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iOS-friendly flash drive makes sharing data simple [Reviews]

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This flash drive will connect to your Mac and your iPhone.
This flash drive will connect to your Mac and your iPhone.
Photo: Rob LeFebvre/Cult of Mac

Best List: Xtra Drive by Naztech

We’ve all been using flash drives on our Macs for ages, ever since Apple dropped the disk drives from its computer lineup.

iPhones and iPads don’t have a USB port, so it’s hard to use the same external thumb drives on the go.

The new Xtra Drive from Naztech is the best of both worlds, providing a single microSD card-based solution that has both a USB and a Lightning connector that will let me back up and transfer files from my iOS device to any computer.

Has Apple become boring in its middle age? [Friday Night Fights]

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Well... are you?!
Photo: Ste Smith/Cult of Mac

Apple is 40 years old today. In that time, the Cupertino company has delivered some incredible products and services, and revolutionized smartphones, tablets, and music players. But is it boring now?

Friday-Night-Fights-bug-2Some say Apple’s innovation has stalled in recent years, and it has become too predictable. The surprises we used to see during its big keynotes no longer show up, and despite its secrecy, you can almost predict its product roadmap for the next year.

Are those claims harsh? Is Apple really past its best, or will it deliver groundbreaking new products again that can shake up the consumer technology industry?

Join us in this week’s Friday Night Fight between Cult of Android and Cult of Mac as we fight over Apple at 40.

Apple’s dev edition Safari brings future WebKit to your Mac

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Safari will be kinder to MacBook Pro battery life.
Safari will be kinder to MacBook Pro battery life.
Photo: Apple

You can get a taste of the future of Safari on the Mac today, thanks to the release of the new Safari Technology Preview from Apple that gives regular users and developers an easy way to test new features and improvements that are coming soon to the web browser.

The new stand-alone app for OS X can be downloaded and used for free by anyone, and includes a cutting-edge version of the WebKit browser engine that is still in development. It’s a great way for web developers to get ahead on new features by testing them before they’re public.

Safari Technology Preview can be used side-by-side with the regular version of Safari to test for behavioral issues. It also includes new improvements for Web Inspector.

Here’s a list of the new features:

Infinite Tanks brings open-world destruction to your Apple devices

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Out for a relaxing city drive.
Photo: Atypical Games

There are times for precision racing games and times for, well, blowing the hell out of some giant vehicles. Guess which category Atypical Games’ newly-announced Infinite Tanks falls into?

Having previously made the entertaining Battle Supremacy and Sky Gamblers, Atypical’s Infinite Tanks is coming to iOS, tvOS and OS X this summer. Check out the trailer below:

How to save only your most treasured iMessages in OS X

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Keep only what you want, get rid of the rest.
Keep only what you want, get rid of the rest.
Photo: Rob LeFebvre/Cult of Mac (Original image by Patryk Sobczak/Unsplash)

When it comes to the Messages app, saving all your iMessages can be a good thing, letting you go back in time and see the delightful conversations you’ve had with your loved ones or even just checking to see where you’re supposed to meet up on Friday.

Of course, there might be a few of them, however, that you’re not super keen on saving. You may not want to get rid of an entire iMessage conversation thread, but there might be bits of it you’d rather forget.

Here’s how to get rid of parts of your iMessages while saving only your most treasured iMessages in OS X.

The seventh OS X 10.11.4 beta is here

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el-capitan-beta
New El Capitan beta is here.
Photo: Apple

Apple is not quite done tinkering with OS X 10.11.4 before its public release.

The company seeded the seventh beta of OS X 10.11.4 to developers this morning, a little over a week after Apple released the last beta for the desktop operating system.

Why won’t Apple build a game-worthy Mac? [Friday Night Fights]

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Tell us, Apple!
Photo: Ste Smith/Cult of Mac

Mac users needn’t bother pre-ordering an Oculus Rift headset because they can’t use it. According to Oculus founder Palmer Luckey, that’s because none of the machines Apple offers are powerful enough to meet its recommended specifications.

Friday-Night-Fights-bug-2They’re not powerful enough to play the latest games at high-settings, either. Even if you spend thousands on a high-end Mac Pro, you’re going to be disappointed with its gaming prowess — especially if you want to drink in some of those sweet, sweet 4K graphics.

So, is it about time Apple built a Mac that’s good for gaming?

Join us in this week’s Friday Night Fight between Cult of Android and Cult of Mac as we battle it out over this and more!

Apple’s website becomes NSFW without this one line of code

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Apple's website, with and without the line of code added.
Photo: Ryan Ackermann/Twitter CC

Apple avoided a potentially embarrassing incident by altering OS X marketing materials on its website to make the word “click” in the slogan “There’s more to love with every click” look … well, less like a certain term for the male sexual apparatus that begins with a “D.”

