MONTH peck Products’ iGuy ($34.95, www.speckproducts.com) transforms your MAC LIMITS trusty fourth-generation iPod into a toy that’ll bring you back to your The days of nebulous .Mac bandwidth childhood, when bendable figures made of rubber and wire provided hours and restrictions are history. Apple has imposed hours of fun. in the seated position, iGuy oSes your ’Pod’s port so you can a 3GB-per-month data-transfer limit Dock it with your Mac. The iGuy on the standard $99.95-per-year .Mac also fits an iPod photo; there’s account, which inciudes 250MB of storage even a version available forthe (divvied up among iDisk, .Mac Mail, and iPod mini.—Michelle Victoria the Web-page hosting service HomePage). Ifyou buy Apple’s 1GB storage upgrade for $49.95 per year, your bandwidth limit increases to 10GB per month. —Roman Loyola Move over, Gumby and Pokey. a custom-n u can submit The Mac madness now knows bounds. October 2005 MacAddict 15 $002 48G019Q joppyoeN OL Turn Your Mac into a lean, mean, aS: a) macht screamin By Dave Hamilton twas just five short years ago that an entry-level iMac came with only 64MB of RAM and a 7GB hard drive. Even running the relatively svelte OS 9, you had to keep an eye on memory use if you had more than one app open at a time—there’sno toom in 64MB for superfluous activities—and you quickly found out that seven gigs wasn’t as huge as it sounded at first. 2Py9eN G00Z 4eq0}90 aw Today, though, the same money will get you an eMac with four times the RAM anda hard disk 11 times the size. With that much machine, there’s not nearly as much incentive to keep excess junk—apps with bloated code, unused files, cluttered caches—off your Mac. And most of the software you run on your Mac (yes, including good ol’ OS X) includes legacy stuff that’s older—and less useful—than some Mac users. Apple has made it possible for all of us to lose sight of such old-school practices as keeping tabs on startup items and deleting outdated files. But keeping a clean machine is stilla good idea—RAM still gets filled up, and even 80GB can quickly get eaten up, MP3 by MP3, video by video. While it may not be possible to get rid of every piece of clutter gumming up your Mac’s works, there are plenty of tweaks you can perform to make both OS X and some of your favorite apps run more efficiently. “Running efficiently” may sound like an outdated concept in a world dominated by powerhouse Macs, but it’s still a goal well worth striving for. Trust us—you’ll notice the difference. The first step to running a cleaner, leaner Mac is analyzing its current performance, Thankfully, with Unix under the hood, Mac OS X has more than enough tools for the task—but don’t worry, we're not going to send you to the Terminal (not yet, anyway—let’s warm up first). Mac OS X’s Activity Monitor utility is a great place to start to get a handle on your system. It’s located in {Applications/Utilities and deserves a place in every performance-oriented Mac addict's Dock. When you run Activity Monitor, it shows you a list of everything running on your Mac—it also shows you how much RAM and what percentage of the CPU each process is using. With this knowledge, you can pinpoint problematic apps. Prevent process buildup. Ideally, you should run Activity Monitor at least once under typical usage conditions before you start having problems—that way, you can get a baseline feel for what’s normally going on inside your Mac (think of it as. a general physical). After you open Activity Monitor, change the Show pull-down menu at the top to All Processes. Then clickon the % CPU column header until the little disclosure triangle points down; this puts the most CPU-intensive applications at the top of the list. Then do the same thing with the Real Memory column. Now you've identified the current biggest resource hogs on your Mac under normal conditions. If (when?) things start to get flaky—unexplained slowdowns, eternally spinning beach balls—you can come back to Activity ane: 12968 What's goin’ on, Mac? The Activity Monitor has the answer. If your Mac seems to slow down at seemingly regular intervals, only to speed back up again after a period of time, then one of your regularly scheduled activities might be causing a significant load in the background. If you’re having intermittent slow-down problems, keep Activity Monitor open, and when your Mac slows 18 MacAddict Oct ta Selene ply coe thet (tse og rut Google any scary Console messages and see what the geeks say about them—sometimes the scary-looking stuff is really justharmless. Monitor and look for unfamiliar processes that might be causing the problem (see “Reduce Startup Items,” p19). While you have Activity Monitor open, you might as well start by making /trun more efficiently. Normally, the application surveys your Mac every second or two. You'll rarely benefit from such frequent checks, so it’s best to slow it down and get it out of your way. If you’re running OS 10.3 (Panther), select Monitor > Update Frequency and set it to Update Less Often (5 Sec). If you’re running OS 10.4 (Tiger), select View > Update Frequency and set it to Less Often (5 Sec). That will keep the activity list fresh without unnecessarily burdening your system. Dust off the Console. Another good place to perform general diagnosis is your Mac’s Console utility, where you can find logs of recent activity. Go back to /Applications/Utilities, and open Console. In Console, select File » Open Console Log from the top menu bar, then select File > Open System Log. You'll see lots of text—some of it unintelligible gobbledygook, but most of it written in language you can easily understand. Everything may look benign, or you may see things that look like screaming, triple-exclamation-mark problems. If your Mac is working fine, these scary messages probably don’t mean much. But if you’re having a problem, peruse the recent entries (which are at the bottom), and if you see something that looks suspicious, copy it and paste it into Safari’s Google search. The first few results should give you an indication as to whether you're seeing something truly bad. Now that you've got a general overview of what your Mac’s doing under normal circumstances, use the following procedures to keep it running smooth and efficiently. down, examine the list for automated processes such as email checking, podcast-subscription updates, RSS-feed updates, and scheduled backups. Switch any you find to manual operation (or change the frequency or timing of the activity in the app’s preferences), and you'll be able to save the slowdowns for more-convenient times. Over the months and years, you've likely installed some stuff on your Mac that you simply don’t need anymore, such as drivers for old third-party mice, outdated scanners, obscure media viewers you needed once, applications you don’t use, and so on. Most of these forgotten items lie