There are some Mac users frequently use, including iTunes, safari, iPhoto, calendar and iCloud, no matter on old Mac OS operating system or the newest Yosemite. Don’t Miss: However, sometimes you may encounter some issues when using these popular apps, such as iTunes – Check.

Or you would be tired of using these apps and want to try some new. In these situations, alternative apps could make difference. In this post, we offer all Mac users some top alternatives to iTunes, iCloud, iPhoto, Safari and Calendar.

All of these alternatives are compatible with Mac OS X 10.10 and the new-released 10.11 El Capitan. Now let’s check them by following the list below.

Best iTunes Alternatives on Mac Probably you are using iTunes to manage iPhone, iPad or iPod on your Mac. Even though the iTunes is widely used, it has its drawbacks and problems. Just as you get used to your version of iTunes, Apple launches a new different update that you need to spend a lot of time trying to figure it out. In addition, transferring of data between iOS device and Mac is always a very dreary process. To make this much simpler, here are some popular you can have a try.

You May Like: 1. AnyTrans ($ 39.99). AnyTrans is an all-in-one iOS contents management tool that gives users fully control on iOS contents. With AnyTrans, you can manage your iPhone or iPad freely and easily without the restrictions of iTunes. Top Features:. Sync almost all types of iOS contents to your Mac - from a message to the whole music library, AnyTrans is capable of syncing up to of personal info, multimedia data, and even app document and files. Transfer music from your iPhone, iPad or iPod touch to your Mac and vice versa.

AnyTrans allows you to transfer selected songs to from your Mac to iPhone, iPad or iPod touch without erasing the existed music on your device. The Six well-marked buttons on the homepage provides you the possibility of one-click to transfer data to anywhere as you want. Allows you to access and export valued data from iCould. You can directly visit your iCloud backups from AnyTrans, view the backup, and even download the selective items to your computer. You May Like: 2.

TunesOver ($ 39.95). TunesOver TunesOver is an ultimate media management solution for your iDevice and Mac. It manages to detect your iDevice contents and provides you with one-click to transfer all music to your iTunes without duplicating any contents you have got on your iTunes library. Top Features:. It allows you to transfer music, playlist with artwork, rating and play counts from iPhone, iPad and iPod to Mac or iTunes library without duplicating contents. When transfer videos or music to iPhone, iPad or iPod touch, TunesOver will directly turn the file format into the device compatible format.

It manages to backup music, movies, TV shows, photos, e-books, audio books on to Mac. It's very helpful in case your computer crashed or you've deleted the files by mistake. Part 2: Best iCloud Alternatives on Mac There are always some about iCloud, such as slow speed to backup iPhone.

After Yosemite was released last year, iCloud brought iCloud Drive for Mac - one folder named iCloud Drive on Mac. You can drag and drop files/data to this folder, and then all of these files will be uploaded to the iCloud server so that you can access them on any iPhone, iPad or iPod touch by using the same Apple ID. However, Apple still only gives its users limited 5GB storage space for free.

Must Read: If you have large files need to be stored and synced, 5 GB free storage space is far enough. Therefore, we offer you these two below so that you can choose the one suit for you to backup data on Mac/MacBook.

1.Dropbox ($ 9.99/month). Dropbox To be honest, iCloud Drive of Apple is exactly like Dropbox, both of them work on the same principle – users drag files into the folder created on computer and then access to the synced files on their mobile devices. Top Features:. Put files in Dropbox and access to it from your computer, mobile phones and tablets. Edit, add and share docs, photos and vidoes anytime anywhere.

Ensure your stuff safe even if your mobile device is broken, lost or stolen. Also offer storage service for business to help companies manage and share files among their team members easily. Enjoy 1 TB storage space by paying $9.99/month (when using iCloud only have 500GB at same price) Important Note: When using Dropbox for storing files and data, you only can enjoy 2 GB free storage space. Google Drive ($ 9.99/1 TB).

Google Drive Similarly, Google Drive also works on same principle – drag files in folder and then access to them on mobile devices. But you also can choose to upload files to Google server on webpage without installing Google Drive App on your Mac. Top Features:. Store, sync and share files with ease. Get access to files you stored in Google Drive from desktop, mobile phones, laptop, etc. Enjoy free 15 GB storage space. Have extra 15 GB free storage space when sharing across Google Drive and Gmail.

Easily open the files you synced without buying extra software. Note: Google Drive also offers storage service for business.

