It's been a year in coming, but Handbrake, the multiplatform, open-source video transcoder, has been updated to version 0.9.4. It's one of the tools I included in my list of 10 must-have apps for a new Mac.


That 10% performance improvement estimate appears to be very close to the mark, at least on my MacBook Pro. Using 0.9.3, Handbrake encodes would average around 27 - 29 frames per second when transcoding a VIDEO_TS folder to H.264. In 0.9.4, using the same settings, I'm seeing encoding rates of closer to 30 - 34 frames per second. This means that on my Mac, Handbrake is now transcoding DVDs in real time or faster thanks to the improvements in the new version.

The Handbrake team has trimmed some of the fat from this release. There are no more presets for the PSP, PS3, or Xbox 360; all three have been replaced with a "Normal" preset that should work on any device that supports Main Profile H.264. Handbrake has also removed support for transcoding to AVI, OGG, and XviD. Personally I won't miss any of these, as I always transcoded to H.264, but for people who are still clinging to AVI (for whatever reason), this update will force them to abandon the format.

Another new feature that looks like it'll be incredibly useful is Live Preview, which allows you to encode a small portion of the video source using current settings and then see what it looks like. This will keep you from having to encode the entire video only to find out two hours later that one of your settings was off, forcing you to start all over again.

Handbrake 0.9.4 is a free download, available here.

Here's a great video assembled by applemctom that presents the history of Apple (more or less) in two minutes. There are some huge leaps in time and some obvious errors (Apple Mac II? MacIntosh?), but that's OK. It isn't easy to cram decades of history into 120 seconds.

There's much nostalgia for old-timers like me, as the Pippin and Newton make an appearance. Though I still use my Newt, I've never had the pleasure of a face-to-face meeting with a Pippin. The dark days described in the video (the early 90's after Steve left) is exactly when I started using Macs in earnest. It's amazing that I stayed a customer after bloodying my hands on a 7100's beastly innards.

The video ends with the introduction of the iPhone, so don't expect to see anything beyond that. Still, it's a bit of fun. Check it out.

Adobe's Flash Player has long been a notorious CPU hog on Macs. Every time I hear my wife's MacBook's fans going off like a cyclone on the other side of the living room, I know it's because she's playing Bejeweled Blitz or some other crazy Flash-based game that's pegging her poor machine's CPU to infinity and beyond.

Things are a bit rosier with Adobe's pre-release of Flash Player 10.1. The Windows version has significant improvements, namely support for hardware-accelerated video decoding of h.264 video, but the Mac and Linux versions do not include support for this feature. As usual, Adobe blames Apple for "not being open enough" -- "Mac OS X does not expose access to the required APIs" according to Adobe -- but even without hardware-accelerated video decoding, this pre-release build of Flash boasts significant CPU load improvements over its predecessor.

Anandtech tested the performance improvement of the pre-release version of Flash Player with the following results:

I took the same Office clip I'd been using for all of the other tests and ran it on my Mac Pro at full screen (2560 x 1600). Using Activity Monitor I looked at the CPU utilization of the Flash Player plug-in. I compared both versions of Flash and saw a significant drop in CPU utilization:

Flash 10.0.32.18: 450%
Flash 10.1.51.45: 190%

Going from roughly 450% down to 190% (or a bit over 10% of total CPU utilization across 16 threads) made full-screen Hulu playable on my machine. In the past I always had to run it in a smaller window, but thanks to Flash 10.1 I don't have to any longer.

Sonos, best known for wireless music systems that link to your iTunes library and internet services like Pandora, Rhapsody and Napster, is offering a one piece, 5 speaker system that can be placed in any room. It's called the Zone Player S5 and it's US $399 direct from Sonos or dealers around the country.

Sonos shipped me a review system to try for 30 days, and I thought the sound was great. I already had a mutli-room Sonos system so adding the new portable player was just a matter of plugging it into AC power and pressing two buttons on the S5.

If you don't already have a Sonos system, you have to plug your unit into a router to connect to your music library and the internet. If that doesn't work in your home layout, you can buy what Sonos calls a Zone Bridge (US $99) that plugs into your router and lets the S5 make a wireless connection. Once that basic pairing is made, you can add as many other Sonos music systems as you like, all connecting over a wireless mesh network.

The system sounds quite good, given the limits of the small desktop-friendly size (8.5 x 14.4 x 4.8 inches). There are 5 speakers, two tweeters, two 3" mid-range drivers, and one 3.5" woofer all driven by individual amplifiers. The woofer is a ducted port design and the rear port serves double duty as a carrying handle.

