05-12-2007, 08:53 AM

I remember a couple days after I got my Mac I found a little app built in to OS X which told me which apps were PowerPC and which were Universal Binary. But I cant find it now and I forgot it's name.

Can anyone tell me what its called and where it is. I believe it was in System Prefs, but I could be wrong.

05-12-2007, 09:11 AM

There are websites that have a list but I'm not aware of an installed app that does that??

Universal Applications

05-12-2007, 09:14 AM

Any app that's Intel-only loaded onto a Power PC machine wouldn't run, and vice-versa. So an app telling you which it is would be superfluous, since the app would have to be loaded anyway for it to know. However, I don't have an Intel machine, so I don't know from my own experience whether such an app exists. Edit: Sgt. Beavis's post below reminded me of Rosetta.

You may be thinking of a freeware app called TrimTheFat (a post that warns against ending up with two apps) that removes the extra freight carried by universal apps. I have a G4, so it pulls all the Intel coding. TrimTheFat saves a ton of space.

05-12-2007, 09:15 AM

If you go into the Activity Monitor and look under the "KIND" column, you will see if the app is running under PowerPC "Rosetta" or Intel instruction sets. Universal simply means the app was compiled so it can run natively on PowerPC or Intel.

05-12-2007, 09:56 AM

Originally Posted by Sgt Beavis

If you go into the Activity Monitor and look under the "KIND" column, you will see if the app is running under PowerPC "Rosetta" or Intel instruction sets. Universal simply means the app was compiled so it can run natively on PowerPC or Intel.

that was it! thanks.

I was just wondering because I got an app the other day and it's running kinda slow, so I wanted to find out if its because it's a PowerPC app running under Rosetta.

Turns out I was right - it's PowerPC.

05-12-2007, 11:46 AM

You can also select any app in the Finder and choose File > Get Info. Under General, it will say either PowerPC or Universal.