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January 21, 2008

tips

Leopard brings superfine volume controls to the table

Posted Jan. 21, ’08, 12:54 PM PT by Dan Moren
Category | Tips

Volume bezelHere’s a trick that’s not only useful, but one that will amaze and astound your friends. Well, if your friends are easily astoundable/amazable (trust me, it’s the best kind of friend). Every Mac user knows that hitting the volume keys on the keyboard raises or lowers the Mac’s system volumes. But discrete volume levels can be annoying: what if going up one notch is too loud, but going down one is too soft? What’s one to do?

For those Leopard users out there, here’s a tip on getting finer volume controls, courtesy of our cousins over at Mac OS X Hints. Hold down the shift and option keys when you hit the volume button and you’ll notice that each volume block is now divided into four smaller levels. So if something’s just a little bit too loud, drop it down a fraction. Too soft? Pump it up just a wee bit. Then you, like Goldilocks, can get it just right.

Were my friends amazed when I showed off this sparkly new feature? Well, not really, but they were amazingly derisive, so perhaps that counts for something.


6 Comments

Preshit said:

This thing doesn't work if you are using a MacMIni with your own keyboard. Just thought I'd let you know :)

January 21, 2008 5:33 PM
GCarden Author Profile Page said:

Bonus tip: if you hold down on the shift key while hitting the volume keys, you can adjust the volume without the confirmation sound.

January 21, 2008 10:10 PM
Paul Martin said:

Also, adjusting volume up/down whilst holding just the SHIFT key will prevent the system sound confirmation - useful if you want to change the volume discretely!


January 21, 2008 11:10 PM
Chris said:

alrite, how do i do this with the brightness? THAT will be mighty useful!

January 22, 2008 2:27 PM
Anonymous said:

Chris,

You can bring up the display settings by pressing option-F1 or option-F2.

In that panel, there's a slider bar that lets you change the brightness in whatever small increments you want.

January 22, 2008 8:04 PM
DWesnor said:

Wouldn't it be cool if you could change the volume/brightness by holding down the volume/brightness button and sweeping across the trackpad?

January 24, 2008 1:12 PM

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