Existing users, 
User Name Crazy Dave
Member Since 2004-06-10
Total number of Feedback Posts: 14
Total number of comments: 19
Last 10 Feedback Posts by Crazy Dave [ Search for All ]
SpeedTools Utilities 2.8.1 (Mac OS X)
The new Scan Files for Bad Sectors mode included in 2.8.1 is FANTASTIC!!!! I have successfully recovered data from two failed hard drives in the past two days. Copying large amounts of data from a failing hard drive can be tedious, time-consuming and fraught with danger without the correct tools, because copying the data invariably tries to also copy the CORRUPT files along with the good, resulting in a hard drive crash and basically having to manually spend hours weeding out the bad files from the good. However, SpeedTools v2.8.1 is the first Mac OS X software I'm aware of that reports which files are sitting on bad blocks so I can ignore and copy everything EXCEPT them. Since OS X has been severly lacking in decent hard disk utilities I previously had to resort to using OS 9 for small (<120GB) hard disks and Windows for large drives (>120GB). MediaScanner's Auto Reassign function also successfully restored three previously unusable hard disks to full working order. One drive had four bad blocks, another had one and another had two bad blocks. The drives were impossible to use without a bad block remapping tool due to the way hard drives remap blocks. Before I had to resort to using Windows or OS 9 to remap bad blocks, but MediaScanner as of version 2.8.1 now seems to finally be the hard disk tool I've been searching for. I wish this tool was available years ago when I worked at AppleCentre, it would have saved us from having to have a Windows computer in the office and probably would have saved literally hours upon hours each week, because removing a hard disk from an iBook just so you could scan it on a Windows computer meant spending about 30 minutes dismantling the entire computer then 30 minutes reassembling it again, one hour of completely wasted time. I believe this is a more worthwhile tool than DiskWarrior, as most hard disk corruption is caused by bad blocks, which DiskWarrior DOES NOT FIX. Some people swear by DiskWarrior and tell me it's saved their data on many occasions - but if your hard disk is corrupting itself and regularly needs to be repaired by DiskWarrior, you should be asking yourself, WHY is it corrupted? If the corruption wasn't caused by bad memory/power failure/accidental unplugging of a USB drive/system crash then it's highly likely you have a bad block sitting somewhere on your hard drive. Disk Utility, and DiskWarrior will NOT pick this up, and TechToolPro only does a read-only scan which will not reassign bad blocks so it is completely useless. However MediaScanner seems to work just as well as OS 9 Norton Utilities or Windows Disk Scan at mapping out bad blocks. Now that this tool is available for OS X, the possibility of a Windows free office is getting closer each day. If Apple would just fix Spotlight and bring back the old Find File from OS 10.3.9, I would be able to literally throw the PC out the window and have a Mac ONLY household as was possible five years ago. [alert admin]
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Sunday, May 17 2009 @ 03:15 AM PDT
Apple Mac OS X 10.5.6 (Mac OS X)
Combo update is 669 MB in size
Talk about bloatware! Years ago Mac users used to laugh at Windows users for their constant huge updates. Now a Mac bug fix update fills an entire CD. Much of the world is still stuck with using dialup internet with hourly connection limits, making this update IMPOSSIBLE to download for these people. That doesn't even include updates to any other Apple software. I clicked 'Software Update' on a friend's MacBook and it wanted to download 982MB worth of updates, which would take a few weeks to download with limited dialup. Here in Australia only about 40% of households have broadband, and most of them have 512/128 or slower. Way to go Apple. 'It Just Works' - unfortunately for many of us it doesn't. I have to go back to using Windows XP for my work while the Mac is busy trying to download Leopard updates - the software I'm trying to use requires 10.5.2 or above so I can't use it until this download is finished. However the Windows version of the software works beautifully with Windows 98, XP, even Vista without updates. Why do so many Mac software developers force us to use the latest version of Mac OS X? I can't think of a single piece of Windows software that REQUIRES Vista to work. Software is still written for WinXP, meaning somebody who purchased a PC eight years ago doesn't need to spend a single cent to remain compatible with the rest of the world. I have 17 Macs in the house but can't run some of the latest software because I don't have the latest version of Leopard. Only four of those computers are even capable of installing Leopard, even though they are still fast and useful production machines. The old iMacs running Panther are far more productive than the newer Leopard machines, because they don't have Spotlight slowing everything down and they can actually perform reliable fast network filename searches. Pitiful situation. I lost half my software in the transition from System 6 to System 7, another 20-30% of my software stopped working between System 7 to System 8, about half my software never survived the transition to OS X and couldn't print reliably in Classic, some of my software only works with 10.3 but not 10.4 or 10.5, some of my software will only run with 10.3 or 10.4 but not 10.5, and some software requires Leopard. I'm SICK OF IT! Meanwhile EVERY SINGLE PIECE OF SOFTWARE I ever purchased for Windows works just fine on the oldest ten year old and newest one year old PCs I own. Do we blame Apple or the developers or both? Or do we blame ourselves for buying this buggy OS X that requires so many bug fixes before it works in a vaguely stable and reliable fashion? [alert admin]
