Hackers at Driven Design have found a way to hack 5G and 5.5G iPod videos to firmware similar to the new iPod Classic. I haven’t installed mine yet, but it is supposed to work pretty well, although laggily and without cover flow. Check it out here.

[Via Gizmodo]

Technorati Tags: Apple, iPod Hack, iPod Classic, Firmware, Driven Design, Gizmodo

Photo Booth utilizes a flash feature when taking pictures, but does not include an option to turn it off. If you want to take pictures without the flash, you must simply invert the screen colors before taking the picture, and then changing them back to normal. Inverting the screen is done by entering the following shortcut: Control-Option-Command-8.

[Via A New Mac Tip Every Day]

Technorati Tags: Apple, Invert Screen, iSight, Photo Booth

Knew this for Safari already–but in Camino, to switch between tabs with the keyboard simply press ⌘⌥← or ⌘⌥→.

I would like to welcome Humberto as the newest MacTips writer. He will be covering some of the more advanced OS X tweaks such as command line hacks and fiddling with the backend of things.

Here’s some quick info about him:

My name is Humberto Cueva and I am from Mexico. I am a 22 year old EE student and I’ve been using Macs for about 5 years now. Before that, I used to be a Linux user (mainly Red Hat, ever since the 6.0 version). I am interested in all things Unix, developing web applications, and data compression.

Please give him a warm welcome to the site everyone :).

Technorati Tags: mactips writer

Lifehacker’s Geek to Live series recently released its Complete Guide to Mac/Windows Interoperability. The guide discusses the best ways to make a home or office running both Windows computers and Macs work well.

The following topics are discussed:

• File Sharing
• File and Application Compatibility
• File Sync and System Files: Thumbs.db and .DS_Store
• Printer and Fax Sharing
• Running Windows on your Mactel
• Remote Server Access
• Instant Messenger, Email and Outlook/Entourage
• iTunes, your iPod, and Other Incompatibilities
• Making the Switch

Technorati Tags: Apple, OS X, Windows, Lifehacker, Interoperability

Since I filter a lot of my emails directly into folders for archiving in Mail.app, sometimes it becomes a hassle to look back at them after the first time, for which I use my “Unread” Smart Mailbox.

To read over only the emails that I have received on the current date, I created a Smart Mailbox:

First of all, launch Mail.app and select “Mailbox” from the menu bar and then “New Smart Mailbox….”
Then, name the Smart Mailbox “Today” in the given box. (Or whatever you choose.)
In the conditions section, select “Date Received,” and “is today.”
Finally, press OK and the you’re new Smart Mailbox should appear in the pane on the left of the Mail window. You can mess around with the rules to include trashed or sent emails, or create more folders for emails from yesterday, last week, or in any date range.

.

Technorati Tags: Smart Mailbox, Conditions, Mail, Apple

Recently I’ve begun using Quicksilver for quickly opening files instead of launching a Finder window. It is really quite an easy process, especially if you have an organized hierarchy of folders for your files like I do.

First, you must trigger Quicksilver to pop up using your keyboard shortcut.

Next, type at least part of the name of the overlying folder in which the file you’re looking for is located.

Then, to navigate through the hierarchy of folders to find your file by pressing the right arrow to move into a folder and the up and down arrows to select files and folders within each folder.

Once you find you file, simply press enter and it should launch. The default command here is to open the file. You can also choose to reveal the location of the file or to open it with a specific application via the second and third panes of Quicksilver.

Technorati Tags: Quicksilver, Open Files, Keyboard Shortcuts

We talk a lot about Safari here at MacTips, but personally my browser of choice is Camino. Imagine Firefox with the sexy Mac look–that’s Camino. Minus most of the cool third party plugins.

Why don’t the third party plugins for Firefox work on Camino? They’re the same Mozilla browser aren’t they? Yes and no. Camino’s interface is built off Cocoa. Firefox is built off XUL. Apparently this is why it’s so hard to make Firefox plugins work for Camino.

So why use it if plugins don’t work for it? It’s fast, elegant and very powerful.

It’s the little things for me. Like how I can tab through a set of form items and actually use my keyboard to change select fields. Give the new Camino 1.5.2 a try.

Even though Firefox plugins don’t work in Camino doesn’t mean other tweaks don’t. Enter about:config in your browser and edit away. Listed below are some popular tweaks:

network.http.max-connections
Changing this will increase the maximum number of connections opened by Camino. The faster connection you’re on the higher this can be. For Cable/DSL 48 should be plenty.

network.http.max-connections-per-server
The maximum number each website can use. I set this value to 16.

network.http.pipelining
Pipelining reduces page loading times by sending multiple requests to the server before it’s received anything back. Not all servers support this–and some behave strangely with this request. Turn to false if it’s behaving strangely–otherwise, turn it to true.

network.http.pipelining.maxrequests
The number of requests to send with each pipeline. A value from 1-8. 8 should work fine.

network.prefetch-next
This is a strange one. Camino guesses where you’re going to click next and automatically downloads those pages. It makes the page load faster if you do click the link, but if you don’t it just runs up CPU cycles and bandwidth. I’d leave this one off.

If you have any other suggested changes please let me know in the comments.

Technorati Tags: Camino, about:config

ASCII Projektor is a cool application that presents videos or your iSight in ASCII characters. While I cannot see any practical use for the application, it is a lot of fun to play with, especially with its various customizations. Download it here.

Technorati Tags: Apple, ASCII, ASCII Projektor, iSight

NetNewsWire is simply the best solution for reading RSS feeds on the Mac for anyone who needs something more powerful than Safari’s RSS or Google Reader. If you currently read your feeds in Safari, and want an easier and better way to read them, you’ll want to transfer your current feeds to NetNewsWire. Doing this is actually quite simple. First of all, launch Safari. Then, click on the bookmark icon on the far left of the bookmark bar. In the Collections bar on the left, select “All RSS Feeds”. Highlight the first feed you want in NetNewsWire, and drag it over to the NetNewsWire icon in the dock. NetNewsWire will ask where to put the feed in your folder hierarchy. Choose, then go back to Safari and repeat this for all your feeds.

Technorati Tags: Apple, RSS, Safari, Google Reader, NetNewsWire, NewsGator, Import RSS