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Awaken6.2.1

Name: Awaken
Price: 6.99 $
Rating: 4.25 (8 reviews)

22 April 2020

Digital alarm clock uses iTunes to wake you.

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Overview

Awaken turns your Mac into the ultimate music alarm clock and sleep timer.

Alarms

Wake up to your music or built-in sounds
Supports multiple alarms with sorting and labeling
Customizable snooze control
Create one-time alarms, weekly alarms, or target a specific date
Gradually fade in the music volume and screen brightness
Launch applications or files at alarm time
Controllable via Apple Remote and keyboard shortcuts
Auto-stop alarms after a customizable duration

What's new in Awaken

Version 6.2.1:

Updated to work with the latest AwakenHelper for macOS Catalina.

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78 Reviews of Awaken

I use iTunes Match and can't seem to find how to make it the "go to" folder for music played in this app.

(1)

Used to love this, but haven't had on my Mac for over 3yrs as it got very buggy. Thought I'd give it a try again, but I'm still running Mojave and this requires Catalina.

(0)

Mhoutman

25 October 2015

Version: 6.0

MAS version 6.0.1, Non MAS version 6.0.1 needs updated d/l link

(0)

"Refined user interface with Retina display support. New application icon." Yep,- now i have a ugly black clock in my Menuebar (10.9.5), and it starts the timer slowly. But its is a good tool,- never let me hang.

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Buggy. CPU usage of over 20% when sitting idle is not acceptable. Also many crashes on OS X 10.9.5. While the program looks nice, it's basically not a good idea to use it, in it's current state if you are trying to be productive.

(2)

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Tekl

03 October 2013

Version: 5.0.12

To bad it cannot shutdown. It only supports sleep. Cool would be a feature to shutdown after playing an album or a playlist in iTunes.

(1)

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Nontroppo

28 September 2012

Version: 5.0.6

This is currently very broken on a retina macbook on 10.8.2. I've emailed embraceware twice, and no responses. Plus we cannot download the latest version outside of the app store. Not a good experience at the moment...

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This app was once unstable, sometimes, and not so pleasant to use. I think it is now almost perfect.

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Aargl

03 March 2012

Version: 5.0.5

I'm surprised the dev doesn't answer to those bad reviews: I had the same problem on PPC when I switched from Tiger (where Awaken was perfect!) to Leopard, and had to find alternatives...

(0)

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Qwertyale

26 February 2012

Version: 5.0.5

I got 5.0.5 but the Awaken Helper don't power up my MBP. It only wake up from sleep... I'm very disappointed. =(

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The new version is rubbish. Alarms often don't work. The Awaken Helper as a separate download is a mess. Also, I have had to keep the PKG handy as it vanishes constantly & I have to reinstall it. Waist of money.

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It just crashes every morning. I reinstalled the OS with clean install, but still happens. Now I made up my own alarm with Automator, iCal and iTunes which is never fancy but the most reliable way.

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Not so keen on the new UI for v5 - got trapped a couple of times when setting a timer by the fact that you have to create a timer, then save it, then click on the start button to actually use it. I would have thought that 99% of the time, when you create a timer, you actually want to time something! so the UI should make that the default.

(0)

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Robk

15 May 2011

Version: 5.0.3

For those of you who have purchased Awaken OUTSIDE the Apple App Store, here is the link to version 5.0.3 of the software: http://embraceware.com/awaken/download/Awaken_5.0.3.zip

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I've been a registered user through many versions and, as far as I'm concerned, the latest 2 version have sunk an otherwise decent application. An alarm program that only functions sometimes is an extremely HUGE problem and that is what Awaken has become. If you're counting on it waking you up you should look for another program.

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Great alarm clock.

(0)

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gatovadio

08 April 2011

Version: 5.0.1

wow, latest v5 is now an ipad app. what a great trade-off, eye candy for functionality. the window is now non resizable and two big flaws are still there: one, once a timer is set, you can't change tabs and manage anyhting else without stopping the timer and two, you can't set a value longer than 24H for a timer so I have to make calculations to set a temporary, date-based timer, just to remind me my 27H-charge batteries are ready. This approach also forces me to manually disable this "what should be a one-time alarm" since there is no option to "auto-disable on completion". the "one time" option doesn't cut it because it deletes the entry, doesn't disable it. it's still among the best on its category, since you can use it (and play your music)without having itunes installed.