dormant until you launch them, so they don’t really affect your performance—they just take up hard-drive space. Some of this stuff, however, installs little startup items that fire up every time you boot your Mac—whether you need them or not. To determine if you have any of these ancient relics running needlessly, next time you restart your Mac, launch Activity Monitor before you launch any other applications. Scroll through the list and see if there’s anything there that you recognize as something you don’t need to have running from startup—an old scanner utility, for example. If it’s on the list, it’s taking up RAM and CPU time, and—if you don’t need it—it’s worth getting rid of. It’s generally best to stay away from processes whose User is Root, though, unless you’re sure they don’t belong to OS X itself. For more information, you can find a short list of background processes at www.westwind.com/reference/ 0S-X/background-processes.html. Quit right. You can quit a process from within Activity Monitor, but that can cause you to lose data, and the process will be back after the next restart anyway. Instead, it’s best to quit the application normally and then either uninstall the offending app or—if you can’t figure out where exactly it lives—at least remove it from the Startup Items list. Launch System Preferences, go to the Accounts pane, select your account from the left-hand list, and click the Login Items tab (if you're using Tiger) or the Startup Items tab (if you’re using Panther), Find the process you want to remove, highlight it, and click the minus sign (in Tiger) or uncheck the box (in Panther) to remove it from your startup. Note that this doesn’t actually delete the application—it simply keeps it from automatically launching at startup. While background pictures can look pretty on your desktop, believe it or not, they've been known to (te slow down a system or two. How come? In order Tages to display that oh-so-sexy photo of Fabio on your desktop, your Mac has to load it into RAM and constantly redraw it around windows as you move them and close them. This can (and will) slow things down, especially if you’re starved for RAM anyway. We’ve gotten good results by removing the desktop picture and replacing it with a solid color. Boring? Yes! Slow? Not a chancel Plus, your friends might actually get envious of your minimalist Solid Kelp—colored background, right? Desktop & Screen Saver E Aopie inages (2 manure (Bi Pans (black & wine (Bi tostract G Solid Colors [Bi Piaures Folcer (Gi Screen effecs [DB choose Foider. [fj veeary : change picture: { every 30 minutes L By setting your desktop to a boring, solid color, you can help tweak your Mac to speed-demon efficiency. Yes, we know what they say: “Mac OS X runs on Unix and Unix never needs to be rebooted.” ‘START, Well, that maxim has an oft-overlooked coda; ne eee ees mos it’s supposed to finish “because Unix is typically ae is rs used on a Server that runs one set of applications ‘Keyboard Maestro Engine Application Sransport Monitor Unknown AMicrosoft AU Daemon Application Eitunestielper Application DioefauitFoiderxec Application sates Application Qsope Application Orca Application Buatsmen Application Dresnewswice Agplication “Tehide an application wher you 19 nick hs Hide check. aoao ae Remove any unneeded login items to make your Mac both start up and run faster. | | ee | forever.” Your Mac, on the other hand, probably isn’t set up that way—you probably treat it just like you would any other desktop computer (how dare you!), opening and closing apps left and right—right? Assuming that’s the case, then hear this: Launching and quitting different apps all the time will eventually begin to bloat your system, despite its protected and virtual memory. You could quit all your apps and let your Mac sit for a few hours to give it time to reorganize its resources on its own, but frankly, we say it’s quicker to just use that Restart command in your Apple menu. We'll let you decide which course of action is best for yourself. October 2005 Macévidict 19 As you save files to your hard disk, it eventually gets full to the point where there won’t be enough space to store all the bits and bytes of a document or application together in one place. That’s OK—without any help from you, your Mac will spread the file around the disk space that is available, breaking it up into as many fragments as necessary. Way back when, the general consensus was that this was a Bad Thing, and we were always told to defragment our hard drives (that is, collect all those fragments and put them back together). In the early versions of OS X, conventional wisdom was that you really didn’t need to defragment your disks—OS X’s Unix underpinnings would work fine without you needing to perform that chore. Well, apparently someone at Apple decided that we should go retro: Both Panther and Tiger defragment key frequently used files as well as highly fragmented files in the background. Obviously, there must be something to be gained from it. In our experience, however, OS X’s defragger may fail on a drive that’s thoroughly chopped up, resulting in 100- percent CPU usage and overall system instability. To keep this from happening, use a third-party utility such as Prosoft Engineering’s Drive Genius ($99, www.prosoftengineering -com) or Micromat’s Tech Tool Pro 4 ($97.97, www.micromat .comm). You’ ll need to boot from the supplied CD to defrag n riite aro DRIVE The Dashboard in Mac OS 10.4 (Tiger) is pretty darn cool, but fora lot of us, that’s about as much as we can say right now. Our guess is that this is yet another technology from Apple that will mature with age and become something we can’t live without. Until then, you can save quite a bit of RAM by disabling it. To do this, you'll have to open up the Terminal (/Applications/ Utilities/Terminal) and type defaults write com.apple -Jashboard mex-disabled -boolean YES and press Return. Then type killall Dock and press Return again. As of OS 10.4.2, the Dashboard icon remains in the Dockand appears active even after you disable it—it’s not really there, though, and ifyou dragit out of the Dock, it just poofs away. Mac OS Xattempts to make your Mac more efficient by saving (or caching) frequently used data to keep it readily available. This is a great idea, and generally caching works quite well. However, like anything, data in the caches can become stale aftera while, causing the 0S to stumble a bit, so clearing your caches out can be agood thing—as long as you're careful. The two main cache folders used by Mac OS Xare /Library/Caches and /username/Library/ 20 MacAcdlict October 2005 @ Defragment {Rocker & 3 Formsi werzosoan 9 uke Idav/aiskisi0 “Total Size 152.545 6B 39% = Maxtor 6 ¥160°0 ‘The Ouke Haxaor 6 y160°0 Lule Church {SiLogle svMLarws0 [ ae ¢ y @ mmr aa OS X's built-in drive utility is a bit bunk. Use