A couple of handy Mac apps have received maintenance updates today - Ed Hamrick’s VueScan, a powerful scanning software solution available for Mac OS X, Windows and Linux, and Speed Download, a download manager created by the talented Mac developers over at Yazsoft.

“Faster and more secure, more features, easier to use and sporting a new look, this latest Speed Download release sets a new standard for download manager innovation, and is designed to be your central, unified hub for almost all the downloading and file transfer activities you do online,” Yazsoft says.

Able to collect and organize all your downloads, Speed Download 5 is optimized for any Internet connection (dial-up or broadband). Some of the noteworthy features in Speed Download 5 include a clean interface with various view modes, a re-engineered, “universal” download engine optimized for a maximum performance, a powerful database to manage all downloads, uploads, and file transfers, Mac iDisk integration and auto-resuming file transfers. The latest release, Speed Download 5.2.11, updates Growl integration, addresses a bug that would cause SD to quit when in minimized mode, and includes various memory optimizations.

Download Speed Download (Update / Trial / Buy)

Download Speed Download Lite (Update / Trial / Buy)


VueScan 8.6.10 is a noteworthy update as well. Existing users should be relieved to learn that Hamrick Software has improved cropping of dark slides, and fixed problems with 'Crop | Multi crop,' and some HP scanners on Mac OS X 10.6 (Snow Leopard).

As far as newcomers are concerned, they should learn that VueScan includes a built-in color calibration of scanners, producing colors that look true-to-life. According to its maker, Ed Hamrick, it offers options for scanning faded slides and prints, batch scanning, IT8 color calibration and other advanced scanning features, as it supports more than 100 brands of negative films. The program assists users by automatically adjusting images to an optimum color balance, which reduces the need to work in Photoshop, or other graphic-editing programs. VueScan supports around 1,000 scanners on Mac OS X alone. Requirements include Mac OS X 10.3 (Panther) or later, and a supported scanner. VueScan currently supports multiple different scanners on Windows.

Download VueScan (Update / Trial / Buy)