Related Reading. Pixa Pixa is a Mac application that manages your pictures, helping you to quickly find and share them. You can browse by image color, use a picker to click and extract the exact RGB (or other) color codes, and you can quickly export your pictures to many formats. Top Features. Pixa supports all the image formats you need: psd, ai, svg, jpg, png, tiff, pdf, bmp, gif, ico, icns, tga, raw, LittleSnapper, Pixen, Acorn, Sketch and Pixelmator. You can browse the pictures by folder, Project (Album), Screenshots or Recent, and the app can make and store its own screenshots. Freely share images via Dropbox, CloudApp or Imgur, and Pixa also offers the standard Mac OS X sharing options.

You can add a bunch of pictures directly to the app. Tags can be added, and metadata is pulled in whenever it can be. Photos are also tagged with their color on import so you can access this info elsewhere. You May Like: 2. PhotoTrans($ 29.99).

PhotoTrans for Mac is a handy iPhone iPad photo transfer software, which is made to transfer, organize and showcase your photos between iPhone, iPad and Mac. It manages to access the Camera Roll, Photo Stream, Photo Library and every single album, and lets you organize your photos on iPhone, iPad and computer as easy as buying a cup of coffee. Top Features:. Allows you to export your photos from Camera Roll, Photo Library, Photo Stream and Albums to the Mac all at once.

Freely import photos to your iPhone or iPad from any iTunes libraries on any Mac or PC. In addition, it won't erase the original photos and albums stored on your device. Organize the Albums on your Mac with ease. You can import, export and create new Album directly on your Mac. By showcasing your photos in a slideshow, or letting it auto-play itself, you can sit around with families or friends to watch them on the Mac with the full size.

Related Reading. Google Chrome Google Chrome is the fastest web browser, of course, it's also the most popular browser. The browser fully supports Mac OS X Full Screen mode - which coexists with Chrome's own, functionally identical Presentation Mode. Top Features:. It is designed to be the fastest web browser.

It's quick to start up from your Mac desktop, loads web pages in a snap, and runs complex web applications lightning fast. The browser window is clean and simple. For example, you can quickly and easily search and navigate from the same box and arrange tabs as you want. It is designed to keep you secure on the web with built-in malware and phishing protection, auto-updates ensures you the latest security fixes. You can freely customize your Chrome. Download jabber for macbook.

It's easy to tweak your settings and add apps, extensions, and themes from the Chrome Web Store. You May Like: 2.

Opera (Free). Opera Opera is not the most popular desktop or mobile browser, nor widely used, but it's can be regard as the dark horse in the browser battle with its its features and security options.

It is compatible across every platform and device. Top Features:. Native BitTorrent supports (downloading via Torrents just got a lot easier) and a 'Turbo' mode, which optimizes web pages for times when your bandwidth is limited. It stays ahead of the curve with a new integrated mail client, and also is featured with one-click bookmarking and tab stacks.

It stays ahead of the curve with a new integrated mail client, one-click bookmarking and tab stacks. Opera also supports mouse gestures, which are similar to keyboard shortcuts but use the mouse. Note: To change the default browser on your Mac OS X: Open Safari, choose Safari Preferences and select the General tab. The first menu option is 'Default Web browser', and you can click to choose your preferred browser. Fantastical Fantastical for Mac is a good assistant to help you manage your Calendar and Reminders, all from one convenient interface with just a few clicks. As well as you link all of your accounts to this app, you can instantly access appointments, make new events, and prioritize tasks right from the app's drop-down main screen.

Top Features:. Fantastical sits in the menu bar of your Mac, providing a drop down menu rather than taking the whole screen. It is just as easy as on the iPhone to add events and reminders with natural language input and a text field at the top of the screen. Recognize the location of your event and allows you to invite people from your Address Book to the event. You can edit and delete events with ease. Just select the event you want to change and take control of your event with a single click or keystroke. Must Read: 2.

BusyCal($ 49.99). BusyCal BusyCal for Mac is an unique calendar app that provides powerful time-saving features in a friendly and easy-to-use package. BusyCal makes it easy to organize multiple calendars, reminders, notifications for events, and even the ability to create events using voice commands. It is designed for families and small workgroups, and allows users to easily share calendars on a local area network. Top Features:. Supports display your calendar by Month, Week, Day, Year or List and customize the number of weeks shown per month, or days shown per week.

