Several readers reported their experiences with the new Vista Service Pack 1 running on Macs with Boot Camp and with Parallels Desktop.

Jeff Julian runs Vista SPI in Boot Camp and is happy with it:

I have been running SP1 for a month now (Microsoft Developer Network subscription) on two different MacBook Pros (17-inch) and have had no issues at all. In fact, I believe it performs better than before, but I have no statistics...

Mike Goodfellow responded to our report of a reader who had hard disk space disappear when partitioning a drive for Boot Camp. Goodfellow sent us a fix:

I have seen this problem and know how to solve it. Startup the Macintosh in question from another volume, such as the Leopard DVD or startup external hard drive. Run Disk Repair. This will fix the problem and give you your missing hard drive space back.

If you've used this tip

Patrick Zirngast was having the problem of kernel panics with Leopard 10.5.2 while using Boot Camp Assistant to partition his drive. He tried two fixes listed on our Boot Camp Tips and Reports page. He no longer has kernel panics, but is still having problems:

I tried to fix the problem via the DVD Disk Utility; this solved the problem with hard disk, though Boot Camp would still not run the partitioning.

So I bought iDefrag and did a 5-hour defragmentation. I was then able to partition the disk; but when I tried to install Win XP SP2 my screen started to flicker on startup and the system stopped... That's the status so far.

As soon as I find some time, I will go back and reinstall everything from scratch.

Eric Benfer sent us an AppleScript to fix the problems with Leopard 10.5.2 and the Cisco VPN client for Mac OS X:

I too have experienced the problem with Cisco VPN and 10.5.2. I am using the using vpnclient-darwin-4.9.01.0100-universal-k9.

I usually get the "Error 51: Unable to communicate with the VPN subsystem" when I switch network connections. Such as changing from wired to wireless. Running the CiscoVPN StartupItem fixes it for me. I wrote an AppleScript to automate the process for my users. Here is the code for the script for anyone who wants to build it themselves...

Derek Collie verified a fix for Windows Vista problems accessing a Mac server:

Mikael Fredriksson's solution of changing the Network Security: LAN Manager Authentication Level via secpol.msc worked for me. Thanks Mikael it was driving me insane! I am running Vista Business on a Sony Vaio TZ31 connecting to a Mac G4 running 10.2.2.

Several readers responded to a report of a Mac usurping network's DHCP server with the same suggestion. Christoph Sahm:

Shon Hall probably has turned on Internet Sharing in the System Preferences. This causes Mac OS X's built-in DHCP Server to start handing out IP addresses...

March 26

CrossOver Games runs PC games on Mac at native speeds, without Windows

Wednesday, March 26, 2008

Yesterday CodeWeavers debuted CrossOver Games (US $40), new software that runs Windows games natively in Mac OS X, but without using Windows. The company said that PC games will run faster in CrossOver Games than in virtual machine products such as Parallels Desktop and VMware Fusion. CodeWeavers also released a version for Linux.

CodeWeavers said that CrossOver Games will run Guild Wars, World of Warcraft, and most Steam-based games, including Team Fortress 2, Portal, Half Life 2, Civilization IV, Peggle...

Vista SP1 ships, but problems with some drivers exist

Reader's Mac usurping network's DHCP server

Leopard Security Update disconnects mounted shares

Verification of Terminal restart command fix for OS X 10.5.2/Cisco VPN problem

Boot Camp partitioning losing hard disk space

Russell Vickery in New Zealand lost some hard disk space when partitioning his drive for Boot Camp:

I've installed Boot Camp on my Mac Book Pro with Windows XP Pro release 2. I partioned the drive using Boot Camp Assistant to have 30 GB for Windows and the Mac OS X to have 50 GB. The installation went smoothly and I thought I was up and running. Then I found that the PC drive has only 5 GB while the Mac Book had the full 50 GB. The Windows partition lost 25 GB.

I then reinstalled Boot Camp, creating a partition of under 30 GB and it appears to be working well, but now I've lost 20 GB from my Mac partition.

If you've seen this problem or have a suggestion

Srinivasan found that the Leopard 10.5.2 kernel panics with Boot Camp partitioning didn’t occur with smaller partition:

I ran into the same issue with kernel panics: I was trying to get a 15 GB FAT32 chunk. I was on the verge of giving up, but since an earlier attempt to partition the my 120 GB MacBook HD running Leopard to get a 12GB partition for Windows was successful, I gave it a shot again, and it worked. Maybe with smaller partition sizes, the kernel doesn't panic. It worked for me.

Erik Akerblom responded to a report last week about the Office 2008 12.0.1 update having problems with Excel:

The Office 12.0.1 update seems to have broken a few random documents, or is correctly identifying some documents as being broken. I have the same error as your reported user "File Error: Data May Have Been Lost" on one particular document, which then opens up fine and appears to have all the data within that is expected. Other documents appear fine. The document in question was not created by me but sent to me from another Mac via email.

I am keeping my install "as is" for now. PowerBook G4, Leopard 10.5.2.

A reader reports that the new Safari 3.1 for Mac has a problem that manifested itself over a virtual private network:

With Mac OS X 10.5.2 MacBook Pro, Cisco VPN client 4.9.01 (0100) was working reliably. Then I updated Safari to 3.1 (5525.13). The client connects, Safari connects to site, but it won't open the application any more. I'm able to open with FireFox 2.0.0.12

This appears NOT to be a VPN issue at all, however. On my system, Safari 3.1 has a broken "open in new window" setting. Any links clicked that are set to open in a new window don't work. No error, no nothing.

If you've seen this problem

FireFox maker slams Apple over Safari for Windows updater

Monday, March 24, 2008

Mozilla CEO John Lilly criticized Apple for using its Software Updater program to install Safari 3.1 on Windows PCs, saying that it “undermines the safety of users on the web.”

“What Apple is doing now with their Apple Software Update on Windows is wrong,” said Lilly. “It undermines the trust relationship great companies have with their customers, and that's bad - not just for Apple, but for the security of the whole Web.”

Mozilla makes the FireFox web browser, which has a 17.3 percent market share on the Windows platform, compared to 5.8 for Safari, according to the Market Share web site. Last week's release of Safari, however, was the first post-beta version for Windows.

The Safari update was made available through the Apple Software Updater program, which is installed with iTunes for Windows as well as with Safari for Windows. Lilly complained that the iTunes users who don't already have Safari installed are given the option to install Safari. Lilly said that because option to download Safari is checked by default, it could “endanger the security of the Web.”

Lilly posted his criticisms of Apple on his blog on Friday.

Apple released Safari 3.1 last week, calling it “the world's fastest web browser,” which some testers said was a valid claim.

March 21

Apple Safari for Windows gets out of Beta, delivers speed, includes HTML 5, but lacks some features

Toast 9 adds HD video burning for Macs and video streaming to iPhone

Reader says video driver crashes under Vista on iMac

VPN Tracker 5.1 simplifies WatchGuard VPN connections

12.0.1 Office Update broke reader's Excel

PDF2Office Personal v4.0 adds Word 2008, improved conversion

Leopard connecting to Windows server and crashing the server

IPv6 didn't solve Leopard writing problem to Windows

Verification of 10.5.2 Cisco VPN connected-but-not-really problem

Reader recommends alternative Win-app servers

Yesterday Microsoft posted updates for its current and previous versions of Office: Office 2008 for Mac 12.0.1 Update and Office 2004 for Mac 11.4.1 Update. Both address security issues and stability, but the Office 2008 update is the more substantial, with two dozen bug fixes, including some that affect cross-platform abilities. The Office 2008 12.0.1 update also includes performance improvements and includes bug fixes for Mac OS X 10.5 Leopard.

Office 2008 for Mac 12.0.1 also fixes several synching problems with Entourage synching calendars and contacts with Exchange Server. These include problems with duplicate and missing calendar events. Microsoft said that the update will provide "more consistency with changes to the calendar on the Exchange server." The update also fixes a problem with syncing contact lists between Entourage 2008 and Exchange.

Office 12.0.1 also fixes two bugs in Word opening documents created in Windows:

• Fixes an issue that prevents Word 2008 from opening documents created by Word 2007 for Windows that contain equations.
• Fixes an issue for PowerPC Macs that causes fonts in documents created by Word 2007 for Windows to display incorrectly when the document in Word 2008.

For the Office 2004 update, Microsoft said that the Office 11.4.0 must be installed before the 11.4.1 update.

If you've seen any of these problems with Entourage 2008 and Word 2008, how well the update worked.

CodeWeavers is working on version of its CrossOver product that will focus on games. CrossOver allows Macs to run Windows application in Mac OS X without the use of Windows or a virtualization environment. The tradeoff is that CrossOver runs a selected number of Windows applications, including several games.

CrossOver Games will focus on supporting and being optimized especially for PC games. A company spokesperson said:

CrossOver Games will allow many leading games, such as World of Warcraft, Guild Wars, Team Fortress 2, Civilization 4, Counterstrike Source, Peggle, EVE online (all running under Steam) and many others, to be played on either Mac or Linux PCs without the need for a Windows OS license.

A private beta has been in testing for several weeks. CodeWeavers is getting ready to start testing Beta 2.

See our CodeWeavers CrossOver Reports page for more on CrossOver.

Luke Patrick confirmed a previous report that going back to Leopard 10.5.1 from 10.5.2 fixed the problem of Boot Camp kernel panics while partitioning. Patrick used a different method of back-grading to 10.5.1 than the previous report:

I also had success with repartitioning when I reverted to 10.5.1. I did this by reinstalling Leopard from the install disk rather than rolling back in Time Machine. The only problem was that after I loaded windows, something was preventing a startup in Mac OS. The Leopard partition was recognized, but wasn't coming up with the option key startup, or when set as the default in the windows bootcamp control panel. What I finally ended up doing was reinstalling Leopard a third time on the new, non-windows partition. My files and settings were saved, and now I can start up in Windows or Leopard as intended.

Will Tisdale has a theory as to where the bug is:

I have 4 drives in a Mac Pro. The disk that I was using for Boot Camp has 200GB remaining free space. However, the disk is in a fairly bad state of fragmentation due to all sorts of junk being put on and off it over the last 6 months or so.

I started the Boot Camp Assistant and within about 20 seconds of it attempting to partition, the machine had a kernel panic. So, I switched it off and booted off the install disk and verified all the hard drives, all came back with no errors. So, I then decided to try first partitioning it in Disk Utility, and then delete the partition, restore the drive to full capacity and THEN run the Boot Camp assistant.

Having set it to give me a partition of a modest 60GB in disk utility, it started, and then 30 seconds later came up with a "Not enough space left on device" error. I thought, odd, as there is 200GB free. So I tried a 10GB partition, and it gives the same error.

The conclusion I drew from this was that although there is space on the drive, there isn't any free space at the end of the drive where you are trying to create the new partition, and iDefrag confirmed that the free space on the drive was all in the middle. It is obviously a bug of some description in diskutil, which prevents the creation of new partitions when there isn't enough contiguous free space at the end of the volume.

Henrik Wiman in Sweden had luck with a previously reported fix for a problem with Windows Vista connecting to Mac OS X Server:

About the tip from Mikael Fredriksson; We run 10.5 server and this tip worked out just fine! Now we join our domain with Vista clients! Thanks!

Yesterday, Apple announced the iPhone 2.0 software platform, its next-generation software for the iPhone and iPod Touch. The software will include built-in direct support of Microsoft Exchange Server for email, contacts, calendaring, and access to global address lists (GAL). Apple is also opening up the iPhone platform...

A reader named Grant sent in a suggestion getting around problems with Windows PCs accessing Leopard shares. The main idea is to create a local user account on the Mac with file sharing already turned on:

For those of us using only domain accounts on our Macs within a Windows Active Directory Domain, we just get used to the idea that we can access the PCs from the Macs but not necessarily so the other way around.

