Innehållsförteckning för Oct-12 från MacLife

MORE MAC|LIFE, LESS PAPER The Hottest Articles on MacLife.com Deals! You Want ’Em, We’ve Got ’Em We have a Deals tab now and it will save you money. http://deals.maclife.com How Mountain Lion Makes Everything Better It’s fast and looks beautiful on the Retina display. http://bit.ly/ML_OSXML_RMBP Mountain Lion and You: Boot Camp Edition We find out if Mountain Lion produces any ill effects for Mac users relying on Boot Camp. http://bit.ly/ML_BootCamp 10 Tips for Using Time Machine Tips to help you rev up Time Machine. Vroom, vroom. http://bit.ly/ML_TimeMachineTips Get Social! Facebook facebook.com/maclife Twitter twitter.com/maclife Our Apps Mac|Life Digital Edition for iPad Apple Newsstand MacLife for iPhone bit.ly/ML_iphone_app…

When you dream of computers, do you dream of high-resolution displays? What about 5.1 million pixels on a screen that is almost comparable to the resolution of the human eye? A screen where the picture is as detailed and sharp as the scenery outside your window? Whether or not you’ve got the cash for it, you can’t deny that the MacBook Pro with Retina display is one of the most impressive notebooks ever built. But unlike the iPad’s vast library of Retina-ready apps, the Retina Mac apps are lagging a bit behind. More often than not, owners of the new MacBook Pro have to adjust the dimensions for apps that haven’t been updated. Developers are becoming increasingly aware of the need to convert, however, and they’re starting to do what’s…

After you read this month’s musings, tear out this page and stuff it in the bottom of your sock drawer. Five years from now, pull it out, read my next sentence, and compare it to the reality of that future day. Microsoft is teetering on irrelevancy. Oh, the industry-leading software company will remain more than merely solvent for the foreseeable future—after all, it has a humongous installed base and an army of talented developers—but the world is going mobile and Microsoft is playing catch-up. As any computer-savvy homo sapien who hasn’t been vacationing in Ulaanbaatar for the last few months knows, Microsoft is about to release its long-awaited Windows 8. To that I say, “Big whoop.” Windows 8 won’t play well with business. Its whiz-bang Metro user interface, growing as…

When iCloud was introduced at the 2011 World Wide Developers Conference, there was little fanfare surrounding the announcement. To many, the new service seemed to be just the latest in the company’s long line of lackluster cloud offerings—from iTools to .Mac to MobileMe—which all launched with bugs and widespread network outages, and never reached their promised potential. But over the past year, iCloud has evolved into a must-have service, and has become a cornerstone of our favorite fruity company. When iCloud finally rolled out, its features mainly benefitted iOS users, with Mac owners getting very little iCloud support in OS X Lion. This all changed with OS X Mountain Lion, in which iCloud support comes fully baked in. From storing documents in the cloud to the seamless syncing of preferences…

The original iCloud features are still going strong, and have been improved upon since they were introduced a year ago. If you’re new to iCloud, we’ll catch you up on the basics and help you connect your Apple devices in the most seamless way possible. iTUNES IN THE CLOUD iCloud is meant to be your own personal cloud, offering you tools that connect your devices in a seamless way. One of those seamless device connections happened with iTunes, which received two iCloud offerings: iTunes in the Cloud, and iTunes Match. iTunes in the Cloud lets you easily re-download purchases made in the iTunes Store. Be it music, movies, TV shows, apps, or books, re-downloading is only a few clicks (or taps) away from the iTunes Store on both Mac and…

Sharing your data across a home network has been possible for a long time, but it’s only in recent years that it has become really simple, at least if you’re using Macs. We’ll skip past the old-fashioned methods of using USB memory sticks or burned DVDs to move files; although these methods are still available, they’re quite labor intensive. These days, it’s all about being networked, and the most common way to network computers is using Wi-Fi. There’s a good chance you’re on wireless broadband at home anyway. And even if your computer connects to your modem using an Ethernet cable, you can still share its wireless connection (and even its broadband connection) to other computers over Wi-Fi. To do this, go into the System Preferences > Sharing tab and…

