"there are sites that check the stealth status of your router"

Best known is Gibson Research

Home of Gibson Research Corporation

two items of note on "The Register" today

First is that Apple have released a tool to remove the "Flashback" trojan
Apple finally deploys Mac Flashback Trojan terminator ? The Register

second is that another OSX/java trojan has turned up in the wild
Yet another OSX/Java Trojan spotted in the wild ? The Register

Anyone with a simlocked iPhone s may be interested to know AT&T will now unlock them.
Call 1 800 222 0300 if outside the States. and go to the mobile phone option. You need the 15 cipher IMEI number, best to say the phone was a gift, and expect the call to take some 25 minutes.

If the phone is elligible to be unlocked you'll get a case number and expect to receive an e-mail with further unlocking details (requires iTunes on your computer) For some reason it takes several days to get this info (I was told to expect it on the 26th) but best of all it's free.

iMac and Parallels
 

Can anyone advise the limitations of using Parallels and Win 7 on the latest iMacs. There now seems to be several versions of the small screen iMac, CPU and disk storage which is the best system to go for.

Sorry for what may seem very basic questions but considering moving to Apple but still need to run Win applications.

Thanks

Depends on what you want to do with it...

If you thinking of playing Windows based 3D games, then forget it, use W7 in Bootcamp. If you are just going to use it for less demanding tasks, e.g. office applications and the like, then Parallels will be fine.

I use Oracle VirtualBox to run a Windows XP virtual machine on a quite old MacBook Pro, and it is OK. I have Bootcamp installed with a copy of Windows 7 for more demanding applications, but rarely do I use it.

Mainly for big spreadsheets and MS Access database applications, no games at all. So would run Office as a Windows App, also would want to CAD drawing. I suspect I would need to increase the RAM from the 4MB to 8MB.

I'm not sure running a CAD program in a virtual machine (VM) is a terribly good idea. You take a performance hit because you're running it virtually and the graphics "card" in the VM is almost certainly considerably less capable than your real one. Think 3D work. These are just general observations on using VMs and not specific to Parallels or Mac.

As you mention the more RAM the merrier because whatever amount of RAM is used by the VM is no longer available to the host system. How much RAM does your Windows PC have? Add a couple of GB for OS X to keep running comfortably and there's your answer.

If you want to buy a Mac by all means do but wanting to run all that Windows software says to me you really should be doing it on a Windows system. VMs are great for occasional light use but not so good for regular heavy lifting.

Many thanks for all the good advice, I really wanted move away from HP desktops they are fast but reliability sucks they just exceed the 3 year extended warranty and die so real pain doing a new build. Currently have 4MB of RAM with 1MB of RAM on the graphics card. Seems like I may need to find another vendor for the CPU box, it would have been nice to break free from Windows...... Thanks for all the advice.

"Currently have 4MB of RAM with 1MB of RAM on the graphics card."

Thats the kind of spec of a 486-based PC from around 15 years ago.
If you are really trying to run a CAD program on that, no wonder there are problems

The problems are HDD crashes and power supply failures, point taken on config of current dead box which is a Quad core CPU, bearing in mind your comment the iMac would perform no worse..

If I went for more RAM 16MB seems to be the limit I sense I should be in a similar performance bracket. Having done some video editing looking at the Mac software will this be as good as the current (high end) offerings that are available and by this I do not mean MS Movie Maker and similar software..

Oh dear should be GB and not MB total brain failure...

and

Other than MS Access (which can probably run quite happily in a VM) all the other software is available on Mac ? So you can break free if you're willing to relicense.

What video editing software are you using?
If its one of the offerings from Edius or Adobe, don't even think of using a VM

I am currently using Vegas Movie Studio

I have no issue with purchasing Mac versions of the software, I did a little research on the Mac version of Excel and the functionality is not as rich as the Win version. I could be wrong however but my understanding is that there is no Direct X available on the Mac which poses a problem if you are using drop down down and list boxes or any other Excel objects which are used in the Win versions in spreadsheets.

"I am currently using Vegas Movie Studio "

Then don't even think of virtualisation
Performance hit will be too high
You need all of those four cores and memory of the current machine and more

Go and have a chat with this company Welcome to David Vincent Clarke Ltd
They are specialists in systems for video editing. In the UK they are probably the specialist


PS I have no connection with them, except to have seen / supoportred several of their machines in use, And when I say chat - I mean just that. Ringo and the other chaps there are very helpful

Many thanks Milo you have been very helpful as have the others who addressed my query.

