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Mac Sales Go Up 39% in 2010

Brian Proffit — Tue, 16 Mar 2010 17:07:21 -0500

CNN Money and Fortune Brainstorm Tech reported that a new analysis from Piper Jaffray's Gene Munster continued to advise clients to invest in Apple. He pointed to Mac and iPod sales as reasons for optimism.

Wall Street estimated a 22% increase in Mac unit sales for the first quarter of 2010, but January and February numbers show a 39% increase over 2009. The iPod models have turned a corner in sales as well. After sales drops for 16 months in a row, January and February revenue was up 7%.

Munster points out that the increases are skewed somewhat by the fact that the beginning of 2009 was the midst of the recession, so sales were down. In addition, the average selling price of both Macs and iPods is down, meaning people are looking for lower priced models.

DailyTech considers the Mac numbers surprising because of the age of Apple's lineup. "Apple's computer lineup, with the exception of the new i7 iMacs, is rather dated. The problem is particularly severe in the MacBook Pro series, whose hardware currently trails even drastically cheaper models from competitors like ASUSTek."

There's room for even more optimism considering the future. The iPad launch in April should be a huge shot of revenue, and an iPhone update is expected this summer.

Survey Says Macs Increasing in the Enterprise

Brian Proffit — Tue, 23 Feb 2010 10:50:16 -0600

Yahoo Finance reported today that the Enterprise Desktop Alliance's annual survey shows that 66% of IT administrators expected the number of Macs in their sites to increase this year. The leading reasons for more Macs were user preference, increased productivity, and ease of technical support.

T.Reid Lewis, president of the Enterprise Desktop Alliance and CEO of Group Logic, said, "Despite the uncertain economic conditions, Apple can expect the Mac to continue to find acceptance in large organizations." Sixty percent of the respondents have a unified support organization that supports both Macs and PCs, and 81% of them said that parity (treating Macs and PCs equally in integration and management issues) was important to their organization. Other issues that were “very” or “extremely” important were:

- 79% - File sharing between operating systems
- 79% - Security
- 72% - Client management (tracking inventory, applying patches, etc.)
- 66% - Active Directory integration
- 60% - Cross-platform help desk and knowledge base support

Currently, 14% of the enterprises surveyed only provide official support for PCs, but that number will be decreasing in 2010. It's easier than ever to support multiple operating systems, Lewis says, because “More and more solutions are available to help these enterprises address their integration and management issues.”

Gartner agrees with the survey results. In their December 4th, 2009 report, Predicts 2010: PC End-User Issues, they claim, “As a greater percentage of enterprise applications become OS-neutral, the cost to support a more diverse hardware and OS mix will decrease, making Macs a more viable choice for a greater number of users who continue to demand them. Providers that sell enterprise-class Mac solutions and Mac services may see an increase in demand.”

Adobe Promises a Better Flash Experience for Mac Users

Cory Bohon — Fri, 05 Feb 2010 13:46:23 -0600

Flash has been the bane of many Mac users over the past few years, but Adobe's CTO says that the company is committed.

Kevin Lynch, Adobe's chief technical officer, said in a statement on the Adobe blog that Flash 10.1 will bring a better Flash experience to Mac users.

"Addressing crash issues is a top priority in the engineering team, and currently there are open reports we are researching in Flash Player 10. From the comments across the web there may either be an upswing in incidents or there is a general piling on happening -- we are looking into this actively and will work to resolve any real issues," Lynch said.

Steve Jobs has been quoted saying some interesting things about Adobe in a recent employee town hall meeting about the iPad.

Is this Adobe's attempt to flatter Apple after Steve Jobs rejected Flash once again on another of its mobile platforms, the iPad? Probably, but one thing is almost certain now: Regardless if we get Flash on the iPad or not, Adobe will be making the Mac Flash experience a better one.

via MacNN

Mac OS X 10.7 Wishlist

Cory Bohon — Fri, 29 Jan 2010 19:10:29 -0600

Snow Leopard was released at the amazing price of $29. The OS updates were mainly "under-the-hood" things, which explains the lower price. The next version of Mac OS X (10.7) has already been spotted online and more than a few people have been wondering what might be in the next iteration of the operating system. After all, Apple might have to show people some innovation to get them to upgrade.

TechRadar has posted the 10 things they would like to see in 10.7. They mention:

1. A unified interface

2. System-wide tagging and smart collections

3. Superior Spotlight

4. Better stacks

5. More Multi-touch

6. Configurable Spaces

7. Cloud services

8. Finder tabs and enhancements

9. Embrace third-party services

10. A Mac App Store

There's no doubt that Apple could be rolling out cloud services, as that has been rumored regarding Apple's acquisition of the Lala music service. More Multi-touch is inevitable since many of the Macs shipping today have either a Multi-touch enabled trackpad or Magic Mouse. A Mac App Store could prove to be quite beneficial to Apple, its users, and the developer community just as it has been on the iPhone and soon-to-be iPad.

You can see the list and descriptions of each of the topics on TechRadar's website. Let us know what you'd like to see in 10.7 in the comments.

The iPad vs. The ModBook: Which Should You Get?

Cory Bohon — Wed, 27 Jan 2010 17:07:13 -0600

If you haven’t heard about the iPad by yet, then you must be living on another planet. Apple’s newest device brings about a new player in the ever expanding tablet market. However, the Apple Tablet isn't an entirely foreign concept. The Axiotron Modbook was released in 2007, hoping to spark interest in the idea of a Mac tablet. And it’s no wonder that the Axiotron project did just that. After all, Steve Wozniak (yes, the “Woz”) was on the Board of Advisors for Axiotron and demonstrated the product last year at Mac World.

For those who don’t know, the Modbook is an Apple-approved endeavor in which Axiotron purchases a MacBook (or MacBook Pro) and converts it into a tablet by adding a Wacom Pen Screen (with 512 levels of pressure sensitivity). They also offer a process by which you can send in your Macbook (or MacBook Pro) and have them convert it for you at a discounted rate.

With today's announcement, Apple completely changed the playing field of tablet devices. That’s why we wanted to take a look at how the new iPad stacks up against the Modbook.