When you’re away from home with a laptop, you can still access all of your Mac’s sharing capabilities with a network connection. In fact you don’t even need a Wi-Fi or Ethernet connection if you have an iPhone or 3G iPad. With iOS 5 and the relevant MiFi device enabled with your cellular provider, you can use the Personal Hotspot feature built in to iOS to share the cellular connection to any compatible device including a laptop. On your iPad 3G or iPhone 4 or later, go into the Settings > General > Network section to turn on Personal Hotspot. You can then create a mini wireless network over Wi-Fi and USB, and even over Bluetooth. On the device, you create a name for the network and set up a…

Each month, the Mac| Life staff gives you a peek inside our iPhones, iPads, and iPod touches to show you the latest gems, oddities, and WTFs that we’ve uncovered in the App Store. Marvel’s the Avengers I’ve been digging Marvel’s The Avengers: A Second Screen Experience (free, universal), with its constant drips of bonus content—such as character bios and video clips—leading up to the September 25th home video release of The Avengers. Instacast I get the benefit of putting podcasts in their own app, but I’m not a fan of Apple’s Podcasts. Instacast ($1.99/iPhone, $4.99/iPad) has iCloud sync, push notifications, and per-podcast settings, and its Now Playing interface looks like what I was used to in the Music app. Nice. Cartoon Network Sometimes, I’m just in the mood to watch…

Rovio’s latest isn’t actually an original offering—it’s a reskinned version of the stellar Casey’s Contraptions, which the company acquired and sacked from the App Store. Still, Amazing Alex HD is plenty entertaining, allowing you to craft cartoonish Rube Goldberg machines to ferry objects around the screen to their destination. To do so, you place and rotate a medley of pipes, ramps, balls, and other gadgetry in creative ways to solve each level and collect stars as you go. The game is thankfully forgiving when it comes to testing and retesting your designs, thanks to drag-and-drop controls, plus thousands of user-made levels are available beyond the built-in ones. Still, it’s lost some of the personality that made the original so endearing. The bottom line. It retreads familiar territory, but the fun…

The G-Connect is a 500GB network-attached storage device designed to provide wireless access to video, music, photo, and document files for up to five different iOS devices simultaneously. Sounds pretty sweet, right? Well…it ain’t. Let’s start with the “wireless” part of the G-Connect’s promise. In order to set up the G-Connect, you first have to connect it to your Mac via USB 2.0 so that the drive can be loaded full of multimedia goodness. We’re OK with this: while wireless syncing is no longer the stuff of science fiction, it’s still pretty slow compared to the transfer speeds that can be achieved by even a pokey wired standard like USB 2. Next, in order to use the G-Connect as a multimedia file server for an iOS device, you have to…

BiKN is a simple piece of hardware that tethers your phone to anything you don’t want to lose: your keys, your wallet, your cat, even your kids. BiKN comes with an iPhone 4/4S case and two tags (additional tags are $49.99 a pair), which you can attach to just about anything. A free iPhone app lets you communicate with the tags in Leash, Page, or Find mode. In Leash mode, the tag “pings” audibly when it gets far enough away from the iPhone. Page makes the tag beep wherever it is, so you can locate it by sound. Find mode tells you how far away from your tag you are, and which direction it’s in. And if you misplace your phone but have a tag handy, you can press a…

Enterprising indie software developers trying to gain ground on the industry’s major players can take a couple of approaches. One is to ape what’s come before, but with a fraction of the resources. Another is to try to do something entirely new. Sketch 2 goes with the ballsier tactic, and largely succeeds in creating a sleek and modern app for crafting vector graphics. Although Sketch 2 will appeal to some fans of Illustrator (and, to some extent, Fireworks), it’s not trying to be an Adobe product, nor is it striving to be all things to all people. It lacks Illustrator’s interface flexibility and depth, but its efficiency more than makes up for it. Sketch’s approachable, usable single-window workspace has common tools across the top, layers and objects in a panel…

Seemingly tired of watching its third-party partners fumble the Android tablet experience—aside from Amazon and its successful, albeit locked-down Kindle Fire—Google stepped in. The Nexus 7, developed with Asus, is easily the best Android slate yet. Packing pure Android 4.1 (Jelly Bean), this startlingly slick 7-inch tablet offers a remarkably polished experience at the entry price of $199. The Nexus 7 feels dramatically sleeker than the Kindle Fire—at 0.41 inch thick, it’s virtually as thin as the new iPad (0.37 inch), though its overall size and 12-ounce heft make it more ideal for reading one-handed. Nexus 7’s rubberized backing feels great in the hand, and doesn’t detract from the premium feel. Aside from power and volume buttons found on the upper right, the device relies on Android’s virtual buttons for…