Safari stopped working
 

Just like that....I was using it as per usual, nothing out of the ordinary, put the mac to sleep and when I returned Safari just sits there, unable to connect to every website that is tried. I reset Safari, I emptied the cache, I restarted, and I even deleted the '.plist' so that it could rebuild again and all to no avail :ugh: I'm running 10.6.8 and have all the updates added. Strangely the only Safari page that works is the 'Safari extensions', but any attempt to go anywhere else just brings the grey page with 'cannot connect to server blah blah'. All other browsers work fine, Skype, Google Earth etc etc.

Any ideas chaps ?


SHJ

SHJ,

Can you get other browsers to work? Firefox? Opera? You would be able to establish whether it's related to the system or peculiar to Safari.

You could open Console and see what errors relating to Safari it's bringing up.

Of course, try Repairing Disk Permissions in Disk Utility, too.

Thankyou mr macster

Yes, I'm currently on Firefox, working fine (though without any of my bookmarks!). I also did a verify disk and disk permissions and all seemed A-ok. It leaves me puzzled to be honest as I was using it as I ever do and there was no indication of any problems....Any other ideas, please let me know and I'll check in later on today :ok:


SHJ

You could try a Safari reset.

Firefox should be able to import the bookmarks, assuming the bookmarks file associated with Safari isn't corrupted; I've had that happen once. Luckily, they were backed up.

Console can be quite useful in showing what the problems are.

I had a perusal through console, but faced with a wall of data, even in and around the event, I decided to go and see a genius :8 at an Apple store who might cut through the confusion. However, after much faffing around announced that it seemed to be a user account problem and that I should do a back up and then do an erase/restore of the whole OS! As I'm the only user and there was no and seems to be no problem otherwise it is all a bit strange to be honest. It's so rare that I ever had a software problem I find myself being somewhat annoyed...


SHJ

SpringHeeledJack,

Have you tried setting up a new user account and using that for a couple of days to see if it's any better ? You may just have a corrupted user profile.

I've set up a new user profile and Safari is working again, though without my one million and one bookmarks! As to how my user profile got corrupted beats me :confused: It would be nice just to delete my user profile after transferring all data across to the new one, but I'm sure that would just transport any corrupted data over to the new profile ?


SHJ

SpringHeeledJack,

Profile corruption on OS X is rare, but it does occasionally happen (normally if you've a fair bit of software installed and you've done upgrades to newer versions of OS X)

Fortunatley for you, OS X is BSD based (although I admit, the following concept can be used in Windows too !).....

Simples.... now you have a working profile.....

(a) For your files and general clutter, just give your new user permission to access your old user's home directory then you can continue to access that like you would any other folder......

1/ Apple-N
2/ Apple-Shift-G goto "/Users" (no quotes)
3/ Apple-I on the folder corresponding to your old user
4/ Add your new user to the sharing & permissions list and give yourself full (read & write users)
5/ Close the info window
6/ Drag the folder to the shortcuts bar on the left for ease of access in the future

(b) For you safari bookmarks.....

1/ File -> Export bookmarks on your old user
2/ File -> Import bookmarks on your new user

PDF web pages not displaying
 

Running OS-X on Macbook Pro with latest Acrobat Reader and browsers.

All of a sudden...whenever browsing to a page which is a pdf, none of the content is displayed. The link appears to open but just white space where the pdf document should be.

A page like this for example http://www.easa.europa.eu/certificat...utoretrctn.pdf

In some cases Save Link works and I can then view the pdf on the hard drive (and all my pdf files are working fine in A. Reader). Also, Quick View in Google works when available.

Tried reloading A. Reader.

I'm baffled. Any ideas???

Oxford OAT Compatiblity
 

Hi,

I want to buy Oxford's "Essential GCSE Maths and Physics" package (OATmedia Products), but I can't work out if the software will work on my new Macbook Pro.

Can anybody help me? :uhoh:

Thank you,

Luca!

Algy

which web browsers have you tried?
do they all give the same problem?

However, try this from another forum

Go to /Library/Internet Plug-Ins
Move the Adobe PDF Viewer plugin to the Trash.
Restart the Mac.

Luca, From the link you posted, they're Windows products.

luca321,

Do you have Parallels / VMware Fusion running on your mac ? The products might work fine under an emulator.

No, I haven't! Are Parallels or VMware Fusion worth buying? Do they let me access all window's programs?

Numbers app on a IPAD
 

Any help greatly appreciated.

Working on putting a large set of FRCs on my IPad using the 'Numbers' App.

Basically most sheets are just simply Jpegs of the real thing (about 200). I then had to create all the warnings cautions' on a sheet. Now I would like to touch a cell on this page and get it to direct me to the corresponding Jpeg sheet. I can do it on excel but somehow the same does not work on the numbers app. Any numbers experts out there?

Have you tried creating the spreadsheet you want in Excel, then opening it in Numbers?
I've done this with some relatively complex spreadsheets (difficult formulae and embedded charts) and they work well.

luca321, another option is Virtualbox, which is free:
https://www.virtualbox.org/wiki/Downloads

I use it on Linux and it works well.