a EREOG application such as Prosoft Engineering’s Drive Genius to defragment your hard disks and keep your Mac running smooth. your startup disks, but it’s well worth it. Twice a year should be fine—but back up your files first. a Terminal — typi = 1 6 on console Leone te Oarsin! defavite erite com-opple. dashboard mox-dlsabled -boolean YES KILLott Dock I Use Tiger's Terminal to disable the Dashboard if you're not using it. If you decide you want the Dashboard back at some point, go back to Terminal and type defaults write com .apple.dashboard mecx-disabled -boolean NO and press Return. Then either reboot or type killall Dock and press Return again to restore the Dashboard. If you removed it from the Dock, you’tl have to drag it back in from the Applications folder. (Bovine Qm ey By deleting the contents of Mac OS X’s cache folders, you can help clear out any old or erroneous data from the OS. Caches. Delete the contents of these folders (but not the folders themselves!) and reboot to rebuild them with fresh new data. Unmount the Unused There are times when OS X decides it wants to look at all your drives—when you right-click on a file and choose Open With, for example—even though you know exactly where the file or application you want is located. If you have multiple drives connected to your Mac, they can slow this process way down (especially if those disks have been spun down by Energy Saver). Ifyou eject the extra disks and only mount them when you need them, you can keep your Mac from looking where you don’t need it to and save a lot of seconds—and seconds add up. Free Space Is Bliss Ifyour hard drive gets close to full, OS X will have a hard time finding space to write new data; combine that with the added burden of managing files without much room to work with, and you could find yourself having a super-slow time. In order to make sure OS X fas enough space for Virtual Memory and swap files, we recommend you keep at least 10 percent of your hard drive free, if possible (for example, if you have a 60GB drive, keep at least 6GB available). The most obvious way to do this is to delete unused applications and files. Bear in mind that most data files don’t take up much space, so clearing out last year’s Word documents probably won’t net you much. Today’s major space hogs are usually MP3s, photos, videos, and outdated (or unused) applications. It’s a good idea to do housecleaning in your Music, Movies, Pictures, and Applications folders on a regular basis. To find the real space hogs quickly, open up a Finder window, choose Find from the File menu, and search for any files whose Size is Greater Than 100MB. It’s easy to scroll through the resulting list and decide what you do and don’t need without getting lost in a sea of harmless tiny files. There are other folders whose contents might be large = STE (2 eackups BB bave's 15° Powers... |] [ iB besten Q on Tres tus @ nerwore EEA une caren fl moe ate ‘OmniDiskSwee. kes to look for files on ail you’re not using to keep 0S X focused at hand. onthe enough and unnecessary enough to warrant deletion (with caution!). Check out the following: § /Library/Application Support Look in here for folders and files belonging to unused applications. As long as you know what app they belong to—and that you'll never use those apps again—feel free to delete them. @ /Library/Printers Here you'll find drivers for tons of assorted printers, most of which you’il never see. Feel free to delete with care. i /Library/Documentation Help files are stored here. If you know everything there is to know, toss ’’em. (Then again, if you know everything, why are you reading this?) ll /Library/Startupltems Contained herein are apps and utilities that launch when your Mac boots, If you see something here that you're certain you don’t need, axe it—but again, be certain! i /Library/Packages If System Preferences » Software Update is set to download updates automatically or you use Update > Install And Keep Package when you run Software Update, this is where you'll find the downloads. Once you’ve installed your updates and are sure you won’t need them again, go ahead and clear them out. (GDad_Monkey-640_Fullmov Lucas_Walks Full. Sound? mov Lucas.Walks Full.mov Pink Floyd ~ Live 8.a¥1 “Trailer Park Boys ~ 305 closer to the heart.mpg BL Account Sereings (Damaged) B cipoz B aipos arch command to locate large files on your you need to keep them or not. @ Software Update UNG Edit Window Help omnes ignore Update... Download Only New sol ti if you'r not ‘AirPort 4.2 fixes connection problems and resolves security issues with WPA2 ‘wireless networks. lL And Keep Pai ate menu, you'll find the downloaded package in /Library/ en afterit’s been installed. Destroy it! October 2005 Mac: BOSS \ Bus Management mm No, we're not talking about the first week of school BUS), when you can’t find your child. Your Mac sports several | different types of busses (input/output chains): FireWire, USB, ATA, and Serial ATA are just a few examples. Each bus has a maximum throughput—that is, the rate at which it can transfer data—and by cleverly managing devices and the busses to which they connect, you can actually gain quite a performance boost with certain operations. Say, for example, that you’ve connected a FireWire drive to your Mac for the sole purpose of storing your massive music library. Ifyou hook up your iPod using the same FireWire bus as the external drive, the devices can’t just send the data Private Spotlight Spotlight can be a fantastic timesaver, and it’s one of Tiger’s most touted (and least understood) features. Sure, searching for files is great, but Spotlight can do more than that. For example, you can use Spotlight to launch applications without taking your hands off the keyboard. Just press Command-spacebar (or whatever you’ve configured as the Spotlight Menu keyboard shortcut) and start typing the name of the app you want to launch. When it shows up in the list (almost immediately, in other words), navigate to it using the arrow keys, press Enter, and directly from one to the other: Your Mac has to read the music data from the hard drive and then write it out to the iPod. Doing this overa single bus limits the amount of data that can be transferred at a given time. A smarter solution? Connect your iPod to your Mac’s USB 2.0 port and let your Mac read over FireWire and write over USB 2.0. That way you won’t be doubling up on the same bus. You can use this trick with many different devices. USB still cameras and FireWire-based video cameras take up bus bandwidth when transferring their contents back and forth to and from your Mac. By having that data copied to a device ona different bus, you keep things running as efficiently as possible. you’re good to go. This can be especially helpful if you’ve got applications buried deep within your Applications folder. Spotlight can really