I tried version 1.0 of Pennies and found that it lacked several key features. The developer was unresponsive to me and other users who emailed him. It took months for version 1.1 to be released with key features still missing, though the dev promised them.
- Dennis Metzcher
from BuddyFeed
I will say that the Pennies UI is beautiful, despite my other complaints.
- Dennis Metzcher
from BuddyFeed
It's my most used iPhone app. Although possible, it's not meant to be your complete financial planner, but a small app to track those small daily expenses. It does a wonderful job if you, like me, lack the discipline to track your coins. :D
- Dudu P
I vascillate between Safari 4 and Firefox 3.5b4 - I can't get Gears installed in Firefox so I go to Safari for that and for slightly more screen space for sites. On the whole I am preferring Firefox at the moment.
- Paul Jacobson
Guess I should have asked 'why' as well... I just got a Mac over the weekend, and I've been using Safari. I've used Safari on my PC in the past and like it, but Firefox is so customizable with all of the plugins.
- mark
Also, is there a bank of plugins for Safari akin to that of Firefox? Do any of you Safari users have any recommended/must-have Safari plugins?
- mark
I've learned not to go overboard with Firefox extensions. Slows everything down. I like Safari because it feels like a simpler, cleaner browser. I try keep my Firefox extensions to what I actually use to keep the experience slick.
- Paul Jacobson
Safari, but Firefox when I have a debugging issue and need one of the plugins. Firefox just feels 'clunky' most of the other times.
- Andrew Leyden
Firefox all the way - I hate the way Safari renders webpages. They look 'cold' and 'harsh' whereas they're a lot easier on the eye in Firefox.
- Martin Bryant
FireFox. I know it well, and many options to play with. Safari looked good but since i just got a mac a couple weeks ago i was use to Firefox on a pc.
- Edward Shekhter
eh, is it ok to say chrome even though you didn't list it?
- metalerik
Until recently, Safari. But I've been playing with the FF 3.5 beta the past few days, and it's faster.
- Chris Baskind
FF3 when my MB is plugged in to mains, and Safari 4b when I'm running on battery power, because S4b consumes barely 3-5% of CPU, while FF3 never uses less than 20% CPU even with just a handful of addons (ABP, NoScript, Delicious, CoolPreviews), and with my about:config "gfx" settings that enable ICC Colour Profile support and font smoothing. Safari4b renders fonts much better IMO, and has Colour Profile support as default.
- Siddharth Deb
Andrew has the right idea. Also, turning of bluetooth and any email related business helps.
- Mike Nayyar
I was using edge! I need one of those backup battery thingys. If I use it with any regularity it lasts 3/4 day. And by regularity i mean live tweeting or messaging events. Maybe I need to bring charger like I would with laptop?
- Jason
Push is the greatest villain by far. Disable it and avoid having tons of email accounts -- the less, the better. A good strategy is to redirect some of your email accounts to a main one, and have only this one setup on your iPhone. 3G and Brightness are in the second place. Wifi is OK, but you must disable the auto locate wifi networks -- it will automatically connect to the ones it already knows. And of course, no bluetooth.
- Dudu P
I have a friend looking at refurb iPhones. Which one, 8GB or 16GB? I say 16GB because on my iPod Touch 16GB isn't enough. Is anyone out there happy with the 8GB version and not sorry they didn't spring for 16GB?
8GB gets you 3-4 days of unique music. I suspect that most people's libraries are larger than 16GB and so sync to a playlist rather than the whole library anyway. But if you want to be able to take a trip with a week of music and several movies, then 16GB looks pretty attractive. But I assume that cost is a factor or there would be no question. Just keep in mind that what gets bought today will probably get used for two years or more, so you have to anticipate future wants a bit.
- LogEx
I'm getting the 16 GB next week. Mostly because I will load it with a decent amount of music. Not all of it mind you, as my 30 GB iPod only has 3 GB left.
- Mathew™ one of a kind
8Gb fills up pretty fast if you ever want to use it for video.
