posts on CNET - Page 154

Precautions to take before installing iTunes 10

Apple has released iTunes 10 for Windows and Mac, which brings a number of new features to the program including a new icon (finally!), a hybrid column view to prevent repetitive album listings, and a new social network for music called Ping.

The update is available through Software Update in OS X, but can also be downloaded from the iTunes Web site (Apple has updated their site to say iTunes 10 is "coming soon"); however, be sure to take a couple of precautions before installing it.

Let others test it

We do not expect there will be major … Read more

Apple to stream music event--to Apple devices

Apple announced Tuesday afternoon it will provide live video streaming of Wednesday's music event, but unless you have access to a Mac, iPhone, iPad, or iPod, you are going to be out of luck.

The event, starting at 10 a.m. PDT at San Francisco's Yerba Buena Center for the Arts, will be available at Apple.com, but only on Macs running OS X 10.6 and the Safari Web browser, or on an iPad, an iPhone, or iPod Touch running iOS 3 or higher, according to a media alert posted Tuesday by Apple. For those who don'… Read more

A reminder on how to reset your Mac's system password

One of the most frustrating troubleshooting situations one may come across is when a user has forgotten his or her system password. As an independent consultant this is one the more common issues I encounter. Luckily, resetting a user or administrator password is pretty straightforward. The following tips work for any Mac running Mac OS X 10.3 or later.… Read more

Mail messages appearing blank

There may be times when mail messages will appear in Mail but will not have any content. When this happens the whole message may appear to be blank, or there may only be a few of the message's fields being used, so you only get a subject, or a sender.

The first thing that comes to mind when a message is received like this is that it is spam, and is just not being handled by the junk mail filter either on your mail provider's servers or on your system. If this is the case then you can … Read more

Adobe Lightroom update brings direct Facebook publishing; Camera Raw 6.2 released

For photographers who use Adobe's Lightroom program, there's an update available that fixes a number of issues with the previous version; it also adds new online publishing features. There is also an update for Adobe's Camera Raw plug-in, which brings new Camera Raw profile support to various Adobe programs that use the plug-in.

Before installing any of these updates be sure you create a full restorable system backup using Time Machine or a drive clone.

Lightroom 3.2

Additional camera support for several new camera models including the Panasonic DMC-LX5, Sony NEX-5, and Canon EOS 60D Numerous … Read more

AutoCAD returns to the Mac, mobile app offered

After an absence of more than 15 years, AutoCAD is finally back on the Mac.

Autodesk announced Tuesday the launch of AutoCAD for Mac, a new version of its popular design and engineering tool that will run natively on Mac OS X.

AutoCAD for Mac will offer many of the features familiar to users of the software but will also take advantage of Mac OS X, said Autodesk. The program's Cover Flow interface will help users browse through graphical previews of each file, while the Mac's multitouch gestures will allow for panning and zooming of each drawing. Users … Read more

Unix commands for managing HFS+ compression in OS X

A couple of days ago we discussed some problems that could arise with sizing files with HFS compression. This problem basically arises from there being a lack of consistency in the various utilities that are available in OS X, where some show compression status and size, and others show the uncompressed size.

If you regularly do scripting or other work with files on disk that require you to know details about the compression, there are some utilities available that can help you get the status of file compression, and apply or remove compression from files on disk.

Hfsdebug

Hfsdebug is … Read more

CNET TV Apple Byte: September 1st predictions and Netflix on your iPhone

CNET TV's Brian Tong discusses the latest in Apple news, rumors, tips, and tricks. This week Brian sorts out the new iPod rumors, Apple TV (or iTV) rumors, touch-screen iMac rumors, and Apple's patent for security devices based on sensor detection. You'll also learn how to retrieve visual voice mails that may not show up on your iPhone and get a look at the Netflix App for iPhone.

MacFixIt Answers

MacFixIt Answers is a feature in which we answer questions e-mailed from our readers. This week we have questions on missing "new message" chimes in Mail, installing iPhoto from another computer, Time Machine drives not being recognized despite being formatted properly, and how to set a system to boot to the 64-bit kernel by default.

Question: New message chimes in Mail

MacFixIt reader "Robert" asks:

I have an iMac that is 2 years old. When I purchased it I was running Leopard 10.5.8 I have since upgraded to Snow Leopard 10.6.4 I … Read more

Apple releases MacBook Pro EFI Firmware update 1.9, iWork 9.0.4

Apple has released an update for 15- and 17-inch MacBook Pro systems released in mid-2010, which addresses a problem that could cause freezes and hangs during use, and more notably during start-up. The prevalence of this problem is rare, but has affected a few systems.

In addition to the freezes and hangs, the update addresses compatibility issues with external displays.

In order to install the update, you will need to have your external power supply attached and should expect a gray screen with a status bar appear when the system reboots. It is important that you do not interrupt this … Read more