Odds & Ends: Software Update and Disk First Aid error; Work-around for iBook sound bug; more

Software Update mistakenly lists Disk First Aid 8.6.1 Pieter Coolsma writes: "A few weeks ago I updated Disk First Aid to version 8.6.1. But today, when I ran Software Update, it said I needed to update to the same version again." Many other readers have reported the same symptom. We checked and saw it ourselves. Even though we have left DFA where it was initially installed and have not changed its name, and even though a week or so ago it did not appear in the Software Update listing, it appears now. It must be some bug in Apple's servers for Software Update.

Update: One reader suggested that deleting Software Update Preferences and/or Software Update Logs might fix this. We tried it. It did not help. One other thing we did note: even though Disk First Aid is listed, it is not "pre-checked" in the checkbox; other software that we have not yet downloaded is pre-checked.

Deleting Sound Preferences works around iBook sound bug Regarding yesterday's report of a sound volume bug with the new Dual USB iBooks, Brian Scarborough confirms it. He found that trashing Sound Preferences was at least a temporary work-around.

FoolProof log in causes Finder quit? Marcello Rodi reports: "I've been successfully running FoolProof Security 3.4.2 along with Virex 6.1 on G3s and G4s with 9.0.4. I recently put Mac OS 9.1 and FoolProof Security 3.5 on a few of these Macs. FoolProof continued to work well except that if you have the computer set up to require logging in by authorized users, the Finder quits when you try to launch an application without logging in first. Disabling the Virex control panel eliminated the symptom."

Update: Marcello informs us: "It turns out that the culprit was a shipping mistake. Apple sent me a 9.1 CD that is for English International. I tried FoolProof with the North American English 9.1 and everything now works great."

Toast Reader 5 triggers freeze With Toast 4, Toast CD Reader has been reported to cause< various problems (see this item for example). Based on this MacFixit Forums thread (Toast 5.01 CD Reader incompatibilities), Reader problems persist with Toast 5.

iBook (Dual USB): How to Find the Serial Number TIL article 88138 explains how to find what the title indicates.