Sync and share calendars with iCloud, Exchange, Google Calendar, and other CalDAV servers, enabling you to sync and share your calendars with other Macs running BusyCal or the built-in Calendar app on OS X. Manage To Dos easily, like display the To Dos directly in your calendar, create repeating To Dos, and sync To Dos with the Reminders app on OS X and iOS. Related Articles You May Like.

What is HDRInstant is a cross-platform desktop application for Windows designed to grab still images from video footage. It uses its own algorithm to analyze the sharpest frames of your footage then stack neighboring frames to produce an image with high dynamic range (HDR). (Credit: Ant Pruitt) Typical HDR production happens when a photographer takes three or more images in succession of a scene, but with. For example, three shots are snapped. One image is overexposed, the second has balanced exposure, the third is underexposed.

Photographers then use photo editing software to blend the three images together into one final shot which in turn creates a higher dynamic range in the image. The shadows are dark, but still allow you to see detail.

The highlights are not blown out, but are just bright enough for more drama. FOLLOW for all the latest app news.

HDRInstant is essentially following the same process, but uses video frames instead. In addition to this processing, the images can be output to a 16-bit or 32-bit rendering, which is much higher than the typical 8-bit structure seen with most photography shown online. This larger bit depth gives more flexibility when it comes to post-processing and the final image quality. Getting started with HDRInstant Three versions of this application - Free, Light, and Pro - are available as well as a plugin for users running Adobe Lightroom. The version pricing ranges from $25 to $99 for a license.

Of course, each price bracket gives you specific features. In my review, I found that the Pro version the way to go. Photographers may find the tools offered to be quite useful. The Free and Light versions seem to be a crapshoot where you hope the algorithm gets it right when it comes to creating the final image. At least with the Pro version, you can make tonal adjustments and fine-tune your final image.

Pros. The app works. The app really crunches the numbers in trying to figure out the best frames in your video footage to be considered for an actual still image.

Ease of use really helps. Pick your frame, pick your neighboring frames, combine the frames, tone map, export. Exported images are rich with detail, color, and dynamic range. The quality is also improved. Notice the images below. The processed image is on the left. The original is on the right.

Both images received the exact same tone mapping and post processing. The image on the left is definitely better in quality and clarity. (Credit: Ant Pruitt) Cons. Speed.

Rendering 16 or 32-bit images is a lot of work on a computer. I'm running an 8-core CPU, and the app still took several minutes to complete the image compilation. GPUs not used.

Installed graphics processing units are not utilized at all for the rendering. Pricing seems a little steep for what is being offered.

'Time is money' is the common phrase creative artists say. This takes quite a bit of time. Rendering from 4K/UHD video may take almost an hour to produce an HDR image with this software. This image wasn't finished rendering just yet and my CPU was definitely getting taxed. (Credit: Ant Pruitt) Bottom line The application would be OK if the pricing wasn't set to $100, in my opinion. The final images did look nice upon rendering. Unfortunately, I personally couldn't find value spending that much time and system resources on compiling an image that I would probably have to spend another five to ten minutes tone-mapping and processing.

GPU support isn't currently offered with HDRInstant, but the team advised that this is something on the project board to be considered for future versions of the software. Even though this software was pitched to me as an option for getting more out of your drone video, it works better with a larger images sensor such as those found on a DSLR or mirrorless camera. If you add great quality to this process, you'll get great quality on output. What software are you using to pull stills from video? Tag me on Twitter with your thoughts.

I've previously used the screen-capture option in Windows or the frame capture built into Adobe Premiere Pro. Granted, I don't get HDR images, but I do get nice quality images in less time with those methods.

Apps. Windows and MacOS. You can get HDRInstant for Windows and MacOS. You'll have to register your email address to get the download via. Note that MacOS compatibility is only via the Lightroom Plugin.

(Credit: Ant Pruitt) Competitive products. Adobe Premiere Pro. Using Premiere Pro or any other NLE video editing software, you can export individual frames as a still image. Sometimes this is just as useful and faster. Creating dynamic range wouldn't be easily possible, if at all possible. At any rate, you can still process still frames with your photo editor of choice.

Top 4 Alternatives To Hdrinstant For Mac Os

(Credit: Ant Pruitt). S creenshot function from Windows or Mac. This clearly isn't the most elegant way to go about getting still images from your video, but it's doable. Depending upon the quality of still image needed, this can be useful for quick grabs.

Also see. (TechRepublic). (TechRepublic). (TechRepublic).

(CNET). (ZDNet).