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Friday, April 24 2009 @ 06:35 AM PDT
VisualHub 1.34 (Mac OS X)
Unfortunately Techspansion closed its doors this week and will not continue development of VisualHub. The product is no longer available for download from the TechSpansion website, but , but can be found at various archives around the net if you do a web search. I wish the programmer of this fantastic software the best for the future. Every day he makes my life just a bit easier with this great application's ease in converting files that would otherwise be very tedious. [alert admin]
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Thursday, October 09 2008 @ 09:24 AM PDT
Apple Mac OS X 10.5.4 (Mac OS X)
Today a third client called asking me to revert her MacBook back to Tiger, only a week after she installed Leopard. We tried for hours to get her wireless network to behave reliably, but Leopard's wireless support is still broken. Hundreds of people have posted on Apple's forums about this problem, yet there are no solutions. The problem has existed since Leopard was released, and a year later it's not fixed. The airport menu keeps constantly scanning for new networks even when you're already connected to a network. If the signal is lost for some reason, trying to select the same base station results in the airport menu turning blue for 10-20 seconds, but nothing happens. It can work well for a few hours or even a day or two, then all Airport activity ceases. Then it suddenly reappears a few minutes or hours later, even if nothing has been touched. Problem seems to be worse if the laptop is running on battery power. As usual, Apple denies any bugs exist, blaming user error, external interference or third-party routers (even though Airport Base Stations are also affected). Naturally, booting into 10.3 or 10.4 solves all these problems. I'll go back to playing with these toy Apple computers after my anger has subsided a bit, otherwise there's a risk I'll throw the MacBook out the window. Another unsatisfying day trying to get work done with Leopard, one step forward and two steps back. Oh well, back to my Windows box to get some real work done. [alert admin]
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Wednesday, August 20 2008 @ 01:42 AM PDT
Facebook Exporter for iPhoto 1.0.3 (Mac OS X)
Facebook Exporter for iPhoto is broken again with yet another hopeless update from Apple that breaks almost every application in existence. I'm so happy I bought a Windows XP computer to go with my Mac, otherwise I wouldn't be able to get ANY work done. At least it works reliably most of the time. Leopard = headache every time Apple releases a system update. Windows XP = get stuff done without having to worry about updating your programs every 2 weeks. Apple: It just works (only just, and only sometimes) [alert admin]
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Sunday, June 29 2008 @ 06:02 PM PDT
Application Enhancer 2.5b1 (Mac OS X)
It's strange how people flame the hell out of Unsanity for producing APE, which many people seem to think is the root of all evil, even though it makes OSX vaguely usable again. It's strange how nobody flames Apple for producing a rubbish OS that requires third-party hacks to restore useful features like WindowShade and the Application Menu that were in Mac OS 7.5 back in 1995. APE is designed to restore the features Apple removed, the features that were the original reason I bought a Mac 16 years ago. Keep up the good work Unsanity. [alert admin]
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Thursday, May 29 2008 @ 12:04 PM PDT
Apple Mac OS X 10.5.2 (Mac OS X)
Terrible leap backwards for Mac OS X 
I just can't believe how bad Leopard is. After two major updates I figured maybe they would have fixed it, but Spotlight is now even more useless than it was in Tiger. I cannot even instruct it to only search one or two volumes so now it searches all my volumes, all my 'network shares' (whatever the hell that means - does it mean mounted network servers, or all publicly searchable folders, or only the computer names?) or only the Home folder. Useless. If I do a network search 5 times, I get 5 different lists of results. Searching for a filename the first time might give me 6 results, then 25 the next time, then 102 the next time, then 12 the next. There is absolutely no feedback given to tell if the search has finished or is still in progress. Still can't re-order the columns in Spotlight searches, and the lack of file size or other info makes it feel like a phillips screwdriver when you only have blade screws. ie completely useless. The bottom panel of Spotlight searches 'giv...me..resul..like thi..so..I cannot f..nd anth...ing..way' Can you read that? No, me neither. I have three A4 pages full of bugs that are still present in Leopard 10.5.2. However nobody has the slightest interest in trying to fix them, and if I put comments on Apple's discussion forums they are always quickly and silently removed. The first time I saw Leopard with its stupid small-text sidebars full of useless items (unlike the fully customisable ones in Panther) I had a sense of deja vu but couldn't remember why. Then this weekend I had to do a job in an office full of Windows Vista computers. Leopard has an almost identical copy of Vista's sidebars, but unlike Leopard, Vista's ones can be fully customised to make them more useful. Vista also had this horrible Transparency feature which gave 3 out of the 7 people in the office headaches, but it was always easy to turn off, unlike Leopard which took 2 system updates to