Expressly great Apple’s little-brother base station got a makeover. It’s now the same size as an Apple TV, with a regular power cable that makes it easier to locate in more places. (The old versions had a fold-out plug, unless you used an optional extension cord kit.) It also grew a new Ethernet port, now with separate WAN and LAN ports. But the changes inside are even better. 802.11n speeds came to the AirPort Express in 2008, but in single-band mode. Now the Express can use the 2.4GHz band (for all of your 802.11g and earlier devices, as well as iPhones and pre-2006 Macs), and the 5GHz band (for your new Macs, all iPads, and other 5GHz-compatible devices), without having to restart the router to switch between them. When needed,…

iPads used to turn heads, but after 63 million sold, give or take, an iPad in the wild isn’t the conversation starter that it used to be. But more than any other stand we’ve tested, Octa’s creative TabletTail is novel enough to draw attention at coffee shops, on planes, or anywhere you’ll use it—and with its compact size and 6-ounce weight, you’ll use it almost everywhere. The Whale Kit comes in two pieces. Think of the Vacuum Dock as a suction cup on steroids; you’ll position it on the back of your device, press it down, and push the wide, flat button five or six times to pump out the air. When it’s attached correctly, you can shake it as hard as you can, and it won’t budge. But not…

HELLO? iTUNES? I have set both my iPhone 4 and my iPad 2 to automatically open iTunes when connected to my MacBook Pro, in order to be synced. Neither of them opens iTunes, but they do open iPhoto. How do I get them to open iTunes as they should? Open iTunes (version 10 or later), and connect your device. In the Summary tab of the device pane, disable the option to “Open iTunes when this device is connected,” and click Apply. Then re-enable the option to “Open iTunes when this device is connected,” click Apply again, and then click Sync. A dialog will appear that reads, “Do you want iTunes to open automatically when you connect this device?” Click Yes, and then wait for the sync to finish. After the…

iPhoto is one of the more powerful programs in the iLife application suite, but that doesn’t mean it doesn’t have a few kinks to work out. For one, all of your images are stored in one single location, which becomes an issue if you’re using your computer for both work and play. Though you can create different albums and events to separate them, it doesn’t change the fact that when you fire up iPhoto it’s just a mishmash of unrelated images. Fortunately, you can create multiple libraries in iPhoto. The process can be a little convoluted, but with iPhoto Library Manager (www.fatcatsoftware.com, $19.95) it’ll be a cinch. >>> WHAT YOU NEED » iPhoto ’11 version 9.2.3 or later » iPhoto Library Manager (www.fatcatsoftware.com), $19.95 1 View Your Current Library Launch…

GarageBand is great for huge projects and making your very own custom ringtones, but launching the application can sometimes be a huge overkill. If you’re in a jiffy and just want to extract a snippet of your favorite pop song, you can quickly do so in iTunes and then immediately sync it to your device. Read on to learn how it’s done. >>> WHAT YOU NEED » iTunes 10.6 » A song you’d like to clip 1 Locate and Trim Launch iTunes. Locate the song in your library that you’d like to convert into a ringtone, go to Get Info, and then click the Options tab. Check the boxes labeled Start Time and Stop Time; input the time in the song where you’d like it to start and then select…

If there’s one thing about Android phones that iPhone owners look down upon, it’s rampant fragmentation—the endless little differences in software, hardware, and carrier services from one phone to the next that prevent the Android platform from providing the kind of smooth universal experience that Apple is known for. It’s the classic PC-versus-Apple comparison: democratic incongruity versus tech totalitarianism. And while Apple’s iron-fisted rule ruffles some feathers, it’s hard to argue that its game-changing products could have come about any other way. But if the rumors are true (and where there’s this much smoke there’s got to be fire), Apple—the paragon of platform purity—is about to fragment its two most important product lines by introducing a taller iPhone and a smaller iPad. Whether or not these reports are accurate, there…

We all thought we knew Steve Jobs. A brilliant inventor and unparalleled showman, he had an uncanny knack for making us believe in whatever he was saying, even when he played fast and loose with the facts. But it wasn’t just his audiences who were captivated by his infamous Reality Distortion Field. As described in the recently released book Insanely Simple—and in Walter Isaacson’s bestselling biography Steve Jobs before it—Jobs had tremendous influence over his company, his family, and even the authors themselves. Walter Isaacson was given unprecedented access into Jobs’s life during his final years, and the result is a unique close-up of a man who always got his way. Isaacson delves deep into the darker side of Jobs—malicious poaching, temper tantrums, manipulative dealings—but never quite steps far enough…