slow your system down, though, when it does its regular indexing of your drives and files. If you have external drives connected to your Mac that you know you’ll never search, you can use Spotlight’s Privacy controls to keep Spotlight from wasting time on them. Simply go to the Spotlight pane in System Preferences, click the Privacy tab, and drag in the drives and folders you don’t wish Spotlight to index, 4 © Wed 4:14 PM (9) sim =| Show All (3021) Top Hit _ SimpleTextimportFilter.fram... @ SimpleText System Preferences §§ Accounts FinalCutPro-ms2 FinalCutPro-ms1 PocketMacPSP-ms4 Documents Folders Simple - Vertical Thumbnails Simple Simple - Horizontal Thumbnails Images 4 simsO1.Jpg G&S Sims1.tif PDF Documents MacOSX_Bonjour_TB.pdf <>] { Show ait} Spotlight ) Spotlight helps you quickly fing things on your computer. Spotlight is RaBF cated at the top right comer of the screan. Prevent Spotlight rom searching these locations: ‘lick the Ad button o raga folder or dsk note ist below. El The Duke pes WB spotlight menu keyboard shortcut: |M Space ja @ spotlight window keyboard shortcut: [9% Space 4 Music _|@ Simple Cabasa 01.aif ips, you can use Spotlight to launch nt indexed to Spotlight’s s (and your) time Sure, you can take care of a lot of the tasks we’ve suggested manually or from the Terminal, but Mac fix- it gurus have written useful applications to do most of those chores for you. Consider adding the following jes to your cleaning kit: Cocktail We've said it before, and we'll say it again: Cocktail ($14.95, www.macosxcocktail.com) is simply one of the most useful maintenance utilities ever created for OS X. It'll clean your caches, run maintenance scripts, rebuild your permissions, update all your system databases, and reboot your Mac, leaving it ready and waiting for your next command. Just go get it. OmniDiskSweeper OmniDiskSweeper ($14.92, www -omnigroup.com) does something very simple but extremely useful: It scours your drive and sorts everything by size. Once it’s done (it takes between 5 and 30 minutes, depending on the size of your drive), you can easily traipse through your directory structure and see exactly what’s @ Clean caches ‘Automatically: (Restart) Last run on Sunday ine 5, 2005 11:59:22 PM @ Run cron scripts & Delete all rotated log files @ Repair disk permissions Run selected tasks ations) using up all your valuable disk space. MenuMeters This utility (free, www.ragingmenace -com) lets you put miniature reports and graphs in your Mac’s menu bar, showing you CPU usage, RAM usage, disk activity, and network traffic. Used properly (that is, without obsession), it can really help you keep an eye on what your Mac is doing. Tidy Up Flexible and fast, Tidy Up ($30, www .hyperboiicsoftware.com) lets you search for files that meet a wide range of criteria or that share features in common. It also gives you several choices of what to do with them. For example: Look through your Music folder for all files with the same name, extension, and running time, and delete all copies but one. Cocktail’s Pilot lets you automate a series of maintenance tasks for your Mac. Click one button, and it handles all the rest. jave Hamilton polishes his G5 every day and keeps it on a rict regimen of daily exercise and Mega Mac multivitamins. Use OmniDiskSweeper to take the guesswork out of finding ‘space hogs on your drive. October 2005 MacAddict 23 PHOTOGRAPH: DIGITAL VISION October 2005 Macddidict 25 (( (omy RE, | fail ven without a font manager, the first step to ending font frustration is to organize your fonts logically (which, in turn, will also make it easier to use any font utility you end up trying). Begin by creating a single folder (called something like All My Fonts) on your hard disk. Within this folder, create a set of subfolders for grouping your fonts. For example, you can organize fonts alphabetically into folders named A-F Fonts, G-L Fonts, and so on. Or you can group them by appearance, with folders called Serif Fonts, Script Fonts, and the like. Note that if you decide to use a font manager (see “Call In an Expert,” p28), not all of them maintain your folder structure, and those that do may require some planning. Once you’ve set up your personal folder hierarchy, move all of your fonts—with the exceptions noted in the next paragraph— into the appropriate folder. (To find all of the places fonts might be hiding, see “Where the #$*! Are My Fonts?”, p27). That way you can keep track of how many copies of each font you have (ideally, just one) and know where they are when you need them. To use a font, just move it into one of the appropriate folders listed in “Where the #$*! Are My Fonts?” on page 27. Your Mac requires certain fonts for normal system operation, and removing them can cause applications to behave POSTSCRIPT TYPE 1 This is the granddaddy of digital fonts and the format most commonly used by creative pros. Every PostScript font includes two files—a screen font and a printer font—and both files must be in the same folder for the font to work correctly. The printer font usually has no filename extension, but the screen font often has a .scr or .bmap extension. Asingle TrueType font file (often identified by a .ttf extension) stores both the onscreen and printer versions of a font. TrueType fonts are supported by most printers and are common in home and office environments, though not widely used in professional publishing. TrueType fonts are available in Macintosh- and Windows-specific formats; Mac OS X supports both. OPENTYPE This is the newest kid on the block. Like TrueType fonts, OpenType fonts (identified by a .otf extension) are ‘October 2005 FORMAT FREAK-OUT Mac OS X support all major font formats, so chances are that most fonts you’ve used in the past (as well as any new ones) will work just fine. Heve’s a quick rundown of the supported font formats: erratically. Make sure you leave a copy of the following fonts in /System/Library/Fonts: AquaKanaBold.otf, AquaKanaRegular .otf, Geneva.dfont, Keyboard.dfont, LastResort.dfont, Lucida Grande.dfont, and Monaco.dfont. If you use a non-Roman language as your system language, you also need to keep other fonts in their places: Hiragino Kaku Gothic Pro W3 and W6, Hiragino Mincho Pro, Osaka, and Osaka Mono for Japanese; LiHei Pro, Apple LiGothic Medium, and Hei for Traditional Chinese; STXiHei and STHeiti for Simplified Chinese; Apple Gothic Regular for Korean; and Geeza Pro and Geeza Pro Bold for Arabic. If you use Classic mode, don’t remove any of the following fonts from the Classic fonts folder (/System Folder/ Fonts): Charcoal, Chicago, Geneva, and Monaco. While we’re on the topic of required fonts, some OS X applications, including Mail, iCal, and TextEdit, require an active version of Helvetica and Helvetica Neue. Similarly, installing Adobe graphics applications—either the standalone versions or the