(0)

Aargl

03 February 2011

Version: 4.0.23

Well... I was really enthusiast about Awaken running in 10.4.11, but since I switched to 10.5.8 it fails waking the computer up, or crashes, one time out of two... Hard to say if Awaken is the one to blame, but, as there's no update since more than one year, it's probably better to look for another app, unfortunately.

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The sleep times has not been working anymore since 10.6.5. Can we expect an update anytime soon? Or is all development focused on the iPhone now?

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After using awaken for a few weeks, i have stumbled on a few bugs, and also felt the need for a few feature enhancements. I've sent the developer a mail containing those bugs, and my feature wishlist. I'll also paste that same info here. Excuse the "raw format", i just cut and pasted it from the mail i sent the developer. Requests: 24 Hour format clock. Per alarm override setting (volume, auto stop etc). Auto stop alarm -> no setting (playlist length only). Egg timer/snooze -> launch app/script. Bugs: Fullscreen backwards icon is corrupted on fullscreen snooze (imac 27). Settings window places itself a little bit more to the bottom every time you open it. Fails to sleep right after woken by awaken scheduled alarm (even when i disable the alarm and quit awaken). Playlist repeat settings are sometimes changed, I would prefer they weren't changed at all.

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Compared to Alarm Clock Pro, it hasn't all those rich and useless features - if you just need to wake up with music - but the interface here is infinitely nicer and more user-friendly! With ACP, you need to click through 6 windows and 1 confirmation dialog to edit an alarm while Awaken has all in 1 window! I'm not using iTunes but some other webradio app so I had to make a little script to do what I wanted (launch the app and raise continuously the volume) + a second alarm one minute later to launch a P2P app (so my only complaint could be that I'd like one single alarm to launch a script and then an app, for instance). Then, the ridiculous thing of ACP is that you have to launch that "power manager" thing (after having set the alarm...) each time you want an alarm to wake your computer up, and click again through various windows while in Awaken, it's already understood! So, for my use no comparison!

(1)

The app is really great except for one little annoying bug. When an alarm goes off in full screen, at first everything looks good, but then after 1 second the "previous"-button gets messed up and an annoying "beep" sound plays. I'm on a 27" iMac, maybe the big screen is the problem?

(0)

Hmmm... when I hit the center play/pause button on my remote, it appears to stop the alarm instead of snooze. Does anyone else have this problem?

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Well, after my recent moan, the developer of awaken got in touch immediately, and very promptly fixed the focus issues I was having. He was corteous and efficient, and so I am reposting a review emphasising that he is still very much responsive and active in keeping Awaken as the best alarm clock app on OS X. Thank you!!!

(2)

Im using awaken again and everything seems to be working fine, I used alarm clock pro briefly after SL came out but I hated it lol, glad to have awaken back

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Ouch, this version will not even launch and while the last version will work I often have to relaunch it a couple time of day as the alarms draw will go blank so I can't add, delete or edit alarms. Switching back to previous version.

(2)

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Well, after a few days they did write me with a suggestion for fixing the problem. Alas, it didn't work. I've written their tech support back more than once telling them it didn't work, and after a week or more, I've heard nothing. It's a shame. I really like this product and was very happy to pay for it, but it just doesn't work on my iMac now, and I'm getting no help at all from the developer. Time to move on, I guess.

(4)

I have been a big fan of Awaken for years. However, I have to agree with the comments about vanishing technical support. I installed my copy of Awaken on a new computer, and every time I launch it, I get an error message that I must enter my admin password so it can install a helper to allow it to wake my Mac from sleep. However, I enter my password, and it apparently doesn't install whatever it needs to, as I can't activate the "wake from sleep" feature, and every time I launch Awaken I get the same error message. I've written Embraceware repeatedly, and no reply. I wasn't worried until I came here and saw other people were having support requests go unanswered. I suppose I'm on my own here. I hope embraceware returns from vacation, or wherever they've gone, as I like this program, and I want to continue using it.