fix the transparent menu bars. And I still can't change the menu fonts or font size, so three of my elderly clients had to move from OS9 to Windows XP, because OS9 was fully configurable but OSX is not, and they simply cannot read small fonts. It's not their fault, but Apple has lost them as customers due to their short-sightedness (excuse the pun). Apple, I bought my first Windows XP machine this year because you made Tiger useless to me, but now Leopard is even more useless. Will you ever fix Spotlight and bring back the old Find File? If you don't, then I'll not be coming back to the Mac platform, and you can guarantee that the next time I have an office of 200 computers needing upgrades I will NOT be recommending they replace them with Macs. This is coming from somebody who has been consulting in the Mac community for more than 15 years and used to run a BBS for an Apple User Group. I have twelve Mac computers in this household, but your buggy, lacking software has lost me, possibly forever. [alert admin]
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Monday, May 05 2008 @ 02:18 AM PDT
Azureus BitTorrent Client 3.0.4.2 (Mac OS X)
That this does not work with 10.3 or below
It seems this new version requires the newer version of Java that is available with 10.4 and 10.5 therefore cannot work anymore with 10.3. Apple are not releasing Java updates for 10.3, even though they were still selling computers with 10.3 pre-installed only 2.5 years ago. Azureus 3.0.4.2 works beautifully on my 1999 Windows 98 PC because it runs the latest version of Java. Thanks for nothing Apple. You've done a great job of creating the world's most incompatible and quickly outdated computer systems. When our office full of twenty five 2.5 year old mac computers is completely incapable of running recent software until we fork out thousands of dollars for upgrades (upgrades to something that isn't even broken), something is very badly wrong. That being said, Azureus version 3.0.3.2 still runs beautifully on 10.3, so I'm very happy with it. You can't run anything above 3.0.3.2 on 10.3, so be careful if you have the program set to automatically update because it will kill your installation and you'll need to track down an old version. I haven't yet found a place where older versions are available but being a SourceForge effort I'm sure there is a mirror somewhere. I'm completely happy with Azureus and highly recommend it, but I'm just not happy with Apple's newly acquired Microsoft marketing tactics forcing people to spend money on non-upgrade (meaning flaky updates that don't provide any additional functionality but in fact remove some functionality) every year. I expect to get flamed by the Apple fanboys here, but companies will never invest money in Apple computers if they have to budget an OS upgrade every year. If you have 200 Macs in a company, that's a heck of a lot of money to spend every year. Much cheaper to go the Windows route, plenty of businesses still run the latest software on Win98 computers without issue. [alert admin]
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Sunday, January 20 2008 @ 12:00 AM PST
Flip4Mac WMV 2.2.0.49 (Mac OS X)
It's not surprising that a third-party can produce far better software than the multi billion dollar Microsoft with their 2,000+ software developers. But what does surprise is when Flip4Mac simply performs better than most other software, and integrates so smoothly with QuickTime that sometimes I actually don't realise I'm working with a WMV file. Formats like RealPlayer will never catch on commercially in the Mac community if they don't have QuickTime compatibility, but Flip4Mac makes the WMV experience seamless. I can now import and export WMV movies in one step, which is still virtually impossible with Windows itself! It's not a half-assed attempt at making a WMV viewer (like MS original Windows Media Player for Mac) but is a completely seamless addition to QuickTime, meaning it works with any application that supports QuickTime. Now I'm free to use QuickTime, Cellulo or even Front Row to view WMV movies. I should mention, I'm using it on a lowly 350MHz G4. If somebody sends me an HD WMV file that the computer is too slow to play back (which would be the case with ANY HD format and a 350MHz machine) I simply use Flip4Mac to re-encode the file into something smaller that the computer can handle. So far it has never skipped a beat or crashed on me. I haven't had any audio/video sync issues either, even though these issues can be common with third part codecs and conversion software. [alert admin]
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Thursday, January 03 2008 @ 11:20 PM PST
Microsoft Office Open XML Converter 0.2.1 (Mac OS X)
Great, requires Tiger or Leopard
None of my clients from schools, charities or not-for-profit organisations can use it. I'll load NeoOffice onto their computers for them, they'll be very happy with that I'm sure. Last time I tried it, NeoOffice was much more stable than the official Office anyway. It has been able to open corrupted Word documents for me on a few occasions (Word corrupted its own docs somehow and was unable to read them, but NO worked just fine, reminds me of how Adobe Reader can't open some of the documents that Apple's Preview can open without issue) [alert admin]
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Tuesday, December 18 2007 @ 11:00 PM PST
Last 10 Comments by Crazy Dave [ Search for All ]
It's easy to extract the photos from the screensaver file. In the Finder, right-click on Lamborghini Miura 2.slideSaver (or control-click if you have a one button mouse) the select 'Show Package Contents' now open up Contents, then Resources. The photos are all stored as .jpg files, which can be used as wallpaper.