complete Creative Suite—puts a folder named Reqrd in the Adobe fonts folder (/Library/Application Support/Adobe/Fonts/ Reqrd). if you move any of these fonts, keep copies ina folder that’s always available, or keep them permanently activated using a font manager. contained in a single file, and they’re cross-platform compatible. Even better, they can include up to 65,000 characters, a significant advantage over 256-character PostScript fonts. OS X introduced Dfonts (Datafork TrueType fonts, often identified by a .dfont extension), a format used only by Apple and not recommended for professional publishing. Some Dfonts that come with OS X use the same name as existing PostScript fonts—for example, Courier, Futura, GillSans, Helvetica, Optima, and Times—and you should remove duplicates. MULTIPLE MASTER The multiple-master font format is a variation of the PostScript Type 1 format that can include multiple weights, widths, sizes, and styles. Adobe has discontinued the multiple-master font format (except in two instances for use with Acrobat), so these fonts’ days are numbered. WHERE THE #$*! ARE MY FONTS? In the good old days, all fonts were stored in the same place. This led to huge System files and Fonts folders, but at least it was simple. Mac OS X lets you store fonts in any of several folders, but with this flexibility comes complexity. To add to the confusion, many commercial applications, including Microsoft Word and Adobe graphics apps, often install fonts of their ‘own without your knowing. So take some time to learn where font files can be stored, because a font’s location determines which users and applications can access it. Fonts can be in any of the six locations described below, depending on how they were installed. (Ifyou have OS 10.2 or later, you can also store fonts in subfolders within any of the listed font folders.) When OS X wants to activate—a fancy term for “load” or “turn on”—a font, it starts looking in an application’s Fonts folder and proceeds folder-by-folder down the list. FONT LOCATION PATH ACCESSIBILITY PROGRAM-SPECIFIC _/Library/Application Support/application/Fonts Fonts stored in these folders are available only to the applications (or suites of apps, FONT FOLDERS or /Applications/applicetion/Fonts ina case like the Adobe CS suite) they're stored with. USER FONTS (/Users/username/Library/Fonts Fonts in this folder are available only to the named user. Put your fonts here if you're the sole user cf your Mac and you don’t run Classic mode. ‘LOCAL FONTS: /Library/Fonts Fonts in this folder are available to all users of your Mac; however, administrator access is required to change the contents. Put the fonts you want all users to share in this folder. NETWORK FONTS /Network/Library/Fonts Allfonts in a Network fonts folder are available to all users on the Mac’s local network ‘with proper sharing privileges. ‘SYSTEM FONTS: /System/Library/Fonts Mac OS X uses the fonts in this folder for menus, diaiogs, and icons. The fonts are available to all users and applications with the exception of Classic-mode apps. CLASSIC FONTS: /System Folder/Fonts Fonts stored in this folder are available to both Classic and Mac OS X apps, but FONT FACTS FONT MANAGEMENT IN MAC OS X (www.apple.com/pro/training/fonts) This Apple Web site includes QuickTime movies, tips, and step-by-step instructions for working with fonts in Mac OSX, as well as detailed information about how to use Font Book. USING AND MANAGING FONTS IN MAC OS X: A GUIDE FOR CREATIVE PROFESSIONALS (www.apple.com/pro/archive/creative/fonts) Download this PDF, which covers best practices for font management and includes several informative appendices. MAC OS X: FONT LOCATIONS AND THEIR PURPOSES (http://docs.infor.apple.com/article.html?arinum =106417) This Apple Support document explains how to install fonts in Mac OS X, where fonts are stored, and how fonts are loaded. FONTS IN MAC OS X (http://download.info.apple.com/Apple_Support_Area/manuals/ mac_os/Panther_Fonts_TB_10082003.pdf) This PDF from the fine folks at Apple contains information about Font Book and other font-related system utilities, including the Font panel, the Character palette, and the Typography panel. Classic can use oniy the fonts in this folder. For more information about how fonts work and how to manage them, check out some of the following resources: FONTS & FONT BOOK (www.apple.com/support/tiger/fontbook) Find links to basic Font Book documentation, top support articles for Font Book, and information about using fonts with Mac OS 10.4 (Tiger). FONT MANAGEMENT IN MAC OS X: BEST PRACTICES GUIDE (hitp://dl.extensis.com/downloads/SC/EN/P/Fonts_Best_ Practices_in_OSX.pdf) This PDF explains where OS X stores system fonts, how to clean up and organize your font library, and techniques to troubleshoot font problems. FONT MANAGEMENT IN OS X FOR GRAPHIC ARTISTS (http://ideastraining.com/PDFs/OSX_FontManagement.pdf) \f you need basic information about working with fonts in OS X, turn to this bare-bones PDF. TROUBLESHOOT FONT PROBLEMS (MAC OS X) (www.adobe.com/support/techdocs/327791.html) This Adobe document contains information about installing, using, and resolving problems with fonts in Adobe applications. ‘Octaber 2005 Mac: 27 s you might guess, moving fonts in and out of the many different OS X Fonts folders is a difficult and inefficient way to deal with fonts. When you’re working with fonts as files at the Finder level, it’s easy to get confused about everything from what Frutiger looks like and whether you have the Frutiger- ExtraBlackCondensed font to why you have five Times folders and why some fonts won't show up in Classic applications. When you’re tired of wrangling with puzzles such as these, you need a font manager—an application that shows you which fonts you have and what they look like, turns fonts on and off, and often lets you group fonts in various ways. Depending on your needs, you can use the font manager that ships with OS X (Font Book) or purchase a third-party application. The font manager you choose depends largely on and off, these basic tools will do the job. FONT BOOK Located in your Applications folder, Font Book offers a clean interface that lets you create font collections (or sets) for specific purposes, view a character map, see customized font previews, locate font files on your hard drive, specify that selected fonts activate with specific applications, and view some font details. Although Font Book doesn’t offer automatic font activation on its own, you can set this up with Tiger’s Automator (though you're on your own with that one). a Rebert Autiny 9 Sone | Mictiel Autos, 3) Apple's Font Book can mond show you a fontin iim __ eS customizable text. Font Tools includes tools for converting measurements, calculating proportions, sampling color values, and grabbing screen captures. Within the disjointed interface, you'll