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It's really disappointing that support for Awaken 4 has dropped off a cliff; at this rate it's really doubtful we'll ever see Awaken 5.

(2)

I sent this e-mail on 4/28/09 to support@embraceware.com concerning a problem I am having with Awaken. No reply. Sent this again on 4/30/09. Still no reply from support. So now I have both a problem with the software and a lack of support from the developer!! â˜¹ â˜¹ â˜¹ â˜¹ I own Awaken version 4.0.2.0. When I put the timer on to remind me to do something & click on "use full screen" there is a problem. As the alarm starts at full screen I move my mouse to choose whatever I want to happen, before I know it the whole screen is BLACK. So I hit every button to get my screen back, including force quit, but nothing happens & my screen is still black. This happened on the earlier version as well. I had hoped this problem would have been resolved in this version. It is no fun losing the use of my computer in trying to deal with this. If this is a bug in Awaken 4.0.2.0. it needs to be fixed. If there is something in preferences, please let me know what to change.

(2)

I've been having issues with alarms simply not going off and disappearing from the queue (they reappear when Awaken is closed and re-opened). Console message just states: 4/1/09 6:30:03 AM Awaken[1862] Awaken error report: ""iTunes"" and then 4/1/09 6:31:24 AM com.embraceware.awaken[1874] Wed Apr 1 06:31:24 NatBook.local com.embraceware.awaken[1874] : Shutting down Anyone else having this problem with itunes alarms?

(1)

This is a great, simple, effective application. There was a crashing problem but it was fixed almost immediately. It does its job very well and without much fluff. Incredibly easy to use.

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No update on August 9th. Awaken still crashes on my iMac G5 10.5.4. Even when I delete all prefs and the folder the developer described. Hope they fix it soon.

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If Awaken crashes on startup after upgrading to the latest version please delete the Awaken folder located here: /Users/Shared/Awaken. We are working on an official fix for this in version 4.0.13 coming on Saturday August 9th.

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Well, this is disappointing. After months of waiting for a bug fix, the application crashes on opening with the just-released 4.0.12 version. Don't get me wrong, I love Awaken; I just like it better when it works. Hopefully this a one step backwards, two steps forward kind of scenario...

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I've been trying this application out for the past two weeks and while I really like it (and the price is quite low) there is one major flaw in the program that I've found. Sometimes I wake up before Awaken is scheduled to sound. While I'm actively using the computer, Awaken will take over, go into full screen alarm setup and start gradually increasing the volume of the music as it should. The problem is that when I'm actively using the computer Awaken should not activate in full screen mode despite the settings. Worse yet, Awaken was not responsive to my mute button at all so I had to close the laptop to silence the music because I was on a phone call. Outside of this epic flaw in the program, I still think it's worth the $12.95 for the program and will end up buying it. I will just have to make sure I uncheck every alarm each day that I wake up before Awaken to ensure it doesn't hinder my workflow and start playing music uncontrollably while I'm on the phone.

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I am in process of testing. It looks awesome but unfortunately I found so far 2 issues which holding me back. Please could developers respond, if they can fix it? 1) Remote control - "next" and "previous" track buttons always act as I had pressed them twice. For example "Next Track" always jumps to the second song (song after the next song) and not to the "next" song. 2) Gradually decrease or increase volume feature doesn't work since I am using optical output and there is no system volume control for that. It will be awesome if Awaken can use iTunes Volume control instead of System Volume. The same applies on Remote control volume buttons. They don't work with optical output. (note: iTunes Volume works with this kind of output). Would be possible to fix these issues in next version? Thanks for the respond.

