Mac - page 9

Nothing illustrates the power of Apple’s ecosystem like the Continuity features that help your Mac, iPhone, iPad and Apple Watch work seamlessly together. Thanks to Continuity, your iPhone can serve as your Mac’s webcam. You can start an email on one device and instantly pick it up on another. You can use the same keyboard and mouse with a Mac and iPad, copy and paste across devices and more.

These features flex the power of Apple’s hardware and software — and they would never be possible on a PC. Unfortunately, that means a lot of people don’t learn about these features because they don’t expect so much from their computers.

In this post (and the accompanying video), I will show you some of the time-saving, annoyance-busting Continuity features you can enjoy when you go all-in on the Apple ecosystem.

Apple is reportedly testing multiple M4-powered Macs for launch later this year. More importantly, a new report says all the Macs ship with 16GB or 32GB of system memory.

This signals that Apple might finally bid farewell to the paltry 8GB RAM for Mac base models.

The macOS Sequoia release date could arrive alongside iOS 18 and iPadOS 18 next month. Apple typically releases a major new iOS and iPadOS update in September alongside new iPhones. And while the next version of the Mac operating system usually follows in October or November, that could change this year.

Apple has supposedly hit a major setback and significantly delayed the mass production of its MacBook with a super-size, folding screen. The company has run into technical issues with the display and other mechanicals.

Apparently, these problems will force Apple to delay mass production until as late as the end of 2027 or 2028.

If you work on a Mac, these six useful apps can help you get that work done faster. And you don’t need to take time to download them or figure out if they’re worth the price — you already have these apps on your computer.

These come with every Mac, and you can locate them in the Applications and Utilities folders. If you’re in the Finder, just hit Shift-Command-A (⇧⌘A) or Shift-Command-U (⇧⌘U) to find them.

I’ll walk you through a few of the more useful Mac apps hiding there that you probably haven’t heard of.

This week on Cult of Mac’s podcast: It sounds like a whole bunch of Macs powered by Apple’s M4 chip — including a Mac mini that will be surprisingly small — will arrive in the not-so-distant future. We discuss the latest M4 Mac rumors (and can’t help getting more than a little excited).

Also on The CultCast:

• The latest iOS 18 beta brings more interesting changes, including one that makes Griffin very happy.
• We’ve got questions about the next Apple Watch SE. Will it be plastic? Vibrantly colorful? Cheaper?
• Samsung’s copycat designers take heat from an unlikely source for mimicking Apple’s products.
• In a new Under Review segment, Griffin tells us what he likes (and what he doesn’t) about an unusual three-in-one MagSafe charger.

Listen to this week’s episode of The CultCast in the Podcasts app or your favorite podcast app. (Be sure to subscribe and leave us a review if you like it!) Or watch the video live stream, embedded below.

Apple is going to shrink the next Mac mini when it adds an M4 processor, according to an often-reliable source of insider information. The desktop could be the size of an Apple TV.

So, Mac micro?

As if Siri’s unhelpful answers were not irritating enough when you actually want them, Siri often interrupts a conversation, meeting or TV show when you haven’t asked for anything at all. The good news is you make it stop — if you know how to deactivate Siri on your Apple devices.

keep reading or watch our video.

Although the Mac offers fantastic support for opening and editing PDFs in the built-in Preview app, the simple act of copying and pasting text from a PDF can still be a nightmare. For instance, selecting text on a two- or three-column document often selects across the whole width of the page, which is totally useless. Luckily, there’s a better way to copy text from a PDF on a Mac using Apple’s Live Text feature.

Taking a quick screenshot and using Live Text often yields better results when you need to copy text from a PDF or an image. (It also works with photos and old document scans as well as PDFs. Here’s how to do it.)

The Mac offers many options for taking screenshots without installing third-party apps. You can take a Mac screenshot that shows the entire screen, get a clean image of a specific window, or select specific areas to capture. There’s also a built-in way to take a video of your Mac screen (and even record a voiceover for your screen recording using your microphone, headset or AirPods.)

We’ll show you various ways to take a Mac screenshot so you can decide what’s best for your needs.

No PC maker is growing faster than Apple. Mac shipments increased 20.8% year over year in Q2, according to market analysts. That’s a growth rate that dwarfs larger rivals.

It’s the second quarter in a row of double-digit growth for Apple.

You can make a GIF on your iPhone or Mac out of any Live Photo or video you have in your photo library or saved to your computer. You don’t need to download any apps — simply add a shortcut, and you can do it directly from the share sheet.

Of course, not all looping animated images are GIFs. A faster way to animate your Live Photos is with the iPhone’s built-in Loop effect. In the Photos app, just tap on the “Live” tag in the upper left and select “Loop.” This will produce higher-quality results, but might not be compatible with third-party apps like Snapchat or Discord.

If you need an actual GIF file, there’s still a pretty easy way to make them on your phone or Mac. I’ll show you how.

Apple only shows off its finished products, which makes the company’s secret prototypes and early concepts all the more fascinating. Details of these first-draft designs usually don’t come out until years after Apple dreams them up and discards them. Even if you’re well-versed in Apple history, these alternate-history unreleased Apple products will intrigue and confuse.