This is the kind of thing that probably should have been done a long time ago, but Macworld is reporting that Apple has launched iTunes Preview, a page that appears when you click an iTunes link (like this one) and your browser sends you over to iTunes. Previously, you just got that placeholder page that said "One Moment Please" and asked if you wanted to open the link in an external application, but with iTunes Preview, you get a nicely laid out page with information and reviews (and your browser still opens up the iTunes store).

Currently it only seems to work with music -- movies and television only get a small thumbnail, and applications get the same old gray page. But that'll probably change before long -- it's much smoother to see what you're clicking through to, and of course there's the added bonus for people who don't actually have iTunes installed. As MacWorld points out, there are actually no "preview" buttons on the page -- you can't listen to music there, only click through to the iTunes store. But like I said, it's better than a blank window and a browser popup asking for your permission. I wouldn't be surprised at all to see this grow a lot more in the future.

On the boxee blog this morning, Avner Ronen announced a new and exciting partnership with an undisclosed consumer electronics company that will result in a dedicated device for users who want to use Boxee as a home theater system.

They were quick to say that they're still looking to develop Boxee for every possible device connected to your TV... computers, game consoles, set-top boxes, they want to be the media software for your device of choice (like the Apple TV).

However, I have to say that this isn't surprising. It's easier and quicker to develop an awesome application on the hardware of your chosing: any Apple fan knows that. This presents a new dilemma for Mac users who want to see Boxee on their computer or Apple TV -- you can't devote an equal amount of time to development when you add another device into the mix.

That said, Boxee development hasn't exactly been the quickest process to begin with, and the service has been in alpha for quite some time. So, this may be a good way for Boxee to get out of alpha and into something that will show its true potential.

If you are a sometime PC user you probably know about Orb, a multimedia sharing tool that allows you to access your media from anywhere you have an internet connection and a browser. Now, Orb has come to the Mac and it's got great possibilities -- but it's a mixed bag in terms of reliability.

You can download Orb for free, and set up a no-cost account. The software will index your iPhoto libraries, as well as your iTunes library, both audio and video.

You can then log into your Orb account on any other computer, fire up a browser, and play your media files. Orb has also had an iPhone app that logs you in and gets your media as well. It's been available for a long time, but only would work with a PC-based host. Now your Mac is accessible too.

Orb still lacks a few features you can get on the PC version. One big one is it won't talk to a TV tuner, so you can't look at live video from home on another computer. I expect this will be coming in short order. You can share media with others from the Orb website. They will need a free account, but they can watch a movie or listen to music or view photos just as you do.

[Our regular Sunday night Talkcast is cancelled due to a sick host. Sorry, and we'll see you next week. –Ed.]

Let's face it: Flash on the Mac is a dog. Actually, that's an insult to dogs, which are known for running fast. Flash for Mac is such a an unoptimized beast that you can expect it will suck up as much CPU as possible, even for the simplest of videos.

My first line of defense is ClickToFlash (which I've mentioned before), but the folks over at NeoSmart have another solution, at least for YouTube: HTML5.

By using the newest version of HTML, they have devised a system to send YouTube videos directly to any MP4 decoder on your computer. Simply go to their custom web page and paste the YouTube URL into the field. In a moment you will be presented with a clean window showing you the video, as well as a download link for the MP4 version.

They also have a Greasemonkey/UserScript available which will add a link to all YouTube pages. That's nice, but what I was really looking for was a bookmarklet I could keep in my Bookmarks Bar and just click on when I was on a YouTube page. I didn't find one, so I made one. Drag (don't click!) this link to your Bookmarks Bar: FlashFree YouTube and you can easily access the NeoSmart/HTML5 version.

How does it work? Superbly well. I tested it using Safari, and watching a YouTube video through NeoSmart had no noticeable impact on my CPU at all.

I've nearly given up hope for a version of Flash for Mac that doesn't stink. Until then, ClickToFlash and NeoSmart's HTML5 YouTube are a great combination to make your web surfing more enjoyable.

(Update: NeoSmart is being blocked by Google/YouTube. It turns out that if you load YouTube videos on YouTube.com while having ClickToFlash installed, they play through QuckTime, not Flash. So download ClickToFlash.)

A few of us here at TUAW received an email from Apple this morning stating that Apple TV-compatible versions of previous iTunes LP purchases are available for download. You'll remember that LP purchases made before the Apple TV 3.0 release would need a second download to work with the Apple TV. Apple is now offering those downloads.

The email from Apple is very straight-forward:

"With the latest versions of iTunes (9.0.2) and Apple TV software (3.0), you can now use iTunes LP on your Apple TV. We have updated the iTunes LP that was included with [your previous purchase here] so that it can now be viewed on Apple TV in addition to your Mac or PC...."

From there, the message provides a download link. Grab it, sync your Apple TV and you're off. My own is syncing as I type this, so we'll let you know how it looks and behaves later today. In the meantime, enjoy iTunes LP on your Apple TV!