SUITS HD SEASON 1 $24.99 ($19.99 SD) Harvey Spector and Mike Ross are two of New York’s finest lawyers—or are they? This show spans genres by offering suspense, comedy, romance, and mystery. The writing is incredible and the acting is golden. Not to mention, it’s filmed in my hometown: Toronto, Canada, eh. Catch up quickly because season 2 is already in progress. WHAT WOULD STEVE JOBS DO? Peter Sander $15.99 I needed a book for the plane, so of course I launched iBooks on my iPad. Out of the corner of my eye, I spotted this title. When I read the book while going for walks in Palo Alto (where I live), I feel like I’m walking in Steve’s shoes. My entire summer was based off a simple question with…

EASY SETUP You get a feel for just how big of a role iCloud plays in Mountain Lion when you first set up your Mac. When prompted, you can use iCloud Easy Setup. By signing in once, your Mac will automatically enable several valuable iCloud features including Mail, Contacts, Calendar, Messages, FaceTime, Game Center, Safari, Reminders, iTunes, the Mac App Store, and Notes. If you don’t have an Apple account, you can easily set one up right from this same screen by selecting “Create a Free Apple ID.” You can still enable all of the iCloud features manually by selecting the Skip button on this screen during the setup process and proceeding to the iCloud System Preferences. iCLOUD DOCUMENT LIBRARY When iCloud first launched, Documents in the Cloud was a…

Brace yourselves, because it’s coming. The rumors of a smaller iPad have swirled since, well, the first iPad came along, and it no longer seems to be a question of if we’ll see one, but when. There’s no doubt that a market exists for a junior iPad; Amazon and Google have proven it with their own pint-sized tablets. And judging by past Apple patterns, a mini iPad makes sense in Apple’s timeline. While nobody knows exactly what the device will look like, what its tech specs will be, or what it will cost, one thing seems sure: Apple will release a smaller iPad, and here at Mac|Life, we think it’s a smart move. [SIZE MATTERS] During Apple’s Q4 2010 results conference call, Steve Jobs famously ranted that 7-inch tablets should…

Apple’s iTunes has come a long way since its early days as a simple jukebox. Now it lets you purchase, play, and share all your music and movies in a multitude of different ways. It’s grown to support all of Apple’s iOS devices as well as integrating with iCloud, adding internet storage to its list of capabilities. If you have an iPad you can connect it to your Mac using a USB cable. Then in iTunes, go to the device and find its Apps tab. Scroll down and you’ll see a File Sharing section where various apps are displayed; these are the apps that can swap data with your Mac. It’s possible to drag and drop items out of the list to your Mac, or into the list to copy…

Remember the scene in John Carpenter’s sci-fi classic, They Live, where the hero dons a pair of special sunglasses and finally sees how the world around him really is? Using Google’s awesome new iOS version of its Chrome browser offers a similar type of reality check, shining an ugly spotlight on how Apple holds back third-party browsers on the platform. If you’ve used Chrome on the Mac, you pretty much know what to expect from the iOS app: fast omnibox search or URL entry, unlimited tabs, Incognito mode for private browsing, and the ability to sync open tabs, bookmarks, and passwords to a Google account in the cloud. All of this goodness is carried over to the free, universal iOS app, adding the ability to remove tabs with a swipe…

Kingdom Rush continues the trend of slick iOS tower defense titles with a fantastically well-produced affair that’s bursting with challenge, content, and excellent presentation. As the genre dictates, the goal here is to ward off waves of invaders by placing offensive towers, with the game offering a limited array of destinations for such buildings. Despite only offering four base towers to choose from, there’s quite a bit of strategy involved with the way you choose to upgrade the towers. Not only does each tower offer multiple upgrade levels, but higher-level ones can be further tweaked to add special features, like poisonous arrows or a magic spell that rewinds afflicted foes further back on the path. All of the towers and skills can be enhanced between rounds with stars earned through…

I’m beyond pleased to share that my wife and I are expecting our first child, and while we’re both reasonably responsible, well-adjusted adults, this is totally new territory for us. It’s early days still, so our minds are not so focused on delivery and upbringing, but more on educating ourselves, making sure mom is as healthy as can be, and figuring out how best to enjoy this once-in-a-lifetime process. We already have the requisite stack of reading material, and iBooks doesn’t disappoint in that regard—but I wanted to make sure we used our iOS devices in more innovative and interactive ways to ease and improve the weeks and months ahead. Luckily, the App Store is up to the task, and I found a handful of helpful options that can have…