The wild and crazy ideas go back more than 40 years. If anything, it proves that Apple continuously skates toward the next hit. The quest for innovation continues, no matter whether the company is in dire straits or cruising on success. Keep reading or watch our video to see the wildest Apple products that might have been.

If you’re trying to listen to podcasts or music on your phone, it can be annoying when your AirPods keep switching to other devices, like your Mac or iPad.

Personally, I don’t mind this behavior. If I’m sitting at my Mac, I want to use the Music and the Podcasts apps on the Mac. But a lot of people consider their phone to be their primary device and always want to play audio from their phone, no matter which other device they’re using.

If you want your iPhone to keep supreme control over your ears, here’s how to disable AirPods auto-switching.

Consumer and business computer spending data for 2024’s first quarter shows iPad maintaining dominance in tablet sales, while Mac shipments show significant growth in the PC sector, according to a new report.

And in even better news, the analysts expect to see computer market growth through 2025.

The easiest way to convert a YouTube video to an MP4 for free is with an app called 4K Video Downloader for Mac and PC. This tool gives you all kinds of options for converting video and audio from YouTube, TikTok, Facebook, Soundcloud, Twitch and more.

If you want to save videos or podcasts to your computer to include in a video of your own, this app is the easiest way to download the highest-quality original.

It has other uses, too. If you’re going on a flight, or if you simply have a slow internet connection, you can use it to download what you want to watch in advance. If you’re privacy-conscious but you still want to watch a TikTok sent to you by a friend, you can download the clip without visiting the website.

Here’s how it works.

We found more precious nuggets in new software releases from WWDC24: new wallpapers for Apple devices. They include Mac versions that reference old-school icons, iPad landscape and portrait wallpapers in various colors, and similar pretty images for iPhone.

“This new dynamic wallpaper floats over old Macintosh iconography, Control Panel, and applications like the Calculator and MacWrite, Apple’s early word processor,” Basic Apple Guy said of the new-old Mac wallpaper he found.

macOS Sequoia brings the “incredible features” of iOS 18 and iPadOS 18 to your Mac. This includes improvements to the Messages app, Math Notes and more.

Craig Federighi, the Apple software VP who unveiled macOS Sequoia during Monday’s WWDC24 keynote, said the new Mac operating system “introduces even more features to help you effortlessly get things done.”

If you want to know the fastest and easiest way to send someone photos, videos, files and so, so much more, you should know how to AirDrop. There’s no need to send an iMessage — Apple’s slick AirDrop feature will immediately send and open the content on someone else’s iPhone (or other Apple device). There’s no middle step.

AirDrop works iPhone-to-iPhone, iPhone-to-Mac, iPhone-to-iPad, Vision Pro-to-Mac — any combination and permutation of two Apple devices.

Keep reading to find out everything you need to know about how to take advantage of AirDrop.

Don’t get your heart set on new Macs launching at WWDC24 next week. A generally reliable tipster predicts that that’ll be none unveiled at Apple’s developer conference.

And not just Macs. Supposedly the agenda includes no new hardware at all.

Whether you run a video production studio or you’re starting a hobby YouTube channel, you’ll want to make sure you have the best Mac for video editing. 

Video editing is a good stress test for any computer. Cutting together an epic two-hour video essay requires high-speed storage, a lot of memory, processing power and GPU power. Apple silicon delivers all this in spades. Apple’s chips also come with special built-in hardware for processing video — the Media Engine. 

These days, every Mac is capable of 4K video editing. The best Mac for you comes down to whether you want a desktop or a laptop — and the size of your budget. Keep reading or watch our latest video.

When Ubisoft launches Assassin’s Creed Shadows this November, Mac will be on the list of platforms supported by the action-packed role-playing game.

The adventure is set in medieval Japan, and players can choose either a samurai or a shinobi for very different gaming experiences. For more details on the game’s setting and storyline, check out the latest updates on Assassin’s Creed Japan.

If you still own an Intel MacBook Air, it might be time to upgrade to the new MacBook Air with M3. But what about if you own a MacBook Air running on an M1 or M2 chip? In those cases, it’s not as obvious if you should upgrade to the latest model.

Now that the newer models feature efficient and powerful Apple silicon chips, the MacBook Air is the laptop that strikes the right balance of speed and portability for most people. The thin design is easy to slip into a backpack and the battery will last all day — even when juggling dozens of apps.

How badly you need to upgrade to an M3 MacBook Air depends on which model you’re coming from. Our easy guide will help you decide. Check the infographic below or watch the video.

A MacBook with a 20.3-inch folding screen will hit the market earlier than expected, according to an analyst. The folding Mac supposedly will go into production in late 2025.

And a folding iPhone allegedly will follow the next year.

These are the best Mac apps that’ll help you through all kinds of work — writing, graphic design, video editing — with a few simple (must-have) utilities that everyone can make use of.

Finding good apps can be hard, especially if you’re new to the Mac. Luckily, we’ve put together a list of the very best.

Keep reading or watch our video guide instead.