QuickTime was one of the few apps which changed significantly in Snow Leopard. We've heard from some readers who missed the initial reports about it, so we're repeating it here, with some additional QuickTime information.

Q: "What happened to QuickTime in Snow Leopard?"

QuickTime Player "X" has brought significant changes to the way the app looks and works. Most notably, there is no "chrome" to the player when a file is being played. This is intended to let you see as much of the picture as possible.

Q: "How do I get the old QuickTime back?"

You can install QuickTime Player 7 on Snow Leopard. Apple even posted instructions which boil down to this:

• Insert your Mac OS X 10.6 Snow Leopard Install DVD.
• Open the Optional Installs folder and double-click "Optional Installs.mpkg".
• Select the QuickTime 7 option and click Continue.
• QuickTime Player 7 will be installed in your Utilities folder.

It goes on to say "If you double-click any media that requires QuickTime Player 7 for playback and it is not already installed, you will be asked if you want to download it from Apple."

Q: "I had QuickTime Pro before I upgraded to Snow Leopard, I want to use its features!"

That's not really a question, but we understand that you're upset. QuickTime Pro had the ability to do more than QuickTime X. If you installed Snow Leopard over your Leopard installation, check /Applications/Utilities/ QuickTime 7 should already be there. If not, you can install it as above.

Q: "I have QuickTime 7.6.3, and I tried to install 7.6.4 but it wouldn't let me."

That isn't a question either. You're not very good at this Q&A thing, are you? Nevermind. This confused me as well. The webpage for QuickTime 7.6.4 says that it is for "... Mac OS X 10.5 or later" but the download page for QuickTime 7 says that it is for Leopard or Tiger only. The installer for QuickTime 7.6.4 refuses to install on Snow Leopard.

Q: "What's New in QuickTime 7.6.4?"

That's a good question. From Apple: "QuickTime 7.6.4 includes changes that increase reliability, improve compatibility and enhance security. This release is recommended for all QuickTime 7 users." It's unclear why this isn't available for Snow Leopard. Perhaps the security and compatibility aren't applicable. I hope.

Q: "How can I take a screenshot of a movie in QuickTime X?"

One gripe about the new QuickTime X is that when you pause a video, the on-screen controls stay visible, making it impossible to grab a clean screenshot. TUAW reader Gwion Daniel wrote in to tell us that you can make the controls fade by double-clicking the picture frame. I have had mixed results with this. I have had the most success double-clicking on the far right side of the window (where the scrollbar would be, if there was one). Sometimes it seems to work, sometimes it takes a few tries. If you can't get it to work, fire up VLC and use the menu item Video > Snapshot.

Q: "What happened to QuickTime X's preferences?"

Thery aren't any clearly visibe as there's no preference menu. However, if you install the Secrets preference panel which we mentioned earlier you'll find hidden preferences for:

• Autoplay movies on open
• Allow multiple simultaneous recordings
• Always hide title bar
• Autohide titlebar/controller
• Autoshow titlebar/controller
• Automatically show subtitles and closed captioning on open
• Exit fullscreen when switching apps
• Use square corners

I'm hoping that the new QuickTime player will eventually regain all of QuickTime 7 Pro's functionality and the user interface will become a little more user-friendly (hiding these basic preferences seems like an odd decision), but for now we are living in an in-between time in QuickTime's development. QuickTime turns 18 this year, and it's obviously going through some changes. 'Ol Quicktime is no longer who it was, nor is it yet what it will be when it grows up. At least you don't have to worry about it staying out all night with its friends.

Just in case you were waiting for the stop-motion app on your hard drive to be compatible before switching to Snow Leopard, you can stop waiting -- even if you're using some other program to do stop motion, iStopMotion is the best and brightest, and with the brand new update to version 2.1, it's completely compatible with the newest version of OS X.

OK, you probably weren't waiting for this upgrade to bring the OS up to date, but hey, Snow Leopard compatibility is a nice selling point with any app. This upgrade also includes the ability to put markers (with their own name, color, and description) in the timeline of your video, as well as a full Japanese localization, to go along with the English, German, and French already in there. It's a free update for all current users, and considering that iStopMotion has made quite a few appearances in various Mac software bundles, odds are you've already got it anyway.

A look at Halloween posts gone by...

