Preference Manager v1.0.1 released

I've been getting a lot of feedback about our new application, Preference Manager. A lot of you have really good ideas and we've just released Preference Manager 1.0.1 to take some of these suggestions into account. Here are the new features:

• Bug fix: The help link is now correct.
• Feature: You can now set a custom backup location (in Preferences). This feature was highly requested.
• Feature: If a backup exists, you now have the option of overwriting it.
• Feature: There is now a "Show in Finder" button in the Restore dialog.

Keep that feedback coming in via the bug report and feature request forms.

New tool: Preference Manager

We've just introduced a new tool - Preference Manager. This application allows you to trash, backup and restore your Final Cut Studio preference files.

Preference files store information about user preferences, window and toolbar placements, and launch settings. Sometimes these can become corrupted, causing problems. Preference Manager allows you to trash corrupted preferences and keep backups of working preference files in order to quickly restore your settings.

Now, I know there are a few other apps on the market that do this as well, so what makes Preference Manager unique? Well, for a start, it works for the entire Final Cut Studio suite, not just Final Cut Pro. In addition, it is completely free, you are not limited by the number of backups you can perform, you can assign names to your backups, and it is Leopard-compatible.

As always, we are trying to create a genuinely useful application, so your comments and suggestions are encouraged.

FCS Remover 1.0.6 released

We've just released a new version of FCS Remover, taking it up to 1.0.6. This update offers no new features but makes changes to some elements of the automatic updating facility. It is a recommended update because in the next few days we are going to make some changes that will cause problems with it.

FCS Remover is a program to automatic the uninstallation of Final Cut Studio and Final Cut Express. It has many uses such as wiping an old version before updating, downgrading to an older version or simply removing the entire suite from your machine.

FCS Remover 1.0.5 released

We've just released FCS Remover 1.0.5, based on much-appreciated user feedback. This new version offers Final Cut Express support (version 3.5 (HD) and 4, although earlier versions may work as well) plus a couple of bug fixes.

If you don't know, FCS Remover is a tool that allows you to completely remove Final Cut Studio (and now Express as well) and its associated components. Why would you want to do this? Well, maybe you are planning to upgrade to a later version and want to fully uninstall the previous one in order to improve the stability of your upgraded system and reduce issues. Or you might be one of the unfortunate few experiencing problems with a particular patch and wish to downgrade.

Alternatively, you may be swapping project files between your up-to-date machine and a machine running an earlier version, although an XML export is the recommended way of dealing with this problem.

Whatever the reason, we always appreciate your feedback, bug reports and feature requests.

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Major blog overhaul

Just wanted to let everyone know that we've completed a major overhaul of this blog. It's now much faster to load and puts less of a strain on the server, which is something that was worrying me as its popularity increased.

The most important change is to the page URLs. Instead of having one central page, each post now has its own separate page. The old page will forward requests to the correct place but for improved speed and general ease-of-use, you are advised to update your bookmarks.

Also, I have noticed that a lot of people are using the category RSS feeds instead of the main feed. That means they are missing out on a lot of other posts. The old blog didn't make this clear so if you don't want to miss half of the posts on this forum, subscribe to the global feed listed above (if you can even read this, that is).

P.S. There might be a few teething problems over the next few days so please bear with us.

FCS Remover 1.0.4 released

I just commissioned a quick patch for FCS Remover, bringing it up to 1.0.4. The removal of some extra frameworks was added in v1.0.3 but the corresponding package receipts were not removed, leading the FCS installer to mistakenly think that the frameworks were installed when they weren't. This caused some "missing framework" errors when starting FCP up after reinstalling.

This is now fixed in v1.0.4. Apologies for any inconvenience caused by this bug.

To be notified of new updates automatically, subscribe to our appcast feed.

FCS Remover 1.0.3 released

We've just released version 1.0.3 of FCS Remover. This doesn't offer any new features - it's just a small release to chase up some Final Cut Studio files that were not deleted in previous versions.

For those that don't know, FCS Remover is a freeware utility to remove the entire Final Cut Studio. Why would you want to do this? Well, it's a good thing to do if you are upgrading from a previous version of Final Cut Studio or Final Cut Pro. Sometimes upgrade installations do not work very well so an installation from scratch is recommended. The best way of doing this is to completely wipe your hard disk, but we understand that not everyone wants to do this. FCS Remover fills the gap by removing Final Cut Studio and leaving the operating system and your other files intact, allowing you to install a new version.

Other people use it for reinstalling an unstable installation of FCS, while others use it to downgrade to a previous version in order to save Final Cut Pro projects to an earlier format for compatibility reasons.

FCS Remover can be downloaded here for free. Also keep an eye on our appcast or this blog for updates and new releases.

FCS Remover 1.0.2 released

We've just released FCS Remover 1.0.2. FCS Remover is a free utility for uninstalling Apple's Final Cut Studio suite.

This update offers the following features and fixes:
* Compressor and Qmaster support
* Now removes Final Cut Studio codecs
* Now removes some extra files that were missed out in previous versions
* New automatic update facility

This is just a minor update to fix a couple of things. I've been receiving a lot of feedback and the next version will not only be faster, but it will allow you to select which Final Cut Studio products you wish to remove. I am planning to rewrite the application for the next release so please be patient. Your comments and suggestions have been noted though and the update facility will notify you when additional versions are available.

You can file bug reports and feature suggestions here:
Bug reporter
Feature request

As always, your feedback is highly appreciated.

I also wanted to let you know that we now have an appcast feed up and running. You can import this into an RSS reader such as NewsFire and be instantly notified of new application updates, complete with a link to install them immediately.

New tool: Pixel Aspect Ratio Calculator

We've just released a new online tool on our site. Pixel Aspect Ratio Calc will take two image resolutions and work out the pixel aspect ratio needed to convert from one to the other.

It can also work out the necessary square-pixel resolution of a still image that will fit perfectly into the non-square pixel video frame. If you have ever tried to resize still images to fit into an NTSC frame, you will understand how useful this tool is.

Pixel Aspect Ratio Calc is available in two versions:
Pixel Aspect Ratio Calc (standard)
Pixel Aspect Ratio Calc (iPhone edition)

See our Resources section for more tools.

FCS Remover v1.0.1 released

Just a quick patch to fix a couple of issues with the first release.

Changes:
* Added Final Cut Pro HD 4.5 support.
* FCS Remover no longer removes third-party plugins.

FCS Remover v1.0.1 is available here.

About FCS Remover
FCS Remover is a utility for Mac OS X designed to uninstall Apple's Final Cut Studio and its related components. This can be useful for downgrading to a previous version or removing an old installation before upgrading.

FCS Remover is freeware and is designed for Mac OS X 10.4 Tiger and 10.5 Leopard.