Mac Gems: iStat Menus is a standout app for monitoring your Mac
It pays to know what’s going on inside your Mac, whether you’re watching your free memory or monitoring hardware. To that end, almost no piece of software does what Bjango’s $16 iStat Menus 4.05 achieves, offering full monitoring of your system’s CPU, RAM, and disk usage; network activity; component temperatures; fan speeds; Bluetooth functionality; and international dates and times. If you crave useful, at-a-glance information about your Mac’s components, iStat Menus puts that data right in your menu bar.
The Temperature module shows readouts for just about every sensor and component in your Mac.
Over the years, iStat Menus has undergone some few radical transformations, growing beyond its origins as a freeware System Preferences pane to become a full-fledged application—but it has grown up gracefully. You can customize the application, which now resides in your menu bar, to display information about the specific components you’d like to watch. On my 2011 13-inch MacBook Pro, I prefer to display the Battery, Network, Hard Drive, RAM, and CPU modules on display. Dragging the desired components into place is easy enough.
Charts in the CPU module display what your processor is going through, and if anything is out of order.
iStat Menus offers generous portions of valuable technical information in a readily digestible format. A quick click on the Temperature-sensor module, for instance, reveals the temperatures for each element of your computer, down to components such as the CPU cores, your MacBook’s palm rest and battery, and so on. The utility can display historical data as a chart that allows you to see exactly how each component in your Mac has performed over time. This feature is handy for diagnosing components that may be failing, and outside of a few programs—including the tools generally leased to Apple Certified Macintosh Technicians—it’s rare to find a program that offers readouts for specific modules, sensors, and system components.
An easy-to-understand readout displays your battery's health, cycles, and overall status.
Other features, such as a battery-cycle counter and -condition readout, help answer pertinent questions, such as whether your battery is in good shape and when you might need to fork out some dough to Apple for a replacement. Shortcuts for Apple’s Activity Monitor, Console, Terminal, System Profiler, and System Preferences give you easy access, so you don’t have to wade through the /Applications/Utilities folder to get to the app you want.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
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