Skype 5 Beta for Mac

I read this morning that a new beta of skype was out for mac, that would include features already included in the windows version (which is out of beta at the moment) like video conferencing with multiple people. So I was curious and installed the skype beta (you have to sign in to download the .dmg file for some reason, odd). I was surprised to see a window layout not unlike that of windows skype, and I immediately detested it. Granted, it's easier to access some functions (I won't double click accidentally and call someone), since there are buttons for chatting, calling, etc. but everything was just expanded and took a horrific amount of space (ok ok I'm exaggerating here) but compared to the stable version of skype it really is a huge change.

I remember in the windows version, even with these new changes they gave you the option of changing the panels back to the old layout, which is not present in the skype beta. I immediately gave some feedback, and I hope that such options will be given to us just like on windows. The loading time is quite fast, though I haven't tested out the video and calling functionality of the new skype beta. The chats also followed the expanded theme, and every line just had a lot of space in between, which in my opinion is a waste of space. I don't own a 27" or a 30" monitor, and can't afford to enlarge my windows that extent. There's also a set minimum window size, so I couldn't change the window size to how it was like in the previous version (somewhat hard to describe it here).

These are just a number of initial impressions, I will give more input after I have tried it out for an extended amount of time.

Edit: I would include a screen shot, but I couldn't hide my contacts effectively and I didn't want to bother photoshopping all the names out. There is no way (from what I see) of hiding offline contacts, a step back from the previous version. Again, I hope that as the skype beta matures we will gain more options.

Reinstall Mac OS X?

This is a pretty tentative plan, but I'm hoping to reinstall my mac os x in the christmas holidays when I have a bit more time. There's going to be a lot of preparation work, however, since I want to keep some (but not all) of my application preferences. So even if I had time machine back up all my system files I don't want to put everything back (since that would pretty much negate me reinstalling mac os x). This time I'm going to get a hold of a 10.6 disk (since my computer came with 10.5) so I won't have to do the upgrade to 10.6 manually. Now you might ask, why do you want to reinstall mac os x?



How in the world can spotlight take 500 MB virtual memory just by itself? That too has perplexed me. But the main reason I want to reinstalled was that I realized today that my computer could be a lot faster. I was trying out the new macbook pros 13'' (with the same processor as my current computer, might I add) and it was so much faster. Now you might say that the new mbps come with 4 GB RAM while mine only has 2 GB, but still. I don't think RAM should affect loading applications (unless you don't have enough free ram I suppose). So hopefully I can get everything together to have Mac OS X installed but we'll see. I haven't tried out a lot of apps recently (Though I did try out omnidisksweeper today and I found out it wasn't that particularly useful for me), I am quite interested in ilife '11 and when I get my hands on a copy of it I might make a short review. Though note that my main focus is on iPhoto since I don't use iMovie a lot anymore, nor do I use garageband/idvd/iweb.

Edit: I also realized looking at the screen shot that the finder was using more memory than firefox and word for some reason. Very strange indeed (by the way I still want an improved finder in 10.7).

Repairing Disk Permissions

I was verifying my startup volume today and the app that I used (Maintenance) notified me that there was an error and I had to pop in my installation CD and open up disk utility. So I used the "repair disk" option and it took a while. When I went back into OS X I figured I might as well run repair disk permissions since the startup volume had errors beforehand. This is what I saw.


This computer surely has issues :S Makes me wonder whether I should do a clean install next summer.