Try this -- it worked for me and now all sharing on all Macs and PCs is working seamlessly:

1. System Preferences > Sharing > Confirm File Sharing is enabled
2. System Preferences > Accounts > Create yourself a local user account on your Mac with admin rights
3. System Preferences > Sharing > File Sharing > Options > Confirm that you are sharing files using SMB
4. Access your shared folders from a PC > Voila

It appears that by creating the local user account with file sharing already turned on you are initializing the Mac to show itself correctly. You can even now safely go ahead and remove the local account that you no longer need.

If you've tried this

Clement Shimizu reports that turning off IPv6 fixes the problem where files copied to a Windows server remain invisible:

I just wanted to let you know that I too had a Mac-to-Windows file copying problem (the Leopard invisible file problem) that got fixed using your suggestion of turning off IPv6.

Although Apple said that the Leopard 10.5.2 update fixes issues with Active Directory, Lisa Madden said she still has problems. She fixed it by editing the hosts file:

I upgraded a cleanly installed 10.5.1 Mac with 10.5.2 and still could not bind to AD. Got stuck on the final step, not able to find the DC. There was no way to specify the domain in Directory Service either.

What finally did fix the problem was adding the IP of the DC and the domain into the /etc/hosts file, rebooting Mac, and trying to bind again. Bind went flawlessly then.

Not sure if this is a problem with how our DCs are configured, or with Leopard, but as long as it's working, that is all I care.

If you've tried this

Botond Orbán sent in the solution for a problem he was having with networking in Ubuntu Linux running in VirtualBox Beta3 in Mac OS X 10.5.x:

I figured out what happened. The DNS was set incorrectly by the Ubuntu guest on Virtual Box. I found this spread across on different Ubuntu and VB forums.

VirtualBox Beta3 is a prerelease version of an open source virtualization environment for running Windows and Linux on Mac OS X.

Readers have contributed two more suggestions for getting around kernel panics in Leopard 10.5.2 when using Boot Camp to partition a hard drive. A previous suggestion, defragmenting the hard drive, has been verified by several readers.

Timo Jääskeläinen suggests booting from the installer DVD to do the portioning:

I have had the same problem with partitioning for boot camp on 10.5.2 as you described on macwindows.com on Feb 18.

I was able to overcome this problem by booting from my Leopard installation DVD (which is 10.5.0), and doing partitioning from there and it went fine without kernel panics. No need to download/pay for additional software.

Shawn Hart suggested using Time Machine to roll back to 10.5.1:

I have experienced the problem with 10.5.2 and boot camp partitioning. I'm running a MacBook pro 15 inch on 2.2 GHz processor. I have not been able to be it to work. But a friend said he used Time Machine to go back to 10.5.1 and it worked.

If you've tried these suggestions

Responding to our article Reader reports success with Apple NVidia driver for Boot Camp, Geoff Armstrong said that issues still remain with his external projector:

These older drivers posted by Apple did partially fix my problem using an external projector. Previously, using the later drivers supplied with Leopard, the highest resolution I could get on the projector was 1024x768.

With the Apple posted drivers I can go right up to 1920x1080 (Full HD) Unfortunately there is nothing in between 1280x1024 and 1920x1080 available for the projector with this driver.

My projector's native resolution is actually 1400x1050. It seems absurd that I can send full HD to the projector or 1280x1024; but the drivers can do nothing in between.

If I use 1920x1080, obviously I get overscan and this is a pain to correct when watching movies.

If you've seen this problem or have a suggestion

Botond Orbán has a problem with the last version of the VirtualBox running Linux. Virtual Box is an open source virtualization environment. Orbán said:

I have tried Virtual Box 1.5.51 on Leopard. I struggled a lot to make the network working on an Ubuntu guest OS without any success.

If you have a suggestion

For more on this topic, see our VirtualBox Beta Tips and Reports page.

Jason Lisi reports that Mail.app on his Leopard MacBook Air doesn't sync with Mac OS X Server's IMAP server. Readers have reported some other Leopard problems with IMAP servers, but these had been with Exchange Server. Lisi also resolved the problem:

I have an IMAP server (XServe running OS X Server Tiger) for my mail, iMac at the office running Leopard, MacBook Air for the road running Leopard.

The iMac, connected at all times to the Internet, syncs with the IMAP server perfectly; changes made on the iMac are reflected on the IMAP server. When the MacBook Air is connected to the Internet, same result.

However, when I am on the road and not connected to the Internet and reading my mail, the changes I make (deleting spam, filing messages in subfolders) do not get synced with the server. When I connect the MacBook Air to the 'net, all the deleted messages repopulate my inbox and the filed messages become un-filed back into the inbox.

When I had used a PowerBook G4 running Tiger, offline changes to Mail would work just like it would if connected.

After a few hours' worth of testing on this issue, I believe it has resolved itself. I decided to download Thunderbird and set it up with the identical settings to Mail.app. After going through the IMAP sync and downloading my gsigs of email messages, I tested Thunderbird, finding it to work properly.

Oddly, then Mail began to behave. I have to assume that using another IMAP client must have affected a cache somewhere, but can't put my finger on the issue.

If you seen this or other issues with Mail.app and IMAP

Several readers responded to Monday's report of two suggestions for dealing with Cisco VPN client problems with Mac OS X 10.5.2, or any OS X update. Most reported success, though one reader did not.

Dan Pearson has used both methods successfully:

The Cisco client is well known to be finicky (for all versions of OS X). I've used both these methods (re-install the client and use the terminal command to restart). In addition, if you get the error 51, you can frequently recover by just restarting the client, without the re-install.

So, while the client is easily tripped up by any change to the OS, it's also easily fixed.

Michael Wilmar had success with the terminal command:

David Graham's suggestion for the Cisco VPN Client Worked for me. The Graham suggestion I used was the Terminal command to restart the VPN Client. Using VPN Client 4.9.01 (0030)

Mark Polzin used the reinstall:

I was able to get the latest Cisco VPN client build working again by reinstalling the application after my upgrade to 10.5.2.

Vincent Philion still has the problem after reinstalling the Cisco client:

I completely removed the VPN client using the Cisco script (sudo / usr/local/bin/vpn_uninstall) and then reinstalled everything.

The problem remains the same. The VPN "link" is established, but I can't connect to Window shares or to VNC servers. From the VPN statistics, I can see that data is sent from my computer, but nothing is received from the VPN server.

Kevin Ledgister has a different experience:

In Leopard, the Cisco VPN works fine for me until I reboot, and then have to use the "sudo" command to restart it. I'm running the latest version of the VPN software. Cisco had this problem before with an earlier Mac OS X release (I don't remember) but later fixed it, only to be broken again after Leopard.

It may be because I upgraded to Leopard over an existing Tiger installation and had to reinstall the VPN client after the install. Those who are having no problems with it might want to clarify if your Leopard OS is an OEM install, clean install, or upgrade.

A number of readers responded to last week's report about the Leopard 10.5.2 update breaking the Cisco VPN client. Some report seeing the problem, while other say 10.5.2 didn't cause a problem. David Graham believes that the Cisco VPN client tends to break with most OS X updates. (A belief that has some data to support it as documented on our archive of Cisco VPN client reports.) Graham also sent a couple of suggestions...

A pair of readers commented on our reports of slow Active Directory logon with Leopard 10.5.2. Jeff Geerling, who has previously reported that turning of Bonjour fixed the problem, also notes the same potential cause in the .local suffix:

It's my hope that someone figures out a solution for everyone. I don't know if this has anything to do with the problem, but our AD server ends in ".local," which is the suffix that is also used by Bonjour.

Daniel Costello also confirmed the workaround:

I can also verify that turning off Bonjour solved the slow login problem. We are faced with figuring this out since some laptops being shipped today are quirky when Tiger is installed (they ship with Leopard). After disabling Bonjour, the 3-minute log ins went to 5 seconds. Also, the 5-minute binding duration dropped to less than 10 seconds.

James Minerve in London has an Active Directory problem on all of his Macs running Tiger, but does not see it with Leopard:

We have Tiger running on Mac G5's and a few Macs Minis and whilst we can bind them all successfully onto our Windows Domain, there seems to be a consistent problem with every single one of the Macs. We have specified for Domain Users to have local admin rights when going through the binding process; this seems to be ignored and all domain users still do not have local admin rights. (Our users are web designers and need admin rights!) When we go into System Preferences/Users, the domain user does not have a tick to enable admin access; however we can change this manually. Having said this, we installed Leopard and binding along with domain users admin access worked perfectly.

If you've seen this problem

Anthony Fappiano is seeing a previously reported problem with Tiger Mac binding to Active Directory through a firewall. However, the suggested fix isn't working:

The fix regarding UDP 464 doesn't work for me. I still get an unknown error issue after step 5 on the bind. This is with Tiger. It should be noted also that this works fine as soon as I take the firewall out of the equation. The issue seems to be that Tiger cannot set the computer account's password in AD through the firewall. It has no problem setting the password when there is no firewall in place. I've even taken it as far as opening ALL ports and it still fails through the firewall.

We've previously reported a fix for failures at Step 5 in general.

If you have a suggstion

Yaron Elad is seeing the problems with Entourage 2008 calendar events and the "Casablanca" time zone problem:

Me too! I thought I was going crazy. I have an iMac running Leopard 10.5.2 with iCal synced to Entourage 2008 which is connect to my Exchange Server at work. I am seeing the same behavior described by others. Any all-day events created in iCal wind up shifting to 24 hour long events spanning 5 PM to 5 PM from the day before to the day of the actual events. The time zone on Entourage says Casablanca, Monrovia. I have the time zones in iCal and Entourage set to Pacific Time where I am. The event looks OK on iCal.

The problem started with Entourage 11.2.3 about two years ago, and is now being reported in Entourage 2008.

If you have a suggstion

Dr. Duncan Lamont of Scotland says that the Leopard problem of Safari crashing with ISA Proxy continues in Mac OS X 10.5.2. One reader previously reported that the 10.5.2 update fixed the problem. Lamont reports otherwise:

Simply adding my support to the Safari crash problem. I have never been able to persuade Safari to run without crashing on our NHS intranet connection. A MS ISA proxy is used and I've tried numerous work-arounds including applications that set the mac as a proxy itself then connect using their own protocols to the ISA proxy. None have worked under any flavour of OS X at least for the last 3 years. I am using 10.5.2 currently, which was a clean erase and install version so I can't blame it on any inherited settings from Tiger. Firefox however is reliable and connects without issue when separately configuring its proxy.

The most annoying thing about this is it prevents me using the Citrix web client on my Mac since this uses Apples own proxy settings to connect through the ISA proxy. As such, it doesn't work either. When I need to use the Citrix client, I end up using a vodafone datacard to establish a separate connection. I am very surprised that such a long running problem that is so easily replicated could be left unfixed for so long.

Gary Bartos has success with last week's suggestion to fix Leopard 10.5.2 Boot Camp kernel panics when attempting to create a partition. Bartos added some detail to last week's report:

After encountering the Boot Camp Assistant kernel panic problem described on your page Boot Camp in Leopard Tips and Reports, I followed the method described by Bob Estes:

1. Download and pay for the full version of iDefrag from Coriolis ($35 and worth it).
2. Create a bootable CD using Coriolis CDMaker.
3. Reboot from CD, then click "Go" in iDefrag using default settings.
4. Reboot from hard disk.
5. Run Boot Camp Assistant again, this time successfully. Win XP also installed successfully for me.

Many, MANY thanks both to Bob Estes and to your site for posting his comments.