- Kevin Pedraja
I love me 8gb. I also really enjoy putting limited albums on my phone. I have over a 100gb of music and I get along just fine with 8gb.
- Joshua Schnell
Looks like the refurb deal is gone. He's going with a new 8GB. Thanks all.
- Eric @ CSTechcast.com
16GB is not enough either, so the 8GB will do. The trick is to build Smart Playlists (2GB of most recent, random 1GB of 5 star, etc) and auto sync with them only.
- Dudu P
That's exactly Ballmer's point. In a more price-sensitive market, people are less likely to pay the addtional money will cost to buy a Mac.
- Ian Betteridge
It's an asinine point; the market on the whole is on a downturn. I can pick any company and put it in place of Apple, find year over year sales will be down. Apple's reduced sales aren't an indication of the market "turning against" them, it's part of a larger trend of reduced spending on computers in general.
- Mike Nayyar
Ballmer should learn not to say anything about Apple. His predictions about them usually tend to be the opposite of reality. Vis: "There's no chance that the iPhone is going to get any significant market share. No chance." He probably just doubled Apple's market share.
- Kevin Pedraja
Except that, if you take a look at Joe Wilcox's summary of the market (http://blogs.eweek.com/applewa...) PC unit sales are actually up. What's down is average selling price - so, while there's still strong demand for new computers, people are prepared to spend a lot less. If that trend continues (and it may not), that would spell trouble for Apple if it tries to hold on to its high ASP position.
- Ian Betteridge
" paying $500 more to get a logo on it? " Thats rude!
- Nishant
The problem with Ballmer's "analysis" is that he posits a permanent trend. Apple has plenty of cash and can weather a short-term (1-2 year) drop in demand without breaking a sweat. When the economy picks up, there will be a flight to quality, as there always is. And Vista or Windows 7 will still suck.
- Kevin Pedraja
@Ian Betteridge: they're just counting numbers -- units. People are buying crappy netbooks, which is a completely different beast, more likely to be a secondary computer at most -- and one segment that they don't compete.
- Dudu P
Just like Ballmer said that the iPhone would NEVER succeed in the marketplace? Maybe he should spend more time buying (or not buying) Yahoo, or building yet another set of unnecessary "updates" to Microsoft Office. Or whatever.
- Stan Scott
He needs to concentrate getting his own house in order rather than throwing stones at others.
- Mel Buckpitt
i'm using Mozy for now (started with it, and it works fine.. .amm.. well i didn't had the chance to do a restore.. soo :))
- Naor Mark
great question. i don't like how apple describes the iTunes backup process and would rather have some sort of selective rsync setup. i was thinking of getting a few RAID drives into my old FreeNAS server...
- Glenn Batuyong
I use time machine over the network. Last backup was about 20 minutes ago -- I don't really think about it, just go into the office and it happens.
- Dustin Sallings
time machine works. i just wish there was another polished solution for a mirror system similar to ChronoSync
- Glenn Batuyong
Time machine, not sure why'd you need anything else.
- orionstarr
Are there any apps that provide compression? My removable storage is smaller than my internal drive.
- Neil Bernhart
Time Machine using Time Capsule for all my data, and a external 7200rpm 2.5" HDD cloned with Super Duper, so I can have a bootable OS X drive to access my Time Capsule in case of a HDD crash. :)
- Dudu P
Time Machine to a Time Capsule for regular, incremental backups, and a periodic Carbon Copy Cloner to an external drive which is stored offsite.
- DGentry
Time Machine to a Drobo via FireWire, ChronoSync to Amazon S3 for documents (daily) and photos and purchased music, films and TV (weekly) and DVD for purchased music, films and TV in 7GB chunks, i.e. when it'll fill the next DL DVD.
- Timothy Griffin
TBH, I would prefer multi-tasking instead of push updates. It really sucks if you have to switch between apps, specially the ones that do have their preferences stored under the Settings app.
- Dudu P
Is the track ball sticking? Try flipping the mouse over and vigorously rolling it in all directions on a piece of paper. Works for me!
