Xounds is a haxie that brings back Appearance Sounds to Mac OS X. Tired of silence? Want audio feedback when you navigate through menus or drag your windows around? Xounds will convert your existing Mac OS 8 or 9 soundsets and make Mac OS X a better place to work in.
Features:
Plays sounds when you work - when you pull down menus, drag windows, select menu items, empty trash, and more.
Assign freely which events you want to be voiced and which not.
Assign any AIFF sound to supported events.
Ability to import Mac OS 8 or 9 sound sets for use in Mac OS X.
What's New
Version 3.0.1:
Addressed a problem when using the 32-bit side of the Xounds prefpane. Clang was incorrectly doing stuff to make the Objective-C runtime "cranky". sad face. Clang/LLVM is still FTW. happy winking face.
3.0 (released Apr 25, 2010)
This version is only compatible with Mac OS X 10.6 Snow Leopard v10.6.x.
Now requires Mac OS X 10.6.x.
You may have to restart after installing Xounds for the first time.
Updated to support Mac OS X 10.6 Snow Leopard v10.6.x
Now supports only Mac OS X 10.6 Snow Leopard v10.6.x
Adds support for 64-bit processes (x86_64 only, ppc64 is not supported)
Requires Rosetta. If Rosetta is not installed, Mac OS X 10.6.x will offer to install the 4MB Rosetta package during the install of Xounds.
Clang/LLVM's excellent static analyzer helped us to find and fix some bugs that would only show up during a red moon.
Version 3.0.1:
Addressed a problem when using the 32-bit side of the Xounds prefpane. Clang was incorrectly doing stuff to make the Objective-C runtime "cranky". sad face. Clang/LLVM is still FTW. happy winking face.
3.0 (released Apr 25, 2010)
This version is only compatible with Mac OS X 10.6 Snow Leopard v10.6.x.
Xounds quit working on my new intel iMac about two weeks after install. I have been a registered user (of 3 haxies) for years, and I'm a bit surprised at their lack of support. I have contacted Unsanity numerous times for support with no reply at all. I read that they are slow to reply, but I think 2 months is a reasonable amount of time. Overall rating is 2 for this reason. Had they tried to help it would have been a 5 because I have never had any issues running their haxies.
Ah, it's like an old flame come back to give it another go. She's still attractive you still have many fond memories, but there is that little queasy feeling in the pit of your stomach, especially since I've adjusted an moved on. Some time ago, I found Sounds4Fun. Implementation is lightly different, but it works. Will I try Xounds again? Maybe, but I'll need to think about it a while.
For all the nay-sayers and anti-Unsanity brigade, you'll be delighted to hear it's stable and works a treat on Snow Leopard (running on MacPro 1.1):
Tried it with:
Final Cut Studio - check
CS4 suite - check
Quark 7.5 - check
Toast Titanium - check
Font Explorer X Pro 2.5 - check
OmniWeb - check
Office 2008 suite - check
All my old Classic soundsets loaded back in from Tiger and worth the wait.
Upgrade fee already paid both for this and my beloved Windowshade... with thanks. Hopefully Unsanity will now have a chance to bring back proper Customer Service and regular updates for the rest of us who have always and (now) will continue to still support you now that you've hopefully got your house in order internally.
Just Fruit Menu and Menu Master to go now for me and my joyful days on Tiger OSX will be a distant memory for me and I'll fully embrace my other Snow Leopard partition.
Really nice to see it back on track after 18 months.
But the new OS X 10.6 is coming now.
Shall we have to wait for another 18 months this time ?
Hope not.
Aren't I lucky that I still have the "Classic" Xoundset from the old days.
The new "default" Xoundset are just a complete abortion. Unsanity, if you're listening... GUY'S YOU NEED TO GIVE EVERYONE ACCESS TO THE PLEASANT ORIGINAL "CLASSIC" SET!!!!!!!
Xounds importer still PPC application. Crashing after try to import classic soundset. I'm glad that Unsanity still keep Xounds (also looking for Labels X). BTW Please release a stable version. This is too buggy!!!!!!!
I've been using Unsanity's software for years and have had very few problems. One thing that helps is that after installing new software I always repair disk permissions and follow Unsanity's instructions. They always recommend that you either log out and then log back in or restart your computer after installation. I do both and found this does the trick. This new version of Xounds is no different and upon logging back in I found everything worked fine. I only dropped the main rating one star due to their poor communication of what's going on to end users. This is one feature they really need to improve.
My finder started crashing which I do not remember it ever doing so I deleted the preference pane including the application enhancer. I do not mean to be unfair (as in I cannot be sure of a cause and effect) but it was coincidental.