The iPad Hardware

Just from looking at the iPad, you would think it’s the bigger brother of the iPhone/iPod touch. Well, that’s true in some areas, but the overall device is much, much more than that. The front of the device features a 9.7” LED backlit Multi-touch glass screen. This screen produces a native resolution of 1024 x 768. That resolution is found on many devices, including some netbooks. In addition, this beauty comes in capacities of 16GB, 32GB, or 64 GB. It has a custom-built processor called the Apple A4 chip that runs as 1GHz. The iPad also includes WiFi (a/b/g/n), Bluetooth, and optional 3G connectivity.

The battery power will last longer than a MacBook at 10 hours of surfing the web on WiFi, watching video, or listening to music. Charging and syncing is done with the 30-pin Dock connector on the bottom of the device. Input and output ports include: a Dock connector, a 3.5-mm headphone jack, built-in speakers, a microphone, and a SIM card tray.

All of this technology fits into an enclosure that’s only .5” thin and weighs 1.5 pounds. The iPad starts at $499 for a 16GB model without 3G.

The Modbook Hardware

The Modbook is essentially a MacBook (or MacBook Pro) and the specs depend on the level of the Apple hardware they use. The newest Modbook can be souped up with a 2.13 GHz processor, 512MB to 4GB of RAM, and a 60GB to 250GB hard drive starting at $1,649. With the Modbook, you’ll get all of the usual ports and connections, plus an iSight webcam (something the iPad can only dream of--for now).

Pros and Cons

Where the iPad differs from other devices like this is that it runs the iPhone operating system. Sure, there’s over a 140,000 applications that can run on this device right out of the box, but there’s a bit of a limitation when it comes to this sort of device. You’re not going to be able to run Mac applications. Plus, there’s reports that you might not be able to view Flash content in Safari. These things might be a deal breaker for some.

Apple has released a new developer SDK (Software Development Kit) that will give developers the ability to build iPad-specific applications. Apple has already announced they will be bringing their iWork suite of applications to the iPad in the form of $10 downloadable apps for Pages, Numbers, and Keynote.

With the Modbook, you’ll be able to do everything a Mac can do, including the ability to view flash content in whatever browser you choose.

Which Should You Get?

If you’re in the market for a laptop with a slimmer form factor, touch screen capabilities and the ability to run Mac OS X-compatible applications, then go with the Modbook. However, if you're looking for a thinner, lighter device that will enable you to surf the web and share your media anywhere, then the iPad could be a good choice.

Our Favorite Tablet Mock-ups and Patents

David W. Martin — Mon, 25 Jan 2010 19:54:26 -0600

In January 2008, an Apple patent application originally filed in July 2006, titled Integrated monitor and docking station, was finally published by the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office. We believed that this particular patent could foreshadow a future tablet accessory -- a docking station that looks like an iMac.

According to the patent, a device resembling the MacBook could be inserted into a slot within the body of the iMac and provide additional monitor space. The concept looked great because, unlike traditional docking stations, it would have been aesthetically pleasing, while conserving desk space.

Above, Figure 1A of Apple's patent shows a conceptual view of this idea. The drawing suggests that the computer is an iMac with the body of one of Apple's recent generation of cinema displays. The device shown sliding into the new docking station looks like it could be a removable tablet with MacBook innards. The patent also mentions the inclusion of an iSight camera, storage devices, speakers, microphone, memory card reader (like all of Apple's current computer line up with the exception of the Mac Pro), a battery charger, and a modem connection.

The above figures depict other aspects of the iMac dock. Figure 1B shows the rear, Figure 1C shows the empty docking slot and, Figure 1D shows the slot with what could be a tablet nestled in its docking state.

Mock-up by Adam Benton

We took Apple's black and white drawings and came up with the mock-up above. Will we see this on Wednesday? Probably not, but it's still nice to dream.

The iMac dock isn't our only foray into the world of three-dimensional design based on patents. We gathered some of our favorite mock-ups, patents, and unreleased Apple products and dropped them in the gallery below.

Be sure to check out our live blog of the Apple event at 10am PST on January 27.

Research Firm Says Mac Sales Can't Keep Up With Cheap PCs

Matthew Tilmann — Thu, 14 Jan 2010 09:16:08 -0600

Even though Mac sales were up 31% in the fourth quarter of 2009, Apple couldn't keep up with cheaply priced Windows PCs, falling to the number five spot in the U.S., research firm IDC said on Wednesday according to ComputerWorld.

Meanwhile back at the ranch, rival analysts at Gartner said Apple's growth was at 23%, but that still put them in fifth place behind Hewlett-Packard, Dell, Acer and Toshiba. The new spot for Apple is down one from the same quarter.

"The U.S. market last quarter continued to be very price driven," Mikako Kitagawa, a Gartner analyst said. "If a company is not in the low-priced market, it's absolutely difficult for it to increase market share. And Apple did not do as well as others in share because of its prices."

Despite a difference in numbers, IDC felt similarly. "The U.S. market exploded in the fourth quarter," IDC research manager David Daoud explained. "The vendors responded with new low price points to stimulate demand and face competition." Even though Apple gave the iMac desktops new life, and brought in a lower-end MacBook in October, they opted to not drop prices during the quarter.

IDC said that overall, U.S. computers sales hit a record high of 20.7 million units for the quarter. "These preliminary results indicate the recovery of the PC market on a global level," said Kitagawa.

Apple is due to release its official sales figures on Monday, January 25, at which point it will hold a conference call with Wall Street analysts.

50 Killer Mac Apps For Under $50

The Mac|Life Staff — Tue, 12 Jan 2010 16:13:24 -0600

Who doesn't need more for less? We present 50 Mac|Life-approved applications--many free, all under $50--that'll guarantee you get the most from your Mac without traumatizing your wallet.

The Internet is full of noise--countless different applications for every occasion, with reviews everywhere that love and hate them at the same time. While that’s hardly news, it’s still a hassle that isn’t going away. Say you picked up a spiffy new MacBook Pro, and it’s time to kit it out with the leanest, meanest software. After all, Macs have that rich history of garage-roots development, of a few folks in a basement brewing up quality software that smokes the big-name stuff. So you’ve got a feeling there’s great, affordable software just waiting for you to find it--and you’re right. But how do you sift through the zillion calendar apps and jillion media players to find the gems worthy of your hard drive space? And more importantly, your time and money?