- Walt Ruppar
Never liked the mighty mouse. I use the MS intellimouse explorer (I think that's what it's called). Not exciting but gets the job done.
- mikepk
I have the Intellimouse Explorer as well. Got fed up with the stupid unfixable trackball in the might mouse (replaced a couple even under warranty but still hated it). I liked the shape of Intellimouse (though it might suck if you are a lefty). Don't get the MS bluetooth one as it has 'issues' with Mac bluetooth (or did about a year ago)
- Andrew Leyden
i only use logitech marble mouse, a centered trackball for both sides, and no thumb-action compared to other wrond-designer trackballs. a primary input device shouldn't be too gimmicked...
- Progresif Cem Gencer
Thanks for suggestion Walt. I think that is the only thing I haven't done to get it to work.
- Mark Powell
I hate my mighty mouse, too. the trackball is so bad....going to try that tip, Walt!
- WorldofHiglet
Microsoft Arc if you're looking for portability. It is absolutely amazing.
- Brandon Titus
It's all about the Logitech MX Revolution.. best mouse ever
- Dave Senior
from twhirl
I really like Logitech hardware, but I can't stand the Logitech drivers for OS X. Last time I tried one I got a kernel panic right after reboot, and I've all kinds of problems you can imagine on nearly any mac I've had in the past. And you have so much work to adjust the speed and acceleration. I don't *love* the Mighty Mouse but I got used to it. I would prefer any Microsoft mouse over them when using a Mac.
- Dudu P
I'm a big fan of Logitech VX Revolution. It's billed as a "portable" wireless mouse, but with my small hands, it works great and have 3 of them for my various tethered and portable machines. I believe this may have been replaced with the VX Nano, but not sure. Logitech's drivers suck for the Mac and many of those who had issues upgrading to Leopard way back when were due to these drivers, so I use SteerMouse for my mouse driver: http://plentycom.jp
- Bobby Kircher
from twhirl
just purchase a vx nano and it is great but i also have a kensington expert mouse when i need to rest my wrist.
- Joe Breen
from twhirl
Personally I haven't ever found a wireless mouse that I'm happy with. I use a Razer Pro|Click v1.6 that is a very good wired mouse. I know they also make a mobile bluetooth mouse calle the pro|click mobile. It may be worth a look.
- John Collis
Aww c'mon the mighty mouse is awesome. Try to clean it a little. :)
- TheHenry
And how do you clean the trackball without dismantling it? o_O
- WorldofHiglet
on the marble mouse, its very easy to remove the ball w/o dismantling the whole thing. just pull it (with a minor bit of force) and clean the parts and put the ball back in. just like cleaning your eyeball... ;)
- Progresif Cem Gencer
Get this msg. on my laptop - "iPod cannot be ejected because it contains files in use by other application". Why such a msg? I resolved this as - From the USB Icon - safely remove hardware!! Why do I need to do it this way?
OK, how do you MBP folks manage disk space. Those 120 G's disappear quickly. I have a 500 GB passport for all my audio projects, a 1 TB firewire for all my samples. I do keep my iTunes and iPhoto on my main drive, so that's the main culprit. Strategies folks
I have a 500GB drive in my MBP. And a 500GB notebook external drive that's a direct clone of my internal that I update every now and then just in case. I keep my prior years' photos and vid clips on an external Drobo which is backed up to a Time Capsule.
- ronin
Backup and sync are not primary issues, so I am set there (got tons of data backed up (both on network attached disk and in the cloud). The challenge is keeping things close by, and the way it looks the attached drive or upgrading my HDD seem like the best bet
- Deepak Singh
Upgrading the HDD is definitely the way to go especially since 500GB internal notebook drives are going for a little over $100 these days. With the latest MBP, it's a breeze too. With the previous gen ones, it's a bit more of a pain since there are so many screws involved but I've done it so many times I can install one in 15 minutes max. Just make sure you have the right sized Torx driver handy.
