Dashboard Widgets, MacRiot’s Freeware Picks

Since the release of Mac OS X 10.4.2, Tiger we’ve been messing with Dashboard and perusing Dashboard widget after widget and the Macriot crew has rounded up a few ‘must-have’ freeware widgets other than the generic lot that ship with Tiger.

We’re fun-loving people so we’ve focused on games and geek monitors that will keep you posted in real-time on the going-ons within your Mac. Here’s our selection:

Games

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Asteriods – A all time classic arcade game that will keep you entertained for hours or minutes depending on how long your Mac takes to render the iMovie you’re working on.

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Advanced Snake – “A Javascript implementation of the classic game of snake — green and orange, nothing better! There are currently only ten levels, but more shall be added soon. Features three difficulty modes.”

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Minesweeper – A mini version of the long-running Windows game. Simple, small and sweet to wile away the minutes between downloads or renders.

Geek Monitors

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SysStat – “Allows you to view memory usage, CPU usage, network stats, uptimes, load averages and the top 3 process’s from one simple widget. Authors Brad Gale and Jonathon Zdziarski. Graphics by Marc Edwards.”

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miniCpuHeat – Works with most Mac models equipped with CPU temperature monitors and takes average temperature of dual processor Macs. Great monitor to provide you an early warning in the event your CPU fan is damaged; preventing CPU over-heating.

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miniUptime – Tracks your Mac’s uptime, giving more detail information if your Mac is up for more than 1 day.

Click on the titles to be brought to the relevant download sites. “Register and post a comment to share your favourite widgets with the rest of us!…”