Apple recently presented this year’s operating systems, and they are full of new features to boost your productivity and increase your fun. macOS Ventura, iOS 16, and iPadOS 16 also have a number of useful new features to enhance your security and privacy. Most of these features are present in all of the operating systems. Here’s an overview of what to look forward to this fall.
Read the rest of the article on The Mac Security Blog.
For this year’s Worldwide Developer Conference, Apple has presented the new operating systems that we’ll be downloading in a few months. macOS Ventura, iOS 16, iPadOS 16, and watchOS 9 were all highlighted in a two-hour presentation. In addition, Apple has shown off two new Mac laptops that will be available next month.
Read the rest of the article on The Mac Security Blog.
If you use a Mac, iPhone, or iPad, you can store files in iCloud Drive, Apple’s cloud storage service. This is just one of the many iCloud features available, ranging from privacy and backups to cloud sync of your photos and music library.
iCloud Drive is especially useful if you have two Macs; you can sync your Desktop and Documents folders to iCloud Drive, so you can easily switch between working on a desktop Mac and a laptop. And you can even access these files on your iPhone or iPad.
In this article, I’ll explain how iCould Drive works, and tell you how you can get the most out of this service.
Read the rest of the article on The Mac Security Blog.
iCloud is the umbrella for Apple’s services that you can access with your Mac, iPhone, or iPad. Not all of the company’s services; there are other services, such as Apple Music, Apple TV+, Apple Arcade, and others, which you access with a paid subscription. But iCloud is the backbone of the services you use to manage your data and communicate with others.
In this article, I’ll explain what all the various elements of iCloud are, and how they work together.
Read the rest of the article on The Mac Security Blog.
The ports that you use to connect keyboards, mice, and hard drives to your Macs have changed over the years. Current Macs have USB-C, which provide standard USB speeds, along with faster Thunderbolt to compatible peripherals. But what’s the difference between USB-C and Thunderbolt ports, and how can you tell them apart? And which cables do you need to get the most out of them?
In this article, I’m going to explain what Thunderbolt and USB-C ports are, how to identify them, how they work, which features they offer, and how to choose the right cables for your needs.
Read the rest of the article on The Mac Security Blog.
Apple has long tried to convince people that the iPad can replace a computer; that it can be a mobile device that does everything that most people need to do on a laptop. To this end, Apple has tried to make iPadOS more flexible through a series of multi-tasking features, such as Split View, and Slide Over, and Center Window.
Apple first introduced multitasking features back in iOS 9, and expanded on them with iOS 13, but they were hard to use, and most iPad users only encountered them when an accidental swipe on their tablet’s screen enabled them. Now, in iPadOS 15, these features are a lot more usable, and easy to discover.
In this article, I’ll explain how to use multitasking on the iPad to view two apps at a time, and more.
Read the rest of the article on The Mac Security Blog.
When you buy an iPhone, you have several options. You can choose from a few different models; you can pick a color; you can select how much storage you want. The Phone 12 starts at 128 GB, and you have two other options, 256 GB or 512 GB. This amount affects what you can put on the device: apps, photos, videos, music, etc.
But you never see any options for RAM.
If you look at specs for new Android phones however, you’ll see how much RAM the devices have. Take Google’s Pixel phones, for example. If you look at the specs for the phones, you’ll see that “Memory & Storage” is a section in the specs. The Pixel 5 has 8 GB RAM, and the Pixel 4 models only have 6 GB RAM. Might those two extra gigabytes of RAM sway a potential purchaser to opt for a more expensive phone?
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Taking screenshots on your Mac, iPhone, or iPad, is a great way to save things. Rather than save a URL of a web page, you can save a picture of it, so you can see it exactly as it was at the time you shot it. You may want to do this when you’ve bought something online, and want to keep a record of the purchase confirmation. You may also take screenshots just to remember items you’ve been shopping for on your iPhone or iPad, or to send to a friend to show them something you’ve seen. Or you may take a screenshot of some text to post on social media. Or, you may need to take screenshots to demonstrate a problem with your device.
On macOS, iOS, and iPadOS, it’s easy to take screenshots, crop them, and annotate them, and they save to the Photos app (on iOS and iPadOS) or to the Finder, so you can access them quickly. You can even take screenshots of your Apple Watch.
Here’s how to take screenshots on Apple devices.
Read the rest of the article on The Mac Security Blog.
We’ve finally got the second delivery of Apple’s M1 Macs, after the first salvo, last fall, with updated versions of the Mac mini, MacBook Air, and 13″ Mac Pro. But these models were simply new gets in old clothes; the new 24″ iMac has a totally new design, replacing the older 21.5″ model. This new iMac increases the display from 4K to 4.5K, with only small changes in the computer’s size. We also now have Apple’s M1 chip powering the latest iPad Pro models, both at the same size as previously, 11″ and 12.9″.
Here’s what’s new in these devices.
Read the rest of the article on The Mac Security Blog.
In 2010, Apple released the first iPad. Available in one size (9.7″), with three storage options (16, 32, or 64 GB), a Wi-Fi only version was released first, with a Wi-Fi and cellular model following shortly after. At the time, this ground-breaking device was competing with netbooks (remember them?) for primacy in the lightweight/portable device market. It didn’t take long for the iPad, and the tablet in general, to flourish.
Over the years, Apple has iterated the iPad many times, with nearly two dozen different models in many sizes.
It used to be easy to choose an iPad. When there were just a couple of models available, all you needed to choose was the color and how much storage you wanted. But things have changed. Nowadays, you have multiple options to choose from, each with varying configurations; it’s not so simple to know right off the bat which iPad is best for you.
If you want an iPad today, there are four different models, each with different feature sets. There are five different sizes, and the base price varies from as low as $329 to as much as $1099 (these prices are for Wi-Fi only, with the base storage amount, and without any of the accessories that make the new iPad Pro models interesting). You can choose models that offer Wi-Fi, or both cellular and Wi-Fi, and even 5G on some models, and there are as many as five color options, depending on the model.
Based on your needs, how can you tell which iPad you should get? In this article, I’m going to look at the different iPad models and recommend which iPad is best for you, depending on how you plan to use it.
Read the rest of the article on The Mac Security Blog.