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For some reason my backup alarms have stopped working. I don't know if it's an issue with the latest iTunes or what, but if iTunes fails to play I no longer get a backup alarm. All my music is on my external hard drive so iTunes can load but no music will play as the song will be "missing" and thus I am left with silence. Unfortunately as I tend to be plugged into my external most of the time I haven't noticed when this stopped working. What I do know is that it was working once upon a time. iTunes 7.6.1, Awaken 4.0.11, OS X 10.5.2

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Best alarm clock application available. I have used and tested Alarm Clock Pro & Aurora along with Awaken and I went with Awaken because of it's great feature set, awesome support, great GUI and great pricing and update model (updates for life). It has almost all of the features you could want and more. There are some features I and others have requested and many of those are on the way. Check out the recent blog about the new features coming in version 4.1 - http://embraceware.com/blog/

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I wouldn't have thought to buy an alarm clock program but got Awaken as part of MacHeist. Now I don't want to live without it. It wakes me every morning, keeps me from burning food, and reminds me to do stuff - like go get kids and go to appointments. Great features, really easy to understand and use, value - free updates and great support for a great app. It is very stable - I gave it a 4 because if you forget to open your laptop lid or turn on your powered external speakers you could miss an alarm. So the app works but user error can cause a misfire. I think I've trained myself now. All in all - this is a Mac Essential and if you try the demo you'll use it daily.

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Awaken doesn't revert to backup alarm if iTunes doesn't play a song. My music is on an external drive and when it's not plugged in Awaken still acts like iTunes is going to play a song so it doesn't revert to the backup alarm. Itunes 7.6, OS X 10.5.2, Awaken 4.0.11.

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Featres (5): With this latest release they've added all the old features back so it's completely back to where it was, plus all the added new stuff. I can't think of anything else it could possibly need as it has all the features I want. Ease of Use (5): Everything is simple and easy to figure out, being right where you'd expect it to be. Value (5): Sure, enough of it's functions are done on other alarm apps to make you wonder if it's worth paying for one that does just a little bit more, but once you've seen how much that little bit more is your worries about price pretty much disappear. They did for me. Stability (4): The only issue I've ever had with the program is that one morning I woke up late to find that an update had been released since I went to bed and instead of an alarm, an update notice was shown. Turning off the auto-update feature solved this but I'd much rather it wait to tell me until AFTER I've turned off my alarm.

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Awaken is truly excellent application overall. It looks great and works as advertised. Its very easy to use (even if you are tired...) which I believe is essential in application such as Awaken. My only complaint is that Awaken currently can't start up your Mac. However, developer has told that such feature will be added in future. Also, I must say that Awaken has best support that I have ever seen in any application. With product and support like this and "free updates for life" update plan this is product that you shouldn't pass.

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I bought Awaken just with the MacHeist II Bundle and I like it. However, I miss a little feature: It seems not possible to set fixed times for the "Egg timer", but I boil my eggs always the same period of time. ;) That way I could not start the "Egg timer" just with a singel click...

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Awaken looks great, is pretty stable and has plenty of nifty little features that simply make this a joy to use. All you have heard about Jerry Brace's amazing support is true : he's very, very dedicated to his app and users. That alone has made me buy his app in a heartbeat.

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Awaken is great and all but it needs better iTunes+external drive support. If you have your music on an external hard drive and you allow your disks to go to sleep, starting up of iTunes and the playing of that first song can take a few seconds while the drives spin up. This is a problem because Awaken won't wait long enough and tends to go right to the error message and backup sound. This could be solved by, if you're playing an iTunes track, having it start up the minute before the alarm is set to go off that way when you're set to play the song iTunes, and your external, are ready. Or you could just extend the time before you get an error message to a few minutes.

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Just to let everybody know that I've solved the problem of Awaken not playing. It was due to Unsanity's Shapeshifter! Now the app works like a charm. I still wish for more functionality like in Alarm Clock Pro... but Awaken is just easier to use and more beautiful to look at.