Original feedback item : Read More
Friday, October 03 2008 @ 10:03 PM PDT
General fragmentation question
Apologies, I didn't see the end of your first sentence where you mentioned 'SuperDuper!' - I forgot that SD! only does file-level copying, not block-level. I would assume those 54 fragmented files are log files (which will always become fragmented over time but are not important to defragment) or maybe system cache files that have been added to since starting up the computer. OS X will automatically defragment small files when it is idle, so…
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Wednesday, September 24 2008 @ 12:38 PM PDT
General fragmentation question
Just wondering how exactly you cloned the HD. If you used block-level cloning software, this would have created an identical hard disk image,and would not have defragmented your files at all. A true block level clone does not modify any data or file mappings. You could do a hundred block-level clones of a volume and still have file fragments, because the process completely ignores the files themselves, concentrating on the underlying volume…
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Wednesday, September 24 2008 @ 12:27 PM PDT
That upgrade scheme works for Apple doesn't it? Buy OS 10.0, then go and buy 10.1 (with no upgrade pricing available) and 10.2 and 10.3 and 10.4 and 10.5. 10.6 is just around the corner, again no upgrade pricing will be available. It's not quite yearly but since 2000 they've released 5 fully-paid updates already. Even Microsoft offered upgrade pricing for Vista, and that was upgrading XP which was over 5…
Original feedback item : Read More(1 words)
Saturday, September 20 2008 @ 10:24 AM PDT
Do you seriously think Snow Leopard will re-introduce all the fantastic features Apple previously removed from the OS with the introduction of OS X? So far, every time Apple has promised something in regard to OS X, it's either not there or it's lobotomised to the point of lunacy. For example, Leopard introduced network-enabled Spotlight but it ONLY works with other Macs running Leopard, it still can't search Windows or Linux shares. …
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Monday, August 11 2008 @ 02:20 AM PDT
Did you try a non-alpha version? 1.34a denotes alpha. It's possible that an older more stable version would do the job better. I'd suggest emailing the author with the name of the DVD, maybe he can do something to fix the problem. I have been using VisualHub for many months and haven't had any problems so far, but haven't tried this new version yet. If a bug has crept in,…
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Thursday, August 07 2008 @ 06:44 PM PDT
Still the same problems with Adobe CS3 files
Wintermute, I have hundreds of clients who work with large Photoshop and Illustrator files mounted from a server. It is simply the ONLY way to do it for some projects, especially magazines and other publications where you may have ten or twenty people working with the same material that is constantly being updated. This practice has been working for years. I managed an advertising company with 45 designers all working from the same server…
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Thursday, July 10 2008 @ 05:56 AM PDT
Still the same problems with Adobe CS3 files
Definitely report these problems to Apple at their feedback website: Apple don't care, but at least there will be a record of all derogatory correspondence if a whole bunch of people decide to take a class action lawsuit against them one day. It's happened to them before, remember the class action when people bought OSX then found that it didn't have half the features of OS9 and they couldn't even play a DVD. You're not the…
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Saturday, July 05 2008 @ 12:35 AM PDT
There's no point asking somebody else how long it takes and thinking it will take the same amount of time to backup your hard disk. The time taken is completely dependent on how much data you are copying. You might find somebody with a 120GB hard disk says it takes 20 minutes to back up, but they may not have mentioned that they only have 20GB of data on the hard disk. As a rule of…
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Wednesday, June 04 2008 @ 08:04 PM PDT
You should be emailing Apple to get them to re-instate these features in the OS, rather than being forced to resort to third-party hacks. I wonder how many people are only using Application Enhancer to restore functionality that Apple has removed from its OS over the years. Many APE utilities simply restore OS7.5 functionality, usability and ENJOYABILITY to OSX, so WHY DID APPLE REMOVE THE FEATURES IN THE FIRST PLACE?!? Two things I have…
Original feedback item : Read More(1 words)
Sunday, June 01 2008 @ 01:21 AM PDT
