Xounds - January 14, 2004
Author: Unsanity
Cost: $10
Version: 2.1
Reviewed by: Steve Streza
User Rating: 
64%
The Unsanity group has done some great things for OS X. Between apps like Silk, WindowShade, and the important ShapeShifter, Unsanity has proved their skill and calling as haxie developers. So now we come to Xounds, which can be described as ShapeShifter for your speakers. How does it compare?
Features
After the installation, Xounds appears as a preferences pane with preferences and controls. You can change the volume of sound effects, apply the effects themselves, and, as usual, exclude any application that you want to be silent. There is also a button that sends you to a website to download more soundsets, which I enjoyed browsing. It was an excellent resource for sounds that I didn't know existed.
Ease of Use
Getting things configured can be initially a little confusing. Xounds was made by the same people who did ShapeShifter, and I'm quite used to being able to just drag-and-drop. While this is implemented for the configuration of your soundset, you can not drop downloaded soundsets into Xounds to install them. Also, once the soundsets are imported, there really isn't a large enough window to convey all the information I want to see. In addition, since the application is housed in a preference pane, the window can't be resized any larger. This makes the interface feel rather cramped.
As far as actually setting up the sounds goes, Xounds is very easy to use and configurable. All of your soundsets are in one portion of the interface, and you can drag and drop them onto the appropriate action, so if you want a boing sound when you open a menu, you find the appropriate sound and drag it onto the "Open Menu" option. Of course, that could get incredibly tedious, so Unsanity added "Smart Picks", which automatically finds appropriate sounds. It works extremely well, and nine times out of ten the sound I originally delegated to an action got picked up in the Smart Picks.
However, there are some caveats. It seems that once you get the sounds active, they don't work all the time. For instance, in iChat or Safari, if you try to move the window around, the appropriate sound will only play if you're clicking the title. Moving brushed windows around from the sides or the bottom doesn't cut it. Also, apps that are programmed to change the size of a window will trigger the sound to play. So, if you open a tab in Safari when there weren't any, it'll make the window resize sound. In addition, sometimes, sounds don't even work. Clicking in the dock doesn't make the mouse click sound.
Xounds can get annoying after a while, too. It only took so many beeps and boops before I wanted to just crank up iTunes to tune it out. Sure, you could take a trip to System Prefs and turn down the volume or disable it totally, but that's unelegant and takes too many steps. For the times when I want a little respite, Unsanity, please, make a menu bar item or dock item or something.
Price
The price is a little tough to evaluate. If you look at it from a technical standpoint, to see how much work had to probably be done to get this effect achieved, then the app is probably worth more than $10. However, in terms of its value, I can't totally justify paying for something that makes my computer beep and buzz whenever I start resizing a window (or when it starts resizing itself). There is no doubt that this is yet another highly polished application from Unsanity, and it's the only app of its kind, so for those who are interested, the $10 is worth it, but for others, you have to wonder; is Xounds really as useful as say, WindowShade X? The decision is up to you.
Comments
Posted by Comie Prevette at January 16, 2004 08:23 AM | Edit | Delete
I like Xounds, but there are still some things that need sounds assigned to them that don't. Mostly, pressing tabs, and widgets. It's true though, the program is unneccessary, but for those in maybe an office environment with no music, it breaks up the silence, just a little. ;)
Posted by Steve Streza at January 16, 2004 10:00 AM | Edit | Delete
In case anybody was wondering, my personal favorite for a soundset goes to Acid.
Posted by allap at January 16, 2004 04:21 PM | Edit | Delete
you know that's funny, when i read the article, i couldn't help but ask myself "which sounset does Steve Streza prefer?" :P
Posted by danielgrenell at January 17, 2004 12:57 PM | Edit | Delete
i used platinum sounds in 9, and missed them when i moved to 10. but by the time xounds came around, i was already used to the quiet interface and when i tried xounds out, i just found it annoying and distracting. i have to give apple the credit for removing these noises. but as a program, i would say it's very good, it just doesn't fill any void in my digital life.
Posted by walkingmac at June 20, 2004 01:12 PM | Edit | Delete
I use it and love it... using NextGen 1.1 (Star Trek TNG) with some modification.
Posted by Lauren Waterbury at September 6, 2004 07:54 AM | Edit | Delete
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