When it's time to leave your Mac for a while, you want a nice quick way of putting it to sleep and a little bit of flexibility in how you do it. Midnight can either put your Mac into its standard sleep mode or into hibernation mode (also referred to as 'safe sleep' or 'deep sleep'). In addition to choosing a particular sleep mode you can choose whether your Mac should switch to the log-in screen before going to sleep. If your Mac doesn't support safe sleep you can still use Midnight but the hibernation option will be disabled. Midnight is a clever little fella and can handle all this for you without ever needing to know your administrator's password. Apple only officially supports safe sleep on the PowerBook G4 (Double-Layer SD) together with all of the new Intel books and desktops, so Midnight does just the same. Donations gratefully received.
Not recommended deep sleep mode wireless mouse/keyboard
MrMcMac
Pros
Puts the Mac to sleep rapidly, really shutting it down but without quitting your running programs.
Cons
Seems to take longer to get back to business than starting the computer from the off position. Does not scan for bluetooth, so if you use a wireless mouse and/or keyboard, you have to use a wired mouse to re-scan and enable them.
Summary
I will say I've only used the product a half dozen times. Only because I forgot between uses what a chore it is (for me) to get back to work on my iMac. If I turn off the Mighty Mouse and Wireless keyboard, it presents several problems. The first is, you can't awaken the computer using these devices, you have to use the on/off button on the rear of the machine. When it does power up, the mouse cursor is right where you left it, on the deep sleep button in the Widgets display, so if you attempt to pair the mouse, and I think I did, it puts the computer back into a deep sleep. A connected wired mouse was never initialized, so I could not move the cursor.
Now, I may be doing something wrong, out of order, etc., to put myself in this predicament. The only work around I could see was to leave the wireless mouse and keyboard turned off until the Mac was completely restored (and a Time Machine backup finished) then put it back to sleep with the on/off button, power up the bluetooth devices, and go through the process of re-pairing them using the wired mouse.
Given the hassle, I (finally) removed this Widget from my Mac, and shall continue to use the tried and true "Sleep" mode from t he Apple Menu or by hitting the on/off switch for a second. So much easier.
100% CPU on iMac G5
ColinT
Pros
Cons
Summary
This review was originally posted on VersionTracker.com.<br />It pulls 100% cpu on my iMac G5 when loaded.