Andy's Un-Official Unsolicited Mac Advice Thread

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  • ShepsMomShepsMom Registered Users Posts: 4,319 Major grins
    edited December 30, 2007
    HALLELUJA!!!!! David for President wings.gifbarbwings.gif
    Marina
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    Nikon 70-200 2.8/50 1.8/85 1.8/14.24 2.8
  • BradfordBennBradfordBenn Registered Users Posts: 2,506 Major grins
    edited December 30, 2007
    caroline wrote:
    This is driving me totally nuts and has been happening apparently randomly for a couple of weeks - the sound of a bell (like an old fashioned door or bicycle bell) comes from my Mac. Sometimes it rings just once, other times 3 or 4. It happened on 10.4 etc and still does in Leopard. I have noted the times when it happens - inconsistent, always have lots of apps open but nothing that has any kind of alarm set, and I can't think why this is happening - headscratch.gifscratch

    Caroline

    Do you have Growl installed? You can check under System Preferences. It might be triggered by something unexpected.
    -=Bradford

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  • BradfordBennBradfordBenn Registered Users Posts: 2,506 Major grins
    edited December 30, 2007
    Help finding directions for Calibrating by eye a Mac
    Howdy Gang-

    I thought I bookmarked the page, and I remember seeing it somewhere, but the search function returns way too many to wade through so I figured I would ask as I figure someone would have it at their finger tips... where are the directions for calibrating a Mac monitor by eye?
    -=Bradford

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  • DavidTODavidTO Registered Users, Retired Mod Posts: 19,160 Major grins
    edited December 30, 2007
    Howdy Gang-

    I thought I bookmarked the page, and I remember seeing it somewhere, but the search function returns way too many to wade through so I figured I would ask as I figure someone would have it at their finger tips... where are the directions for calibrating a Mac monitor by eye?


    Sys Prefs>Displays>Color>Calibrate. You just follow the steps, take your time and make sure you squint your eyes just right as you adjust the sliders to make the apple disappear. At the end choose gamma 2.2.
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  • BradfordBennBradfordBenn Registered Users Posts: 2,506 Major grins
    edited December 30, 2007
    Thanks!
    Well I have figured out that astigmatism and calibration can give one a headache! So after getting some help from the wife, I think I got it as best as we can get it. So what should the white point be at?

    Also will a calibrator like a Huey work on a MacBookPro monitor?
    -=Bradford

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  • StevenVStevenV Registered Users Posts: 1,174 Major grins
    edited December 30, 2007
    DavidTO wrote:
    In FF, right-click on the link in this quote, and choose "Save Link As". It will download the file just fine.

    yea, what David said. [whatever].dmg is a file to be downloaded, not a page to be read.
  • SloYerRollSloYerRoll Registered Users Posts: 2,788 Major grins
    edited December 30, 2007
    will a calibrator like a Huey work on a MacBookPro monitor?
    Yes. But be careful when moving your laptop around. If you go from a dark room to outside and don't have the ambient light sensor to make adjustments. Your display will "think" it's still dark and be adjusted accordingly.
    To fix this, just connect your sensor and let it take an ambient light reading. It should do all the heavy lifting for you.
  • gusgus Registered Users Posts: 16,209 Major grins
    edited December 31, 2007
    How in gods name do i find out whats running on this thing headscratch.gif (new imac that is)

    Something is severly slowing it down & i mean between 3 to 5 mins just to save a 3 meg jpeg to desktop from CS3. The colour wheel just sits there spinning & it eventually sorts it chews it.

    I have nothing open but sometimes i have bridge but it is doing it with just CS3 open ne_nau.gif

    BTW...its random...it can run full speed then choke without warning. I only have a dot beside email & finder so i assume they are running in the background.
  • blalorblalor Registered Users Posts: 94 Big grins
    edited December 31, 2007
    gus wrote:
    How in gods name do i find out whats running on this thing headscratch.gif (new imac that is)

    Something is severly slowing it down & i mean between 3 to 5 mins just to save a 3 meg jpeg to desktop from CS3. The colour wheel just sits there spinning & it eventually sorts it chews it.