find a surprising number of features for the price, including the ability to search, view by class and type, preview with custom page ‘October 2005 BASIC FONT MANAGERS If you just need something to list all your fonts, preview them, and turn them on how many fonts you’re dealing with on a daily basis. If you've just got the 20 or so fonts that ship with OS X, then no problem—just keep them all active all the time. If you have the 500 or 800 font files a graphic designer typically has, you need help. And if you have the more than 10,000 font files a service bureau has (many of which are different versions of the same font), you need serious assistance. All the following font managers provide some capabilities for searching for specific fonts, activating and deactivating fonts, previewing fonts, and viewing a character map. The advanced font managers provide, among other features, both system-level and application-specific automatic font activation. This means that, for example, when you open a document in QuarkXPress that uses 26 fonts, they are all activated automatically, and you never see a Missing Fonts alert. e men Fonte 2 eee and type color, and print a type book. You also get a preview slide Sent Fonts San Serif Fonts show with customizable text and a [stelle unique tool for measuring a font’s Modern Fonts eee aie ascent, descent, and leading. Handwriting Fonts Thematle Fonts n Holiday Fonts Font Tools lets you choose which eo Fonts _ Grunge Fonts fonts to display in its font list. MASTERJUGGLER ($ MasterJuggler provides font sets, temporary activation, customizable previews, activation for Classic apps, Font Guardian for rooting out corrupt fonts, detailed font information (including version number, foundry, and copyright info), and a menu in the Dock for quick font activation. Although it’s fast and easy to use, Masterjuggler simply doesn’t offer the power you can get from the advanced products for just $10 more. [ia teow m «]| Masterjuggler Gy = i a ee Boo Py f tn fons fea sont | details, maps, eee a iS fan | {Tonsoury i rt _seoe_) and more. ADVANCED FONT MANAGERS Advanced font-management applications take things further by automatically activating fonts as you open documents, providing tools for managing fonts in the various Fonts folders (including getting them out of there) and handling font corruptions. They also all offer font- management tools for workgroups—an attractive incentive if you’re in print publishing. FONTAGENT PRO ftware.com) Always up-to-date and stable, FontAgent Pro offers superior corruption checking and repair along with quick, system-wide automatic font activation. Unfortunately, its auto-activation is based on nothing but font name—it simply activates the first version of Minion, for example, that it finds. That doesn’t cut it if you're in professional print publishing (especially if you receive a variety of fonts from different sources). Also, FontAgent Pro doesn’t deactivate fonts when you close documents, nor does it offer temporary font activation. ee] 7 as | FontAgent Y | Promakes s | iteasy to find the © | font you After Extensis acquired the developer of Font Reserve a couple years back, this manager has been somewhat of a lame duck. But Font Reserve still offers the best in automatic font activation for professional publishing. Its exclusive Font Sense technology uses plug-ins to imprint QuarkXPress, InDesign, and Illustrator files with specific information about the fonts in a document. The plug-ins then automatically activate precisely the right fonts as you open documents, guaranteeing absolute font fidelity. The font database is sometimes buggy, however, and there’s no font player for quickly comparing custom text in different fonts. c_ = nn Kind ~ "Raa Cass PSS seat | The Font Reserve Browser shows a wealth of font information. SUITCASE X The old standby of font managers, especially after the demise of ATM Deluxe, Suitcase received a major facelift for Mac OS X. It now features an awesome font player that lets you preview any text in a variety of fonts on demand. Suitcase also offers solid auto-activation for publishing applications through plug-ins, but based on Apple’s FontSync technology for font identification. While fine for most uses, FontSync doesn’t offer the precision a print-production department may require. Keywords can help, however, allowing users to label fonts with client and job names. PREVIEW TTT PREVI EW | Suitcase Xis renowned for its Preview J font ptayer. NEXT-GENERATION FONT MANAGERS ost people have a love/hate relationship with Suitcase and Font Reserve—they either love Suitcase and hate Font Reserve or vice versa. So when Extensis (developer of Suitcase) acquired DiamondSoft (developer of Font Reserve) in june 2003, it struck fear in the hearts of users who were dedicated to one or the other. Rumors flew about the demise of Font Reserve, the underdog with a loyal following and a strong grip on the font-server market. Martin Stein, director of product management for Extensis, has tried to reassure anxious fontsters by announcing Suitcase and Font Reserve will marry in early 2006. “We are close to releasing a unified font manager—our next- generation font manager,” says Stein. “Suitcase, which is the market leader, and Font Reserve, which is number two in the market, will merge into a new font-manager product. “Feature-wise, the product will maintain the user interface—including the wonderful preview pane—from Suitcase, along with the deep technologies of Font Reserve, such as the managed Vault and font-identification technologies based on Font Sense. This will unify the best-of- breed products.” Although Extensis has not announced the cost or upgrade options, Stein assures us that it’s safe to buy whatever product you want—Suitcase X or Font Reserve—today. “The new product will be in the same price range, and there will bean easy, smooth transition to the new product. We'll take care of all our customers,” John Cruise has amassed a huge arsenal of fonts over the past 20 years while writing books and articles about desktop publishing and graphic design. He'd like to say that because he practices what he preaches about font management, he never has any font-related problems, but he'd by lying. Kelly Kordes Anton has been writing about and wrestling with font managers for eight years. Her favorite T-shirt (from Linotype) says, “Heivetica is not an Adobe font.” October 2005 Mac: 29 Plus==no interest»no MacMall is the #1 Apple Direct Reseller! a, we NEW! Mac: mini eMac. G4 Power Mac: Ss PowerBook: G4 iMac. G5 starting at 94!) starting at $7! 94! starting at starting at 1494! starting at’ 94! FREEShipping? —FREES12MB premtumRAM! FREE 1GB premiumRAM" FREE 1B premium RAM! FREE 512MB premium RAM!" FREE Shipping! FREE Shipping?’ FREE Shipping!’ FREE Shipping! aK; i i i o ers Virtual PC 7.0 with FREE Training DVD! Save $500! Creative Suite 2 NEW! 