Real talk time: the iPad’s onscreen keyboard isn’t the world’s greatest typing tool. It functions admirably for short tappings, but for anything longer than an email, using a virtual keyboard can be an exercise in frustration. But many solutions to this problem sacrifice one of the iPad’s greatest features: its portability. Keyboard-packing cases are nifty, but most add so much weight and bulk to the svelte device that you might as well get a netbook—or deal with constantly swapping your iPad in and out of different cases. Enter Amazon (yes, that Amazon) and a recent entry in its still-pretty-new private label, AmazonBasics. The imaginatively named “AmazonBasics Bluetooth Keyboard for Apple iPad, iPhone” squeezes a nearly full-size keyboard onto a slab barely half an inch longer than the iPad itself. With…

The iCade began life as an April Fool’s joke, but the real-life miniature arcade cabinet that followed proved anything but a gag, delivering a Bluetooth controller that blended function with ample nostalgia. Following the original unit’s success, ION Audio is back with a pair of new control options for iOS devices. The iCade Core is essentially a stripped-down iCade, swapping the old-school arcade cabinet aesthetic for a more versatile plastic base. Rather than slide the portrait-oriented iPad into a sizable shell, the iCade Core accommodates the tablet in either orientation, and it simply sits within the provided slot, which has an opening for an optional dock connector. Like the iCade, the Core easily connects via Bluetooth—within moments, you’ll be ready to go with any supported game. While the buttons make…

There’s something to be said for software that does one thing well. Scratch DJ Academy MIX addresses a very specific need: it automatically analyzes songs—especially dance-friendly electronic tunes—for key and beats per minute, and then offers a limited selection of tools for joining matching songs together in DJ-style mixes. And it does this quite well. Import songs into the MIX library, and after just a moment, the app brings up the tune’s BPM and key. Drag a song into the mix list, and the app highlights other songs that match either or both of those criteria. Pick a match-friendly tune, and the app intelligently blends the end of the first song into the beginning of the second, buffing over minor differences in tempo with a surprisingly successful beat-matching system. For…

Bluetooth speakers are having a moment—not only are they dropping in price and increasing in quality, they provide more versatility than speaker docks. You can stream music from a Mac, an iOS device, or even a PC or Android handset, and you’re not stuck in one spot, either. As our office fills with piles of Bluetooth speakers, we singled out three in the $150 range: The main boast of SuperTooth’s Disco is 28 watts of kicking audio, while Soundfreaq’s Sound Step Recharge aims for versatility with four input options, and Brookstone packs big sound and sensitive controls into the Big Blue Studio. Based on pure audio might, the 30-watt Big Blue Studio tap-dances all over the competition. Its two 2.5-inch front-facing drivers and 3-inch subwoofer pack enough punch to fill…

Create your own wiki with ease Of all the hundreds of ways of organizing information, a flexible, smartly linked wiki is one of the most modern, useful, and efficient. VoodooPad lets you easily whip up personal wiki pages including text, images, and more. If a word or phrase on a page needs further explanation, select it and click the Link button, and VoodooPad creates a whole new page for you to expand on it. Once you’ve created a page, any time you type the associated word or phrase, VoodooPad automatically links it to its page. Pages can have aliases, too—secondary words that link to the same place. For example, if you have a page about Apple, you can create an alias for AAPL (Apple’s stock market ticker code), and then…

Picking up the pieces One of last year’s most successful and beloved games from a small studio, Bastion is now available for Mac via the Mac App Store and Steam, and the extra layover has done nothing to diminish the colorful action game’s considerable charms. Bastion follows the adventures of the Kid, one of the rare human survivors of the Calamity, which has destroyed the world he used to know. We learn about the Kid and his past via the game’s narrator, Rucks, whose contributions aren’t simply limited to mid-mission cinematics or obvious dialogue exchanges. Instead, they provide ample atmosphere while you plow through enemies, with the pitch-perfect spoken lines delivering context and backstory while the stunning soundtrack unfolds. While the aural presentation proves perhaps the most distinctive element of…