Gary Moran described the problem:

I had the same problem yesterday. I attempted to use Boot Camp to partition my hard drive, to create a 5 GB partition for Ubuntu Linux. When I re-started it, I had 5 GB less space but no second volume.

Larry Wheeler responded to our report about Apple's iTunes 7 in Windows Vista can disabling the optical drive. An Apple Tech article provided a Registry edit that returns functionality to most Windows applications, but iTunes will be unable to burn CDs. Wheeler reported additional problems:

I'm having the identical problem described. I've done the registry edit and got my DVD-ROM drive back, but iTunes gives me an error message every time it starts.

I don't really care about burning CDs with iTunes, but the error message is REALLY annoying.

I allowed iTunes to update itself to the latest version and guess what? My DVD drive is gone again (it's back thanks to the registry edit)! I hope Apple comes up with a fix for this soon.

If you've seen this

Kurt Waltenbaugh responded to last week's report of readers unhappy with Entourage 2008's abilities to sync with handheld devices. He is also seeing the Casablanca time zone problem reported with Entourage 2004:

Yes, I just moved to Leopard and Entourage 2008. I had been syncing to a Treo 650 with Missing Sync for about 18 months successfully. With the upgrade, everything has gone to hell: duplicate events all over the place, events set to "Casablanca, Monrovia" time zone.

A smaller version of this happened when I started with Mac/Missing Sync last year, but was resolved relatively quickly. Now, no one seems to know how to resolve the issue.

Note : my colleagues with iPhones have none of these problems. Time to switch?

We've received more mixed reports about turning off Bonjour as workaround to slow Active Directory login in Leopard.

It worked for H. Barnes, who sent us a suggestion and a theory:

I tried disabling bonjour and it works like a charm. There is a small app called iServeBox (v1.04) for the terminal faint of heart that allows disabling Leopard services.

I did some more research on this and it appears it is actually an issue with OS X use of .local and Bonjour. This conflict only appears in domains that do internal authentication ending in .local (for example, example.domain.local). This has been standard move for many single-site businesses since server 2003 and it seems ridiculous that Apple got blind-sighted by this.

Colin Leyden in the United Kingdom confirmed the workaround:

I can confirm that disabling Bonjour does indeed fix the slow Active Directory login problem. As noted by others, login previously took 2 minutes. This was cut to 5-10 seconds after disabling Bonjour. (Windows Sever 2003, Mac OS X 10.5.2 client)

Turning off Bonjour did not help Jeff Geerling:

When I disabled Bonjour using the instructions linked to in your February 25 posting, I could no longer login using any AD names at all; it would give me the 'no' shake, and I can now only login with the local administrator password. I'll have to re-enable Bonjour and suffer through the long login time.

A reader named Nik describes how he enabled Active Directory binding in Leopard 10.5.2:

After a clean install of 10.5 I upgraded to 10.5.2. I then got the error message "The computer is unable to access the domain controller for unknown reason." I found out that domain must resolve to IP, as described in this blog I found. After applying the suggestion, I was able to bind to Active Directory.

The blog starts like this:

Your domain must resolve to the IP address of a domain controller. This was not a requirement in previous versions, but Apple is apparently making it a requirement.

Matt Short reports that turning off IPv6, which has been reported to help with a number of Leopard problems, also helped him with another Active Directory problem:

Have you had any responses of folks being able to bind to the Active Directory network, mounting a volume, but then losing all privileges as soon as a file is being opened? Let me explain:

• Brand new MacBook Pro, fresh out of the box
• Using Directory Utility I can bind to Windows domain terminal can read computer profile in AD
• Server 2003 can "see" computer in AD users & computers
• Connect to a server (listed under "shared" in the panel to the left of a Finder window) with windows network admin privileges
• View a file server, open and mount a shared folder (mounts as a volume on the mac)
• Open a file (so far any Excel spreadsheet)
• Get an error: 'file_name.xls' cannot be accessed....
• Mounted volume disappears
• Windows 2003 server no longer has computer "macbook" listed in AD "computers"

I'm running 10.5.2. I was on the phone with Apple Tech Support for about an hour and half Thursday night. They sent the problem to the Apple Engineers. What seemed to help some is turing off IPv6. At least then, I could open some files, although not all. The biggest problem was Excel documents in Excel 2004 11.3.7. Interestingly enough, some of the smaller spreadsheets would open fine in Numbers '08, but have permission problems in Excel. Word documents, text files, etc were all okay after IPv6 was turned off.

If you've seen this problem

Mark Walsh verified that disabling Bonjour fixes the slow Active Directory login problems with Leopard.

I had a similar problem, was taking about 2mins to authenticate. Disabling bonjour fixed the problem straight away. Check out this link.

If you've tried this

H. Barnes describes having the problem with the 10.5.2 update:

AD integration seems to work very well, except that authentication has like a 1-2 minute delay still (was more like 3-5min before). Tiger is instantaneous, seems silly that Leopard is still having this awful delay after AD supposedly being "fixed."

Jeff Geerling:

I have had this problem as well; all the Macs I've been able to bind to the directory (a few of them with fresh installs of Leopard, and a couple with upgrades from Tiger) take at least two minutes to authenticate a user. This is completely impractical for our situation (a school setting), where students often come to the computer lab to just check their email or print a document.

The PCs in the lab have always logged in in less than 10 seconds, while the Macs always used to take about 20. Now, the Macs take so long that students give up on them and go over to a PC. We'll probably end up reinstalling Tiger on them unless we can find a fix soon.

Andrew Plant sent an update to his report last week, offering a workaround:

For kicks, I tried using my last name, first name as the username when logging in and wouldn't you know it, it worked consistently! Also, in our AD accounts, we have drives that are automatically set to mount and they do. However, I still have to enter credentials when mounting other network drives. The other issues I mentioned before are still present though. I guess Apple still has some work to do.

If you’ve tried this suggestion

We've had two more reports of Leopard users who can log onto Windows servers but can't copy files. Alain De Genst has a workaround that works for Office files, but not others:

I have the same problem as Duncan Maclay, with Leopard 10.5.2. Drag & drop to copy a file to Win 2003 server doesn't work. Result: File with 0 kb. When I open, lets say a Word document, and save it from within the application to the Win 2003 server, it does work! Investigating this further, I learned that Word, Excel, text and PDF files could get saved this way. Photoshop, Indesign, Illustrator and SketchUp files cannot be copied in this way...

Mitchell Fulkerson was doing okay with Leopard until he installed the 10.5.2 update. Now he can't connect to his network attached storage device:

Leopard was working fine on my network, connecting to Windows machines, but my Maxtor NAS device, but as soon as I applied the Leopard 10.5.2 patch, I can't connect (or even see) my NAS device or windows machines.

I know everything is still up and running because my windows machines can see and access it.

The update was supposed to fix a lot of things, like the transparent menu bar, etc. Just now I can't see my local windows network or NAS device.

Earlier this month, another reader reported that an update from Iomega fixed a similar problem with an Iomega NAS device.

If you’ve seen this issue with Mac OS X 10.5.2

Mark Polzin reports:

Updating to 10.5.2 has broken my Cisco VPN client software version 4.9.01 (0100)

Some readers reported Cisco VPN client problems with the first Leopard release, and we had a report that the 10.5.1 updated fixed the problem.

Also, a reader previously suggested reinstalling the Cisco VPN client after updating Leopard.

If you've seen this problem with 10.5.2

Two more readers report on the Boot Camp problem that started with the Leopard 10.5.2 update, where the Mac crashes with a kernel panic while partitioning the hard drive with Boot Camp Assistant.

Stefano Ponti had the problem while trying to remove the partition:

With Leopard 10.5.2, I've encounter a problem when I try to uninstall Windows, using Boot Camp to remove the Windows partition. Boot Camp had a crash, and I needed to force exit from it. After I looked at the info of my Mac hard drive (because the Win HD icon had disappeared) the Windows space was not recovered. The only thing I could do was initialize the hard drive and completely reinstall Leopard.

Johnathon Smith also ran into the problem while removing the partition:

While trying to reinstall Boot Camp after I purposefully removed the partition, I would often get kernel panics. This left my disk damaged because the space was lost. I had to run disk repair from a separate partition on an external drive. Eventually I just wiped the drive and under fresh conditions there weren't any problems. This happened almost immediately after the 10.5.2 update.

If you've seen this problem

Mark Greenberg is having the Entourage problem where all day events change from EST to Casablanca time zone. We've had many reports of this before, but his is the first we had with Entourage 2008:

I'm having the problem in spades! I upgraded to MS Office for Mac 2008 and have an Exchange server at work. Entourage and iCal run on multiple computers, though only my work computer is set to sync between Entourage and iCal. I have corrected my all-day events back to EST and see that they are switched to Casablanca just about every time I launch Entourage.

It appears much worse with Entourage 2008. All my computers are now running it.

Also, a new problem has occurred since I loaded Office 2008. My calendar items in Entourage disappear and reload nearly every time I launch Entourage. There is no loss of data, but it slows things down considerably.

If you seen these issues with Entourage 2008

Oliver Block responded to Monday's report of Leopard files copied to SMB servers becoming invisible. Block has seen the problem and offers a workaround:

Regarding the post below, one of my colleagues fixed this problem for a customer by disabling IPv6 on the Leopard machine that is acting as an SMB client.

Turning of IPv6 has also been offered as a workaround to another Leopard bug, problems with seeing Windows shares on the network.

If tried turning off IPv6 for the invisible file problem

Andrzej Pawelczyk in the UK says that 10.5.2 fixed Leopard's problem with ISA Proxies. He also verified another report that it was a Leopard security update that caused the problem. Pawelczyk said:

In our network we are using ISA 2006 as a proxy server. I have noticed that Safari (using proxy) was working fine with Leopard 10.5 and 10.5.1. After I have installed Security Update 2007-009 v. 1.1 Safari and Software Update start crashing with proxy settings. The good news is that after installation of 10.5.2 update problem with proxy not existing any more. So looks like they fix it and it work for me.

If you can comment on the 10.5.2 update's effect on ISA Proxy issue

Innotek has released VirtualBox Mac Beta 3 (also called version 1.5.51), a new prerelease version of the virtualization software for running Windows and Linux on Intel-based Macs. The main new feature is that VirtualBox now runs in Mac OS X 10.5 Leopard. The previous betas were incompatible in Leopard and would crash. Also new is the addition of SoundBlaster 16 emulation. Previous betas did not have audio. The new beta also includes several dozen bug fixes.

For previous reports, see our VirtualBox Beta Tips and Reports page.

If you've tried VirtualBox Beta 3

Yesterday Group Logic released MassTransit 5.1.1, an upgrade to its cross-platform enterprise file transfer and remote workflow software. The new version adds almost two dozen new features and improvements and includes nearly 30 bug fixes, according to Group Logic.

Among the new features:

• The Web Client is now certified for Mac OS X 10.5 Leopard
• Increased Performance under heavy loads (terabytes per month). Underlying database operations have been improved, which also speeds administration and user searches of logs.
• Increased Security. The latest Open SSL release, v0.9.8, is now used.
• Enhanced Workflow Automation and Integration Capabilities: Version 5.1.1 extends support for automatically triggering Shell Scripts and a wide range of external programs and scripts to Windows. There are also new options for ordering the delivery of files for optimized workflows.
• Enhanced System Administration Tools: Version 5.1.1 adds new error reporting and debugging features that make it easier to troubleshoot and resolve issues, according to Group Logic.

MassTransit 5.1.1 is a free update for MassTransit 5.x owners who have an active support contract.

Yesterday, Kerio Technologies released Kerio MailServer 6.5, a new version of its messaging and calendaring server. The new version adds a rewritten Kerio Outlook Connector module for better support of Outlook and Entourage clients, and support for CalDAV for better linking of Windows and Mac calendars and syncing with handheld devices. Kerio MailServer 6.5 is also now certified to run on Windows Vista, but it also runs on Mac OS X, Linux, and Windows 2000/2003/XP.

