Retired Navy Chief Petty Officer Hal Howell recently shipped his computer setup to Cult of Mac for inspection, so to speak. He emailed photos and words, anyway.
He runs an Intel Mac mini with an outboard engine of sorts on it for extra graphics processing power, plus Satechi USB-C hubs with extra ballast (er, storage).
Check out the full manifest of the Navy man’s gear below.
If there’s one thing Apple displays are known for, it’s high prices. OK — all joking aside — if there are two things they’re known for, it’s crisp, accurate colors and being worth the price for that level of quality.
After all, those who work or play with graphics, photos, video or animation need great color.
And if you go dual-display, it helps if they’re the same model. Today’s featured Mac Studio setup, for example, corrected mismatched displays and the resulting color inconsistency by adding a second Studio Display.
Curved ultra-wide displays are all the rage lately, and it’s no wonder why. What a fantastic amount of real estate. But it can be worrisome buying one if you’re not sure how it will look with your Mac’s resolution and scaling options.
Today’s featured computer setup pairs a beast of a 16-inch M1 Max MacBook with a brilliant 40-inch LG 5K UltraWide curved display. Let’s look at how well it’s working and what some of the issues can be.
With Apple’s big “Peek Performance” event only just past and deliveries of newly release products in progress, we see computer setups with new Mac Studio desktops and Studio Display monitors cropping up on social media sites.
Checking in with real people and their first impressions about the gear — and their answers to others’ questions about it — can be a pretty good early look at how things are going with Apple’s latest products.
Bacioiu Constantin Ciprian, known online as “Zapa,” was born in Buzau, Romania, in 1991, not long after a revolution toppled communist rule there. He loved technology as a kid, but it was expensive and hard to get. And soon enough he realized how much he loved Apple products — especially those around in his youth.
Now a longtime resident of Bucharest, he designs and develops games to run on vintage equipment. And get a load of that retro setup!
Storage provider LaCie has rolled out two new portable solid state drives (SSDs), including one model offered exclusively at the Apple Store in space gray to match Apple gear. Apple will offer it later this month.
Redditor MacSources, aka Nicholas Calderone, is a photographer, writer, editor and co-founder of MacSources.com. He runs a Mac mini at the center of his formidable dual-monitor computer setup. The workstation’s audio and storage components seem particularly epic.
Arizona-based Tyler Botha, aka theallseeingeye on Reddit, is a TV-focused copywriter for a San Francisco startup and a retired pro DJ. The setup and epic gear list he sent to our attention does triple duty with a capable “WFH Desk,” a powerful “Gaming Corner” and a remarkably complete “DJ Desk.”
Talk about “complete.” Botha’s gear list, represented in the links below, is probably the longest one ever published in a Cult of Mac Setups article. You don’t have to be a DJ to appreciate it, but it helps.
I’ve been using a USB 3 external hard drive to backup my Macbook Pro for a while now, and have been pleased with its reliability and fast data transfer speed. I also love that it powers itself via the USB port, letting me live a little more power cord free.
When I received the LaCie Rugged Thunderbolt SSD drive for review, I thought, “well, it’s pretty, but how much better can it be?” It’s just as small, powers itself via Thunderbolt (or USB) and has plenty of space on it, just like my current drive.
Then I ran a few tests and pulled up a drive speed test app on my Mac. I was blown away by the speed difference. This is one blazing fast hard drive. And, yeah, it still looks great.
