"Must have" Mac application

G

guoxiaotian

Registered
Hi all,
Couldn't wait for them to fix the MBP whine problem so intead of I got myself a Mini with 2G memory, it runs so smooth, like butter ;-)
OK, I haven't used a Mac for 5 years, could you guys please recommend a list of "must have" Mac applications? I mean those that everybody uses. I already got Firefox, Adium, Chamonix, Textmate.
Thanks!

-Xiaotian
 
GraphicConvertor - a little ugly in its GUI, but completely indispensible for working with images.

Roxio Toast - for CD/DVD writing tasks

Snapz Pro X

For DVDs and movies - MacTheRipper, Handbrake, DVD2OneX and Roxio Popcorn

Aside from that and the "killer apps" like Photoshop and Office, I tend to find the Mac already has everything I need and don't find as much use for mounds of shareware.
 
Synergy - the best remote for itunes that i can think of, a really nicely skinnable menubar button set, a growl translucent track notifier and i've got my F-keys bound to last/next track play/pause etc.

Pithhelmet - total adblocker for safari. i mean, this thing takes care of all banner ads too, without having to congigure it. you install it and never see an advert again.

Amadeus II - shareware audio editing. i got pi**ed off with Audacity. i much prefer this. very intuitive and powerful.

Handbrake, as mentioned above. the premise being 'insert dvd. press rip. get an mpeg-4 of the entire movie'. that mini should be able to it in realtime, too. ie an hour and a half movie takes an hour and a half to encode into mpeg4. also does h.264, but that's slower, obviously.

Coverflow - when working with conjunction with synergy, it uses artwork for all your itunes library and displays them in a full opengl realtime 3d space. browse through your albums properly. it's really nice.

RealONE player - only joking.

Mactracker - complete database of every mac ever made and more as well. includes history, pictures, and even the startup chime of every mac ever. by and for geeks, obviously, but very useful from a research/tech support angle.
 
Setting aside more individual needs -like ripping DVD's to H.264-, I would definitely recommend Butler over just about anything. It does absolutely everything you could ask for when it comes to shortcuts and workarounds in the GUI. It can even take the place of Synergy with a couple iTunes commands...

Oh, and it's totally free.
 
Here's the cheapest (free :) ), yet very good, so that you can save up a lot of money. IMHO:

Acrobat Reader 7.0.7
Firefox 1.5.0.2
Cyberduck 2.5.5 (S)FTP client
Linotype FontExplorer X 1.0.1
LiquidCD (CD burner)
NeoOffice 1.2.2
NetNewsWire Lite 2.0.1
ScreenShot Plus - a free & excellent widget available for download on Apple's site
 
For me, the following are my "must have" apps:

1. Firefox
2. Adium
3. GarageBand (Of course, if I could find LMMS ported to Mac OS X that would be awesome. :D)
4. OpenOffice 2.x (I don't mind using X11...I use it all the time with Linux. :p)
5. Gimp.app
6. Cyberduck
7. iTunes
8. Audacity

Can't think of anything else at the moment, but I know that there are more. :p Incidentally, I have been playing with Ardour on the Mac and I'm still trying to get that to work properly with JACK and all. EVentually I'll master it. Darned X11 apps... :p

As for Classic Mac apps on my older Macs...
1. MacHTTP and NetPresenz (HTTP and FTP for my Quadra 650)
2. iCab (web browser)
3. Master Tracks Pro (old multitrack MIDI sequencer)
4. JPEGView
5. Clarisworks
6. MpegDec (MP3 player and streamer for 68K and old PPC Macs)
 
pds said:
Snood :D
Apeiron :p
Click to expand...

Snood....oh no...I had to quit that addiction some years ago. Not that it took me away from anything, but it is an addictive game. I still have that on my classic Macs. Heck, I even had a version for my Palm m105 way back when. :p
 
iSquint easily converts any unreadible Movie file (DivX, Mpeg2 without the codec, VOB files etc) to iPod MP4 format, which really you can play in QuickTime and iTunes anyhow

iVolume that supports the Sound Check level in iTunes

FlashMount Mounts and ejects Disk Images and CD/DVD's a lot quicker
 
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