Actually, this behavior IS coincidental. I also had this happen after installing this beta and the Windowshade beta. Deleted both and reinstalled the last stable versions and all was okay. Then I reinstalled the Windowshade beta by itself and everything still worked. Again, I installed the Xounds beta, and the Finder started crashing everytime I moved a file. Left Xounds out for now .
I have been using xounds since the beginning and had grown quite used to it. There used to be a Grateful Dead soundset that I really liked as well, in fact there may have even been two of them that I mixed & matched to my likings. Anyway my G5 iMac bit the dust & I bought a new intel iMac running Snow Leopard. I installed Fruit Menu, Windowshade X, and Xounds with no issues on the new machine. After about 2 weeks Xounds quit working. I have tried re-installing, repairing disc permissions, and every other trick I could think of or read somewhere to get it working again to no avail. I tried contacting Unsanity for some support at least 4 times over a two month span, and I have had absolutely ZERO response from them. It just really pisses me off when you're a loyal paying customer for years, and they just completely ignore my requests for a little help. I had gotten so used to xounds that I absolutely HATE not having it even if I couldn't run the Grateful Dead soundset. Anyone have any ideas on how to get it working again? Have a copy of the GD soundset? I'll pay ya!!
There seems to be a problem with this version of Xsounds. When I put my machine to sleep (MacBook Pro 10.6.3) and then awaken it, my ethernet connection (through which I get my internet, and connect to my other computers, as well as my printer) is dead and I have to disconnect and reconnect the ethernet cable to restart it. When I remove Xsounds the problem goes away.
I too had problems getting Xounds to work on Tiger, and had noticeable slowdowns using ShapeShifter as well...
The solution that worked for me...
Use the installers for all the haxies I had installed to uninstall all of them... then reinstall them all for "this user only".
I'm not sure whether the performance & functionality fixes were in any way related to previously installed for all users or not... but uninstalling them all and reinstalling the most recent versions has allowed Xounds to begin working flawlessly and window dragging/redraws to perform at least twice as fast as before.
It's worth a try for everyone having problems at the very least.
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Xounds is a haxie that brings back Appearance Sounds to Mac OS X. Tired of silence? Want audio feedback when you navigate through menus or drag your windows around? Xounds will convert your existing Mac OS 8 or 9 soundsets and make Mac OS X a better place to work in.
Features:
Plays sounds when you work - when you pull down menus, drag windows, select menu items, empty trash, and more.
Assign freely which events you want to be voiced and which not.
Assign any AIFF sound to supported events.
Ability to import Mac OS 8 or 9 sound sets for use in Mac OS X.
Stereo or mono output - so you actually hear on what side you have pulled the menu down.
Exclude list to remove certain applications from being affected by Xounds.
Easy to configure as it comes in usual Preference Pane form, accessible through System Preferences.
+92
http://roaringapps.com/apps:table
-1
-2
Stranger reviewed on 30 May 2011
+1
+28
+2
+129
Lesoth0 reviewed on 27 Apr 2010
Tried it with:
Final Cut Studio - check
CS4 suite - check
Quark 7.5 - check
Toast Titanium - check
Font Explorer X Pro 2.5 - check
OmniWeb - check
Office 2008 suite - check
All my old Classic soundsets loaded back in from Tiger and worth the wait.
Upgrade fee already paid both for this and my beloved Windowshade... with thanks. Hopefully Unsanity will now have a chance to bring back proper Customer Service and regular updates for the rest of us who have always and (now) will continue to still support you now that you've hopefully got your house in order internally.
Just Fruit Menu and Menu Master to go now for me and my joyful days on Tiger OSX will be a distant memory for me and I'll fully embrace my other Snow Leopard partition.
+1
+18
Thanks Unsanity!!
+1
+79
But the new OS X 10.6 is coming now.
Shall we have to wait for another 18 months this time ?
Hope not.
+3
+129
The new "default" Xoundset are just a complete abortion. Unsanity, if you're listening... GUY'S YOU NEED TO GIVE EVERYONE ACCESS TO THE PLEASANT ORIGINAL "CLASSIC" SET!!!!!!!
Hope you heard that shouting?
-3
-1
+1
+92
Mac007 reviewed on 20 Apr 2009
+1
+14
+940
-1
-2
+17
+1
+105
+1
+92
+1
+940
+6
The solution that worked for me...
Use the installers for all the haxies I had installed to uninstall all of them... then reinstall them all for "this user only".
I'm not sure whether the performance & functionality fixes were in any way related to previously installed for all users or not... but uninstalling them all and reinstalling the most recent versions has allowed Xounds to begin working flawlessly and window dragging/redraws to perform at least twice as fast as before.
It's worth a try for everyone having problems at the very least.
Thanks