A few days ago, I reviewed my first ever purchased program, Media Link, for my new Macbook Pro. Well today I am going to review another product I decided to purchase; it is called Awaken from Embraceware. Ultimately it is an alarm clock and sleep timer for any Mac and iTunes. It is very customizable in that it has many options to set from volume, to playlist, and more.

I have mainly been using the program as a sleep timer so my Macbook Pro will sleep after a specific amount of time. This allows me to fall asleep with my iTunes playing but not worry about running my laptop all night long. I created a custom playlist called sleep, set the timer to 1 hour and that is it! 1 hour later my MBP goes to sleep!

I use a real alarm clock to wake me up so I have not played with the wake functions, but I know it will wake up a Mac from sleep to activate the alarm clock. It also allows you to set a different alarm for each day, and you can completely customize each day!

It is a very beautify written application. The style is at par with Mac standards, and it is very tough with customization options and advanced functionality. I have only touched on all this program has to offer, for more information please browse over to http://www.embraceware.com/software/awaken/. It is a messily $12.95 and comes with updates for life! For many years I looked for something like this on Windows, but never had any luck. Awaken works on both Intel and Power Macs, but sorry no Windows!

Price: $12.95
Trial: YES, 14 Days (Full Functionality)
Rating: 4 out of 5
Official Site: http://www.embraceware.com/software/awaken/

So of you might have heard from my tweets, or my status updates on various sites, that I recently bought a Macbook Pro. Below is a list of the specs in the model I purchased:

• 15.4 inch Matte Screen
• 2.4GHz Intel Core 2 Duo
• 2GB Memory
• 200GB Hard Drive
• Double-layer SuperDrive
• NVIDIA GeForce 8600M GT with 256MB

I purchased it from the Apple Store at Lenox Mall in Atlanta, Georgia. I originally went into the store expecting to buy a 2.5GHz/250GB/Glossy model, but the lady in the store talked some sense into me! I decided to go for the smaller processor because of the $400.00 difference, I just didn’t see it being justified, and also I was coming for a 1.8GHz windows machine, so I figured 2.4GHz was plenty of an upgrade. I also changed my mind on the Glossy/Matte because of the need for real colors in my designs and photography. I am very surprised at how well I like the Matte, because my old laptop was Glossy.

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