"We're seen a growing adoption of Mac OS as a server operating system for small business," said a company spokesperson.

"60 percent of our server business is on Windows, but second most popular OS for server is Mac OS, about 26 percent. Linux is the third most popular server operating system."

The Kerio Outlook Connector is and extension to Outlook and used when using Kerio MailServer in Exchange mode for access to email and PIM data. The new Outlook Connector supports two new Entourage 2008 features: message flag synchronization and out-of-office message dialog synchronization. It also adds an offline data storage mode, includes a new database engine, and has improvements for full-text searches from Outlook and Google Desktop.

The addition CalDAV to the server enables Mac and Windows users to subscribe to each other's calendars using Microsoft Outlook and Entourage, Apple iCal, and Windows Mobile and Palm Treo smartphones. CalDAV in KerioMailServer also enables users to delegate calendars, according to the company. Apple supports CalDAV as a standard, and Leopard is the first Mac OS X to include CalDAV in iCal.

Kerio MailServer also provides connectivity with Microsoft ActiveSync enabled mobile devices such as Windows Mobile, Palm Treo, and Symbian and allows user management through Active Directory or Open Directory.

Several readers responded to Monday's report about slow logons to Active Directory in the Leopard 10.5.2 update. John Malpas in the United Kingdom said:

We are rebuilding (erasing the drives before installing the OS) all the Macs in the business to 10.5.2 using AD (mobile accounts) where the home directories are on an XServe (running 10.4.11). We are seeing the same as most people - it takes ages to log on, if at all. Sometimes you can log in sometimes can't. We're finding it all very frustrating.

Reader named Aj also complained about performance:

I have seen this issue after getting some new iMacs with Leopard 10.5.1 and finding an article about binding them to Active Directory. I followed the article, and it worked, but it was just way too sluggish…

I finally abandoned the idea because it just did not seem worth the benefit. While AD integration might be convenient, I thankfully am not in a situation where it is required.

Apple has listed Active Directory binding problems as a problem that the Leopard 10.5.2 update fixed. Leopard has had AD binding issues since 10.5.0.

Dave Macrae found a new Active Directory problem after upgrading Mac OS X Leopard to 10.5.2:

I applied 10.5.2 the other night and am able to bind to my Windows 2003 server domain. I cannot login however with an administrator account. The screen just shakes when I try to log in. I've reset the password on the domain. It's the most frustrating thing. I'm at a loss as what to do now except restage my Mac Book Pro and hope for the best.

If you've seen this or have a suggestion

Tim Adams says that Active Directory binding works in Leopard 10.5.2 works, but Tiger was better:

Binding to AD seems to work fine now on 10.5.2 however I still have about a 60 second delay at the login and unlock screens when using an AD account. I have followed others' advice and use the FQDN (username@my.domain) for my username and that seems to make things snappier. So far Leopard is no Tiger in the AD integration space.

If you've seen this issue

Although Apple says the Leopard 10.5.2 update is supposed to fix Active Directory binding issues, readers are still reporting problems. A couple of readers found fixes in DNS. Steven Bandyk offerred this suggestion...

Katie Berryhill verified the Terminal DNS-configuration command fix for Leopard file sharing, though under some interesting circumstances:

The terminal fix for Windows sharing under Leopard worked great. Interestingly, though, I didn't have to finish it. I entered the command in Terminal, moved the cursor to the "global" section, and started typing (and, in fact, had mistyped it so far) and my Windows shares popped into view. I corrected the misspelling, finished typing the command, saved it, and they were still there. When I re-enabled file sharing, the Mac was visible to the PCs (when it hadn't been before).

Joseph Swenson reports that Apple added partial support of Microsoft's Distributed File System (DFS) to the Leopard 10.5.2 update:

By pure random chance I have discovered that Apple, clever monkeys that they are, have snuck MS DFS support into 10.5.2. It appears to be limited at the moment, as Access-based Enumeration isn't working, and neither are permissions (I don't have access to diddly squat, even though I should), but it's a start.

Josh Wisenbaker disagrees:

There is no DFS support in 10.5.2. Access-Based enumeration is also a totally server side process. The server decides what to present based on the ACLs and the identity of the user logging in. It has nothing to do with the client at all.

Microsoft describes Access-based Enumeration like this: When Access-based Enumeration is enabled, Windows does not display files or folders that a user does not have the rights to access.

If you can confirm Swenson's report

Minqiang Wu reports a problem when he copies a file from Leopard to an SMB (Samba) server:

When I copy a file to an empty folder of a Samba share on Leopard, the file is not visible. Copy a file into this empty folder, it will not show the copied file in the folder. The file is really copied, and it will show up until you 'eject' it and reconnect it.

If you’ve seen this problem

Bob Estes reports that he and others are experience kernel panics with the Leopard 10.5.2 Boot Camp during partitioning:

I encountered a major problem when attempting to create a Windows partition with Boot Camp Assistant on my MacBook Pro 15" 2 GHz. I have since discovered that others have reported the same or similar problems in the Apple discussion forum on Boot Camp Installation. So far no solution has been posted...

Zach Phillips confirmed the fix using the rERIT utility for the problem of the Mac OS X clock being reset after booting into Leopard from Boot Camp:

I work at ITS at Western Carolina University. We wanted to address the problem of the Boot Camp clock problem in our labs where the Mac OS X is showing the wrong time after reboot. With using the rEFIt bootcd we were able to go into the shell and manually change the efi time zone, which seems to work perfectly! The best part is that it can be accomplished via the boot CD, then taken out and never messed with again.

An Apple tech article warns that installing iTunes 7 in Windows Vista can disable the optical drive. The article provides a Registry edit that returns functionality to most Windows applications, but iTunes will be unable to burn CDs. The article doesn’t mention if the problem occurs with Vista running on Boot Camp on a Mac.

If you've seen this problem

While some readers are reporting that the Mac OS X 10.5.2 update helps Leopard's problems binding to Active Directory, other readers are still having problems.

For Brian Jackson, the update did the trick:

Just wanted to let you know that the 10.5.2 update did indeed fix the AD binding problems introduced in Leopard. We were never able to successfully bind to AD on our large network (although I never had any problems binding on smaller networks) so we are finally good to go with Leopard.

Jem Dowse still can't bind:

I was anticipating 10.5.2. as the fix that would take me back to the simple Tiger days of binding to Active Directory. Unfortunately the only thing that has changed is the message that's displayed when I try and bind - it freezes at step 4 for "an unknown reason." Investigation reveals that it's still error -14006 that's tripping it up (this used to be displayed in the error message; now I have to dig in the logs for this information!)

So 10.5.2 fixes nothing as far as my Active Directory binding problems are concerned.

The 10.5.2 update fixed Andrew Plant's binding problem, but he still has other issues, including joining a wireless network:

I updated my AL PowerBook G4 to 10.5.2 and was able to finally bind to my company's AD. I also was able to actually login with my user account and create a mobile account.

I tried accessing a network drive as well. It mounted; however, it prompted for credentials which points to a problem with single sign on authentication.

There is another issue when trying to access the Login Items for the user under Accounts in System Preferences. When you click on that tab, it hangs for a while and finally a blank screen comes up. Finally, the biggest problem, after you log out, you can't log back in. It seems to try for a while but then it shakes no. I tried changing things in Directory Access with no resolve.

I also still can't get connected to our WPA2 Enterprise wireless network. It tries to authenticate but just assigns itself it's own IP. I'm willing to bet that there is a serious issue with the OS recognizing the user and their permissions because our wireless LAN uses AD authentication. This would explain why I'm seeing issues logging into a network server as well.

whether Leopard 10.5.2 fixed any of these issues for you.

We've previously reported several suggestions for overcoming Leopard problems binding to Active Directory, including deleting the original AD Directory Services entry, turning off Bonjour, and editing LDAP and kerberos settings in the hosts file.

Rob Fawcett offers another suggestion that is similar to another previously reported suggestion:

We resolved our binding issues. Try the following:

Ensure DNS is setup correctly, Date and Time is configured to get time from internal AD server. (Change Kerberos Time Sync in Default Group Policy to 180Min)

if this works for you.

Enrico Luca is still having problems with accessing hidden shares:

I downloaded the update last night and tried accessing our hidden shares on the Windows 2003 servers at work. (These shares have $ signs in their passwords/addresses). Still no luck. The non-hidden shares appear automatically in the Finder. No problems there.

David Searles found that the update fixed file browsing only temporarily:

When I first installed the Leopard 10.5.2 update, I saw every one of my Windows PCs and was able to access shares and was a very happy camper. I said to myself, FINALLY Apple has fixed this mess.

Well, all it took was for me to boot my iMac the following day and voila, the entire Windows network is gone AGAIN! One would think it shouldn't be too difficult to see what they changed between Tiger, which worked, and this Leopard mess.

Adam Radestock says that the 10.5.2 update did not fix Leopard's problem of not being accessible to Windows PCs:

I have been experiencing the same problem as Jochen Bedersdorfer, in that any Windows PCs cannot access my Mac's shared folders and report an error: "The specified network name is no longer available."

This is particularly annoying for me, as I'm the only Mac user in a company full of Mac haters.

I have tried everything under the sun to try and fix this, but to no avail.

I updated to 10.5.2, and cleared out all my shared folders, and started again, but still no luck. I am on an Active Directory Domain, which has worked fine. I think the stumbling block may be that Apple have set Samba up to only authenticate against it's Users list, so when a member on Active Directory tries to log in, it fails.

if how 10.5.2 affects this issue for you.

HyperOffice, Inc., has released a public beta of web-based collaboration service that connects the Apple iPhone to corporate email, contacts, calendars, tasks and notes. Using HyperShare, a gateway tool built into HyperOffice, iPhone users can use Outlook and share calendars, contacts, documents and tasks -- both with and without Microsoft Exchange.

The company said that HyperOffice operates as an alternative to Microsoft Exchange, syncing the iPhone email client with Microsoft Outlook.

HyperShare is a one-time download to the desktop. It automatically migrates Outlook contacts, calendars and delivers email to the email application built into the iPhone. The built-in email client of the iPhone doesn't support Exchange, but only supports IMAP, SMTP, and POP3 email protocols.

The public beta also includes a 30-day free trial of HyperOffice.

On Monday, Apple released the Mac OS X 10.5.2 update and the Mac OS X Server 10.5.2 update. Among Apple's list of bug fixes are two cross-platform networking issues, involving Active Directory binding and accessing AFP network volumes. However, many of the widely reported Leopard cross-platform bugs, including problems with browsing and logging onto Windows servers, are not mentioned in Apple's list of fixes.

Apple said that the update fixes problems with binding to Active Domains, which was widely reported with 10.5.0 and 10.5.1. Apple also said that the 10.5.2 update fixes "a hanging issue that may occur when connecting to an AFP network volume." Third-party developer Group Logic has previoulsy reported that Leopard contained bugs in the AFP protocol.

There was one other cross-platform bug fix regarding accessing printers shared with Windows:

Resolves an issue with some printing options, such as landscape orientation, number of copies, two-sided printing, and so forth that may not have functioned with some printers shared by Microsoft Windows.

Missing from Apple's list of 10.5.2 update fixes are the problems related to browsing and/or logging on to Windows network shares, the most widely reported problems by MacWindows readers.

Apple also doesn't mention if the update fixes problems with virtual private networks and the issue of Safari crashing when accessing a Microsoft ISA proxy. Leopard Boot Camp problems are also not mentioned in the bug fix list.