- ronin
Maybe start keeping projects in the cloud? If you don't trust a thirdy party with your data try getting a WebDAV/SSH enabled linux/Mac server at home for constant access on the road
- Glenn Batuyong
I know what u mean, but I'm purposely sticking w/the factory HD b/c I'm trying to train myself to be less of a digital packrat. I use an A-B-C method: Archive, Backup, Clone. (archives, Time Machine, CarbonCopyCloner on regular schedules and duplicated on 2nd HD off site & swapped w/a 3rd duplicated set in the cloud) HTH a little. I'll soon have a podcast out the will elaborate on it.
- TheMacMommy
from twhirl
Oh I've been using Jungledisk since they existed (and I do work at Amazon Web Services, so you can guess where I keep backup). Plus I have over 2 TB of network storage where I have things backed up in addition to all the important stuff that goes to the cloud. It's for things like my iTunes library and iphoto, items I use a lot where I'd like to keep things close
- Deepak Singh
I bought a 320GB 7200RPM drive from OWC (macsales.com) and never looked back. (That's one way to solve the space problem, for a while, at least).
- Carlos Granier-Phelps
Right now I have about 90 GBs of space left of the 250 GB. When that starts to get low I'll buy a larger hard drive.
- Mathew™ one of a kind
The file should be appearing in the Software Update window at any moment now, depending on how often you've set Software Update to check for new software. The sixth update to Leopard, originally released in October 2007, comes with the usual range of tweaks, bug fixes, and security improvements.
- Jonathon
from Bookmarklet
On the download. I really hope it solves my gripes with iSync and iDisk
- Dudu P
It helps you to do following stuff: Switching proxy setting for another preconfigured cofiguration. Works for HTP, HTTPS a FTP protocol. Indicates the current status of Ethernet or AirPort proxy.
- Dudu P
from Bookmarklet
i have nothing but problems with office 2008. I get windows that don't minimize, sometimes spaces automatically change all over the place... it's terrible.
- Joshua Schnell
yep, office 2008 and spaces are a really bad mix....
- Holger Eilhard
Office 2008 is a huge pain in the ass. I really avoid doing any work on it, I like iWork 08 much better. But sometimes corporate routine will force me to launch Excel or Entourage (eew)
- Dudu P
I have similar problems with Spaces and Office 2008. I do as much work as I can in Google Docs, but I have to load Office 2008 for some tasks.
- Bill Sodeman
Known issue. Office 2008 has made some fixes to help with the problem, and Apple has made some fixes to Leopard to help with the problem, but it's still not 100%. For more details about it, one of the Office 2008 senior developers posted a lengthy blog post about what's happening on both sides: http://www.schwieb.com/blog...
- Nadyne Mielke
Yes, the Spaces bug does pop up in other Mac apps, but Office produces this bug much more often than anything else I've used, even with their patches. At least Erik Schwieber's blog post explains the root of the issue: Spaces doesn't support Carbon well, and Microsoft doesn't want to migrate Office 2008 from Carbon to Cocoa yet. I love this one quote from Erik: "I don’t know the Spaces code — as I don’t work for Apple, I’ve never seen it. " And he's been in Microsoft's Mac unit since 1996? Wotta mess!
- Bill Sodeman
Quicksilver, Skitch, Simplify Media, GrowlTunes, CoverSutra, Twitteriffic, Awaken, Album Art Thingy, Evernote, Growl, Little Snitch, Bluetooth, Time Machine, MobileMe Sync, Airport, Sound, Time, Battery, Fast User Switching, Spotlight.
- Jez Kline
skitch, mailplane, busysync, little snitch, istat menu cpu
- Bryan Liles
Mailplane, Adium, Skitch, iScrobbler, Time Machine, Sound, Battery, Time, Spotlight
- Chris Newman
Dropbox, GrowlTunes, Evernote, BusySync, iChat, Spaces, Time Machine, iSync and the usual Mac OS X others.
