About iTunes 9.0.3

iTunes 9.0.3 provides a number of important bug fixes, including:

• iTunes no longer ignores your “Remember password for purchases” setting.
• Addresses problems with syncing some Smart Playlists and Podcasts with iPod.
• Resolves a problem recognizing when iPod is connected.
• Addresses issues that affect stability and performance.

iTunes 9 comes with many new features and improvements, including:

• An improved look and feel, including a new Column Browser for easily browsing your artists or albums, movies, TV shows, and more.
• iTunes Store has a brand new look, with improved navigation for quick and easy exploration.
• iTunes LP and iTunes Extras create unique experiences that feature exclusive interviews, videos, photos, and more — available with select album and movie purchases on the iTunes Store.
• Home Sharing helps you manage your family’s iTunes collection between computers in your home. iTunes can automatically transfer new purchases, or you can choose just the items you want.
• Genius Mixes are created for you by iTunes and play songs from your library that go great together.
• iPod and iPhone syncing now allows you to organize your iPhone and iPod touch home screens directly in iTunes. Syncing is now also more flexible, allowing you to sync individual artists, genres, or TV show and Podcast episodes.
• iTunes U items are now organized into their own section in your iTunes library.
• Sync with iPod nano (5th generation), iPod classic (Fall 2009), and iPod touch (Fall 2009).
• iTunes 9 also includes many other improvements, such as HE-AAC encoding and playback, more flexibility with Smart Playlists rules, simpler organization of your media files inside an iTunes Media folder, and more.

I think in version 9.0.2 of iTunes it is possible to change the grid view background to dark, instead of all that white! I’ve only discovered that on this new version!

If you want to change the grid view to the darker background, go to iTunes -> Preferences->General Tab and select Dark on ‘Grid View’.

Source: Apple Support (iTunes 9.0.3 change log)

I use Windows 7 at work but on my MacBook sometimes I miss that ‘Windows’ feature.

Now, there is a solution called Cinch.

Cinch gives you simple, mouse-driven window management by defining the left, right, and top edges of your screen as ‘hot zones’. Drag a window until the mouse cursor enters one of these zones then drop the window to have it cinch into place. Cinching to the left or right edges of the screen will resize the window to fill exactly half the screen, allowing you to easily compare two windows side-by-side (splitscreen). Cinching to the top edge of the screen will resize the window to fill the entire screen (fullscreen). Dragging a window away from its cinched position will restore the window to its original size.

from Cinch homepage

The application costs $7, which I think is quite good.

Download: Cinch

Price: $7

Homepage: Irradiated Software – Cinch

Here is the email that they send to the interested people.

It’s finally here: Google Chrome for Mac.

Available today in beta!

Hi there,

Thanks for signing up to hear from us regarding Google Chrome for Mac! We’re excited to let you know that Google Chrome is now available in beta for Mac OS X.

Here are a few fun facts from us on the Google Chrome for Mac team:

• 73,804 lines of Mac-specific code written
• 29 developer builds
• 1,177 Mac-specific bugs fixed
• 12 external committers and bug editors to the Google Chrome for Mac code base, 48 external code contributors
• 64 Mac Minis doing continuous builds and tests
• 8,760 cups of soft drinks and coffee consumed
• 4,380 frosted mini-wheats eaten

Thanks for waiting and we hope you’ll give Google Chrome for Mac a whirl.

Google Chrome Team
www.google.com/chrome

Apple EFI Update Version 1.4

About MacBook EFI Firmware Update 1.4

This update eliminates the noise made by the optical disk drive during system startup and wake from sleep on MacBook computers. When installation is complete, please run Software Update again, and install SuperDrive Firmware Update 3.0 (…)

by Apple

After the EFI Update and the Super Firmware Update installation, I still get the noise from the optical disc during the boot, but when the computer wake up from sleep I don´t listen that annoying sound.

Is there anyone with the same bug?

Read: More EFI Update 1.4 for MacBook

• Improvements on Navigation with Ovi Maps 3.0
• Improvements on it’s performance

On Nokia’s performance, it seems that the touch screen is responding better and the RAM got some improvements too.

Check for yourself.

When I moved to Safari, I’ve tried to reach a flash blocker plug-in but no success at all.
Today, I give it another shot and I’ve discovered a great Safari Plug-in called ClickToFlash.

ClickToFlash in action on Youtube

The features of this plugin are:

• Block evil Adobe Flash
  Flash only when you want it.
• One-click Flash loading
  View blocked Flash with just one click.
• Higher quality YouTube
  Play H.264 videos in QuickTime.
• HD YouTube support (beta only)
  No more crappy, blocky video.
• Website Whitelist
  Allow Flash on certain websites.
• Application Whitelist (beta only)
  Allow Flash in certain applications.
• sIFR Typography Support
  Load quality typesetting automatically.
• Automatic Updating
  Download updates when they’re ready.