Our first reader reports about 10.5.2 are mixed. whether Leopard 10.5.2 fixed any of these issues for you.

Our first reports from readers about the Leopard 10.5.2 update describe problems that are fixed and those that aren't. Two readers report that browsing for Windows shares now works, but one reports that logging on to the share is still a problem. Another reader reported that he still can't create mobile directories in Active Directory:

Noah Aboussafy said that share browsing works in 10.5.2, but the file sharing problems is not fixed. He tried most of the suggestions described on our Leopard Tips and Reports page:

Leopard 10.5.2 does not fix the file sharing problem with Windows. I've tried many of the suggestions described at MacWindows, including:

• Turnning IPv6 off
• Turnning off, and on and off SMB sharing
• Editing smb.conf
• Adding hosts entries
• Creating a new network location
• Adjusting the subnet mask
• Turning off both systems firewalls

10.5.2 will still not connect to SMB shares on my PC, it DOES show up in the side bar now but it simply won't connect and the "connect as" button does nothing.

Jason Lambert also reported that browsing for Windows shares now works with the 10.5.2 update. It also fixed a permissions problem he was having:

I had two specific issues that have resolved themselves since the 10.5.2 update.

1. All of the computers on my network with shares (2 XP Pro, 1 Vista Ultimate, 1 Mac Mini, 1 MacBook) now show up in the left-hand "SHARED" list of the Finder window consistently. Previously, only my Mac shares would consistently show up, even though I always have a Vista share connected on my desktop (showing up as a shared drive icon). With 10.5 and 10.5.1 I would have to choose "Connect to Server" to see these shares because I usually couldn't browse for them.

2. The big issue for me has to do with credentials. My Vista machine contains a large network share with Music, Pictures, and Videos (the default "My Documents" folders). With 10.5.1, even though I entered my Vista admin credentials while using "Connect To Server," I didn't have full write/change access to the root of these folders (the folders even used to show up with the padlock mini-icon on them). After 10.5.2, it appears the credentials are being passed correctly as I can now create folders and files at the root of these directories (and no more padlock).

It's just brilliant to have no-hassle access to my PC-based network with Leopard now.

Jonathan Pittman still can't create a mobile home directory in an Active Directory environment;

I attempted the suggestion that says to go to the search policy and add the specific domain the computer is in. When I click the "+" button to add, it is empty. I only have "Active Directory/All Domains." I do not have my specific ad domain listed. Furthermore, I cannot find anywhere to enter my domain information manually.

Binding to the domain was never a complete problem for me. It would spin and spin and spin, but would eventually bind. I now have Mac OS X 10.5.2. Again, binding is not an issue, but I cannot create a mobile home directory. I had this issue with 10.5 and 10.5.1. Oddly enough, I have another computer with 10.5 that was able to bind and create a mobile home directory.

whether Leopard 10.5.2 fixed any of these issues for you.

Ken Krull reported that the suggested workaround of using the rEFIt utility does not fix his Boot Camp clock problem on his MacBook Air:

I can confirm that this does not work in all cases. I have a brand new install of OSX and Vista x64 on a MacBook Air and I use rEFIt.

Currently rEFIt is not loading Vista x64 on the MacBook Air so I must use the 'alt-option' non rEFIt loader to get into Windows. When I go back and forth from Vista to OSX the clock has to be manually reset in each every time. It is possible that if I used rEFIt every time to load Vista that would be fixed, but now I cannot check.

The rEFIt patch for the MacBook Air is in beta. It took like six hours for the author to turn it around and it works great. Input Remapper doesn't work on the Macbook Air but to be fair I haven't had time to catch the author.

Yesterday, Mediafour released XPlay 3, a major update to the software that lets you use Mac-formatted (and Windows formatted) iPods in Windows, whether on a PC or a Mac with Boot Camp, Parallels, or VMware. Unlike iTunes, XPlay can send multimedia files from the iPod to the PC.

XPlay 3 adds compatibility with Windows Vista operating system, and support for moving videos and photos, in addition to music and playlists, to and from the iPod and Windows. Version three also adds the ability to use an iPod with Windows Media Player 11 and Vista Media Center. As with previous versions, you can also use XPlay with iTunes, or by itself. XPlay 3 can also recover music and videos that an iPod can no longer find, and can automatically convert unprotected WMA files to MP3.

XPlay 3 works with all iPod models except iPod touch and iPhone.

XPlay three is available for US $30 or US $40 for a two-computer license. Upgrades are US $15.

CommuniGate Systems today announced Pronto 1.5, a new version of the cross-platform communications client based on Adobe Flash. The software delivers, to any flash-compatible browser, email, calendar, contacts, instant messaging, web management, playing music and video, and sharing photos. The same Pronto software runs on Windows, Mac OS X, Linux, and Solaris.

Pronto 1.5 adds the ability to send and receive web-based voice-over-IP (VoIP) calls. The new version also adds a modular widget architecture for custom applications.

Pronto 1.5 is available as a free service at TalktoIP.com, and also works with the company's CommuniGate Pro email/groupware server. The server is available free for five clients or less, or US$899 for 25 clients.

CommuniGate Systems recently updated the server to CommuniGate Pro 5.2, which added CalDAV support. This enables users with Leopard's iCal 3 to participate in sharing and scheduling calendars and delegations with multiple views, along with Windows and Linux users. Mac users can also use the Mozilla Thunderbird client with the Sunbird extension for CalDAV support.

With the CommuniGate Pro 5.2 server, Mac users can also share calendars with users of Outlook and Pronto.

In addition to the CalDAV calendar standard, CommuniGate Pro server platform continues to support MAPI, iCalendar, and WebCal.

Since it supports MAPI, CommuniGate Pro can be used as an alternative to Micrsoft Exchange Server. It also supports voice, video, e-mail, chat, and other groupware applications. Users have a single identity and secure login for all communication methods. The server is available for Mac OS X, Windows, Linux, and Sun Solaris.

An anonymous reader reports a workaround to the Entourage invalid password problem. He use Outlook running in Parallels Desktop:

This might defeat the whole point of running Entourage, but I have found that the authentication issues can be solved by emptying trash from an Outlook client.

I generally get the Invalid Password error when I have deleted too much trash. Too much being more then Entourage appears to be able to handle, but not a number of messages or amount of data I can quantify.

When I get the error I can either clean out everything in the Entourage and MS Office cache and start from scratch, or I can log into Outlook for Exchange in Parallels and empty trash, resolving the issue.

If you've tried this if it worked for you.

Richard Kingsley reports that a known bug in Entourage 2004 is still present in Entourage 2008:

Just thought I would let people know that a known bug in Entourage 2004 is still present on Entourage 2008 where the Header for items sent by a Windows Mobile device (or indeed any Exchange activesync device) are not shown in the SENT folder in Entourage.

See Microsoft Knowledge base article 926521.

Pretty annoying bug and pretty poor it was not fixed. (Only cost me £300 to find that out!)

A reader called Marbil has a suggestion for using Mac OS X Leopard in Active Directory networks:

I am able to bind and login consistently now on 10.5.1. Binding doesn't seem to be the major issue, but logging into the network accounts seems to be the principal issue. Here is my solution:

Before you begin select "Show advanced settings" in the Directory utility. In the Directory utility under Search Policy I clicked the plus sign and added the specific domain I am currently in. By default, the search path is set to All Domains. Selecting the domain I am in resolved the issue for me. After multiple reboots and different test accounts logging in was still possible.

As a test I also unchecked "prefer this domain server" located in the Services tab > Show advanced options > then select the Administrative tab. After a reboot the settings from the search policy tab still held up.

If you’ve tried this suggestion

Frank Ong tried a clean install of Leopard. He didn't have the Active Directory binding problems that a lot of reades have reported but did see another problem:

Just thought I'd let you know that a clean install of Leopard up to 10.5.1 before doing any binding did allow me to bind to my Active Directory and get my logon account to work (my user home directory even showed up). But any process accessing my directory (from using file shares to routing a print job to logging on itself) was sooooooo ssslllooowww that I just gave up and took my Mac off of AD.

If you've seen this

Daniel Quarte reports that a simple update fixed his Leopard problem with an Iomega network attached storage (NAS) device:

I'd like to contribute to the Mac OS X 10.5 Leopard Cross-platform Issues page. I bought a MacBook yesterday and encounter the same issues as everyone else trying to connect it to my Iomega NAS. After trying most of the techniques offered in your article with no success, I decided to check on the Iomega website and fortunately I found a simple solution: firmware upgrade. This solution will, obviously, not work for everyone, but might save time for those who have the same NAS. This is a link to the Iomega website about the Leopard problem.

VMware has released VMware Fusion 1.1.1, a maintenance update for the virtualization software for Mac OS X. The update fixes 15 issues reported by customers, including several problems with Leopard reported on our VMware Fusion Tips ands Reports page. It also builds in a workaround for a bug in Leopard itself.

Fusion 1.1.1 fixes the problem in Leopard where VMware Fusion crashing when it is launched. (The workaround had been to delete the plist.) The update also fixes a problem with FileVault in which the system could become unresponsive when suspending a virtual machine.

VMware Fusion 1.1.1 also includes a built-in workaround to a bug in Leopard that can cause Mac OS X to freeze. VMware describes it:

As a workaround for Apple bug 5679432 (Mac OS X hang under heavy disk load when unbuffered I/O is in use), VMware Fusion 1.1.1 disables unbuffered disk I/O on Mac OS X 10.5 hosts, even when the user selects Optimize for Mac OS application performance in VMware Fusion preferences.

VMware also identified another Leopard bug, for which there is no workaround:

A bug in the operating system would, in some cases, result in all applications running with root privileges following a upgrade to Mac OS X 10.5.1, instead of how the user originally set them. This would prevent VMware Fusion from reading its own files. This has been reported to Apple to be addressed in a future release.

VMware Fusion 1.1.1 also adds a new feature to automatically remap keyboard command when switching between Mac OS X and Windows. VMware describes it:

For example, VMware Fusion remaps Command -X to Ctrl-X in the virtual machine whether in full screen, single window or Unity. The same remapping happens for Command-Z/-C/-V/-P/-A/-F. Previously, VMware Fusion only did this remapping in Unity mode.

If you've tried VMware Fusion 1.1.1 if it fixed (or caused) any problems.

Parallels has released Parallels Desktop Build 5584, a minor update to Version 3.0 that fixes a problem with Apple's Security Update 2007-009 for Mac OS X 10.4.11 Tiger. The Security Update prevented drag-and-drop and copy-and-paste between Windows and Mac OS X.

Build 5584 also fixes a problem with Linux where it could not initialize 1600x1200x24 default resolution. This occurred with Xorg 1.3.0 in newest Linux distributions such as Ubuntu 7.10, Fedora Core 7, Red Hat Enterprise Linux 5 and others.

For more info on Parallels Desktop, see our Parallels Desktop Tips and Reports page.

If you've tried Build 5584

Andrew Abyzov found a way to use an open source utility to work around the Boot Camp problem the causes the Mac clock to reset when rebooting into Mac OS X Leopard. He uses an open source utility called rEFIt, which makes it easier to boot between Mac, Windows, and Linux using Boot Camp. (The EFI chip is what Intel Macs use to boot, as opposed to the BIOS chip of Windows-based PCs.)

Abyzov found a way to use rEFIt to solve the Boot Camp clock problem:

There is a way to set EFI time to local time. I have installed rEFIt to have dual booting. There, in the start screen, you have an EFI console. Using this console, you can type the "timezone -s 01:00" to set your Mac time zone to GMT+1. But this time zone does not affect BIOS (and Windows). So then you have GMT+1 in Mac and GMT+1 in Windows.

If you've tried this suggestion

Kenny Michelsen sent in another workaround for the Entourage 2004 problem of the password dialog continually reappearing with the error message "Logon failure: unknown user name or bad password."