    I have nothing open but sometimes i have bridge but it is doing it with just CS3 open ne_nau.gif

    BTW...its random...it can run full speed then choke without warning. I only have a dot beside email & finder so i assume they are running in the background.
    Try Activity Monitor (in /Applications/Utilities). I also have two command-line aliases I pull off the bench for these kinds of thing: qtop and mtop. qtop shows the process using the most CPU (but doesn't poll; just a quick snapshot). mtop does the same but with memory instead of CPU.

    qtop:
    ps -x -a -c -r -o pcpu,pid,command | head
    

    mtop:
    ps -x -a -c -m -o %mem,rss,pid,command | head
    

    Look at your free memory, too. If you're running low, restart the app that's using the most. That's usually Safari, after it's been running for a while. ne_nau.gif
  • photocatphotocat Registered Users Posts: 1,334 Major grins
    edited December 31, 2007
    BTW...its random...it can run full speed then choke without warning. I only have a dot beside email & finder so i assume they are running in the background.[/QUOTE]

    In your applications folder, go to utilities and then hit the top app, which should be activity monitor. When you look for all processes, it will show you which apps are open, and which ones are big memory eaters.

    If you have time machine activated, it slows down photoshop when it is making a backup...

    You can find the specs of your imac when you click in the left upper corner, the apple, about my mac. It should tell you what computer you have, what system is on it, and what the memory specs are.

    Another reason for slowing down a computer can be that the harddisk is too full, but since you say it is a new computer, I think we can rule that one out.

    It is also good to now and then in the same utilities folder go to disk utility, and hit the repair permissions button, and restart after that. That takes care of slowing down faults.
  • SloYerRollSloYerRoll Registered Users Posts: 2,788 Major grins
    edited December 31, 2007
    qtop:
    ps -x -a -c -r -o pcpu,pid,command | head
    
    mtop:
    ps -x -a -c -m -o %mem,rss,pid,command | head
    

    Gottaa love terminal! A main reason most *nix developers switched over to mac was due to having a command line client. They didn't have one for years. Even though terminal is part of the foundation of the Mac OS.
  • gusgus Registered Users Posts: 16,209 Major grins
    edited December 31, 2007
    blalor wrote:
    Try Activity Monitor (in /Applications/Utilities). I also have two command-line aliases I pull off the bench for these kinds of thing: qtop and mtop. qtop shows the process using the most CPU (but doesn't poll; just a quick snapshot). mtop does the same but with memory instead of CPU.

    qtop:
    ps -x -a -c -r -o pcpu,pid,command | head
    

    mtop:
    ps -x -a -c -m -o %mem,rss,pid,command | head
    

    Look at your free memory, too. If you're running low, restart the app that's using the most. That's usually Safari, after it's been running for a while. ne_nau.gif
    tks...85% idle ..260 gig free atm on the HD but its running ok. Its saying 1 gig ram active with just CS3 open sitting idle, is that ok ?

    I will need to look at that info when its choked but unfortunately its so choked it cant get to anything as it just sits there stalled.

    On my PC i used to just CTL-ALT-DELETE & all was in front of me.
  • BradfordBennBradfordBenn Registered Users Posts: 2,506 Major grins
    edited December 31, 2007
    Another option (which takes more resources but it might be more user friendly) is there is a widget "iStat Pro" that can show stuff like this on a widget in your dashboard.
    -=Bradford

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  • gusgus Registered Users Posts: 16,209 Major grins
    edited December 31, 2007
    Ok..i just caught it during its freak out & in the activity monitor its saying "photoshop not responding'
  • SloYerRollSloYerRoll Registered Users Posts: 2,788 Major grins
    edited December 31, 2007
    Cs3?
  • gusgus Registered Users Posts: 16,209 Major grins
    edited December 31, 2007
    SloYerRoll wrote:
    Cs3?
    yep
  • SloYerRollSloYerRoll Registered Users Posts: 2,788 Major grins
    edited December 31, 2007
    Aren't there issues in all kinds of forums about CS3 and OS X compatibility issues?
  • AndyAndy Registered Users Posts: 50,016 Major grins
    edited December 31, 2007
    SloYerRoll wrote:
    Aren't there issues in all kinds of forums about CS3 and OS X compatibility issues?
    headscratch.gif

    Bah. I don't have any and have had CS3 since day one and I use it every day on my Mac Pro and on my Macbook Pro.
  • SloYerRollSloYerRoll Registered Users Posts: 2,788 Major grins
    edited December 31, 2007
    So how do you explain Gus's issues?

    Adobe's FAQ's and press releases all have said that there are known compatibility issues that are being worked on. So to just dismiss it since you are one of the lucky to not have issues doesn't solve gus's problem.