	The TUAW Halloween costume gallery We asked to see your Apple-themed Halloween costumes, and you delivered. As Mac fans everywhere head off to Halloween parties, it's clear that TUAW readers have created some great outfits.		A handful of Halloween for your iPhone or iPod touch Ready for Halloween on your iPhone? The App Store provides a quick fix for trick-or-treaters, and the offerings provide a little of each category. Here's a sampling.
	Flickr Find: Mac-O-Lantern Halloween is just around the corner, and you know what means: spooky Macs! Tim emailed us to share his instructions for making a Mac-o-lantern out of a Mac Classic. Some tape, a can of spray paint...	Also of interest: Found Footage: iPhone costumes are either genius or deeply misguided Found Footage: Use your iPhone in your Halloween costume iPumpkin Macs, iPods and crazy Apple fans on Halloween

Just last week, Verizon released Media Manager for the Mac. While many customers are saying it's less powerful than its Windows-based counterpart, it received significant changes this week. Namely, users can now stream content from their iPhoto and iTunes libraries to a FiOS DVR (something TiVo did three years ago, but let's not nit-pick).

With the desktop app running (configured as a simple preference), you can browse iTunes playlists as well as your entire library. From iPhoto, browse your library, events and slideshows. Keeping events intact is nice for when you want to show Aunt Shirley pictures from your trip to Scranton.

Note that this requires a FiOS TV DVR Set-Top Box, Mac OS X 10.4 or greater, iTunes 7 or greater, iPhoto 6 or greater and QuickTime version 7 or greater. For an unnecessarily enthusiastic demonstration of the software, check out the video after the break.

(Screenshot courtesy of Dave Zatz / Zatz Not Funny)

[Via Engadget]

If you're rocking the Mac mini -- or any other Mac, for that matter --as a media center, then chances are pretty good that you've had some tough times following the upgrade to Snow Leopard. Anticipating such problems, some of us held off upgrading to Mac OS X 10.6. Now the wait is over.

Shortly after Elan discussed the details of a workaround for Plex, a new release has been let loose on the web. Plex 0.8.3 was announced earlier this week with improved Snow Leopard compatibility as well as several other fixes and new features. For users of Apple's latest OS, the biggest new feature is probably the integration of the Candelair driver which returns Plex to the days of Apple Remote compatibility.

Other notable improvements and new features include:

• Fixed an issue with MKV playback over the network
• A problem with the media server crashing has been fixed
• Video playlists work again
• A new feature where downmixing 5.1 surround audio to 2.0 stereo audio has multiple dynamic range compression options. In other words, surround audio will not be as "quiet" when played through headphones.
• New handling of quitting/suspending commands that includes a new scheduling feature.

The new release of Plex means I can finally stop holding my breath and upgrade my Mac mini to Snow Leopard. It is available now, for free (!!!) right here. Anybody else ready to upgrade to SL now that the Plex release is out? Once my mini is upgraded, rest assured that Plex will be the first thing I install.

[via Macworld]

If you work in Photoshop, you've probably had designs which branched off from the original look, based on your own ideas or client feedback. This has, more than likely, resulted in multiple files with names like mockup1.psd, mockup1b.psd, mockup2.psd, etc. The solution would be what coders know as Version Control, something which allows you to "commit" any version of your project to a repository, letting you jump around from version to version, making changes without worrying about losing one of those branches you went off on as an experiment. Version control systems like Subversion and Git can do this for you, but there's a learning curve and a certain amount of geekery required to make it work smoothly.

Timeline from PixelNovel aims to take the "geek" requirements out of using version control in Photoshop. Timeline goes beyond other options and uses a Subversion repository to store any revision of your progress while working on a Photoshop file. If you don't know what Subversion is, that's ok. Timeline simply shows you a row of previews of versions you've chosen to save, and you can jump back in time with a couple of clicks. Make a change, commit it, jump to a different version ... all in a slick, minimal toolbar. You can add comments (a commit message for those already svn-savvy) to each revision, which is handy whether you're working alone or collaborating.

Timeline offers two ways of handling the repositories necessary for it to function. The least geeky option is to use their hosted Subversion service, which provides easy-to-use collaboration options, a web interface and automatic backup. It's available at a subscription fee, but signing up includes a copy of the plugin for free. Alternatively, you can host your own Subversion repository, which isn't terribly difficult. This avoids both the hosting fee and (if you create a local repository on your own computer) the need to download your revisions from a host.

I spoke with the developers of Timeline about the potential for a Git version, and it's something they're looking into. For now, though, the Subversion plan is working quite well. If you frequently find yourself with a folder full of poorly-titled versions of a project, and flipping between them is getting to be a pain, it's definitely something to consider. The plugin itself will cost you $60US and -- if you choose the hosted route -- an account runs $5US for 5GB of storage, or $20US for 25GB. TUAW readers can take advantage of a special offer, and get 20% off of either: use coupon tuaw1 for a standalone license, and tuaw2 for a 20% discount on a hosted option.

[Side note: For the Git-inclined, I've found that the previews in GitX combined with a few shell scripts can provide a decent (but less integrated and robust) versioning system for Photoshop and other graphics applications.]