Virgin Install

Yeah, MacStumbler is really good.

Opera, Skype, Eudora? All excellent SW. There are soem great widgets out there too, like the BBC weather one, and my favourite, smsmac.com I am forced to use MS Office in a work environment on my iBook, and it is vastly superior to the PC version. I will keep an eye on this blog, but I am looking for a really good, free, "tidy-up" utility that will clear free space, empty caches and organise my HDD to maximise free space (a bit like Norton Utils, but not, if you see what I mean). Any ideas? Lewis in London

I have just leapt back into Mac waters myself (after a 15 yr hiatus) w/ a g4 iBook, so these are welcome suggestions. Here's a couple things I have found useful in my new config: MacStumbler (for sniffing out wi-fi hotspots), Audion (a fly-weight iTunes alternative), and Curio (a sketchpad/idea-organizer from http://www.zengobi.com/). Thanks for all the great ideas!

no one mentioned jewelcase from http://opticalalchemy.com/ best iTunes plugin/visualiser around, and FREE!! and i'll second Transparent Dock and Byte Controller!!

VoodooPad definitely - I write first drafts of everything on this now. VoodooPadLite if you are a cheapskate and don't wanna pay, it does most of the job just as well.

Scott, I would highly recommend Sibelius instead of Finale. I have used both and Sibelius is much faster for users than Finale. I convinced a composer friend of mine (about to begin a Ph.D. in Composition at Northwestern University) to switch and he loves it. You also mentioned TechToolPro. I think a lot of Mac users would swear by DiskWarrior. I can't believe that hasn't been mentioned yet. I forgot to mention eFax in my previous list. I use that alot.

I find Synk a much better backup/synchro option than Deja Vu and it's even better since Ben gives a free license for students.

As a recent switcher and a bit of a cheapskate, I've put together a site of mini-reviews of free or nearly free apps at http://andrewsmactips.cjb.cc/index.htm Regards, Andrew Burke

sorry sorry that's 200kB/s.

Scott: You mentioned Acquisition as your P2P. I switched from Acquis. to Azureus Bittorrent client about 3 months ago..and I haven't ever needed to look back. Azureus+TorrentSpy.com (or any of the 100's of BitTorrent sites) and you'll be off and running. Some files I've got up to 200Kb/sec downloads. I never once got that kind of speed through any p2p. So..I guess getting back on subject..Azureus would be another to add to this growing list. (if it hadn't already been listed)