In the run-up to the September release of Snow Leopard, some questions arose as to whether Adobe's Creative Suite 4 package would be compatible with the new OS X.

Given the number of Mac users who are reliant on one or more Adobe products to make a living, this was understandably a pretty big concern for the Mac community. To address those issues, Adobe has posted a Q&A about how its software will work with Snow Leopard.

The short of it is that no, Snow Leopard won't kill CS4. The outlook for the earlier CS3 family isn't as clear, though we will all find out soon enough. So, if you're running CS4, no worries, everything will run fine. If you're running an earlier version that is essential for your job, you may want to hold off a bit and let other people try it out.

As an aside, good move by Adobe to address this issue before Snow Leopard was released. The company took grief for being slow to update CS to Universal Binary, and this was a nice move for a very sizable portion of their user base in creative professionals who use Macs.

If you weren't already sick of the talk of Apple's mystery Mac tablet device, here's a little more to push you over the edge.

The latest talk, this time coming from industry analyst Richard Doherty of Envisioneering Group, has the company pegged for not one, but two different touch-screen enabled devices.

The first device would sport a six-inch screen and act something like an oversized iPod touch. Meanwhile, a second device would be larger and function more like a Mac than a handset. That device, according to Doherty, would be able to run conventional Mac software and could be geared towards tasks such as photo and video editing. I'm sure more than one photographer out there has to be excited by such a prospect.

Time frame still remains an issue. Doherty claims that both devices are still awaiting the ultimate approval of Steve Jobs, leading one to believe that the release would not take place until January. Other reports, however, suggest that the new mystery tablet could be coming as soon as September.

Apple's share of the smartphone market has soared over the last year, according to analysts.

Research firm Gartner said in a recent report that the iPhone accounted for 13.3 per cent of all smartphone sales last quarter, up from 2.8 per cent in the same period of 2008.

Apple's 13.3 per cent share was good enough to place the company third amongst smartphone vendors. Nokia retained the top billing with some 18.4 million units sold and a 45 per cent share, followed by Research in Motion, which staked an 18.7 per cent share.

Much of the boost was credited to the continued global expansion of the device, which logged some 5.4 million units sold. The report noted the rollout of the iPhone 3GS and introduction of a $99 model as other factors.

Obviously Apple wants to keep revenues growing and new customers pouring in, but one has to wonder a bit if the company has reached a sort of "comfort zone" in terms of market share.

The company has a well-known policy of staying out of the larger mainstream market; it doesn't do cheap, low-end stuff. This has the financial advantage of keeping profit margins high, and it's why the company continues to thrive with the Macintosh despite having a share of the PC market that fluctuates between five and ten per cent.

Perhaps Apple may be reaching a similar point with the iPhone. The smartphone market is still booming, and the company may be happy to keep the current iPhone lineup and price range for a while.

Apple MacBook Pro hard drives keep stalling temporarily, according to customer complaints on Apple's own support forums.

Apple has said it is currently trying to fix the problem - that affects notebooks with 7,200rpm 500GB hard drives - with a software update.

Customers have complained that their notebook beeps, the hard drive clicks and then their computer stalls for about 10 seconds before going back to normal.

Customers have said the stalling is random and is not because of third party devices or peripherals being attached. Some have said their computers stall about 15 times a day.

One Apple Support Forum, called Hardrive click + beep, now has more than 88 pages with about 1,300 complaints.

A video of computer stalling, along with the clicks and beeps, has been posted to YouTube.

Earlier this week, Apple marketing chief Phil Schiller did something very out of character for an Apple exec: he talked to a member of the press. Not at a press conference or event, but in an email, as a response to a blog posting.

Schiller sent an email to Daring Fireball's John Gruber in regards to an earlier posting Gruber had made about the App Store's review process. The article centered on a dictionary app that was censored. The exec corrects a few points and clarifies the company's stance.

You can read about the story itself on Daring Fireball, so let's look into the more remarkable fact that the company is taking this seriously enough that executives are personally responding to news reports and blog postings.

As with most companies, Apple shields its executives from the press with a full compliment of press contacts and media relations people. It's pretty rare for any executive to speak with reporters outside of the context of press conferences or product releases.

Gruber is a well-known and respected member of the Mac blogging community, but for someone as high-ranking as Schiller to address the post, the company has apparently had enough of the bad press and is now working to address what it sees as inaccurate coverage.

Hopefully this extends beyond the App Store and into the company's other product lines. Personally, I welcome factual corrections from companies, it makes the stories better and assures that all sides are heard from. Apple is notoriously tight-lipped with the press, and sometimes that means that they take heat for things unjustly.