We’re here to help with a compendium of essential software. It didn’t come easily--we debated, argued, haggled, and even pleaded to secure a prized position on this list for our favorite, most useful applications. But by limiting the software we’re highlighting to 50, we’ve guaranteed you the best of the best--no Internet spew here. And by capping the cost of the software we’ve selected at $50, we’ve made sure you can reasonably buy what you need. You may love your Mac already, but you’re not gonna believe how much it can do once you load up even a few of these choice applications.

Entertainment

Sure, iPods and iTunes make music and movies easier to enjoy, but they're not without headaches of their own. That's where these awesome apps come in. They take the pain out of kicking back with your favorite flicks and tunes.

Simplify Media

Share & stream your iTunes library over the Internet.

The iPod has made several portable music formats obsolete, and we sure don’t miss schlepping around fragile cassette tapes or heavy wallets full of CDs. But even the mighty iPod has its limits--namely capacity. That’s where Simplify Media (free, Simplify Media, simplifymedia.com) comes in handy. It guarantees that the size of your music library doesn’t matter by letting you stream music between computers via the Internet. Yup, this app will play your entire library on any computer (as long as the one that has your library is powered up and online).

Stream your tunes from home or the next cube.

Once installed, a simple login fires up your music. Simplify Media works with iTunes just like the built-in LAN sharing does, and the remote libraries appear under Shared, alongside any local shared libraries. Even better, you can add up to 30 friends’ shared libraries, and an iPhone app ($5.99) lets you pipe your music to your iPhone or iPod touch.

SuperSync

SuperSync keeps multiple iTunes collections in sync.

Speaking of iTunes libraries--streaming is great, but what if you want to sync libraries across multiple Macs? SuperSync ($22, SuperSync, supersync.com) makes it so. Sure, Apple introduced limited music-transfer capabilities with Home Sharing in iTunes 9, but that feature requires computers to be on the same local network. SuperSync one-ups iTunes by syncing iTunes libraries over the Internet. It’s perfect for anyone who uses multiple Macs, and SuperSync also has a bunch of other tricked-out features. In deference to the record companies, Apple makes transferring music from an iPod to a computer unnecessarily difficult. SuperSync handles the task with ease, making it a bacon-saver when the hard drive in your Mac kicks the bucket. SuperSync will even allow you to sync libraries cross-platform.

SuperSync's color-coded interface helps you synchronize your iTunes tracks across multiple Macs.

VLC Media Player

Never worry about video file types again.

If most of your Mac video-watching happens in the form of DVDs or QuickTime movies, you probably don’t think too much about player software. But move beyond the most basic video types, and you’re asking for trouble. With the myriad formats, containers, and encoding parameters available, the simple act of playing back a cat video can become incredibly frustrating. VLC Media Player (free, VideoLAN, www.videolan.org) is like a Swiss Army knife for digital media. It’s open source and cross-platform, and the app will play back practically any audio or video file you throw at it. VLC also handles file conversions with ease, so you can use it to convert audio and video for use online or on portable devices.

It plays, it converts, it makes toast (okay, maybe not that last one.)

RipIt

Backup & convert DVDs with RipIt.

There are plenty of legit reasons to rip a DVD. Backup copies of kids’ movies for the minivan, watching Glee on your iPod touch while you’re on the bus, or even just saving battery power on your laptop (playing back a file from a hard drive is much more efficient than spinning a DVD).

RipIt's simple interface makes ripping DVDs seamless and easy.

Once the domain of übernerds, DVD ripping is a one-click affair thanks to RipIt ($19.95, The Little App Factory, ripitapp.com). And since it makes full rips, all of the menus, bonus features, and subtitles remain intact. You can play back the resulting files with DVD Player on your Mac or use a freeware tool like Handbrake to convert your rips into iPod-friendly formats.

Delicious Library

We love the iTunes Store, but we still end up accumulating books, DVDs, console games, and, yes, even CDs. Delicious Library ($40, Delicious Monster Software, www.delicious-monster.com) helps catalog your collections by--get this--taking snaps of UPCs via your webcam and then automatically organizing your meatspace content onto virtual shelves for easy sorting and browsing. You can track loans to friends, post items for sale on Amazon, and publish Web catalogs formatted for your iPhone. That way, you can avoid buying another copy of John Hodgman’s More Information Than You Require.

Connect360

We’re Apple-faithful, but that doesn’t stop us from engaging in a little Modern Warfare 2 on our Xbox 360. And since the 360 is much more than a simple gaming machine, we also use it to stream iTunes tracks to our entertainment center and view pictures from our iPhoto library on our HDTV--with the help of Connect360 ($20, Nullriver Inc, www.nullriver.com), that is. It works over wired or wireless networks, and it even streams H.264 video straight from our MacBook. Sweet!

Peel

Pack rats, beware: Peel ($14.95, Hjalti Jakobsson, www.getpeel.com) can get really overwhelming, really fast. But if you’re an avid follower of music blogs, Peel can automagically grab new tracks as they’re posted. So forget all that pesky right-clicking and manually adding to iTunes. Just feed Peel a list of your favorite music blogs, and then kick back as tons of new, free tunes get downloaded straight to your Mac. You may never have to buy (or pirate) music again.

CoverScout

Cover Flow is one of those features that looks great in a demo but doesn’t quite translate at home. iTunes can attempt to find the album art that makes Cover Flow actually useful, but it’s limited in scope and can’t make fuzzy matches. CoverScout ($39.95, equinox USA, www.equinux.com) scours the Internet to find your missing album art and presents you with multiple options to let you choose the best images. Don’t Cover Flow without it.

TuneUp

For all of those untitled and mistitled tracks in your music library, there’s TuneUp ($19.95/one year, $29.95/lifetime; TuneUp Media; www.tuneupmedia.com). Like CoverScout, TuneUp can find and download missing album art, but its best trick is cleaning up your ID3 tags--the artist, title, and album info displayed in iTunes. A quick search is all it takes to clear up all those Track 1s and Unknown Artists in your library. It sure beats cleaning up metadata by hand.