- Matthew Vaughan
Fluid running remember the Milk, last.fm, skitch, adium, quicksilver, plaxo, Google Notifier, TextExpander, Evernote, Caffience, iStatMenus Network, iStatMenus RAM, iStatMenus CPU, iStatMenus Clock/Calendar
- Reagan Kelly
Adium, Skitch, Growl, Spaces, Airport, Volume, Monitors, Battery, Ink, Time, Fast User Switching, Spotlight
- Jeremy Grasz
Pathfinder, QuicKeys, Dropbox, Default Folder X, CoverSutra, DNS-O-Matic, BOINC Manager, Wraparound, AllBookmarks, Stuffit Deluxe, Spanning Sync, Little Snitch, iStat Menus. That's just the 3rd party ones!
- Miles Kurland
Adium, MacFusion, Evernote, JumpCut, smcFanControl, SlimBattery Monitor, Caffeine, MobileMe, iStat's CPU Monitor, Airport, Sound, iStat's Date & Time, Fast User Switching, Spotlight.
- Joseph Beedlow
Skype, Adium, Simplify Media, Growltunes, Google Notifier, Twitterific, Slim Battery Monitor
- Matthew
Adium, Quicksilver, Default Folder X, Stuffit Magic Menu, Spaces, Apple Script, MobileMe, Time Machine, ARD, Airport, Sound, Sound, Battery, International, Time/Date, User, Spotlight
- Joe Saresro
Skype, Adium, Dropbox, Google Notifier, WeatherDock, SSHKeychain, Tunnelblick.
- Chris Johnson
Caffeine, Mailplane, Skype, Little Snitch, Mozy, VirusBarrier X5, MobileMe Sync, Bluetooth, and Time Machine.
- Stephen Vaughn
Dropbox, iScrobbler, Quicksilver, Connect360, Growl, Mozy, Canon LJ Network Utility, Time Machine, Airport, Soundsource, Volume, Date/Time, Spotlight
- Jason Mitchell
Adium, Simplify Media, Mail Unread Menu, iStat Menu, Hotspot Shield
- Justin Wah Kan
from right to left: Spotlight Cores Users Time/Date Volume Ink Battery Displays Wireless Bluetooth iChat Time Machine iStat Menus: Processors Memory HD Access Network Little Snitch Growl TextExpander Dropbox Anxiety Quicksilver Twitteriffic Mail Unread Menu WeatherSnitch GrabUp GrowlTunes iAlertU Adium Skype iClip PeerGuardian StuffIt 12 Magic Menu
- Price F.R.
mightymouse, Alll Bookmarks, Stuffit/Dropboxetc, Live Station, Growl, Snitch, Adium, Skype World Clocks
- sofarsoShawn
TextExpander, DefaultFolderX, Camouflage, Little Snitch, SoundSource, Mobile Me, Spaces, Input Menu
- Prescott Perez-Fox
DropBox, MailPlane, DNS-O-Matic, BOINC, Missing Sync for Palm OS, Evernote, Wakoopa, Mozy Home, SoundSource, and intermittently, Coversutra
- Michael A Hall
GimmeSomeTune, Adium, Connect360, smcFanControl, Google Notifier, Evernote, Quicksilver, Lock Screen Menu, Spaces, AppleScripts, Input Menu
- Ed Gutman
Quicksilver (rocks!), DockSwitch, iChat (wife just got MacBook), Spaces, WiFi, iSync, Apple Scripts (pull up iPhoto albums from anywhere), Bluetooth (need to turn off), Volum Displays
- Jeff Krieger
I've had to remove a few, like SMARTDiskMonitor, because some applications like Linkinus have too many menu options. Right to left: MenuCalendarClock iCal, MenuMeters (for bandwidth), MemoryCell (which I want to remove but can't), Caffeine, Wakoopa (would like to hide this), CoverSutra, Twitterrific, Skitch, iFreeMem, Adium.
- Tom
Google Reader Notifier, Gmail notifier, Plaxo, Growl, Wakoopa, Evernote, Sync, TimeMachine, last.fm, Skype, All Bookmarks, iStat
- Paul Papadimitriou
I'm desperate for a solution to my overpopulated upper right menu -- does anyone know any collapsing menu add-ons for this?
- Zeb Dropkin