Ian Austen (nytimes.com) takes a look at Aperture 2 and finds that it “offers a more accessible, streamlined facade and makes it easier to handle photos in full-screen mode. It is also much faster.”

Spend lots of time in email? Then wouldn’t it be great if you had a quick and easy way to create a convenient To-Do list when you get a message about something you need, well, to do? In Leopard Mail, you’re just a right-click away from creating a new item for your To-Do list. Find out how in the latest Quick Tip of the Week.

According to Jim Dalrymple (macworld.com), Time Capsule, the wireless hard drive you can use to back up multiple Mac computers using Time Machine in Mac OS X Leopard, has begun shipping. “Notifications of the shipments began reaching customers that pre-ordered the device early this morning,” he reports.

In the making of No Country for Old Men, Joel and Ethan Coen prove “just how influential a Mac and the right software can be,” writes Jim Dalrymple (macworld.com). “The movie won four Oscars at this year’s Academy Awards, including Best Picture. In fact, it is the first movie edited with a completely digital workflow on Mac to win the Oscar. ‘They [Apple] made it really easy for us — we cut now much the same way we cut on film [using Final Cut Pro]. It’s hugely faster,’ said Ethan Coen.”

After all, as Julio Ojeda-Zapata (twincities.com) explains, “Apple TV is a joy to use.” And it proved “a godsend for one of my family’s recent movie nights” when frigid temperatures precluded a trip to a video store. He downloaded Disney’s The Game Plan, and the movie “was ready for watching soon after the download initiated. Viewing was flawless; ditto for Garfield, another family-night rental.” What’s more, “movie rentals sound superb on the Apple TV, as well, now that it has support for Dolby Digital 5.1 surround sound.”

The film No Country for Old Men won four Oscars at this year’s Academy Awards, including Best Picture.  Find out more about the making of the film by listening to a podcast recorded during last year’s Tribeca Film Festival. In the podcast, director Barry Sonnenfeld chats with Joel Coen and Ethan Coen about their filmmaking experiences in general and their use of Final Cut Pro to edit No Country for Old Men. Enjoy.

Before this year’s Oscars, Larry Magid (cbsnews.com) realized that he hadn’t seen a number of the nominated movies. Last year that might have meant a trip to the video store. “But this year, we got to watch our rented nominated films in our living room on our high definition set thanks to Apple’s newly enhanced Apple TV.” And, Magid notes, “you don’t have to use your computer to buy or rent movies, music or download free podcasts to your TV. You can do it from the comfort of your easy chair using only the small Apple remote control. The process is incredibly simple.”

Apple today announced that iTunes is now the number two music retailer in the US, trailing only Wal-Mart.* The iTunes Store — now with over 50 million customers — has sold over four billion songs. In fact, it sold an incredible 20 million songs on Christmas Day 2007 alone. And with over six million songs from all of the major and thousands of independent labels, it offers the world’s largest music catalog.

* Based on the latest data from the NPD Group.

Apple today introduced new models of the MacBook and MacBook Pro. MacBook Pro models feature the latest Intel Core 2 Duo processors (running at up to 2.6GHz with 6MB of shared L2 cache), larger hard drives (up to 300GB), and 2GB of memory standard in most models. They also include the latest NVIDIA graphics processors — with up to 512MB of video memory — and an innovative Multi-Touch trackpad, first introduced in MacBook Air.

The three new models of the MacBook feature faster processors and hard drives: sleek white 2.1 GHz and 2.4 GHz models with 120GB or 160GB 5400 rpm hard drives and a stunning black 2.4 GHz model with a massive 250GB 5400 rpm hard drive. The 2.4 GHz MacBook ships with 2GB of memory standard, expandable up to 4GB across the line.

Available immediately, the new MacBook and MacBook Pro models start at just $1,099 and $1,999, respectively.