Next Page: Productivity Apps >>

Productivity

Takin' care of business, every day. Takin' care of business, every way. Workin' on a Mac, it's all right. This productivity software is workin' overtime.

WriteRoom

Blocks distractions so you can write in peace.

Proving the tired adage that “less is more,” WriteRoom ($24.95, Hog Bay Software, www.hogbaysoftware.com) is a light text editor with a full-screen mode. Start a new document, and everything else fades away--your Dock, your menubar, and other windows on your Desktop. You’re left with a black screen and friendly green text for a clutter- and distraction-free experience. The Escape key toggles between full-screen mode and windowed mode, which resembles TextEdit with a live word count.

WriteRoom can save your work as plain text, rich text, or Microsoft Word’s .doc format. The preferences offer tons of customization: auto-save, character counts, the appearance of text in full-screen mode, and more. But WriteRoom’s real magic is how it gets out of your way and lets you focus on what you’re doing.

BusyCal

One calendar application to rule them all.

BusyCal ($40, BusyMac, www.busymac.com) is iCal on steroids. It dances circles around iCal, chanting, “Everything you can do, I can do better.” And it’s right. Sharing is a snap: You can set up two-way syncing with your Google Calendar or with other BusyCal calendars on your local network or the wide-open Internet. But even aside from sharing, BusyCal offers tons of calendaring bells and whistles: customizable views, sticky notes, weather forecasts, moon phases, graphical icons, a to-do list, notes, tags, and much more. And since it uses the Sync Services built into Mac OS X, your BusyCal calendars can sync with MobileMe and your iPhone. You can even switch back to iCal anytime without losing any of the events or to-dos you entered in BusyCal.

So what if iCal is free? BusyCal is better.

Things

Flexible to-do list syncs with iCal and the iPhone.

For busy people like us, a good to-do list is beyond essential. But some that we’ve tried are so complicated that just managing your tasks becomes a chore in itself. So the light, easy-to-understand Things ($49.95, Cultured Code, www.culturedcode.com) is a breath of fresh air. You can go the full Getting Things Done route, adding contexts, priority levels, a tickler file, and so on. Or you can keep it simple, with one-off and repeating tasks and multistep projects. iCal syncing can get your deadlines on your calendar, and Things on the Mac can sync wirelessly with Things on the iPhone ($9.99 in the App Store). We’ve tried multiple task-managment systems, from Web-based ToodleDo to iPhone apps like ToDo to Mail’s built-in To-Do list to good old paper and pencil. Things is the cream of the crop for its good looks, quick entry, and easy syncing.

Things uses tags to organize your projects in a million ways--or you can ignore the tags altogether and just work.

Express Scribe

Transcriptions made easy... well, easier.

Transcribing an interview, lecture, or other recording is hard enough, just with the listening and typing. Toss in the extra arm movement as you frantically click from your text editor to your audio-playback application every time you want to pause the recording or rewind a few seconds, and your transcribing job just got tougher and more frustrating. Express Scribe (free, NCH Software, www.nch.com.au/scribe) lets you set system-wide hotkeys for audio playback so you can stay in your text editor, fully control the audio, and never need to reach for your mouse.

Express Scribe can also slow down your audio without changing the pitch, supports video, works with lots of file types, loads recordings from analog or digital audio recorders, and more. Plus, it’s completely free. Wahoo!

NoteBook

The Mac is silly with note-taking applications (Evernote, Yojimbo, ShoveBox, MacJournal…shall we go on?), but Circus Ponies’ NoteBook ($49.95, Circus Ponies, www.circusponies.com) is a standout. If you subscribe to “a place for everything, and everything in its place,” NoteBook can be the place for notes, Web clippings, bookmarks, documents, voice memos, photos, and more. It struts its flexibility with ready-made templates for planning a trip, writing a research paper, collecting recipes, keeping a journal, and so on, while its fun spiral-notebook interface is a nice touch.

TextExpander

A thousand monkeys at a thousand typewriters could produce Hamlet a lot faster if they knew how to use TextExpander ($29.95, SmileOnMyMac, www.smileonmymac.com). This wonder app installs as a System Preferences pane and lets you define shortcuts for your most commonly used words and phrases. Abbreviate long URLs, your email signoff, even your own photo or scanned signature file. Then as you type those shortcuts, they’re automagically expanded to what you really wanted to say. Brilliant.

iFinance 3

Sure, Quicken is popular and Mint.com is free, but iFinance 3 ($29, Synium Software GmbH, www.synium.de) was built from the ground up just for Macs, and it shows. The intuitive interface makes it a cinch--dare we say a pleasure?--to track your accounts, keep an eye on your cash flow, set up a budget, and graph your expenses. It can also import from CSV and QIF files for easier data entry. Plus, a companion iPhone app lets you enter transactions on the go.

FlexTime

This charming timer app ($18.95, Red Sweater Software, www.red-sweater.com) lets you set up multistep routines that run once or repeat ad nauseam. Each step can be marked by a sound, spoken text, or even running a script. Once your routine is perfect, you can export the audio to iTunes--great for following a recipe’s carefully timed steps or taking your favorite yoga routines on the road.

DEVONthink Personal

Another great catch-all for storing, sorting, organizing, and searching information, DEVONthink ($49.95, DEVONtechnologies, www.devon-technologies.com) can take almost anything you can throw at it. Documents, PDFs, photos, multimedia files, bookmarks, webpages, iChat logs--all of those can be imported, sorted, and read right in DEVONthink. Searching is easy, and you can cobble together a brand-new document from items in your DEVONthink database and export it to your favorite text editor for printing or as HTML for posting.

Next Page: Internet Apps >>

Internet

It's a wild place, that Interweb, so there's nothing like a few primo apps to tame everything from blogging to FTPs to Twitter and Flash banners.

Transmit

Traveling the two-lane FTP highway.

