No, You’re Not Going Crazy
ByIf you’ve updated to Mac OS 10.4.9 since it was released last week, you may have fallen victim to an update that wasn’t highly publicized by Apple. To address a problem where PoweBook and MacBook users have been ejecting the CD by accidentally pressing the Eject key (which, granted, is dangerously close to the function keys and not really separated on the Power/MacBook keyboard layout), the 10.4.9 update introduced a “key delay” for that key to curb accidental ejections. Unfortunately, they didn’t really tell anyone about it, and there’s no setting to adjust for desktop Mac users who have a completely separate key and are less prone to accidental ejection.
Now, if we were talking about the ejector seat in a car or plane, I’d absolutely want to prevent accidental pressing of the key. But this is a CD. If you eject it accidentaly, yeah, you may lose a few seconds, but is the fix worth the frustration this has caused some Mac users who are suddenly thinking their keyboards (or minds) are on the blink?
Apple’s Doc on the subject explains the behavior, but doesn’t give much background. There’s also the unusual “This document will be updated as more information becomes available” line at the end of the document. Maybe that means there’s a fix for the fix underway? Who knows at this point…