Michelsen's tip:

You can usually solve this problem by entering the username with an "_" instead of "@":

User_domain.xx

Somehow Entourage can logon successfully with user@domain.xx, but forgets the logon after 10-15 minutes.

If you've tried this suggestion

Maarten Vink confirmed a suggestion for the Leopard problem of being able to log on to a Windows share but not copy files:

I had the problem described here with Mac OS 10.5.1 and a Windows 2003 server. Connecting to shares mostly worked, but reading and writing files almost always failed completely or created 0-byte sized files. The fix suggested by Duncan Maclay (disabling SMB signing on the server) resolved this.

We note that Duncan Maclay's suggestion involoves creating a Group Policy object (GPO) on the server and disabling SMB signing. Microsoft describes how to do this in a downloadable document called Connecting Mac OS X 10.3 and Higher Clients to a Windows Small Business Server 2003 Network. See the section called "Disable SMB Signing on the Server."

Michael May agrees that restarting helps with Leopard file sharing problems. His problem is that Leopard disconnects a Windows share and can't log back on:

Yes, I am getting a similar SMB problem to the one others are reporting: I'll come back to my desk to find the SMB share has disconnected, then when I try to reconnect, I get: Connection failed ... The server may not exist or it is not operational at this time. Check the server name or IP address and your network connection and try again." Rebooting does the trick, but nothing short of that: Log out/in, or relaunching Finder does not help. I have encountered this just in the last few days, so it's not Leopard in general, but must be one of the security updates or something else.

Charles Burton corroborated a previous report that the ISA Proxy Safari/Leopard crash may be caused by a recent Leopard security update:

I am experiencing the anomaly of Safari crashing when our ISA proxy settings are in place in the OS. This only began recently therefore I would affirm that it is likely a security patch that has caused this issue. My Tiger machines are operating normally but the Leopard machines crash Safari. Other Internet access applications like Apple Update function normally.

Jon Tucker forwarded a suggestion for Mac OS X 10.4 Tiger's "delete alias/fix alias" file sharing problem. We have other suggestions on our Tiger Tips and Reports page. Tucker's suggestion is specific to wireless networks:

I posted this in the Apple forums related to the problem I was having with sharing a USB-drive via Airport Express (Mac OS X (10.4.11):

I lose my connection to the USB drive that I have connected to my Airport Extreme. And when I try to reconnect by going through Finder, I get the dialog: The alias "<server>" could not be opened, because the original item cannot be found. There are then options to Delete Alias, Fix Alias, or OK I notice that under /Volumes, a new directory gets created with the server name showing up. There isn't anything in it…

ANSWER:

When using 10.4 (Tiger), you cannot connect to the router/USB-drive via the network connection (Finder Network path or Connect to Server). You MUST use the Air Disk Utility to connect to the router/ USB-drive. So, start AirPort Disk Utility, check all the boxes. Then up on the task/menu bar on your Mac, you should see the AirPort Disk icon. Click that, then on the router name, and then authenticate however you have that setup on your router via the AirPort Utility.

NOTE: The ability to Connect to Server is available in 10.5 (Leopard).

Group Logic has released ExtremeZ-IP 5.1.2, an update to the Windows-based high-performance AFP file and print server supporting Mac clients. The new version also updates the Dashboard widget called Zidget for browsing and accessing AFP print and file servers. The company said that the update adds further compatibility with Mac OS X10.5 Leopard clients as well as other enhancements aimed at ease-of-use.

In November, Group Logic released the 5.1.1 update, which also addressed Leopard compatibility issues.

Group Logic said that the Leopard AFP client still has issues with AFP servers, and that the company is continuing to work with Apple to fix issues in Apple's AFP client.

Group Logic said that ExtremeZ-IP 5.1.1 is the only Windows-based server solution to properly support all Mac OS releases from Mac OS 9 to Mac OS X 10.5. Microsoft has so not issued a Leopard update for its AFP server, Services for Macintosh.

The update is free is available to customers with an active Maintenance and Support Contract.

Jason Wood reports that restarting Leopard provides temporary relief from Windows file sharing problems.

I was just reading the reports you have of people who cannot connect to Windows servers with Leopard. I thought I'd let you know that I have the same problem and rebooting seems to help--usually. Very unusual.

If you've tried this

Andy Peat in the United Kingdom said fixed his file sharing issue with a clean install of Leopard:

I too have had real problems with this, tried all the possible fixes on the net WINS, DOMAIN network configs, absolutely nothing. This machine was an upgrade from 10.4 I did a clean install on a Mac at work and all the windows shares popped up like a dream. So for me it looks like it could be an upgrade account issue.

If you've tried this

Bill Paulson said the command-line fix listed on our Leopard Tips and Reports page improved the problem with Leopard not seeing Windows servers, though not completely:

I'm on a very large network, and Leopard's always been very flakey about displaying Windows shared drives.

I tried the fix at your site, adding:

name resolve order = lmhosts bcast wins

to the /etc/smb.conf file.

As best I can tell, this has improved the behavior. Prior to doing this, I never saw the full list of more than 500 workgroups within Alcaltel- Lucent. After doing this, it usually shows the full list, though not always.

A reader name Jay reports that the current unreleased beta of Apple's planned Mac OS X 10.5.2 update fixed Leopard's Active Directory bugs:

I can confirm that on any Mac running Leopard Client version 10.5.1, I have had a high failure rate in binding to AD. The common error message is "You have provided an incorrect username and/or password."

AD bind works flawlessly on Tiger. However, I have downloaded the Delta release of Leopard Client 10.5.2 from Apple Developer site and the sucess rate is virtually 100 percent. I have reported this AD feedback to Apple. So clearly, Apple is aware of the AD issues and has updated DirectoryService as part of the 10.5.2 update. I have not had to make any changes to AD, permissions or user authentication.

As to when 10.5.2 GM [golden master] will be publicly released is still unclear.

Fabien Hory shared a couple of tips for binding Leopard to Active Directory:

Here are a few tips I discovered for Mac OS X 10.5 AD integration.

First of all, if your computer already exists in AD, ask your admin to remove it before trying to reintegrate it and wait until the replication is complete (ask it to your admin).

Another tip that worked for me : after binding the mac to AD, I wasn't able to login with an AD user. To solve it, I had to uncheck the "create a mobile account" in the AD configuration DialogBox.

If you've tried these suggestions

John McGrath reports that the suggested Terminal command fixed his problems with Leopard's Windows file browsing:

I tried the command line fix. So far this seems to have worked. None of the other fixes stuck.

Andrew Kingdom said that a recent security update is the cause of Leopard's problems with ISA proxies, which causes Safari and Software update to crash:

I've further tracked down the culprit with the issue I previously reported. It appears as soon as OS X "Security Update 2007-009" (1.1) is installed, not before.

Recently, a reader reported that reinstalling Leopard made the problem disappear. This would be the case if the bug is with the Security Update, as the reinstall would erase the update.

If you can confirm or refute that the Security Update 2007-009 is the cause of the crashes with ISA proxies

Developer Sascha Merg released a shareware utility for Mac OS X called NTFSready. Merg writes:

I am an independent software developer on Mac and Windows. I just finished this little program to check the Mac hard drive for restricted characters that cause problems with the NTFS filestructure. You can rename all problematic files and folders automatically.

NTFSready is a little tool to avoid problems with bad characters like ?, <, >, ", |, \, :, / in the filestructure when networking between Mac OS X and Windows.

NTFSready lets you find these restricted characters and delete them from your filestructure before you copy them onto an NTFS drive.

Merg says the software is useful when using Paragon Software's NTFS for Mac OS X (US$30), which enables Mac OS X to read and write storage media formatted in Microsoft's NTFS file system. Mac OS X provides only read access to NTFS devices, such as external hard drives, but cannot write to NTFS. NTFS for Mac OS X is a driver than enables Mac OS X to access NTFS natively.

Last week at Macworld Expo, Rockestream, Inc., released Mac versions of RocketStream, a software-only file transfer acceleration solution that can move files up to 200 times faster than an FTP file transfer. This first Mac release is called version 1.2. RocketStream released Windows versions last year.

The company said that a 10 GB file can be moved between Tokyo and Angeles in 14 minutes instead of the 22 hours it would take over the Internet.

"Our biggest competitor is Federal Express," said a spokesperson.

The company said that RocketStream can be one-twentieth the cost of hardware WAN accelerators and is as faster or faster.

RocketStream uses a modified UDP protocol or its propriety PDP protocol to get around the latency that is built into TCP/IP communications. This latency grows with longer distances, resulting in small bandwidth utilization. RocketStream yields much higher bandwidth utilization than FTP transfers. RocketStream file transfers are reliable, according to the company, with checks on all received data.

RockStream file transfers also provide lossless, on-the-fly compression and encryption. The software also includes automation features, such as synchronization and the ability to check a server for new versions of a file.

The software can work in a client-server configuration or a point-to-point configuration. There are three configurations of the software available for Mac OS X Tiger and later and Windows 2000 and later:

• RocketStream Uplink, a client for uploading and downloading
• RocketStream Station, a client with a limited server, for both sending and receiving on a workstation
• RocketStream Server, a full multithreaded server with administration functions

Each of these is available in an Express and a Pro version.

RocketStream plans produce a Linux version of the server in the near future.

Vincent Kroll solved his problem with Leopard/Safari crashing with ISA Proxies by reinstalling Leopard in a particular way:

I've had the same problem. But after reinstalling the system software (while the Macs are connected to the affected network) with system archiving options, my problem was solved. I've reinstalled 5 Macs (3 Mac Pro and 2 iMacs 24" Mid 2007), all these Macs are running fine now. Strange, but it works.

If you've tried this

Readers continue to report Boot Camp FAT partitions not appearing when you startup with the Option key down, and the possibly related issue of the Mac's clock being reset.

Graham Ellison, of Belfast, Northern Ireland, describes the startup bug:

I have the problem, too, where the XP icon does not appear at startup when using Boot Camp. I formatted the Windows partition as FAT32, 15GB. The only way I can select to boot into Windows is through the startup drives icon in preferences. The machine is a new MacBook SR, running Leopard with latest update.

James Dwyer, who previously reported the FAT problem, has a theory as to why the time resetting isn't always seen:

Another addition to my report, if of interest: I have now also seen the date on Mac OS being reset by the Boot Camp process. I think this has only happened once to me, but it could be that the Apple time server corrected problems before I noted them earlier. This "self healing" may not have happened this one time because I now require a password on my WiFi network (see below).

Another novelty is that Mac OS no longer seems to remember the password to my wireless set-up via Airport, but Windows does!

I have increased RAM on my machine and expect to use Parallels with the Boot Camp machine, so my problems will probably change now. 4GB memory does, in any case, make a huge difference in the performance of Parallels.

Jeff reports:

I am experiencing the same problem. No Windows startup disk icon when holding down Option on a new Santa Rosa MacBook (installed XP SP2). I cannot confirm the clock bug yet.

VMware has posted VMware Importer Beta 2, and new prerelease version of a utility to converts third-party-created, Mac-based virtual machines to run under VMware Fusion. This new version can convert virtual machines created by Microsoft Virtual PC 7 for PowerPC Macs to run under VMware Fusion on Intel Macs. The Virtual PC 7 virtual machines can be running Windows 2000 Service Pack 4, Windows XP Service Pack 2, or Windows Server 2003.

As with the previous version, VMware Importer Beta 2 can also import virtual machines created by Parallels Desktop running Windows 2000, XP, 2003 Server, and Vista.

Last fall, we reported a method (somewhat complicated) of salvaging the copy of Windows used in Virtual PC for use with Boot Camp, Parallels, or VMware.