FTP has been around forever. Social networking and cloud computing may come and go, but FTP is in it for the long hall. Fortunately, there are a wealth of great FTP clients for the Mac, and the best of those is Transmit ($29.95, Panic, www.panic.com/transmit). The client utilizes a split directory window that shows the path on your computer and the path on the FTP site. With in-app search and the ability to sync folders on your Mac and on the FTP site, Transmit helps alleviate the search and drag-and-drop blues of other clients. The sync feature is especially helpful for Web developers and designers. You can even create desktop droplets for quick uploads to heavily used sites.

Two-window FTP FTW.

Mac-Journal

Web-based apps suck.

Blogging about your life is a faux pas. Blogging about anything else that people actually care about is the proper way of utilizing of the blogging systems available out there. The ongoing problem is that most blogging platforms are bit of a pain to use because they’re Web-based. Plus, if you’re somewhere without Internet access, you can’t start laying out your blog posts for your site. MacJournal ($39.95, Mariner Software, www.marinersoftware.com) solves that problem with an easy-to-use multiplatform blogging client. Lay out your articles offline with images, video, and audio, then save them for later posting. The app includes the ability to both write in full-screen mode so you won’t be interrupted by your Twitter friends, and to record an audio podcast in the client.

Create blog posts quickly and without browser issues.

Tweetie

Multi-account Twitter action.

After wowing the world with its iPhone Twitter app, atebits decided to release a desktop version of Tweetie ($19.95, atebits, www.atebits.com/tweetie-mac/). The app can handle multiple Twitter accounts, compose tweets in a separate window, allow you to change the account you’re sending a tweet from on the fly, and let you drag and drop pics and videos right into the Compose window. Don’t have the perfect media on your Mac for a tweet? Record a video or shoot a pic from your iSight camera directly in Tweetie. And since Twitter conversations can be difficult to follow, Tweetie displays the conversation you’re having in a timeline if you just double-click one of the pertinent tweets. The Tweetie bookmarklet in Safari also allows you to share links quickly from your browser.

Have an actual conversation on Twitter with Tweetie.

Dropbox

Stop, drop, and roll on home.

Transferring large files can be a huge pain. Where the hell did you leave that thumb drive? External hard drives leave an unsightly bulge in your pocket, and all those cables are always getting tangled in your shoes. That’s a safety hazard, son. Dropbox (2GB storage for free, 50GB for $9.99/month; Dropbox; www.dropbox.com) is a cloud-based storage drive that you can access from any computer or iPhone. Just pop files into the Dropbox folder on your Mac, and it automatically syncs up with the online disk (which you can view on Dropbox’s website) and with any other machines you have the application installed on. You can even share folders and files with other Dropbox users. If the free 2GB box doesn’t cut it, you can upgrade to 50GB for $10 a month.

Access your files from anywhere in the universe (with an Internet connection).

LogMeIn

If you need to remotely access a Mac or (gasp) a PC with Windows on it, LogMeIn (free, LogMeIn, logmein.com) allows you to peer into your remote computer from anywhere. You can launch apps, move files, and adjust your preferences via a Web-based interface, as if you were sitting at that computer. For $29.99, you can get your iPhone in on the action too.

TweetDeck

If you’re a Twitter power user, TweetDeck (free, TweetDeck, www.tweetdeck.com) should be in your arsenal of Twitter apps. The interface is a series of columns that displays info like your friends’ feeds, saved searches, mentions, direct mentions, and Facebook updates. You can also keep up with trending topics with just a quick glance. If there’s something you need to track on Twitter, TweetDeck can make a column for it.

Vuze

Allegedly, BitTorrent steals medication from senior citizens, but isn’t it time to forget about all the evil things it supposedly does? Instead, focus on the greatness of Vuze (free, Vuze, www.vuze.com) and its ability to download legally available video files. After you’ve done the downloading, Vuze can convert your files for use on the iPhone, Apple TV, iPod, Xbox 360, TiVo, and PlayStation 3. It’ll even stream videos to your set-top boxes. Nice!

BannerZest

Creating Flash banners is difficult, especially when you don’t know or own Flash. BannerZest ($49, Aquafadas, www.aquafadas.com) takes the pain out the process and gives you a simple way to create quick, beautiful Flash banners. From a standard gallery to an interactive experience, BannerZest comes with a collection of themes for different uses, and it uploads your banners to your FTP or MobileMe disk.

FileChute

Sending large files over email can result in the dreaded bounced email. FileChute ($17.95, Yellow Mug Software, www.yellowmug.com) works with your MobileMe-, FTP-, or WebDAV-accessible Web server. Drop your file into the app, and it uploads it to your online server of choice and then creates a URL to add to your email. If you drop more than one file, you get an archive uploaded to your server. Adios, bounced emails!

Next Page: Content Creation Apps >>

Content Creation

Sure, Adobe's stuff is the gold standard, but you don't want to have to count on a good night at the poker table to pay for it, right? Cue these killer applications, which let you effectively draw, edit photos, render, animate, and even scratch for a very fair price.

djay 3

Budgeted beats to grow on.

You want to spin phat beats, but your slim bank keeps you from purchasing the high-end DJ equipment and software. That’s okay, young DJ-in-training, djay 3 ($49.95, algoriddim, www.djay-software.com) gives you everything you need to rock the house without losing your shirt. This surprisingly robust audio-mixing software integrates with your iTunes library and puts all the usual mixing and scratching right on your desktop. The application supports multitouch trackpad scratching and fading between tracks, so it’s especially perfect for the last few generations of MacBooks. And as you grow as a DJ, the application will grow with you thanks to its support for MIDI controllers. That means when you get the cash for those fancy digital mixers and turntables, djay will be right there with you.

With your iTunes catalog at your fingertips, you'll find some pretty interesting mashups.

Audacity

Free audio editor extraordinaire.

Audio editing seems simple at first. Then suddenly, you’re knee-deep in samples, frequencies, and bitrates. Sound editing really is part science, part black magic, so we’re thankful that Audacity (free, SourceForge, audacity.sourceforge.net) removes one of the biggest obstacles: choosing a quality application and figuring out how you’re going to pay for it. Audacity is both terrific and free, which is kinda hard to beat. An audio-recording and -editing application, it captures up to 16 channels at once from multiple sources, features noise removal, includes a metadata editor, and supplies unlimited undos. It can handle most of the audio files out there, and it’ll work with multiple files types in the same project. Audacity is also is cross-platform, so if you’re a recent Mac arrival, you may already know about its awesome power.