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Awaken 3.1.4b has the same problem as previous versions: my Mac does wake up from sleep and when I look at the screen in the morning Awaken's there... but no music is playing nor is the alternative alarm ringing. In fact, I'm still woken up by my mobile phone because I simply cannot rely on Awaken. I've reported this issue numerous times and, judging from the forums on the developer's site, I'm not alone. However, nothing's been done to address the problem. It's been months now since I registered and I'm seriously considering going back to AlarmClockPro. It's not as nice to look at... but it works! Reliably that is. And: I don't have to wait for months before getting a reply from customer support. Awaken should be renamed Asleep.

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Great program and I haven't had a problem with it in ages but this morning I found a glitch. If the program has an alert, say if a new version is available and it wants to know if you want to download it or the like, then the alarm won't go off. You won't even get the secondary alarm. So yeah, because it was asking me if I wanted to download the latest version of Awaken the alarm didn't sound. (version 3.1.2)

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Great Application, used it since version 2 and it's getting better and better. Love the new 3.1 update with the new interface for non-fullscreen alarms, and the feature i requested a while back where you can choose between Music alarm and normal alarm's. I still think the application itself is still a bit dark though, could be a little more aqua and unified instead of the dark itunes 7.0 look. Keep up the good work

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This app is fantastic ... it's got all the features you need in an alarm and it looks just beautiful. Nicely laid out ... tons of preferences .. works great. Reminds me of WeatherDock in its elegance and functionality .... I wish all apps were like this ... then OSX would be unbeatable ... Hire this guy Apple ....!!

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This is a great app. But it would be better if it would allow me to used an iTunes share as the music source. I have all my music stored on a main computer in my living room running iTunes, but I have the program running on my Macbook pro.

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It would be really nice if you could choose the audio output for the alarm. I use external speakers on my PowerBook but turn them off at night. It would be great if I could select my internal speakers.

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I've tried a lot of alarm clock apps, and they just don't work the way I want them to. Awaken isn't perfect, but it's the closest I've found. I've been using it for a while to wake me up in the mornings, and so far it hasn't failed me yet. Although this morning it crashed some time after I hit snooze, but that's why I use my real alarm clock as a backup :) One feature I'd like to see is the ability to turn off the alarm by pressing a key on the keyboard. My computer's monitor is always off when I wake up, and it takes a few seconds to come up, while my music is blasting away. But besides that, the app does what I need. Keep up the good work.

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Clean interface, good features... but its missing an alarm fade up feature. Well, to be more specific, it HAS this feature, but it doesnt work. You can go into preferences and set a fade up time up to 6 minutes, but for some reason, the program overrides this and just blasts the music anyways. iTaf was the best alarm, until development was discontinued for it, and the dameon became unstable. I was late to class more than once because of that... If anyone can point me at a cheap alarm program with recurring alarms and volume fading, it would be much appreciated.

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I set this program to wake me up this morning, however it didn't work as I woke up 4 hours later. I tested the program and while I was sitting there watching it, in one occasion it failed to launch and in another, it opened the awaken splash screen but played no music. Yes, the system and itunes volumes were at maximum. Maybe this is a bug with this version. Anyhow, it's unacceptable to release alarm software without better testing. I also noticed another rather silly bug that was just fixed in 2.3.3 from 2.3.2.

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This is an excellent program. This developer works hard and is very responsive to comments, or questions. There are still some minor bugs and tweaks that are needed, but these are all addressed in due time. I'm very anxious to see where this app will go in the months to follow. I love being able to wake up to my music. I have an iPod, and so I also considered getting the iHome (iPod alarm clock) but I think this program is much better - and cheaper. Getting this program for $9 is a steal. Highly recommended to anyone who wakes up on a daily basis.

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Works like a charm. Woke my computer up as advertised, ramped up the volume just like I selected in preferences, did everything it was supposed to. The price is comparable to a basic Wal-Mart clock radio so I think that it is reasonable. This is at the top of my shortlist for purchase.

