OS X - iCal etc

GoldenGlory

GoldenGlory

GoldenGlory

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17 Jul 2006
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410
Hello friends,

Here I am in OS X, what fun!

Apart from some problems with VLC crashing and Word/Photoshop being slow everything is fine.

I have just one minor niggle. iCal is in my dock, which is nice. It display the wrong date though, until I open it when it switches. How do I fix that?

Also, should I download acrobat reader instead of using Preview?

Thanks
 
You can't change the date, what is displayed in the dock is an alias which is equivalent to an icon in Windows.

Don't waste time with Acrobat Reader, Preview is just as good and does everything that Acro a Reader does. :)
 
What you could do is set it to open when you login, but remain hidden :) It's not a big app, so this won't really affect performance at all.

System Preferences > Accounts > (Select the account) > Login Items > + > (Select the iCal application in 'Applications') > (Select the 'hide' checkbox)

and what's wrong with Preview? It's so much faster than Adobe Reader!
 
FYI the display date on iCal is the date iCal was announced :)

Anyway, I find preview just as good at doing that Acrobat Reader does.
So what's wrong with your VLC app? I'm having 0 issue with it, played anything and everything I've thrown at it.

I've got the student edition of MS Office and I don't find Word being anywhere slow. It does however take 10 sec to load and open then all is good. No difference compared that to my Windows Office back on XP.

I do however find Dreamweaver to take its time to load up - sometimes taking up to 30secs. Damn I hate it and I wish they'll release a Universal Dreamweaver soon.
 
Hi,

Preview is fine, I was just checking there wasn't something better :)
VLC- I tried to play an episode of x and it just moved the progress bar across in about 10 seconds (is a 40min ep) didn't show the video at all. I downloaded a few components for Quicktime which seems to work ok.

StuffIt has also crashed a couple of times when trying to extract some files. It's really annoying WinZip used to work a treat :(

The other annoyance is with Msn, there is no way to tell if someone is speaking as the window is hidden behind my current one. Is there any way of making it pop up infront?

I think the reason some things are slow is because it only has 512MB ram. I've got 2GB kingston coming, will this help lots?

Thanks!
 
You don't need StuffIt or Winzip. OS X has a built in archiver and extractor for Zip files. To archive just select the files and Option+Click (or right click etc.) and archive. To extract just double click on the zip file.

Apple really have thought of everything you know. :)
 
Stuffit Expander is absolutely atrocious. I have never got it to work properly so I downloaded an alternative called "The Unarchiver" which works jolly well.

If you've got Mac Messenger, when someone sends you a new message and the window doesn't have the focus, the Messenger icon should bounce in the dock.

I've read somewhere that it's possible to drag the calendar widget out of Dashboard and put it on your desktop to have an always-viewable date display if the iCal one bugs you.
 
FirebarUK said:
OS X loves ram. 512MB wont be much good so you'll REALLY benefit from 2GB.
Click to expand...


Nope, 1Gb is perfectly acceptable for light use. I noticed sod all diff from 512 to 1Gb, and nowt between 1 and 2...

When you start doing hardcore photo/video editing then does it need 2 or more Gb.
 
It could possibly be how you use it...

Coming from Windows like me, you forget that pressing the red button doesn't close the program, just the window. So you can soon end up with loads of applications running and all taking up memory.

Hence 1Gb might be fine for those good folk who remember to CMD+Q but for me, I like my 2Gb. ;)
 
Nope, 1Gb is perfectly acceptable for light use. I noticed sod all diff from 512 to 1Gb, and nowt between 1 and 2...
Click to expand...

I meant it in terms of him having 2GB on the way. He will notice a big difference. Read the rest of the thread ;)
 
Thanks for the input guys.

RAM still hasn't arrived, let's hope tomorrow!

Some of the video problems I was having were due to corrupt downloads so there.

Loading up Word and Illustrator really seems to kill the poor thing. Will the RAM upgrade sort that? I also need to work with huge photos (18mb) in Photoshop, will this be okay etc with the extra ram?

One other thing, how would I VPN into uni?

Thanks!
 
I'm presuming you have an Intel based mac. In which case Illustrator and Photoshop performance will always be slightly sub standard as they will be running in Rosetta. Adobe are due to release the Universal binary (I presume CS3) soonish, which will really make the Intel mac's shine.
 
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