So many features, you'll second-guess the price: free.

SketchUp

3D for you and me.

Maya, 3D Studio Max, and SketchUp--all of these will let you create magical 3D worlds. Only one will do it for free, and you probably nailed it in one--it’s Google’s SketchUp software (free, Google, sketchup.google.com) that brings the world of 3D to the average Joe. You can create your own items or utilize Google’s 3D warehouse to find models created by other SketchUp users. With all those models at your fingertips, you can create floor plans for your home, build a level for your favorite FPS, or export the files to animation software or Photoshop. The application includes tutorials that’ll get you up and rendering in no time at all… so now nothing stands between you and virtual-world domination!

Build a virtual man-cave for you and your stuff.

Ringer

Wham-bam ringtone, ma'am.

We get tons of people asking us, “How do I make a ringtone for my iPhone?” Until recently, we told them to launch GarageBand, cut a ringtone, and export it to iTunes. Now we recommend Ringer ($15, Pixel Research Labs, pixelresearchlabs.com/ringer) as the quickest and easiest way to create ringtones from your favorite songs and audio files. Ringer has access to your entire iTunes library and works with MP3, AAC, MOV, MP4, M4V, and QuickTime files. Yeah, you can make a ringtone from a video file. A super-simple editor with waveform information makes it a snap to select the perfect section of audio, and you can fade in and out of the file and preview the ringtone before cropping it and sending it to iTunes for a sync with your iPhone.

Acorn

Using an image editor doesn’t have to cost you hundreds of dollars. In fact, with Acorn ($49.95, Flying Meat, www.flyingmeat.com/acorn), you’ll get features like layers, AppleScript support, 64-bit support, drawing, and filters in a package that’s easy on the wallet. This easy-to-use software strips away most of the features most people don’t use and gives you a clean image-editing tool.

Inkscape

While raster-based image editors like Photoshop are great at pushing pixels around, the vector-based drawing programs are where all the real action happens. The open-source application Inkscape (free, Inkscape, www.inkscape.org) is similar to powerhouses like Illustrator and CorelDraw, but with one important difference--it’s free. The app utilizes the Scalable Vector Graphics (SVG) file format and includes a nice 3D drawing tool that allows you to set your vanishing points.

Screenflick

With Snow Leopard, Apple introduced screen-capture into QuickTime, and it’s a nice feature if you’re looking to make a quick full-screen screencast. But if you want something that has features like fixed location output at up to 60 fps, Screenflick ($25, Araelium Group, www.araelium.com/screenflick) is an application you can get behind. It’ll highlight mouse clicks and keyboard events, adding a nifty visual cue into your screencasts that highlights what you’re doing.

Bracketeer

While your eye can take in an amazing range of light to dark, your camera cannot. In order to help create images that include a tonal range that the average camera can’t capture, HDR applications and plug-ins have appeared on the market. These applications take a series of images that have been bracketed from dark to light and combine them to include the darkest darks to the lightest lights in one HDR image. Bracketeer ($29.95, Pangea Software, pangeasoft.net/pano/bracketeer) is a standalone application that does just that. Adjust the saturation, the contrast, and exposure from within the application. The application will even auto-align your images in case you got the hiccups while taking your pics.

iStopMotion 2 Home

Most animators’ first animation was probably a stop-motion piece with Star Wars action figures. And whether those childhood lightsaber battles have you hoping to become the next Brad Bird, or you just love the look of stop-motion, iStopMotion ($49, Boinx Software, www.boinx.com/istopmotion/overview) is a quick, easy way to create simple stop-motion animations. Use your iSight or connect a camera to your Mac and start making your own Wallace and Gromit short. You’ll feel the Force, Lu… sorry.

Next Page: Utility Apps >>

Utilities

Slick utilities can add crucial functionality to your Mac, so we've selected the best options for everything from secure password managers and system-troubleshooting tools to an app that will let you play Windows games on your Mac... without Windows!

AppZapper

Completely trash applications.

Unlike using Windoze, installing and uninstalling apps on a Mac is painless. Drag an application’s icon into your Applications folder, and you’re pretty much good to go. Deleting them is just as simple--just grab them and toss them into the Trash. But if you’ve ever dug around Library or System folders on your Mac, you’ll see that even after you Trash an app, many of them leave crumbs in different parts of your machine. For cleaning up those last little bits, AppZapper ($12.95, Austin Sarner and Brian Ball, www.appzapper.com) is a must-have utility that’s also great for troubleshooting problems. Wiping out all of an application’s preferences and other random files can often turn a troublesome app into a perfectly behaved one after a clean reinstall.

Completely remove unwanted applications with a simple drag and drop.

Hazel

Clean and organize your Mac--automatically.

Hazel ($21.95, NoodleSoft, www.noodlesoft.com) is kind of like Rosie the Robot for your Mac. Or it’s like OS X’s Folder Actions… if they were super-awesome, easy to use, and perfect for helping you keep your Mac’s folders and files organized. Hazel installs as a pane in System Preferences, monitoring locations that you choose, and performs actions on files based on your criteria. By creating simple rules, you can delegate repetitive and annoying file-management tasks to Hazel--for example, automatically add downloaded MP3s to iTunes or move DMGs to an archive on an external drive. Hazel can delve deep into metadata for complex actions like copying images into subfolders by ISO settings or reorganizing music files according to bitrate. You can even set up simple rules for auto-deleting items that have been in the Trash longer than a certain amount of time.

1Password

Keep all your confidential info on lockdown.

You’ve heard it before--secure, unique passwords are the way to go. Yet there you are, still using the same password for everything from your maclife.com login to your Gmail and your bank account. Do we even have to tell you again why that’s a colossally bad idea? 1Password ($39.95, Agile Web Solutions, agilewebsolutions.com) can help clean up your online act, creating and managing complex passwords for every online account and then logging you in with a keyboard shortcut. The app can also be used to securely store personal information like credit card numbers and addresses for use in Web forms. And since all of your passwords are unique, you won’t have to worry about your banking info being compromised because of a data breach at that sketchy Russian website you used to download MP3s for a penny.