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Ok. This was very disappointing. I tried the demo and it didn't wake my computer up from Sleep mode. I set the alarm and checked that all things were ok. I also let Awaken be open, since I believe it hasn't got a 'background daemon' feature. After that, I put my computer to Sleep and well, it didn't fire off at the set alarm time or anything. Just a sleeping computer and a missed wake up time. My apologies for sounding sceptic, but can't someone please make an application equivalent to the now obsolete iBeeZz (http://www.macupdate.com/info.php/id/10589)?? iBeeZz managed did not only manage to always work, but also, it was capable of kickstarting your computer after you had shut it down completely. So far, I've never seen the likes of iBeeZz' effectiveness. Just fanzy looking interfaces, some with lots of more or less unnecessary types of alarms, but no one that can actually be trusted to wake your shut down computer up. Sleep mode drains power, more power than a normal clock. The reason I want to use my computer as an alarm clock, is that it can wake me up with some iTunes music. If I have to let the computer stay on, that would mean my computer would almost never get any rest and it's life span would dramatically decrease by not letting it do that. My question is, if one single person can create the magic that iBeeZz managed to accomplish, why can't companies with lots of people do it? Talk to the developer of iBeeZz and see if you can acquire a license for that particular über-wakeup fuction, or even buyout the whole source code for his program (since he's abandoned any further development) and make a decent, working, efficient and (why not) full-featured Macontosh alarm clock. For whatever it's worth, here are the details of my system; Mac G5 dual 2.5 Ghz, 1.5 Gb RAM, running OSX Tiger 10.4.3.

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Can it wake up the computer after you have put it to Off (i.e. not Sleep mode, I mean, turned off) ? The program iBeeZz can do this, but the developer of that program has seized working on it and it doesn't work in Tiger either...

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A great little iTunes alarm app that does what it promises and looks good doing it. Even more cool features are promised for the 2.1 release, and the developer is responsive and open to customer feedback.

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i love this application because now i dont have to listen to the crappy radio stations in ny or some really bad beap tone. my only problem with this is its not freeware, sigh.time to use iwake

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Great application. Only suggestions are Progressive volume control when the alarm goes off, and maybe a sleep function?

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An outstanding free app. It's so nice to wake up to MegaMan techno remixes instead of BEEP BEEP BEEP BEEP! Important request: volume control. I forgot to turn my system volume to max before I went to bed; as a result, I couldn't hear my computer and didn't wake up.

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didn't wake my computer up from sleep this morning... (iBook G4 1.33ghz running 10.4.1)

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Nice little app, but: iTaf still has the advantage of running a daemon that alarms you even if iTaf doesn't run. You have to take care and always check if Awaken is still running. Or I didn't notice the function, then I'm sorry. (What would happen if iCal didn't have the function of alarming when it's not open? Alarming comes from the idea that you can forget everything about the event, the computer does the remembering, I think. Like an alarm clock. You set it, then forget about it.)

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This is an excellent program. I highly recommend it. It's free, simple, easy-to-use, and it can wake your computer from sleep. That is a huge feature as all the programs for the mac (that I know of) that have that feature cost $10+ . The only thing that could be added is "automatic volume control".

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@ spamguy and others There is one, and one only, answer to this. The solution is: iBeeZz http://www.macupdate.com/info.php/id/10589 I bought it some 1 1/2 year ago and it's simply a golden app for the puropose of waking up to iTunes music, and other tasks. The nice thing about it is, that is really wakes your computer up from 'deep sleep', i.e. wakes it up even if you've shut the whole thing down. I don't know how that works, but it wakes it up, right on time (I've never experienced any time errors whatsoever!). It can also gradually fade in your iTunes music, so that you won't wake up to the highest volume right away. It's really worth paying $10 for, trust me!

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It's pretty and has a clean interface, I'll grant you that. (The icon is very nice.) Unfortunately, this lacks what all other alarms out there lack: sleep control. I can't/won't keep my computer on all night so Awaken/et al will know when to activate. The fan is loud, and it's an energy waste. I should be able to put my computer to sleep, go to bed, and have it wake up at an appropriate time combined with iTunes play. This is doable, I know it, I've seen it in non-alarm apps. I'm aware of iTaf's ability to do this. It, well, likes to wake up at odd, unscheduled times. This is already a clean, intuitive app, and I would undoubtedly use it every day if it managed to work the above in.

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