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Call MacMall now at Mac 1 Pe 800-965 -3 v) 82 Visit us at macmall.com for more Mac solutions. [Field Guide to |FILETYPES| Extension Universit By Robert Strohmeyer rom videos and music to presentations and graphics, the Web is awash with unfamiliar files. Email, too, can bring mysterious documents to your desktop—files with exotic extensions like | .exe and .wmv. Do you know what those three letters mean? Or, even more importantly, do you know | what to do with the files they denote? With this guide to file types, you can be sure you’ll know your | .asf from your elbow. | BUSINESS DOCUMENTS | Business documents come in a myriad of forms, and always the best editor for every type of file. Here are some Microsoft Office hand\es most of them automatically. But fairly common file types, along with the best applications to waiting for Word to load can slow you down, and it isn’t handle them. EXTENSION OPEN WITH WHAT YOU’RE LIKELY TO FIND SF does: | Merit ES @ .inda \"tobeinpesen Aprfessionally designed document, such asa magazine page or | @v -pdf Pre lee Acetone Acatfuly formatted document that's designed to appear exactly te [ | @v sPpt _| Microsoft PowerPoint (MUS or aaa) sound. Soncsiaseuateenrs | ) @ .rtf | TextEdit, Microsoft Word Istands fer Rich Text Format, 80 mostly text with minor formatting, | | Bi voxt | texte | Sines docoent with itlformating en Resitetistaccone | | EXECUTABLE AND SYSTEM FILES Applications and utilities are easy to identify by theirfile special third-party software to run on your Mac. Here are a | extensions and icons, but non-0S X application files require couple common executable files you might run into. | my EXTENSION —OPEN WITH WHAT YOU'RE LIKELY TO FIND vv ,app Self-opening An application or utility that runs on its own. | | BD exe | Lismore Guest Pc, microsoft virtual Pc Windows appl atten ple amen ue gu your Mad (eu. ton bad) a COMPRESSED FILES | Sending large files, or even folders full of large files, via email the most common compression types you'll run across as you is a whole lot easier if you can compress them a little. Here are traverse the great expanse of the Internet. EXTENSION OPEN WITH WHAT IT IS. Called Binhex, the HQX file format is farless common today than it was a few years ago, but | | @ shqx _| Stuffit expander you're still likely to find Binhex files available for download on some Web sites. . This is the native compression format for Stuffit. It’s rarer now that OS X handles ZIP files | @ «Sit Stuffit Expander natively without a Windows emulator. | - Now that BSD Unixis part of 05 X, you often see .tar (or tar, tar.gz, or tar.zip) on download | @ star Stufflt Expander sites. Stuffit handles these easily, but you can also use Terminal if you're feeling adventurous. | | ) 7 Originally designed for the PC’s DOS operating system, the ZIP format is the most common | @v «zip Stuffit Expander, OS % | type of compression today. OSX has built-in support for zipping and unzipping files. 32 MacAddict October 2005 | GRAPHICS While .jpg is the most common extension you see these days, it isn’t always the best format for every purpose, Image formats EXTENSION OPEN WITH fall into two categories: lossless and lossy, depending on how much of the original image data is lost in compression. WHAT YOU'RE LIKELY TO FIND @ eps Photoshop, Illustrator Avery arge file that will only print properly on a PostScript printer. It stands for Encapsulated PostScript. PD .gif Preview, iPhoto, Photoshop Asimple color graphic. A GIF is limited to 256 colors, so it’s a poor choice for photos. @ png Preview, iPhoto, Photoshop creating smooth transparent images. Kd «psd Preview, iPhoto, Photoshop ‘file native to Adobe Photoshop. PSD files can include application-specific information, such as layers, that takes advantage of Photoshop's powerful editing features. Quickly replacing GIF as the de facto standard for Web graphics, PNG does a better job | @ xiff Preview, iPhoto, Photoshop Sometimes seen as .tif. An uncompressed (and, as a result, very large) image file. Some | older Web browsers can’t open these files. VIDEO Between your broadband connection and your digital camcorder, you've probably got a few hundred movie files scattered around your hard drive by now. But unless you’ve downloaded some third-party video software, not all of them will open automatically on your Mac. Here’s how to deal with the most-common movie files, EXTENSION @ .asf OPEN WITH Windows Media Player WHAT YOU'RE LIKELY TO FIND treaming-video file in Microsoft's Advanced Streaming Format; not especially Mac friendly. QuickTime (some) A fairly small or low-resolution video. This format has been all but replaced by WMV. QuickTime Avideo file in the standard Mac QuickTime format. Vv amMpg QuickTime Avideo file in the most-common cross-platform-compatible format availabie, vw rm RealPlayer Afile that the proprietary RealPlayer uses to stream video. @v «WMV | Windows Media Player Avideo in one of several Windows-compatible formats. AUDIO EXTENSION @ .aac The overwhelming popularity of the iPod, iTunes, and the iTunes Music Store has managed to make your Mac the best music OPEN WITH iTunes player on Earth. Still, you'll come across some files that iTunes won’t know what to do with. WHAT YOU'RE LIKELY TO FIND A compressed music file with audio quality equivalent to, if not better than, MP3. @ .aiff QuickTime, iTunes ACD-quality audio file or system sound file, BV .m4p iTunes Amusic file bought from the iTunes Music Store that’s not likely to play on other portable music players. @ .midi QuickTime, GarageBand ‘Amusic file that often sounds like a cheesy Casio synthesizer from the 80s, or maybe a ring tone fora cheap cell phone. MIDI files are also a way of getting music into GarageBand. Amusic file that'll play on just about anything—but may not sound so great if encoded ata @B «mp3 | tres low bit rate, since MP3 is a lossy format. Bi .0gg | rion TRG eC acta rea ANGE Ene Soe a @v ra RealPlayer Afile that RealPlayer uses to stream audio. @v swav | QuickTime Avery large music file or an ald Windows system-sound file. vv «Wimai | Windows Media Player Microsoft wishes this were the only audio format in this table. October 2005 MacAddict 33 The switch is Everyone is moving to FontAgent Pro.. eae (866) 366.8778 (520) 229.1212 WWW. “FontAgent Prois a revolutionary product that has provided consistent success for my customers where other font management products have failed!” SamLitt Author of the Mac OS X Bible, Tiger Edition “Surpasses the others...” Andrew Shalat InDesign Magazine, June/July 2005 “Because of the ease of use and powerful feature set, FontAgent Pro is the “designers” font manager. | give FAP a 5/5 for sucha useful and easy to use product that makes our font headaches go away for good.’ Colin Smith, Photoshop Café “FontAgent Pro is so simple and straightforward in its design that we now plan to extend the move to OS X and run FontAgent Pro on all our Macs.” F, Hersperger, Vice-Director ECAV School of Art and Design “We switched our twenty-plus Macs to FontAgent Pro in less than a day. The next day our font problems had all but disappeared’ David Xenakis, President, XRX, Inc. Publisher of Knitter's Magazine & Knitter's Books “FontAgent Pro is simply the BEST font management tool I've found for Mac OS X” Ted Padova, Author of Adobe Acrobat PDF Bible Co-author of Adobe Creative Suite Bible “It is nice to see a company that is responsive to the ever-changing needs of Mac users, especially when it comes to almost yearly system updates.” Mark Lamhut, Paul-Mark Printing “Nothing compares to FontAgent Pro in speed, accuracy and reliability. It is the best" Chuck Sholdt, Vice President, Weather Central “My users LOVE FontAgent Pro! It resolved our stability issues, made production go more smoothly and made opening, closing, and saving files faster.” Scott McCarty, Cape Gazette “FontAgent Pro is a far superior product for font management.” Eric O'Connell, Apple Consultants Network “FontAgent Pro from Insider Software aims to be the most comprehensively useful font management tool a designer can have... tt proved to be every bit as good as it was billed” Keith Martin, MacUser 2005 Isn't it time you switched to the world’s best Macintosh font manager? PHOTOGRAPH BY SAMANTHA BERS Mac OS X or late ‘Compatible with Mac OS 9 or earlier. le Pack action-strategy game 8D-modeling software 54 iTop iPod button relocator 44 magicolor 2430 DL color /aser printer talos 0. MedliaP’ media catalog WPcamers jotosmart 385 p The Sims 2 ADDICTIVE LIFE-SIMULATION GAME Sims now have wants and fears, which affect their aspiration meters. Fulfill their wants and avoid their fears—unless you're cruel. he Sims 2 builds on the habit- forming quality of the original game and takes it to a new level of realism— and yes, addiction. In The Sims 2, it’s still your job to micromanage the daily lives of virtual families you create. You make sure they eat, take baths, get enough sleep, and make it to work, but there’s a new twist: You also assign your Sims aspirations (knowledge, money, or family, for example) that determine specific goals. Performing certain tasks (such as gaining a logic skill point or becoming friends with a certain neighbor) keeps your Sim’s aspiration meter high and your Sim happy. You also earn points that let you buy crazy items such as money trees or life-extending potions. Gettin’ old. Another big addition is that this time around, your Sims age. There are different stages of life: baby, toddler, child, teen, adult, and elder. Sims get fat if they don’t work out, and hair turns gray when they become elders. Female Sims even get pregnant (and grow bellies) before they give birth. Warning: You might want to shield children’s eyes when a Sim couple conceives—unless you’re ready for “the talk.” Every aspect of gameplay is alittle more detailed than in the original. Faces are highly customizable now—you can even shape your Sims’ cheekbones and pick their hairdos. Instead of simply commanding your Sim to make dinner, you pick what to eat. (The variety and quality of meals improves depending on your Sim’s cooking skill.) Sims only have to work five days a week now, rather than every day like before. They get vacation days and can callin sick to work—they even get a pension when they retire. And at random moments, certain work dilemmas pop up onscreen— how you handle the situation can gain (or tose) your Sims skill points and money. The details. The game’s graphics are much more detailed than before—you can actually see the bubbles ina bath or what Sims are watching on TV. Plus, the ability to customize your Sims is greatly enhanced. From the shape of the nose to the curve of the mouth, there are lots of choices when designing the look of your Sim. And there are tons more options for building your abode—you add foundations, decks, and funky angles. One disappointment: The Sims 2 doesn’t have a notably larger catalog of furniture than the original. Plus, if you've gotten used to the bonus goodies in the ofiginal game’s six expansion packs, you may be disappointed with the lack of cats, dogs, and other add-on fodder—prepare to buy a bunch of expansions again some day. Also, performance is only so-so. On our dual 1.25GHz G4, the game ran sluggishly and tended to freeze up fora few seconds on certain occasions. The bottom line. Between making babies, working, changing diapers, studying, exercising, and cooking mac and cheese, it’s easy to get caught up ina Sim life. Now, how can we pry ourselves away to live our real lives? -Cathy Lu i COMPANY: Aspyr REQUIREMENTS: 1.25GHz G4, Nac OS MacAddict RATED + CONTACT: 512-708-8100, 10.3.8 or later, 256MB RAM, 3GB disk space, WwwW.aspyr.com, ‘32MB Radeon 9000 or GeForce FX5200 video ° © iS} © 16) PRICE: $49.99 card, DVD drive GREAT 36 MacAddict October 2005 REVIEWS PictureMate Deluxe Viewer Edition Photosmart 385 VERSATILE PHOTO PRINTERS 0 longer satisfied with sounding the death knell of the Fotomat, desktop photo printers are now trying to make your Mac an optional accessory. With enormous built-in displays, memory- card slots aplenty, and a host of editing features, most home photo printers can crank out lab-quality 4-by-6-inch prints without having a single cable attached—not even a power cable. Epson’s PictureMate Deluxe Viewer Edition and HP’s Photosmart 385 are two of the newest photo printers to hit the market since our photo-printer roundup (“Snapshot Printer A-Go-Go,” Apr/05, p24), and both are worthwhile home photo labs. Image control. The $250 PictureMate has a large, friendly 2.4-inch LCD color display that lets you view and edit your images before you print. The LCD gives you plenty of room to preview your images and makes it easy to navigate the contents of your memory card in search of the shots you want. Once you open the image you want to edit or print, things get a little more cramped. While the PictureMate’s screen is bigger than the LCD supplied with most digital cameras, it’s still fairly difficult to get accurate views of your shots without zooming and scrolling. Detailed editing isn’t this printer’s strong suit, but you can Crop out unwanted backgrounds, select various print sizes, switch to black-and-white or sepia tone, or insert Xx lame—er, we mean “fun’ picture frames before printing. Onscreen editing is somewhat easier on the Photosmart 385, with its slightly larger 2.5-inch display. Massive buttons on the top help you intuitively navigate through the images on your memory card, and you can remove red-eye in addition to cropping images. Unfortunately, unlike the PictureMate, the Photosmart forces you to swap ink cartridges for black-and-whit