With any of the virtualisation software (Virualbox/Parallels/VMware) you need to bring your own copy of Windows and install it in a virtual machine (VM). You can then install Windows based software in the same VM.

New Mac User
 

Having finally had it with poxy Vista I've done the deed and got a (used) macBook Airbut am struggling to do much more with it than surf the net. Previous owner reloaded the OS as a fresh installation and I've downloaded the latest updates. This thread looks superb but it is so big it is hard to find what I need, no doubt its here somewhere! Bear with me!

Although I am supposed to have ilife (its automatically there, right?) there is no word processor except a toy thing called Text Edit and no photo management programme, shouldn't I have iphoto? If I do its not in the dock - how do I find it? Why wouldn't it be there? I have looked everywhere I can think of but no joy. Is this the best prog for basic photo management and filing - I don't mess with them so simple filing is about all I need.

Which word processor is recommended?
Is Firefox an improvement on Safari?

I can import MS Word files from my PC but can't open them - aren't .doc /.docx files compatible - I thought they were?

Ipad. I want to sync my ipad 2 with the new macbook but it tells me that I can't sync with two computers and must delete the content of the ipad before I sync it with the (empty) macbook. I want to sync the ipad up to the macbook. Can I? Esp keen to get diary/calendar datail across, either from the ipad or the old PC where it is in Outlook format. How to?

Best way to transfer data between PC and MAc? Wireless? Bluetooth? (Can't make them pair)? Currently the only way that's worked is an ext hard drive but that's a bit clunky tho I can live with it.

Any must have progs I should know about?
Any online resources that will help a mac newbie to break the ice?

Scuse the dumb questions - this is all very new!

Agaricus bisporus,

Welcome to the Mac world, and congratulations on making the switch.

See "Restoring iLife applications after Internet Restore of OS X Lion" here

Try the stuff that comes with iLife first.

No, its a bloated memory-hog. Safari is great. But hey, it's a free download, so you can try it out if you want.

Get iLife on there and you'll probably find this question answers itself.

You should always have a backup on external HD anyway.... :cool:

Crossover ethernet cable (or standard ethernet cable via your internet router) between the two. Then enable the appropriate option on System Preferences -> Sharing (I think it's the "File Sharing" one you want).

Don't clutter up your computer with other people's junk. :E

What sort of stuff do you like doing ? e.g. Photo editing ?

MacOSX Hints (hints.macworld.com) for neat tips and tricks
Macworld Forums (Forums - Apple Discussion, Macworld Chat - Macworld UK)
Some random little website called PPRuNe :E

I'll try to dig up some more beginner sites too...

Thanks very much Mixture - just what I needed.

But...That procedure to reload ilife just doesn't work. I get my desktop every time...

You won't necessarily have iLife - it comes with new machines but not with OSX when purchased separately and who knows what the previous owner has done. However, you can get the individual apps through the Mac app store, which you should have with Lion. 'Office' types apps are not in iLife anyway, they are in iWork, but they too are available separately.

If you need/want to run windows software you can do it from within a 'virtual machine' but for that you need the virtualisation software (e.g. VM Fusion or Parallels) and Windows itself. These are mac programs which allow you to run windows. Alternatively, you can use bootcamp, which does come with your OS, (you will still need a copy of windows) - this allows you to boot your macbook air into either OSX or Windows.

I use Oracle VirtualBox, which runs Windows XP well enough for the odd task that requires Windows. I even tried Windows 7 on it, and that works, but is noticeably more sluggish as it is far more demanding on the virtual machine.

Whether or that is all worth it, depends on what Agaricus bisporus is going to use the machine for.

TextEdit is actually more useful than many people give credit for. I use Office 2010 on Windows at work, but I can prepare a lot of the text at home in TextEdit, because it can read and write MS Office .DOC and .DOCX files. It is certainly good enough for basic home correspondence and document writing. Compatibility is not perfect, so complex Office files imported into TextEdit may lose some formatting though.

As for transferring you iPad have a read of this : https://discussions.apple.com/thread...art=0&tstart=0

PCs and Macs can file share over a network, but it can be difficult to set up. I have encountered Windows machines that refuse to mount Mac shares and vice versa, even when settings are identical to other working pairs. My preference is to use external drives, but make sure they are FAT32 formatted for maximum compatibility. NTFS is OK for a one way transfer from PC to Mac, as the Mac can read NTFS, but won't write to them. NTFS is preferred if you need to transfer very large files, i.e. over 4GB.

Great info guys, thanks.

iCal question.
How do I assign colours to calendar entries? There are various screenshots on help and guides showing entries in all sorts of colours but I can't see any reference how to do this.