    The following is just a 30 second Google research job. I bet I could find allot more if I dug it up. This isn't a Mac/PC thing Andy. I'm just trying to help out and get to the bottom of Gus's problem by providing my meager input.
    Acrobat 8 Professional
    update scheduled for January 2008.
    Photoshop Elements 4 and earlier
    "Likely to encounter issues for which there is no resolution."
    Creative Suite 2 and earlier
    "While older Adobe applications may install and run on Mac OS X Leopard, they were designed, tested, and released to the public several years before this new operating system became available. You may, therefore, experience a variety of installation, stability, and reliability issues for which there is no resolution. Older versions of our creative software will not be updated to support Mac OS X Leopard."
    Photoshop Lightroom Adobe has now released Lightroom 1.3 for Leopard compatibility. Versions 1.2 and earlier are not compatible.
    Happy new years!
  • DoctorItDoctorIt Administrators Posts: 11,951 moderator
    edited December 31, 2007
    SloYerRoll wrote:
    So how do you explain Gus's issues?

    from Adobe:
    Creative Suite 2 and earlier...
    CS3 is not earlier than CS2.
    Erik
    moderator of: The Flea Market [ guidelines ]


  • Mike LaneMike Lane Registered Users Posts: 7,106 Major grins
    edited December 31, 2007
    Yes there are CS3 Leopard compatibility issues but afaik gus' issue isn't one of them. Mostly it's a problem using the input boxes for various tools.
    Y'all don't want to hear me, you just want to dance.

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  • ian408ian408 Administrators Posts: 21,936 moderator
    edited December 31, 2007
    Andy wrote:
    headscratch.gif

    Bah. I don't have any and have had CS3 since day one and I use it every day on my Mac Pro and on my Macbook Pro.

    Nor do I. Same set up.

    Of course, there have been periodic updates since the release. Be sure you're
    up to date.
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  • AndyAndy Registered Users Posts: 50,016 Major grins
    edited December 31, 2007
  • David TaylorDavid Taylor Registered Users Posts: 146 Major grins
    edited December 31, 2007
    Beeping sound on video recording
    My daughter is trying to use the internal microphone and the isight on a white imac 24 to record a video. When she uses imovie HD to play it back, the audio contains a high frequency and pitch 'beep beep beep' for the length of the track, but you can still hear the underlying audio. You can also hear it while you are recording, but it is not as loud.

    I tried to replicate the problem using a macbook merely 10 feet away, but couldn't.

    Interestingly, she says that she used garageband to record some audio and there was no beeping.

    ne_nau.gif Any ideas???
  • ian408ian408 Administrators Posts: 21,936 moderator
    edited January 1, 2008
    ne_nau.gif Any ideas???
    Check the connections. Also, you don't happen to have a cell phone or worse,
    a blackberry anyplace near do you? Stuff like that sometimes has a negative
    effect on speakers/etc. Especially the BB.
    Moderator Journeys/Sports/Big Picture :: Need some help with dgrin?
  • David TaylorDavid Taylor Registered Users Posts: 146 Major grins
    edited January 1, 2008
    ian408 wrote:
    Check the connections. Also, you don't happen to have a cell phone or worse,
    a blackberry anyplace near do you? Stuff like that sometimes has a negative
    effect on speakers/etc. Especially the BB.
    Nope, none of those. Just the usual assortment of cable modem and wireless router etc. Tried unplugging all accessories and it still persists. headscratch.gif
  • DavidTODavidTO Registered Users, Retired Mod Posts: 19,160 Major grins
    edited January 1, 2008
    What software is she using to record?
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  • patch29patch29 Registered Users, Retired Mod Posts: 2,928 Major grins
    edited January 1, 2008
    Anyone one else having issues tethering a Canon 5D to their mac via OS EOS Utility via Mac OS 10.5?

    I can connect via 10.4 without a problem, with 10.5 it shows a message similar to "LCD busy..."

    My 30D and 1DmkII both connect with EU and 10.5 without a problem, just hoping someone here has a solution so I don't have to reboot off a back up drive to edit my camera settings on the 5D. I only need to change my copyright notice from 2007 to 2008.
  • DavidTODavidTO Registered Users, Retired Mod Posts: 19,160 Major grins
    edited January 1, 2008
    patch29 wrote:
    Anyone one else having issues tethering a Canon 5D to their mac via OS EOS Utility via Mac OS 10.5?


    Yes, but my problem is strictly monetary. I can't find a cable long enough to reach from my computer to B&H, where my 5D sits, waiting for me. umph.gif
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  • David TaylorDavid Taylor Registered Users Posts: 146 Major grins
    edited January 1, 2008
    DavidTO wrote:
    What software is she using to record?
    It's imovie hd.

    So after much frustration and tinkering, it seems as if the beeping is coming from within the body of the imac. You cannot hear it normally, but the internal mic sure does. I have to wind the input vol down and crank up the noise reduction in editing to remove it. :cry

    Guess it really means it's time for an ext mic rolleyes1.gif
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