1Password securely stores Web passwords, logins, software licenses, and other important information.

iPhone Explorer

Store & browse files on your iPhone.

Breaking tradition with the iPods of yore, Apple doesn’t provide the ability to use your iPhone as a USB drive. iPhone Explorer (free, myPod Apps, www.mypodapps.com) is a simple app that will let you drag and drop files onto your phone for easy portability. The app itself is lightweight, and all it takes is a USB cable to view your iPhone’s folder structure. In addition to storing files, iPhone Explorer can be used to restore iTunes tracks from your iPod to a Mac or to rescue photographs from the depths of your iPhone’s memory. No jailbreaking is required, but more adventurous users with jailbroken phones can also recover contacts, messages, email, and other data. It’s a powerful tool, but it’s simple to use for the careful novice.

AppleJack

AppleJack (free, The Apotek, applejack.sourceforge.net) is one of those things you’ll install once and never think about again—if everything goes right. But if, god forbid, your Mac starts acting weird one day--or stops acting, period--it’ll be AppleJack to the rescue. It’s a command-line utility for diagnosing and repairing problems with your computer. Use the menu-driven system to repair permissions, validate preferences files, and remove screwy cache files.

SuperDuper

With Time Machine built into OS X, there’s really no good reason not to have an automatic backup. But Time Machine has its limits--a big one being the lack of bootable backups. SuperDuper ($27.95, Shirt Pocket, www.shirt-pocket.com) easily handles creating and updating bootable clones of your Mac’s hard drive so you’ll be ready to go when disaster strikes. Just plug in your clone, restart, and you’re up and running again.

CrossOver Games

PC fanboys like to slag the Mac for having fewer games, but with CrossOver Games ($39.95, CodeWeavers, www.codeweavers.com), Mac users--and Linux fans too--can easily play games coded for Windows machines. The list of officially supported games is hundreds deep, and since CrossOver is based on Wine, you don’t even need a copy of Windows just to play Team Fortress 2.

Clean My Mac

Hard drives are never big enough. Whether you have a MacBook Air or a Mac Pro, there always comes a point when there’s just not enough space on your internal disks. Clean My Mac ($29.95, MacPaw, macpaw.com) can help with that problem, scouring your Mac’s drive and tossing out all sorts of gunk you don’t need. Use it to toss unneeded language files, scrub extraneous code from universal binaries, and thoroughly clean up after deleted applications.

rooSwitch

OS X’s Fast User Switching is handy for juggling multiple user accounts and their corresponding settings, but rooSwitch ($19, Rocket, rooswitch.com) allows you to maintain different settings on a per-application basis. Use it to manage Home and Work browser profiles, for example, or to have different profiles in your word processor for writing or editing documents. rooSwitch works with nearly any application, and it supports Automator and AppleScript for the ultimate in customizability.

Next Page: Wild Card Apps & Staff Picks >>

Wild Cards

Not all Mac apps fall into your neat little categories. These five break the mold and completely deserve a place on your hard drive.

Bricksmith

Virtual bricks you can't lose or step on? Sold!

Legos are the official plastic brick of Mac|Life--we’ve had many discussions about the empires we built in our childhood bedrooms and how much we miss “playing Legos” as the soulless adults we are today. Bricksmith (free, donations accepted; Allen Smith; bricksmith.sourceforge.net) lets you recapture the magic in a highly geeky way. It’s a 3D Lego-model creator, offering drag-and-drop construction using thousands of parts in every color of Lego’s rainbow. Tutorials and the one finished model that’s included show you the ropes, and once you’re done with your virtual creation, you can export step-by-step instructions to build it for real. There’s even a mini figure generator where you can design and outfit a matching Lego man and insert him into your model. This software couldn’t be cooler.

We can't believe an application this sweet is donationware.

CameraBag Desktop

Give your photos a new identity or some old-timey charm.

We named the iPhone version of CameraBag one of our “101 Essential Apps for 2008,” and now the same fun can be had on your Mac, thanks to CameraBag Desktop ($19, Nevercenter, www.nevercenter.com). You drag in a digital image, and the app re-creates the look of a real film photograph--choose from Helga, Lolo, Mono, 1962, 1974, Instant, Magazine, Cinema, or Colorcross.

For more variations, click the Reprocess button, and all the options will change their look and coloring just slightly. Or check the Multi-filter box and experiment with adding multiple filters to a single photo. Of course, you can export your altered images back to your hard drive without affecting the original file. The novelty of taking an everyday digital snapshot and making it look like a Polaroid image or washed-out 1974 photograph never gets old.

Your digital photos, plus extra personality.

SousChef

Recipe database + shopping list + cooking assistant = one kitchen lifesaver.

SousChef ($30, Acacia Tree Software, acaciatreesoftware.com) edges out MacGourmet ($49.95, www.marinersoftware.com) in the cooking-assistant category for its cloud database of recipes. Every time a SousChef user enters a recipe (133,000-plus at press time), it’s synced to the cloud, and you can search those and import them into your own library. You can also opt out of sharing your own recipes so Aunt Erma’s secret matzo ball soup stays in the family.

Once a recipe’s in your library, you can edit, print, email, or blog it--or even add its ingredients to your grocery list. Click the Cook button for a full-screen view of the instructions that you can read from across the room, keeping your Mac out of the splatter zone. The Mac’s built-in speech recognition lets you advance the recipe’s steps with your own voice, or you can use the Apple Remote or a Keyspan Front Row Remote.

Temporis

Attractive, drag-and-drop timelines make it easy to "show, don't tell."

Everyone loves a good infographic, or at least geeky types like us do. (And the geeks shall inherit the earth, don’cha know?) Temporis ($24.99, Bartas Technologies, www.bartastechnologies.com) makes it easy to create neat-looking timelines on your Mac, which you can then print or export as PDF or TIFF files that are ready for importing into your presentation software, word processor, or page-layout app.

Adding new events is just a Command-click away, and it’s a snap to drag the start and end dates around on the timeline. The Arrange button will automatically stagger your timeline’s events into the most logical and easy-to-read order, and the Inspector lets you tweak fonts, colors, titles, labels, and your timeline’s span and intervals. You can even export the event data separately as an XML or CSV file.

