LEMERLOT  I used iFreeMem for many years successfully but 3.5 is also not working for me under 10.6. Snow Leo. Pity!  
(Version 3.5)

LEMERLOT  Having not been able to use Picasa for Mac due to its incredible high amount of CPU usage in earlier versions seems that with version 3.5.x the Picasa team finally did their home work pretty well:

Now Picasa for Mac is great app to find and manage images on your hard drive without the need of organizing them in specific folders before or link them to iPhoto.

While the new face recognition feature needs some time to find and index faces in thousands of images the results really impressed me.

Finally well done, Picasa team!

One important hint regarding your data protection:

Think twice if you want to use Picasa with an online connection - especially if you try to import the name tags of your existing Picasa online account !

If you do it, Picasa imports ALL addresses from your Google online address book too without asking - and if you want to tag your images in your local Picasa for Mac app later, it always tries to connect the pictures with the real name, email address, phone number etc. of your Google address book entries.

That's definitely not what I like - especially since Picasa for Mac doesn't allow you to delete those imported addresses from your Google online address book later in a batch mode, so you would have to work on every single one - for me nearly 2.000 entries. Be prepared !  
(Version 3.5)

LEMERLOT  Wow, after years of using Think I discovered Isolator now - and it does nearly all I liked to have with Think. It even hides the dock! If it could hide the menu bar too it would be perfect for me.

Nevertheless I'm very impressed.  
(Version 4.03b)

LEMERLOT  I tried SimpleMovieX several times but there is still a major problem for me (and I guess many other users) - and I never got any response by the developers:

I'm using an online TV recorder (save.tv) which saves videos as AVIs (DIVX).

In the past I've cut out commercials of those AVIs with VirtualDub, a free Windows application (http://www.virtualdub.org) via Parallels Desktop on my Mac.

Native Editing with VirtualDub works perfect. I am viewing the edited videos on my Playstation 3 without any problems.

Now - since I'm using a Mac - I've tried the recent version of SimpleMovieX. While I can cut and save those AVIs (DIVX) with SimpleMovieX (respecting the editing points = keyframe restriction) like with VirtualDub - and also view them on my Mac - showing those videos edited with SimpleMovieX on my Playstation 3 doesn't work: The movie and the sound are playing too fast and frames are jumping.

While I've read what has been published about the AVI format I have to stick to it since it's what I get from save.tv - and I don't want to loose quality and time by re-encoding the videos.

So since loss-less cutting of AVIs (DIVX) is possible VirtualDub I cannot understand why it shouldn't be possible with SimpleMovieX.

I really would like to buy SimpleMovieX if it worked for me.  
(Version 3.9.1)

LEMERLOT  De facto seems using Picasa on a Mac with CrossOver is much less (CPU) trouble than using Picasa for Mac (last tested version 3.0.6)... - but search the Internet archives for Picasa (Win) version 2. After many tests I did on my Mac this works best by far if your main goal is to keep the overview of ALL your images on your Mac.  
(Version 3.0.6)

LEMERLOT  Picasa for Mac's newest version 3.0.6 still uses 90% of my CPU with a test set of only 100 (!) JPG images when Picasa has focus - even after hours...

I really would like to know what Picasa does here in the background with your data - especially since it's offered by Google.

It's a pity... - I would really like to use Picasa if its developers finally would offer a version of Picasa like in earlier Windows days when version 2 didn't eat up all your CPU and offered the same core functionality: just an overview of all pictures stored on your hard disk.

But with this new version it's still a CPU nightmare.

(Core2Duo - and a very well fostered system - Mac OS X 10.5.7)  
(Version 3.0.6)

LEMERLOT  Funny, still in the new version 12.2 Entourage crashes from time to time on my well fostered system. I'm sending crash reports since months to Microsoft - but seems for them a collaboration software addition is more important than basic bug fixes and improvements.

Hmm, in the long run the market punishes such misconduct...   
(Version 12.2)

LEMERLOT  After trying Afloat I uninstalled it. Nice idea but not really working. Even Afloat's (nice) configuration window was not floating above the other windows so I had to "digg" for it.

When trying to pin Pathfinder to the desktop to avoid vanishing Pathfinder in Exposé - Pathfinder disappeared. When trying to show EventBox's Heads Up window in all spaces - Afloat failed.  
(Version 2.1.1)

LEMERLOT  Really helpful to block temporarily not needed apps from stealing CPU.  
(Version 1.1)

LEMERLOT  Smooth update to 10.5.7 - no probs so far, great job, Apple   
(Version 10.5.7)

LEMERLOT  Still old security bug! Although Little Snitch's preferences should be LOCKED to provide security they are UNlocked when my Powerbook restarts UNTIL some seconds after starting up have passed by.

To be clear: After some seconds it locks itself automatically - BUT it's open before so there's no security when the computer is starting up! This happens even with the new Little Snitch 2.1.1. (running Mac OS X 10.5.6).