C. Cantu sent us an update to our tutorial on connecting Windows PCs to an AirPort network. The tutorial described Windows XP; Cantu said that it's slightly different for Windows Vista:

My girlfriend just purchased a PC laptop with Windows Vista. My house has 2 G4's on an AirPort Express. The PC was receiving the AirPort signal but wouldn't go online. She spent almost 2 hours with the HP tech guy until he just disconnected the call. However I googled "using pc with airport" and the MacWindows AirPort page (airportpc.html) was the first listing. We followed the directions, but with Vista it's a little different. You just follow the Vista wizard for connecting to a wireless network. When it asks for the code key you just enter the hex key from the Mac as it says on your page. It worked on the first try!

Dave Loverink reports a problem with iPhones and Exchange Server that results in the disappearance of the Deleted Items folder. He also reported the workaround:

I wanted to pass along this information about a problem with iPhones accessing Exchange Server mailboxes. There is a partial workaround included.

We recently encountered a problem where items in a user's Exchange server-based Deleted Items folder were disappearing. One minute there would be a few hundred items in the folder and the next minute less than 20. We were able to use the Outlook "Recover Deleted Items" tool to retrieve the items. However, anywhere from a few minutes to a few hours later, they would disappear again...

Read entire story here.

Andrew Kingdom has the problems with Leopard's Safari crashing with Microsoft ISA Proxy connections. He also sees the problem with Software Update. Other browsers don't seem to have the problem:

I have both Safari and Software Update crashing under Leopard (10.5.1) when they attempt to authenticate to Microsoft ISA Server 2006 (version 5.0.5720.100) or Microsoft ISA Server 2004 (version 4.0.2163.213). They are crashing with proxy authentication, not authentication on a website (it's not even getting as far as the Internet).

Firefox, however, works fine. I also tried Microsoft's ancient Internet Explorer 5.2.3 for Mac, which works fine. So it seems to be Apple's own authentication that is crashing when confronting MS ISA proxy. Ironically this also means Apple isn't receiving crash reports from us (as they would have to go through the same proxy).

This crash occurs on the Intel Mac minis I'm testing, both when they are bound to Active Directory, and also unbound. It doesn't occur with a direct Internet connection (no proxy).

There are other workarounds on our Leopard Tips and Reports page.

Duncan Maclay offered a workaround for the problem where Leopard can't write to volumes via SMB even though they can connect. (See also here.) His workaround:

In the interim I have resolved the issue. It has to do with SMB signing on the server. In order to get the permissions to work properly, you have to create a GPO on the server. This appears to a new development under Leopard which was not *necessarily* the case under Tiger.

If you’ve tried this workaround if it worked.

Joel Farthing describes the problem:

I have the same problem as the reader who reports being able to read files on windows network shares but not save. Creates a file with 0 bytes. If a solution becomes apparent, I'd appreciate hearing about it. Thanks.

Ville Vartiainen said "I have exactly this problem too. I hope there is a fix very soon!"

Marek Absolon said "I have the same problem."

Two readers verified a command-line fix we reported for the Leopard's Windows share browsing bug. Neal Tobochnik, who previously told it didn’t work, got it to work with a small corretion:

Actually I finally got your tip to work. You have to turn off and on file sharing in the Sharing panel not the Network panel. Also in the Sharing Panel options you have to check the SMB option.

Max Minkoff also reported success:

Wow! I just tried this and it worked immediately and fantastically. I can't confirm that things don't go in and out, as I've just done it a few minutes ago, but it was really a charm.

Now if I could just get my VMWare Win XP machine to see the servers also... But I'll keep looking.

Tom Hughston reported that "The NETBIOS name change to an 8 alphanumeric name did not solve the problem." That problem being Leopard's problems with Windows file browsing.

Parallels has released a beta version of Parallels Server, the company's first foray into the hypervisor-powered server virtualization market. Parallels Server is the first server virtualization software to run on Mac hardware, including Apple's Xserve. It also runs on x86 server hardware that supports 64-bit Windows or Linux.

The company said that Parallels Server supports over 50 different guest operating systems. On a Mac, the Parallels Server beta can run Mac OS X Server 10.5 Leopard. With the release of Leopard Server last October, Apple for the first time allowed users to run a Mac operating system in a virtual machine. However, the Leopard Server Licensing agreement does not allow running the OS on non-Apple hardware.

Parallels Server also runs on the company's hypervisor, a small parcel of code that enables multiple virtual machines to run without a host operating system.

Server virtualization is a growing trend, as it enables enterprise sites to consolidate servers, reduce hardware and energy costs, and centralize and automate server lifecycle management. Hypervisor technology was pioneered by VMware, and big names such as Microsoft, Oracle, Citrix, and Sun are getting into the market. Parallels intends to find its niche in server virtualization by aiming Parallels Server at small and medium businesses and at departments of larger enterprises. The company said it would do this partly by providing easy-to-use management tools, such as the Parallels Management Console, for the deployment of virtual machines.

Last month we reported that a startup company had released a beta of Moka5 Engine, the first Mac software for automatically distributing and updating virtual machines over a network. On Macs, Moka5-distributed VMs run in VMware Fusion.

People interested in beta testing Parallels Server can register at Parallels.com.

For coverage of Parallels Desktop, see our Parallels Tips and Reports page.

Starting on Monday, January 14, CodeWeavers will drop the price of CrossOver to US $40 for the duration of Macworld Expo. CrossOver runs Windows applications on Mac OS X without the use of Windows. It normally retails for US $59.95.

The special promotion is only available at the CodeWeavers web site and only available next week starting Monday morning through Friday night (January 18). No deal codes or permissions are necessary to receive the discounted price.

Earlier this week, we reported that CodeWeavers would be releasing a gaming-optimized version of CrossOver.

(For more coverage of CrossOver Mac, see our CrossOver Reports page.)

Richard Zalan reports a strange problem with using a second monitor with Boot Camp 2.0 on his MacBook Pro.

It didn't cross my mind that my 23" Cinema display would cause any problems on the Windows part. The problem started when I've re-booted to Mac OS and then back to Windows. I could not start Windows now at all.

After some experimenting with starting up into Windows, I've discovered that, when I tried to boot-up with the power cord plugged in (yes, the power cord!) Windows would not start up at all. My other attempt was without the cord, (not on purpose mind you), and Windows miraculously started on. At first, I couldn't believe that the power cord could make any difference to the start-up procedure, but after few other try-outs, it became clear that this was the only variation between my start-up attempts.

The link to the Apple's nVidia drivers at MacWindows, helped with my problem. After installing the drivers everything seams to work ok. Starting into Windows is not an issue any more.

Softhing has released Entourage Entourage Address Extractor 1.5.0 (US $15, free update), a new version of the OS X application for exporting email addresses and names from Entourage email messages. Entourage Entourage Address Extractor can export to vcards or to a tab-delimitted text file. The new version adds support for Exchange Server accounts and adds XML as an export option. Version 1.5 requires Mac OS X 10.5 Leopard.

David Cohen (who writes for MyMac.com) has another theory and suggestion about Leopard's problems with Windows file browsing:

You have plenty of suggestions for fixing the Leopard Windows sharing issue, that I see are all a bit hit or miss. I think the reason for this is because a lot of the things people are trying are fixing the real root issue by accident.

The Leopard advanced network settings has a WINS tab, and in this there is a NETBIOS name field. This is auto-generated by Leopard - it looks like it uses the MAC address to generate it. However, if what is put in there is not compliant with the NETBIOS settings of the Windows network you are connected to, then browsing will not work, because the WINS server will not acknowledge the WINS requests coming from Leopard.

The actual NETBIOS name requirements supported vary depending on the flavour of OS running on the WINS servers on the network. I would suspect the best route to success is to use the most basic NETBIOS name requirements, back from the old Windows NT 4.0 days - stick in no more than an 8-character alphanumeric into the NETBIOS field, and all Windows browsing will be restored.

I had two Leopard machines, one which would browse and one which would not. The browsing one had an 8-character WINS setting, and the non- browsing one had a MAC address in the WINS field. Removing the MAC address and putting in a simple word in the WINS field IMMEDIATELY reinstated browsing.

If you've tried this if it worked.

Neal Tobochnik reports that Wednesday's suggestion to use a Terminal command did not help Leopard's problem with browsing for Windows shares:

I followed Keven David's suggestion. It worked until I rebooted the computer. Repeating the procedure did not help. BTW you must change file sharing from the share control panel not the network control panel.

Duncan Maclay can get onto his Windows server from Leopard, but has the previosly reported problem of copying files to Windows drives:

I can mount all my shares on a wide selection of win2k and XP boxes, my NAS and indeed on the Win 2003 server. What's more I can read, open and close files on any of them no problem. So far, so good. But here's the thing: I cannot save on the Win 2003 server. When I save, it creates a file, beachballs around a bit, bleats about privileges (despite me being logged on to the server with an admin account) and leaves a file on the server with the right name and 0 bytes in it. I am tearing my hair out.

If you've seen this

A reader called Ed had the known problem of accessing Leopard files shares form Windows Vista. He took a suggestion for the reverse (Macs accessing Windows), but it worked:

I was unable to authenticate to my file shares on Leopard 10.5.1 from Windows Vista Ultimate. Received eDSAuthFailed messages in my samba log on leopard. I solved these problems by using MACHOSTNAME\accountname instead of using machostname\accountname as was suggested on your website.

If you've seen this work

Mark Staben is another reader whose Leopard Macs can't bind to Active Directory. He sees the same error message as another reader did:

I can't believe this isn't fixed yet. With regard to Rob Groome's "unexpected error," "Unable to access domain controller. This computer is unable to access the domain controller for an unknown reason."

This is exactly what I get when I attempt to bind. It happens at Step 5 during the binding process. It worked perfectly in Tiger.

I have about 100 machines waiting for Leopard and I bought the licenses the day it was released. Unfortunately, those machines will be sticking with Tiger until this is fixed.

A number of readers are adding to the reports of the Boot Camp 2 problem in which a FAT32-formatted partition icon does not appear while holding Option key while booting. Several users also reported this problem accompanied by a problem of the Mac's clock being changed.

Andrew Weeks thinks the clock issue is related to the Option-reboot process rather than strickly Boot Camp:

Yep, seeing the same problem. Everytime I reboot (and hold Option key) only get Mac OS X HD access. Have also noticed just today that clock is changing every time I reboot holding the Option key. I formatted to FAT32 primarily for file transfer.

Andrew Abyzov found some info on the web about the Boot Camp clock issue that implies it isn't related to the FAT32 problem:

I also have the clock problem. It seems, that Mac OS supposes that the system clock is set to UTC, when Windows thinks it's local time.

By the way, there is some information about it in Internet (here and here.

Keith Olsen ruled out partition size as cause of the FAT32 problem:

Yes , happened to me as well. I thought it might be the size of the partition I was trying to use so dropped it to 20 gig and still got the same thing. Finally used NTFS and it's all good. I use the the beta version using FAT32 and that works fine.

Jim Dwyer notes that it's only the Windows on the Boot Camp partition, but that Windows on a CD is okay:

I received a MacBook 2.2GHz for Christmas and installed Windows XP with Boot Camp. Even after several reinstalls I do not see the option at start-up for a Windows start-up Disk but only the Mac OS X start-up disk appears. (The Windows XP installation disk does appear, so it would not seem to be a Windows ID problem.)

Bruce McIntosh is seeing the previously reported problem with Entourage/Exchange reverting to the Casablanca/Monrovia time zone:

I, too, have experienced this problem. I am trying to sync a PC at work with Macs at home and a Treo. The Treo syncs OTA via Exchange (most of the time). The Macs at home sync with each other via .Mac. Outlook communicates with Entourage via Exchange. Entourage syncs (using sync services) with iCal, which syncs with .Mac, which syncs the Macs at home.

