“Sales of Apple’s Macintosh computers have been growing much faster than PC sales overall, with many new Mac buyers switching from years of using Windows computers,” admits Walt Mossberg (allthingsd.com). And to help those who have made the switch, he’s assembled “a quick tip sheet explaining a few of the most common differences” between Mac OS Leopard and Windows.

Aperture 2: Professionally Manage Digital Photographs, a new title from Ben Long, Richard Harrington, and Orlando Luna, guides you step-by-step through the entire Aperture workflow, even providing hundreds of sample images to experiment with. Download the free Aperture 2 trial, work through the book’s in-depth tutorials, and you’ll see how far Aperture 2 can advance your photography.

Of three ultrathin portables — MacBook Air, Toshiba Portege, and Lenovo ThinkPad — which is the most usable? To find out, Computerworld turned to usability experts and 20 impartial testers. Those testers, David Haskin relates, found MacBook Air the most usable, the most fun, and the best value of the three. In fact, they made MacBook Air “the clear winner when asked which laptop they’d purchase.”

When open windows start piling up on your desktop, Mac OS X Leopard provides a great way to establish control. Spaces. How can Spaces help you get more organized? Find out by reading the latest Pro Tip of the Week.

Thanks to a new educational initiative, teachers and parents can now access a wealth of K-12 educational curricula on iTunes U. Delivered by state and district agencies in Arizona, Florida, Maine, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, and Utah, the free content provides “global access to educational content, curricula, learning materials, news, best practices, and other resources,” reports Dave Nagel (thejournal.com).

THE WAR, the most watched PBS series in the last decade, now serves another tour of duty as an excellent online educational resource. WETA, Washington D.C.’s public broadcasting station, provides film clips, lesson plans, and additional educational resources for students and teachers. Watch — and enjoy — them today on iTunes U.

Bob LeVitus (Houston Chronicle) considers the 17-inch MacBook Pro “the fastest, most powerful, and most capable notebook I’ve tested.” And he’s particularly taken with its display. “All I can say is, ‘Wow.’ With its bright, deeply saturated colors and rich, dark blacks, full-screen HD video is mind-boggling.”

Get Smart introduced us to Bruce and Lloyd. Now the two, played by Masi Oka (Heroes) and Nate Torrence (Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip) appear in their own film: Bruce and Lloyd: Out of Control. A hilarious treat for the holiday weekend, it’s available online exclusively on iTunes for purchase or rental. Enjoy.

Ever wished you could drag the contents of one PDF into another? You can — using Preview in Mac OS X Leopard. We show you how in the latest Quick Tip of the Week.

As a scientist, your Mac can be a valuable asset, especially when it comes time to share your research findings with colleagues. To find out how you can use tools on your Mac to create research posters, websites, and dynamic presentations, visit the Science Productivity Lab, where you’ll find tips and tutorials created with the needs of the scientific community in mind.

“comScore has today released the results of a study into iPhone related searches” during the month of April, reports Davey Winder (itwire.com).The study “reveals that there were 6.9 million searches on related keywords during that period.” Of the 6.9 million searches, 1.5 million of them were for the term “iPhone” and Google delivered 88.4% of the search returns.

After surveying “more than 700 senior IT administrators” and executives, Yankee Group Research Inc found that “nearly 80% of businesses have Macs in-house, nearly double the percentage that said they had users running Mac OS X two years ago,” reports Gregg Keizer (computerworld.com).

New York City’s 92nd Street Y has been serving community interests for more than 133 years. And, now — thanks to iTunes U — it brings its programming to a really large community. For example, “92Y: George Carlin,” just one of the many programs available from 92Y: Online, lets us spend some time with Judy Gold and George Carlin, the renowned comedian who died this week.

If you’re a business customer anxious to get off to a great start with your new Mac, you’ll want to sign up for a free, online seminar. It’s called “New to the Mac for Business Users.” Watch it, and you’ll find out how you can run Windows applications on a Mac, download your email from a corporate Exchange server, give presentations to clients using iChat theater, exchange files over a network, and much more.

When Maximum PC pit the MacBook Pro against the Dell XPS M1530, Apple’s pro notebook walked away the clear winner. Awarding MacBook Pro an impressive score of 9 (out of 10), editors praised its thinness (calling it “impressive next to other notebooks in its class”), its fast GeForce 8600M GT graphic processor, its “top-notch” Intel processor, and its battery life. It also found Mac OS X “really, really slick.”

When National Geographic photographer Steve Winter reviewed his snow leopard images in Aperture, he was literally seeing them for the very first time. Knowing Snow Leopards to be notoriously camera shy, Winter set up 14 camera traps to capture remotely the photos selected for the recent National Geographic article and gallery — just a small sample of the 30,000 he edited and processed in Aperture.

Piggyback loans, death bonds, shareholder mansions, ear marks — if you’re puzzled by financial jargon, get the skinny on less-than-clear economic lingo from iTunes U. Money 101: Buzzwords, an excellent audio podcast from American Public Media, takes about a minute to explain arcane financial buzzwords in terms we all can understand.

Whether you’re formatting a hard drive or simply deleting files you’ve dragged to the Trash, Mac OS X Leopard offers options for securely deleting the data you no longer need but don’t want anyone else to access. Find out how you can take advantage of Leopard’s secure delete options by watching the latest Quick Tip of the Week.

On assignment for Sports Illustrated Kids, photographer Bill Frakes visited the Kona Skatepark to capture moves made by the latest generation of young athletes at the world’s oldest skateboard park. As part of his all-Mac production, Frakes processed his still images in Aperture, exporting his select to Final Cut Pro. There, he mixed in music created in GarageBand and added video and audio tracks recorded on scene.

It only takes a few minutes to create a new event in iCal — and just one or two more to share that event with friends or colleagues. In fact, iCal does most of the work for you, as you’ll discover by reading the latest Pro Tip of the Week.