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Mac OS X & MacBook Pro: my (exhaustive) review (1 Viewer)

Craig S

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Uhhh, no. Not even close.

Quicksilver shines when you are doing keyboard-intensive work (writing). it lets you do all sorts of things (including launching apps, but that's just scratching the surface) without taking your hands off the keyboard.
 

Ronald Epstein

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Christ,

True, I have 4GB ram on my Mac Pro and 2GB on my Macbook Pro.

The problem is that I have so many things running at startup as is
including Yahoo widgets, a GEEK TOOL weather map, and DRAG THING.

I am just very cautious about adding anything additional that
needs to be constantly running in the background. On the other
hands, QUICKSLIVER seems pretty damn cool so I may just go
for it after all.
 

DaveF

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I'm curious: If you were Steve Jobs for a day, what would you change in Mac OS X? And what one feature can you not live without?

I'll choose one small thing that really intrudes on my work process: Provide user-selected file sorting methods (size, date, type, modified, name, etc.) in Column View in the Finder and also in File Open and Save dialogs.

And on a desert island, I think Expose is becoming critical to daily use. Or maybe Dashboard, with its handy little weather widgets.
 

Hartwig Hanser

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At work I use a Mac. What irks me most is that I cant change window size at all four borders; I have to go to the right lower edge. In Windows I can do that.
 

Ronald Epstein

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I was thinking about this today.

iCal is a problem for me. I use it regularly to remind me of
appointments. It works perfectly except for the fact that the
pop-up alert needs to have a better alarm (instead of a simple
beep) and needs more options such as "snooze" or "remind me
again at this time." Microsoft Outlook had a great calendar
reminder. iCal could do better.
 

Andrew Pratt

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I wish Cmd Tab would show all application windows regardless of their status (minimized or not) and it'd be nice to show all sub windows like Witch or Windows do.
 

ErichH

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Ron, I have a Sam Kinison scream you can use with iCal ;)
Sometimes I'll use a well edited JW Pepper from Man With The Golden Gun (`Now Look At Me When I'm Talkin' To Ya' Boy!)
 

DaveF

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I don't use iCal, so no comment there. I'll toss another UI quirk that gets in my way -- and I forgot this in my review.

I'd do something about the green "optimize" window buttton. I find this button almost useless. Strangely, it seems the antithesis of classic Apple design: It behaves inconsistently from program to program and rarely does what I think it should do. Sometimes, it maximizes the window, mostly filling the screen, a la Windows. Sometimes it maximizes vertically, with no horizontal increase; sometimes vice versa. And sometimes it just makes the window a bit bigger.

Actually, I could probably completely get rid of all three stoplight buttons altogether. I find them nearly useless, the way Apple has implemented them.

So, then a positive: Cmd-H (hide). I now hit Alt-H in windows and stare at it, wondering why nothing is happening.
 

Craig S

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I read somewhere that button is supposed to size the window to fit all of its current contents. But I'm with you: for me, it's useless. This seems to be a fairly constant "recent switcher" complaint.
 

DaveF

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Except, in practice, it doesn't. This behavior is not correctly, or sensibly, implemented in most applications. The actual result of pressing the "Go" button is unpredictable. I like the idea of "optimize" but it's not enforced.
 

McPaul

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well, I read up their website info, watched the mac break podcast tutorials, watched the youtube "insert title here" tutorials, and from what they show, it's pretty much just a fancy quick-opener of things.
 

Christ Reynolds

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Big difference. Programs can only mean one thing. 'Things' could mean anything, and usually does with Quicksilver. Contacts, bookmarks, applications, scripts, documents, media, and even contents of your clipboard. It's an opener of 'things', but it's the fastest way to get to your things in OS X. I hate unnecessary software, but I rely on Quicksilver every day.

CJ
 

DaveF

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Paul, I understand where you're coming from. I'm still trying to figure out the point behind the "Hazel" application. It gets similar raves as QuickSilver, but I can't figure out what it does besides automatically delete my trash for me and move downloads from my desktop to my Downloads folder (which I just set Firefox to do via user preferences).

Likewise, while QuickSilver as just a launcher might be useful to me, it's never been clear from the information I've read what else it does besides launch apps.
 

Ronald Epstein

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Dave,

When YOU tell me that Quicksilver is the "must-have"
application, then I'll go download and install it.

I'm still not convinced that it launches any of my programs faster
or easier than using DOCK or even the TIGER LAUNCH app.
 

Christ Reynolds

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So...you've not tried it, but you don't think it's any faster than your current method?

If you keep everything in the dock, and you only use Quicksilver to open programs, then you probably don't need it. But again, it does much more than open programs. Your entire hard disk is kept in Quicksilver's catalog.

CJ
 

Mike Heenan

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Dave, how long did your battery last? From your review I'm gathering about 2 and half hours, was that at full brightness?
 

DaveF

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QuickSilver is on my to-do list. I've got it installed but haven't tried it yet. For me, there is an inexact balance between efficiency and perceived ease in tool usage. I can't really say that Expose is the most efficient (read: fastest) window switching method, but it often feels easier. I think it's akin to the need for active wait-icons: waiting for a task with a spinning cursor feels shorter than waiting with a locked, or frozen, cursor.

For me, QS will have to not only be truly faster, but also feel better in use.
 

DaveF

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I get almost three hours watching DVDs (145+ min) and light text editing (24 min) in travel mode: screen at lowest brightness, wifi off, bluetooth off, and battery settings on most conservative.

For home use (wifi on, bluetooth on, screen dim), my battery life seems to range from two to four hours depending on usage.

I'd like a counter to tally batter usage time between plug-ins, and ignoring periods of inactivity. The battery meter shows a running estimation of time remaining, and isn't useful for gauging actual use time.
 

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