Generally speaking, the update process I use and recommend is this: a) visit http://www.apple.com/support/downloads/ and get the correct “combo” updater. There will be several, so pay attention: it’s a big download, so you want the correct one the first time. Set it aside. b) run disk utility or DiskWarrior or Drive Genius or whatever your […]

… you know: DiskWarrior, Drive Genius 2; TechTool Pro and so on. Over the past few days, I’ve had the “joy” of cloning and updating about a dozen drives several times each. Here’s what I’ve learned. 1) don’t have spaces in your volume names. “My_Volume” is OK; “My Volume” is not. 2) if your just-cloned […]

In order to make the UserAgent “stick” between launches in Safari, one has to edit the plist which is at ~/library/preferences/com.apple.safari.plist . Find CustomUserAgent, and edit the value string. (Find the string by hovering above the menu item in the develop/user agent menu.) To return to plain old Safari, just delete the value string (so […]

In order to make the UserAgent “stick” between launches in Safari, one has to edit the plist which is at ~/library/preferences/com.apple.safari.plist . Find CustomUserAgent, and edit the value string. (Find the string by hovering above the menu item in the develop/user agent menu.) To return to plain old Safari, just delete the value string (so […]

If you use BootCamp, then you’ve probably heard of or are using Winclone, which will make a full drive backup of your BootCamp partition. Not merely handy when Windows wipes itself out, but also if you need to change drives. Having a Winclone backup is very reassuring. (Lord knows I’d love to have something so […]

The Java vulnerability which is a drive-by (just visit the site, no need to click on anything) attack was stopped by my copy of VirusBarrier from Intego. The only way you could have prevented the attack would be to run your browsers with Java disabled. So, once again: to those who insist “we’re safe because […]

I’ve read many of the “botnet debunking” reports on the web, usually from the die-hard “Macs are totally secure” crowd. (I used to be a member, but am no longer.) The “debunk” always includes the line “the only place you can get this trojan is from illegal downloads of iWork ’09 or Photoshop CS4…[and] it’s […]

Here’s the fastest way I’ve found to get good looking H.264 out of EyeTV, starting from your recorded program file. 1) save it as mpeg stream. This takes about 1 minute per hour of video. 2)load it into VisualHub. (Yes, I know it’s been abandoned. Deal with it.) 3) set optimize for (your device) under […]

Tag Folders… …is a free, and really useful, clever way to make use of metadata (spotlight comments.) (I’ve written this because when you install Tag Folders, it starts asking all kinds of questions you’re not prepared to answer unless you understand what it’s doing. It’s one of those “read the manual FIRST” programs.) Consider iTunes: […]

Inspired by something I read this morning, here’s my own anecdotal experience. Epson inkjet printers: when it says “Ink Low!” (implying “your dog will DIE if you don’t replace the offending cartridge RIGHT NOW!” …ignore it. Modern Epsons (at least – I have no experience with other inkjets) will print merrily along for many more […]