Siri-ously? Apple’s virtual assistant finally coming to Mac

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Siri
Your Mac is about to get a new virtual assistant.
Photo: Jim Merithew/Cult of Mac

Siri spread from the iPhone to the Apple Watch and Apple TV in 2015, but this may finally be the year Apple’s virtual assistant lands on Mac.

Apple is planning to make Siri this year’s big OS X feature, according to a new report that claims Siri integration into OS X 10.12 will be unveiled at the Worldwide Developers Conference in June.

This simple command will keep your Mac apps bleeding-edge

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You're a Terminal command away from keeping your Mac updated more frequently.
You're a Terminal command away from keeping your Mac updated more frequently.
Photo: Lifehacker

Here’s a surprising fact: By default, OS X only checks for software updates once a week. That’s shockingly infrequent, considering the fact that iOS and Windows both check for critical updates every day.

If you’d like your Mac to keep more on top of things, there’s an easy way to tell it to check for software updates more frequently.

New El Capitan beta is now available to developers

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A new beta is out for OS X El Capitan.
A new beta is out for OS X El Capitan.
Photo: Apple

Apple has seeded a new beta build of OS X El Capitan to developers this morning in the form of OS X 10.11.4 beta 4.

The new beta build can be downloaded directly from Apple’s Developer Member Center, or via the Software Update option in the Mac App Store if your Mac is already rolling on the last El Capitan beta.

How to find out which Mac apps are using your location

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Find out when your Mac is looking at your location data.
Find out when your Mac is looking at your location data.
Photo: Apple

As our digital lives converge across mobile and desktop devices like our iPhones and Macbooks, we rely on them knowing where we are at any given time. Safari suggestions, for example, count on knowing your location, as do any Maps searches or such.

You might want to know when your Location data is being used, however, for privacy reason. If you enable the Location Services menu bar, you’ll be able to see when any app is accessing your private location data, making it more possible to lock down any sources you don’t want using it.

Here’s how to get that menu bar notice working.

Apple busts out new betas for OS X, tvOS and Apple Watch

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A new beta is out for OS X El Capitan.
A new beta is out for OS X El Capitan.
Photo: Apple

Apple has dished out a brand new batch of beta software updates today for developers, bringing new software to OS X, Apple TV and Apple Watch.

The new software updates come exactly two weeks after Apple served up the first beta versions of iOS 9.3, watchOS 2.2, tvOS 9.2, and OS X 10.11.4, all of which bring a host of new features to your favorite Apple products.

How to send app crash reports to OS X Notification Center

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Crash reports don't have to interrupt your Zen.
Crash reports don't have to interrupt your Zen.
Photo: Lifehacker

OS X is about as reliable as any operating system out there, but apps still can — and do — crash. When they do, they take up the entire middle of your screen, interrupting whatever you’re doing, even if the app that crashed was running in the background.

It’s a mild annoyance, true, but it doesn’t have to be an annoyance at all. Here’s how to push crash messages to Notification Center instead of the middle of your screen.

Get it now: OS X update boosts Mac performance

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A new beta is out for OS X El Capitan.
El Capitan's third big update brings performance enhancements and bug fixes.
Photo: Apple

The newest build of OS X El Capitan is now available to the public after undergoing a month of beta testing.

OS X 10.11.3 can now be downloaded and installed by all Mac users with supported hardware. It’s a free update that promises to bring a number of enhancements, including performance improvements and tons of bug fixes.

Mac sales are on the up now, but is a downfall inevitable?

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Apple's Mac business is still growing... but how?
Photo: Ste Smith/Cult of Mac

Apple was the only computer maker that didn’t endure a blue Christmas, with Mac sales up 3 percent year-over-year as worldwide PC shipments declined. But for how long can the Mac business continue to fight on, immune to the growing thread from other industries?

Friday-Night-Fights-bug-2Smartphones and tablets are now capable at handling many of our daily tasks, and every year they get better. Will the iPad Pro ever be powerful enough to replace your iMac, or will we forever be reliant on powerful processors and dedicated GPUs?

Join us in this week’s Friday Night Fight between Cult of Android and Cult of Mac as we battle it out over these questions and more!

Should Apple merge iOS with OS X for iPad Pro?

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It's that time of the week again!
Photo: Ste Smith/Cult of Mac

Is merging iOS with OS X a good idea? For the longest time, the answer to that question has been a resounding no from anyone who appreciates good software — but with iPad Pro on the horizon, there may well be a growing case for it.

Friday-Night-Fights-bug-2The iPad Pro has the potential to be the ultimate 2-in-1 — a laptop that could really replace a notebook when you need to get stuff done. But in many ways, it’s being held back by iOS, which is still very much a mobile platform without many of the basics we have on our desktops — like a file manager.

So, is there now room for a new platform that delivers the best of iOS and OS X, perfectly suited to a tablet that doubles as a notebook?

Join us in this week’s Friday Night Fight between Cult of Android and Cult of Mac as we battle it out over that very question!