A new version of OS X is always an exciting time for Mac users, and the big release of Mountain Lion is no exception. Whether you’re still running Snow Leopard or Lion, Mountain Lion is easily worth the $19.99 purchase from the Mac App Store, and couldn’t be easier to install. Don’t believe us? Here’s a look at what the process entails. WHAT YOU NEED OS X 10.6 Snow Leopard or OS X 10.7 Lion 1 Check Your Mac’s Compatibility with Mountain Lion As with any new upgrade, your first stop should be Apple’s upgrade webpage (www.apple.com/osx/how-to-upgrade/), which details all of the Mac models eligible for OS X Mountain Lion. Unlike the upgrade from Snow Leopard to OS X Lion, not all Macs are created equal—and some that run OS…

Keynote isn’t just a tool for presentations; it’s also a great piece of software for creating slideshows from your photos. Of course, iPhoto, OS X screen savers, and the Apple TV also create great slideshows from your photos, but Keynote offers you far more flexibility to tailor the show to your liking. Take a look! >>> WHAT YOU NEED » Keynote ’09 1 Pick a Template Launch Keynote and select a template that suits your slideshow. The Leather Book template is a good option for the cover of the slideshow, but other templates include better slide styles for images. You can switch slideshow themes once you’ve started your project if you wish. 2 Add Your Photos Fill in the text on your cover and add a new slide. From the…

5 iOS APPS THAT DESPERATELY NEED AN UPDATE Some apps get it right, right from the start. Others are so bad that they don’t last long enough to get sorted. And then there are those that fall somewhere in between. You know what we mean—hiding among the dozens of well-designed, high-quality apps on our Home screens are a few that we just can’t bring ourselves to delete. Maybe they were once great (or maybe we just wanted them to be), but whatever the case, they’re in desperate need of a little red App Store badge. Scrabble Once the novelty of tossing letters from our iPhones to our iPads wore off, the shortcomings of Scrabble for iPad ($9.99) became all too clear; other word tile games have handily topped it since.…

LETTER OF THE MONTH As picking out Apple devices on TV is an obsession of mine, I enjoyed “Lights, Camera, Apple” in the Aug/12 issue. It pointed out many product placements I missed and went into further detail about a few I had barely noticed. I was, however, shocked to see that The Big Bang Theory was completely left out! All the main characters have iPhones, two have iMacs, one has a MacBook, one has an iPad 2, one has a vintage Macintosh, and one has a 1977 Apple II. iPods are mentioned countless times, including a hilarious conversation about the original iPod in a flashback. Also, there’s been an episode focusing on Siri, one episode entirely about iOS app development, and Steve Wozniak has guest starred on an episode…

You can’t call yourself an Apple and Steve Jobs fan without knowing of Robert X. Cringely’s famous interview, which was part of Triumph of the Nerds, a documentary released in 1996. But this was only a tiny portion of the meeting Cringely had with Jobs and sadly, the original footage somehow disappeared—until, by some odd coincidence, a VHS copy of the entire interview was discovered in the director’s garage the week of Jobs’s passing. Trying to improve its quality for a theatrical release was no easy task. When we interviewed Cringely about the process, he confirmed that increasing the resolution and detail of a video clip was definitely not as easy as when the actors on CSI do it: “We’ve tried some existing products, both hardware and software, and they…

THE GEAR WE’RE LUSTING AFTER…THIS MONTH SUSIE ZINKEN www.urbanears.com $140.00 I’ll admit it—I want these because they’re bright red (six other colors as well). But they have some cool features too, from the coiled cable with 1/8- and 1/4-inch plugs, all-day comfort, and a “ZoundPlug” audio output for daisy-chaining to another headphone-wearing head-bobber. CHRIS SPINNAKER www.edifier.us.com $349.99 The first time I saw these, I instinctively blurted out “Shark!” Turns out their unique shape is meant to enhance sound and reduce vibration, and since they’re Bluetooth, they’ll work with audio from my Mac, iPhone, and iPad. And I love the Burgundy option, in addition to basic black (shown here). FLO MACBOOK PRO RETINA 15-INCH SLEEVE www.mujjo.com $80 The new Retina MacBook Pro is thin and light and beautiful, and it deserves…

Plenty of useful new iCloud features were added in Mountain Lion—but even more are on the way. When Apple releases iOS 6 this fall, the iPhone, iPad, and iPod touch will gain Mountain Lion’s iCloud functionality plus several all-new features that will allow you to share even more content with friends and family. Let’s take a look at the new iCloud functions that Apple has announced for iOS 6 so far. SHARED PHOTO STREAM Photo Stream shipped with the initial version of iCloud and allows you to view and sync the most recent 1,000 photos taken with your iCloud-compatible devices. With iOS 6, Apple will take this feature a step further by allowing you to create a Shared Photo Stream, which you can invite other people to join. When new…

