Aurora

(I am the developer of Aurora)

Jonathan: Yes, Aurora will wake your Mac from "everything off". You need to do two things for this to work:
1) Enable "Enable Alarms when Aurora isn't running" in Aurora's preferences (should be on by default)
2) Enable Auto-Login for your Account in the Accounts System Preferences Panel (since Aurora naturally can't do anything if your Mac is stuck at the login prompt)

Then your Mac will power on at the time you set the alarm to, boot up, log you in and start the Aurora Helper Tool (icon in the menu bar, if you didn't disable it), which will then start iTunes playback. Since all of this may take a minute or two, you may want to set the alarm time a few minutes earlier than the time at which you want to wake up.

I chose Alarm clock over Awaken, it's really nice, expecially with the remote and such and such.

So, when I first read this article, I thought it would be just like the other alarms.
But one thing struck me on their site: (quote)Aurora will wake your Mac (even when shut down)(end quote)
I just want to know, because my Mac is in Dutch, does this mean you can totally turn your Mac off for the night ?(no sleep, no status light on the Macbook, no fans, everything off, no power required) Because if it does, this really is the best alarm clock ever.

You didn't happen to get this off my Flckr stream, did you? Because I submitted ascreenshot with Aurora installed into the TUAW pool. Let me know if you did.

I agree with pixelicious on alarm clock choice. I wrote an open source itunes alarm clock for windows, and Alarm Clock 2 has been the closest thing I've found since getting my MBP

You can use automator and ical to play any iTunes playlist. I used it for a while, but I am rather fond of my 70s radio alarms BEEP BEEP BEEP

I use iCal and a small applescript i wrote that ends up having my skype call my cell phone. I have it set to go off 3-5 times seperated by about 15 minutes. Been using that since Skype-out became free.

Thanks for bringing up the subject or alarms, it is certainly a subject that is close to my heart "Curt Kay" is right to react this way I have used too many alarms that quite simply didnt work properly. I ditched my old free alarm for the one "Pixelicious" mentioned though it hides itself up on that top bar thingy rather then the dock which i like and I love that it doesn't not rely on itunes.

This is great. I tried awaken, found it a bit much for an alarm. This does everything it did, but doesnt put it all in my face, and its free. Biggest feature for me was apple remote for snooze...and it's supported!

My Treo has me covered...but thanks anyway.

hey Pixelicious, thanks!