Manga Studio Debut 4

Create your own comics and manga, and even manga-fy your photos.

Manga Studio Debut 4 ($49.99, Smith Micro, my.smithmicro.com) is a must-have for fans of Japanese manga or anyone who wants to make their own comic books. Its ingenious Beginner’s Assistant groups together the tools by processes so you can intuitively wind your way through a typical manga workflow: sketch, panel, draw, tone, and add character dialogue.

You can scan or draw your own art (graphics tablets supported, natch), play with the included samples, purchase manga content from www.contentparadise.com, or even import your own digital photos and watch Manga Studio make them all comicky-looking. Draw speed lines, add dialogue bubbles, move your pages around, and then print or export your finished comic book.

Manga Studio Debut 4 is the younger brother to professional-level Manga Studio EX 4 ($299.99), but Debut has plenty of advanced features too, including layers, templates, customizable patterns, and more.

Mac|Life Staff Picks

Bass Tuner

I’m a beginning bass player--like, very beginning. So it’s a huge help that I don’t have to worry about staying in key. This terrific, simple, and streamlined little app ($9, www.rustykat.com) lets me quickly get in tune in front of my MacBook using the built-in mic. With that necessity sorted, I can fire up some tracks and tablature and focus on struggling to play along.

Multiwinia

Multiwinia ($19, www.ambrosiasw.com) offers crazy replayability. You devise a strategy for your stick-figure army, then watch them take on up to four other teams in six game types on 40 vector-graphic maps. Online multiplayer against Mac and Windows players works flawlessly and keeps me coming back for more. No Napoleon complex necessary.

MetaX

If you need to tag a large amount of MP4 files, you could use iTunes’ painfully slow process. Instead I found MetaX (free, www.kerstetter.net) for all my tagging needs. The app will search the IMDB catalog and plug the information into the appropriate fields, then share that info via tagChimp. You can even scan DVD barcodes via iSight!

Bean

For a word dork like me, word processors are a big deal. Bean (free, www.bean-osx.com) is a lightweight, open-source word processor. It’s missing many of the blinky lights and thingamajigs of the big boys, and that’s exactly the point. Fewer distractions equals better writing, faster. And for anyone who needs to hit a certain length, the live word count rocks.

Fluid

I often find that Firefox has the tendency to crash when I have too many Web applications running. But Fluid (free, fluidapp.com) lets me create a site-specific browser out of my most essential websites, like Google Docs and Flickr. Simply plug in the URL, and voilà! You have a separate application running that won’t go down if something else does.

Next Page: More Gaming Bang for 50 Bucks >>

More Bang for 50 Bucks

Some of the Mac's best games are also its cheapest? Sweet!

Fifty bones won’t buy you even one new Xbox 360 or PS3 game, but on the Mac, you can snap up a stack of premier games for less than that. Or at least, that was our theory when we gave Florence, our new associate online editor, 50 whole American dollars and asked her to max out her Mac with the best gaming that short stack of money could buy. Man, did she score--check out the results of her diligent “research.”

Plants Vs. Zombies

$16, amazon.com

Line up perilous peashooters and sun-soaking sunflowers against an abominable horde of zombies in Plants vs. Zombies.

This animated tower-defense favorite pits you against a horde of zombies with one thing on their (decaying) minds--invading your home for brains! Pit your arsenal of zombie-fighting plants, each with their own spectacular organic weaponry, against 26 zombies and 50 levels of adventure. Fair warning: Once you start playing this excellent game, it’s incredibly hard to stop.

World of Goo

$10, amazon.com

Stack up adorable globs of goo to build structures and watch them band together as you help transport them across various levels.

World of Goo is another addictive and totally adorable puzzle game. Created around the idea that circular goo balls make adequate building materials (naturally), the game has you solving puzzles by dragging and dropping goo to create all kinds of crazy structures that enable you to transport your goo across the level. The oh-so-cute googly-eyed blobs pack the game with charm, and you can also connect online and play against other Goo architects around the world.

Braid

$15, playgreenhouse.com

Braid's aesthetically appealing backdrop and profound storyline will keep you engrossed until the very end.

Some games defy description, and Braid might be easy to pass over because it appears to be just a mix of platforming and time control set against a gorgeous backdrop. But it subverts and transcends those two well-worn clichés with brilliant design and an absorbing story that packs a twist that you’ll never see coming. Watch the YouTube videos if you need help solving its puzzles, but just make sure you see this masterpiece through to the end.

Balcassa

$8, openplanetsoftware.com

Balcassa has a mountain of exciting brainteasers for the puzzle fiend.

Balcassa feeds off those nightmares you still have about attempting to master that archaic, rainbow-colored Rubik’s cube. And while most of you probably never cracked the damn thing (we didn’t!), Balcassa gives you a second chance. The objective of the game is to slide the cubes into a specific sequence, pattern, or orientation. It may sound like a simple task, but much like fiddling with a Rubik’s cube, figuring it all out is the real reward.

Freeware Fun

If you’re interested in first-person shooters and MMORPGs, Quake Live and Second Life can give you hours of entertainment at our favorite price: $0.00. Both games perform smoothly on Mac OS 10.4 or later. Quake Live doesn’t require beefy hardware because it runs through your Web browser. But that doesn’t stop it from delivering all the fast-paced action of the classic first-person shooter. Second Life, while not as packed with storyline as World of Warcraft, offers a similar massively multiplayer world where you can meet people, customize your character’s look, and participate in a virtual world that’s just like our own. You don’t even have to watch the clock to make sure you’re on time for a player-versus-player raid!

You don't need fancy computer hardware to frag your way through this beloved shooter.

Vital Statistics on Our 50 Killer Apps

Total cost if you bought all 50 apps: $1219.83

Number of apps that are free: 13

Apps that have an iPhone counterpart: 15

Whaddaya waiting for? (apps that have a free demo): 39

Number of countries these apps were born in: 7

Apps named "iSomething": shockingly... just 3!

Apps that require Snow Leopard: 1

Apps that require Leopard: 14

Apps that promise "iLife integration!": 9