Now what I hope not to ear the fans on maximum speed, while my CPU usage is constant on 50% just because a Flash Add.

Download: ClickToFlash 1.4.2 (Stable Version) – Only for Leopard
Download: ClickToFlash 1.5 fc2 (Latest Beta Version) – Tiger, Leopard and Snow Leopard
Homepage: ClickToFlash

On Software Update Apple says:

The 10.5.8 Update is recommended for all users running Mac OS X Leopard and includes general operating system fixes that enhance the stability, compatibility and security of your Mac, as well as specific fixes for:

• compatibility and reliability issues when joining AirPort networks.
• an issue that could cause some monitor resolutions to no longer appear in Displays System Preferences.
• issues that may affect Bluetooth reliability.

Source: Apple Support

Changes/Improvements/New features v21.0.02 to v30.0.11:

Standby screen:

• When Music Player is operating, and seeing the track name on the screen, and then when one song ends and goes to the next track, the speed at which this happens has improved yet again from 21.002, although the noticeable change is not as much as from 20.149 to 21.002.

Call log, Contacts and calling function:

• Calling speed (from standby screen to Contacts or Call Log) and transition to call/disconnected screens even faster than 21.002, is more than the instantaneous that I stated for the 21.002, it has improved yet again.
• New menu option in the in-call menu to Send MMS during phone call.
• Loudspeaker maximum volume has seemed to decreased

Maps:

• Maps startup is now almost instantaneous, speed through all the Maps menus very fast, even faster than Maps 2.0
• Switching to different views is very smooth and fast now, i.e. to Map 3D etc.
• Maps version 2.0 week 39 remains the same, although the Maps is able to be upgraded to Ovi Maps 3.01 flawlessly

 Music Player:

• The biggest change is the equaliser improvements. There is a huge improvement in sound quality, even background sounds and other channels are more noticeable. The default equaliser settings are quite good. And bass is less crunchy than before.
• Split-second delays now do not exist when pressing the volume keys to change between volume levels. In the past, there was some degree of delay, even running multiple applications now, that behaviour has been improved remarkably.
• Freezes in the music player have not been evident to me yet in my days of usage with the new firmware. Which is a marked improvement in the functioning and stability of the music player. Screen tearing and slow speed for album art to appear is still present though.

Camera and Photos:

• Biggest change is the reappearance of use of the volume keys to zoom while taking photos/recording video
• Going into Details is faster than 21.002, almost instantaneous now
• Scrolling speed through thumbnails is only minimally jerky now, also scrolling through photos at 100% view has improved in speed so it is now very smooth and almost instantaneous
• When going into menus in Camera, the speed is instantaneous

Video centre:

• Logo has changed for the video centre in the menu
• Appearance of video menu is different and seems to have inherited the newer N-series/E-series style simplified logos
• Speed in the video centre is much improved and is almost instantaneous
• Changing between volume levels in RealPlayer is instantaneous, fast-forward/rewind speed and resume of playback after these functions is improved and almost instantaneous. Sound quality appears to have been improved also.

Search:

• Application has been upgraded from v4.08 to v4.10.0904
• Logo has changed and is now reminiscent of the newer N-series/E-series simplified styling
• Performance is faster and Yandex search service has been removed in favour of Live Search and Google (Note: this is for the APAC variant, will vary between different regions and specific countries)

Web:

• Rendering of webpages has improved in speed since 21.002
• Rotate Screen option speed is now almost instantaneous
• Speed in Web options menu is now instantaneous
• Loading of Minimap on side when scrolling down pages does not have pixelation anymore

Other:

• Overall system speed has been improved so it is somewhat faster than 21.002
• Scrolling in the Multimedia menu from one tab to another whilst multiple applications are running, has improved marginally in speed
• Overall stability seems to also have been improved, have not had one crash or freeze where I have had to remove the phone battery. The slight freezes that have occurred, the phone has recovered from flawlessly.

Source: Symbian Freak

Well, I’ve searched for some changes to this version and discovered that this version put the Nokia 5800 more responsive and with better RAM handling than the previous version.

It looks like that Nokia also added a ‘Home screen notifications for  E-mails’. And the speed of the default web browser, while loading web pages is much faster too.

I’ll try to catch the official change log to this version later.

More info about update:Description of the Microsoft Office 2008 for Mac 12.2.0 Update