All this works, except somewhere along the line Outlook entries change to GMT-0, Monrovia/Casablanca. There is no way to stop it and editing the entries doesn't help as they simply revert back to Monrovia.

Is there some way to turn-off time zones in Outlook, or Entourage, or Exchange? Time zones can be turned off on the Treo and in iCal, but that does not seem to affect anything.

I've tried using Snerdware's Groupcal, which seems to work but causes a proliferation of calendars and duplicated entries, so after a week of use is not terribly satisfying; nor does it seems very reliable. Still searching for the holy grail of reliable data syncing.

If you can shed some light

CodeWeavers will release a version of CrossOver Mac specifically optimized for gamers. CrossOver is software for Mac OS X that enables Macs to run Windows programs without requiring Windows itself. The new version, to be called CrossOver Gaming, will be able to run more Windows gaming titles on a Mac than does the current version. James Ramey of CodeWeavers described it to us:

CrossOver Gaming will be optimized for games and updated more frequently then the more traditional versions. CrossOver Mac is already compatible with hundreds of gaming titles including: Call of Duty 2; Half Life 2; Team Fortress 2; World of Warcraft; EVE Online; and Steam. The new application will offer a subscription model for users not wanting to commit to purchasing CrossOver Mac or CrossOver Linux Professional. The anticipated price should be around $5.00 per month. CodeWeavers is planning to release this version later this year.

CrossOver supports selected Windows applications, including Outlook for Windows and some PC games. The company adds support for more Windows applications with every update.

(For more coverage of CrossOver Mac, see our CrossOver Reports page.)

A two-year-old free driver called WinACD will let Intel Mac users run Apple's 30-inch Cinema Display from Windows XP in Boot Camp. WinACD installs in Windows XP, giving Windows access to the display's hardware controls. It also installs a Windows control panel.

Michiel Buisman described WinACD:

It's ancient, but works on Windows XP. Now you poor 30" ACD owners can use the built-in hub and the controls on the side; that's right: you can now switch your display off! And quadrupel, no, octupel shame on Apple for not supporting their own flagship display!

If you've tried WinACD in Boot Camp how it works for you.

We've had more reports of the Boot Camp 2 problem in which a FAT32-formatted partition icon does not appear when booting while holding Option key down. One reader verified a previous report of this problem accompanied by a problem with the Mac clock changing time:

Forbes magazine reports that the U.S. Army is beefing up its procurement of Macs. The story says that the Army started buying Macs in 2005 as a means of diversifying its PC portfolio for security purposes. Starting next month, the Army will be rolling out Thursby Software's ADmitMac for CAC to integrate the Macs in its secure Active Directory environments in which users log in with Common Access Cards instead of passwords. Forbes reports that the Army's use of the software "should make it easier to get Macs into the service."

The Forbes report says that the Army is also buying Apple's Xserve server hardware as way to deflect the large numbers of cyber attacks aimed at it.

Turning off IPv6 is one of the many workarounds that readers have reported for dealing with the problem of Leopard not seeing Windows shares. Although this doesn't work for everyone, it did work for Tom Kirby:

I had the problem of my Mac not finding Windows shared folder. The method listed of turning off IPv6 is what finally made my Leopard system see my XP machine's shared folder. I'd also changed some of the other things mentioned at MacWindows, but turned my firewall back on and the shared folder still shows up for now. Now on to solving access to the windows machine's printer!

Rich Kosiba was seeing Leopard's file sharing problems while trying to access network attached storage (NAS). He fixed his problem by changing the workgroup name to all uppercase in System Preferences:

I have a Tritton NAS here, not sure what OS it runs. I had no problems connecting to it with Tiger but had many problems with Leopard. Some of the tips from your site got me to connect but there were no files in any of the shares once I connected.

It turned out to be a case-sensitivity issue with the workgroup name. My workgroup name was all lowercase in the System Preferences but I noticed that whenever I type the workgroup name in Windows or on the NAS it is automatically converted to uppercase. Changing the workgroup to all uppercase in System Preferences resolved my issues.

If you've tried this suggestion

See our Leopard Tips and Reports page for previously reported suggestions regarding workgroup names.

MacTech magazine has published performance test results of Boot Camp, Parallels Desktop, and VMware Fusion, each running Windows XP and Vista. Over 2500 tests were performed on four different Mac models and a Fujitsu notebook PC. The tests include the Microsoft Office applications, Outlook, Internet Explorer, some multi-step "cross-platform" tests, and some network and hard drive I/O measurements.

For Windows XP, MacTech said that Parallels Desktop was the fastest of the three:

...if you want the best XP performance with the types of applications tested here, Parallels is not only faster than VMware Fusion, but it's faster than Boot Camp on average for the applications that we tested.

For Windows Vista, MacTech concluded that Boot Camp came in first, but VMware Fusion was second:

Vista under VMware Fusion is 44% faster than Vista under Parallels.

However, Parallels did better in multi-step tests that use both the Mac and Vista sides:

"Parallels is consistently 5x faster than VMware Fusion when looking at cross platform task tests in Vista."

Windows Vista ran slower than Windows XP with all three methods and on the Fujitsu notebook.

MacTech also said that both Parallels and VMware get closer on faster Macs:

"...the faster the machine, the less the difference between Parallels and VMware Fusion. Even more interesting is that both products could be faster than Boot Camp in certain activities. For example, Parallels was very fast at scrolling beating not only the PC, but also Boot Camp, time after time. Similarly, VMware Fusion appears to have some type of disk caching or acceleration in its virtual hard disk which makes it faster than both the PC and Boot Camp."

The article is published in the February 2008 issue of MacTech magazine as well as at MacTech.com.

Two more readers report having the Boot Camp problem with FAT32 partitions, where the FAT drive icon does not appear when booting while holding Option down.

Tariq Chowdhury:

I refer to your article titled "Boot Camp 2.0 problem with FAT partitions", dated 14th of December. I too have been having this problem after making a 32GB FAT32 partition on my 250GB Santa Rosa Black MacBook. I'm using Windows XP.

Selim Gencoglu has the problem, as well as a problem with is clock being reset:

I am having the same problem when booting up my computer (new MacBook 2.2 GHz, 2 GB Ram, 120 GB hard drive). Although I have installed Windows XP without any complications, somehow I don't get to see the Windows icon while holding down the OPTION key when starting my MacBook. XP works fine with some minor bugs. FN + Delete does not work, and FN + Up Arrow or Down Arrow to substitute page up and down are not working.

In addition, every time I start Mac OS after I use Win XP, my clock in Mac changes. It is kind of strange. Every time I go back and forth Mac OS X and Win XP, I have to adjust my clock.

If you've seen this problem

A reader named Kenneth sent a report about problems with VMware Fusion 1.1 and Leopard 10.5.1. He wasn't seeing crashing as some other readers have reported with Leopard (Tiger didn't have this problem), but Kenneth is having some other problems, including a printing issue:

I've been using Fusion 1.1 with Leopard 10.5.1 on an iMac Intel Core Duo with 2 GB RAM for a few days. I created the virtual machine from Boot Camp. My experience so far has been somewhat mixed...

Two more fans of VirtualBox for Mac OS X Beta report that it doesn't work in Leopard. VirtualBox is virtual machine software for Mac OS X. (See our VirtualBox Tips and Reports page for more.) The VirtualBox web site still doesn't mention Leopard, though there was a recent update for the Windows version.

Markus Müller describes the symptoms:

I just updated to Leopard 10.5. VirtualBox 1.4.1 Beta2 ran under Tiger with hardly any crashes, now I get unexpected quitting.

In more detail: First start of VirtualBox after booting. It "Quits unexpectedly." Selecting "relaunch" brings up the main VirtualBox window.

Starting one of the virtual machines brings the black screen, then the message "starting the virtual machine," then unexpected quit of the VM Selecting "relaunch" shows no visible result. However, now there are two instances of VirtualBox shown running. But the virtual machines do not start.

Sometimes, VirtualBox doesn't even start (hangs before displaying the main window).

Nevertheless: VirtualBox is a great product!

Eduard Prats Molner in Berlin, Germany:

Hello, mine crashes too. I would like to know if someone has actually a positive experience. Really sad, I love VirtualBox!

Michael Landewe recommends the Lobomoto's IPSecuritas virtual private network client for Mac for CheckPoint VPN users who want to upgrade to Leopard:

There are a lot of frustrated CheckPoint VPN users that cannot upgrade to Leopard because CheckPoint won't run. I recommend IPSecuritas to them. It has worked for me: 100 percent CheckPoint and Leopard compatible.

Two readers report success with a tip from Wednesday on enabling Leopard to bind with Active Directory.

Tom Stovall:

Yes, AD sign-in does work for me if I use a fully-qualified active directory name eg... jrizzo@division.company.ad

Adrian Stancescu focused on Step 4 of Wednesday's tip

With regards to the Michael Anderson's tip, it seems to have worked for me. The only thing I did differently when trying to bind my Mac was Anderson's Step 4, to check the box that allows domain admins to administer the computer.

Everything works now, including accessing the GAL through AdressBook or through the Directory application. I am amazed. I have even managed to log in with my AD account and it worked fine.

Tim Levin suggests a workaround for the problem of Entourage failing to receive some email from Exchange Server 2007. On Monday, we published a workaround from another reader. Here's is Levin's suggestion:

I've seen this problem before. Two fixes. You can rebuild the users database and 40 percent of the time, all mail will show.

The best solution is to quit Entourage, delete the users local entourage e-mail database file (found in /Users/[username]/Documents/Microsoft User Data/Office 2004 Identities/Main Identity/). Then launch Entourage and enter the user settings for the account. A new database file is created and will sync with the server.

CAUTION: If the user has local e-mail stored, it will be deleted when the database file is deleted. You can save local e-mail messages by opening the folder in entourage, drag the e-mails to a folder in the Finder.

If you've tried this if it worked for you.

Michael Anderson provide another suggestion for working around problems with Mac OS X 10.5 Leopard binding to Active Directory:

I've seen this in several iterations and with several different symptoms. But it's been easy to fix. The problem is that the Leopard implementation is picky.

1. Make sure your time zone is set correctly.
2. Make sure your Date/Time are auto set by the system. Or that it is VERY close to what the AD server is set to (if it's off by just a little it won't work).
3. Make sure your using your full domain, as in "domain.company.ext." Not just the short name for it.
4. Make sure the checkbox to allow domain administrators to administer the box is checked.

That's it. I have had a few different error messages. And if I double-check all four of these things, it has works every time: 18 and counting.

If you've tried Anderson's suggestion if it worked for you.

Keith Cox reports that Apple told him that the problem is with large networks:

We have the same issues with computers not being able to join the domain. I have talked to Apple and we have been told the issue is related to large domain of more than 64 DC's.

Deanna Santangelo offered yet another fix for Leopard's problems accessing Windows shares:

I was unable to connect to my Windows XP shares from the Mac even though my Windows XP machines could connect to Leopard shares. After several hours of trying different things I found it worked if I moved the Mac to the same subnet as the XP machines. I have no idea why this was the case since the other direction worked fine. I don't have any ACLs configured on the router.

If you've tried this suggestion if it worked for you.

D. Harminder reports another bit of odd behavior with Leopard problems browsing Windows shares:

I've had the same problem as others after upgrading to Leopard, with my Windows PCs disappearing off the Leopard sidebar from time to time. This was usually resolved with a Mac reboot.

After some time, I've found that if I connect to a drive using the GO- >Connect To Server, then giving the smb://... drive URL, ALL of my Windows PCs reappear in the sidebar! And all starts working again as normal.