I filed that security relevant bug 5 months at the developer ago but unfortunately it's still part of this recent version Little Snitch. That's why I have to rate it accordingly.  
(Version 2.1.1)

LEMERLOT  UPDATE: Since even today's update to Picasa 3.0.5 still didn't fix the unacceptable CPU problem I downgraded to Picasa for Mac version 3.0.0.310 and now everything is fine. No more CPU hogs, a highly recommendable approach for all affected users :-)   
(Version 3.0.5)

LEMERLOT  Thanks for your feedback Jonsi, seems you're a lucky. Here's some other feedback from users affected by the same issue:

http://www.google.com/support/forum/p/Picasa/thread?fid=750197dedb74cf58000466e120717bcb&hl=en

I checked really everything - maybe it's because I'm having thousands of images... - but as said: 90% CPU isn't acceptable.  
(Version 3.0.5)

LEMERLOT  While I really like the "Picasa for Mac" concept also this version 3.0.5 takes up to 90 percent of my CPU (MacBookPro Core2Duo)without letting me know why.

That makes Picasa useless for me. Even researching on that issue on the web and rebuilding Picasa's database didn't help. Also Google didn't clear what's going on in the background and why Picasa takes such a huge amount of CPU (which it didn't in earlier pre 3.x versions). What a pity :-(

That's why I had to rate it negative.  
(Version 3.0.5)

LEMERLOT  I've bought both - VMware Fusion and Parallels Desktop 3 which still works great.

When I wanted to use both processors of my Core2Duo MacBookPro for special tasks with Win XP, I tried Parallels 4. Since 4 months (!!) I haven't been able to install Parallels 4 and even Parallels' support didn't help. Have a look in their forums - it looks like a very unhappy beta testing community.

So I finally switched to VMware Fusion 2 which works like a charm. Btw. I was really sad seeing how the formerly really great Parallels Desktop went down in customer satisfaction.  
(Version 2.0.4)

LEMERLOT  I've bought The Missing Sync for iPhone some months ago. Now with the update to 1.0.2 it's the first time (!) it works for me.

BUT: While I understand that Apple's API doesn't allow two way syncing so far nevertheless there would have been a lot of room for improvement which could have be done already in the past from the Missing Sync's manufacturer MarkSpace. Unfortunately they missed it and so Missing Sync for iPhone is still a very rudimentary solution even mostly without standard features like e.g. sorting dates up or down in SMS Log, showing your contact in sent SMS in SMS Log etc.

So I think it's still highly overpriced and therefore not recommendable at all !  
(Version 1.0.2)

LEMERLOT  Finally! The long wait has an end - Leopard can be themed now very easily.

Magnifique works flawlessly for me and it really makes a difference for all eye candy lovers working with a Mac (and Leopard) :-))

LeMerlot  
(Version 1.0)

LEMERLOT  Correction: "(...) for me version 1.6.6's item info box on the RIGHT side was preferable (...)"   
(Version 2.0.7)

LEMERLOT  In current version 2.0.7 catalog images still rebuild too slow and for me version 1.6.6's item info box on the left side was preferable...

Facit: I'll stick with version 1.6.6.  
(Version 2.0.7)

LEMERLOT  Excellent! The long wait finally has an end...

Long time ago I bought CrossOver for being able to use Picasa with the pictures on my Mac.

Now I installed the new Mac version of Picasa and it's working so smoothly - wow, I love it :-)  
(Version 3.0.0.310)

LEMERLOT  I've tried to upgrade from Parallels v3 to v4... - and the nightmare started.

Now I have to downgrade to v3 again since v4 never worked – only showing me a blue screen with my formerly rock solid XP Bootcamp partition.

If you look in Parallels' forums you'll understand why I only can give you one advice: Do yourself a big favor and wait with the upgrade until the next version which (hopefully) works...   
(Version 4.0.3522)

LEMERLOT  Could be a nice and helpful app but:

1. doesn't work for me with spaces (only shows in one space)

2. I can't choose apps NOT to be shown in Fantasktik e.g. LaunchBar and QuickKeys which I don't want to see there

3. Hides the top part of my windows an so the close box of the respective window etc.

If this is fixed then it's worth to buy it.

LM  
(Version 1.0)

LEMERLOT  Works like a charm on my Macbook Pro's Bootcamp partition (Mac OS: Leopard 10.5.2).

I never would like to work without it any more.  
(Version 6.5.1)

LEMERLOT  Wow!!! Letterbox is the Mail enhancement I've waited for. Works like a charm - and I love its options.

Now I even think of switching from Entourage to Mail as my main email application...

Thanks so much for this great app!!!  
(Version 0.22b)

LEMERLOT  Wow, I'm impressed.

After having installed Parallels Desktop 3.0 Build 5580 I didn't expect very much. But seems the Parallels team worked hard because this version rocks. I am even able now to use my Treo 650 Smartphone remotely on my Mac via USB and PDA Reach (for Windows) for the first time - AND in Parallels' Coherence mode - best of both worlds - so convenient and cool!

Since Parallels so far never was able to handle this USB task I wanted to switch to VM Ware Fusion. But with Parallels' Build 5580 this isn't necessary any more. Parallels Build 5580 is now very snappy and fast again so I have no reason for switching any more. In a perfect world I would wish that it would support both processors of my MacBook Pro Core2Duo - but hey, who's perfect?

I can highly recommend Parallels Desktop now again - it's worth every Dollar!

Cheers from Switzerland

Jo   
(Version 3.0.5580)