Not too long ago, people tended to own one computer on which they would store all their data, occasionally moving it around using floppy disks, CDs, or USB memory sticks. And although we’re only a few years down the road from those times, the concept of all our files living on a single machine now seems very outdated. As technology has developed rapidly, the ways in which you can transfer, share, and send files have become many and varied. The rise of the internet is the biggest factor in allowing this to happen, providing an increasingly fast and easy way to send documents, pictures, music, and even movies between devices and around the world. Faster home broadband connections are at the point where uploading data no longer takes hours, and…

The internet has revolutionized the way we communicate and consume and share information with each other. The rise of social networking sites like Facebook and Twitter as well as the prevalence of fast internet connections means it’s now more convenient than ever to share things electronically. At its simplest, this can mean emailing files to people. Apple’s Mail is great with attachments, and you can drag and drop documents into a new message to attach them. In the case of pictures, there’s an option at the bottom-right corner of the message window to resize them prior to sending, which works beautifully. Movies can be dropped in as attachments too, and there’s even a Photo Browser window that’s able to access your iPhoto albums and your Facebook albums online, if you…

Apple’s new Podcasts app is a testament to the tremendous evolution the medium has undergone since its humble iPod beginnings. Having long outgrown its iTunes tab, it was inevitable that Apple would develop a standalone app to mark the podcast’s maturation into a legitimate form of entertainment. As we’ve grown to expect from Apple’s iOS apps, Podcasts looks great, with large, album-style artwork to accompany subscriptions. Playing a podcast launches a slick reel-to-reel player that’s incredibly realistic; flipping a switch literally slows down or speeds up the reels, and you can actually watch the virtual tape run through the machine. Podcast discovery is the closest thing to a killer feature, offering a clever radio dial interface for browsing “top stations” and a familiar revolving wall that shuttles you off to…

Outwitters seems primed to sell players on iOS turn-based strategy, with an asynchronous online multiplayer board game approach that utilizes hexagonal grid maps and a colorful, quirky art style. Maneuvering your team of odd creatures (like salty sea critters or sugary rainbow-pop cuddlies) to destroy the enemy’s base is the goal, but naturally, your foe’s attempting the same exact task. All player activities cost wit points that recharge after each turn, while each unit is only allowed to move and attack once per turn. Part of the challenge comes from deciding which units to use and how aggressive to be, or if you want to spend your wits on a new battle recruit. Choose wisely, because you won’t have enough for everything. The bottom line. Outwitters is great for casual-minded…

What comes after N? In the alphabet, that would be O. In the world of Wi-Fi standards, the answer is ac. Buffalo’s AirStation AC1300 N900 dual-band router and AirStation AC1300 N450 dual-band bridge are based on the second revision of the not-yet-final 802.11ac standard, which promises Gigabit Ethernet speeds wirelessly, up to 1300Mbps maximum on the 5GB band and 450Mbps on the 2.4GHz band. Keep in mind that you can only get 802.11ac speeds with 802.11ac-compatible gear—and everything on the market except for draft-ac routers like this, including everything Apple makes, tops out at 802.11n. That’s why you need both the Buffalo router, which connects via Ethernet to your modem, and the 802.11ac bridge, which you locate next to your Mac, your TV, your Apple TV, whatever you can wire…

A text editor is not a word processor—the role of TextWrangler is to slice and dice words and spaces (and code) with great power and flexibility, not to produce finished, gussied-up documents. And none of the new features in version 4.0 makes TextWrangler any more suitable for designing cute party invites. You can write fresh words in TextWrangler, of course, but where it really shines is in processing large quantities of existing text, thanks to the most powerful search-and-replace functionality around. Want to look for all the lines containing a particular string, and copy them to a new document? No problem. Need to compare documents, look for duplicated text, or perform dozens of other jobs? TextWrangler takes away the pain of doing these manually, so it’s great for getting messy,…

When I was a kid, I discovered something amazing: detangler. You spray some on your hair, and voilà, a comb will run right through it no matter how tangled it was. To my knowledge, this product hasn’t been invented for headphone cables, and that’s a darn shame. But Jays seems to have solved the tangled cables problem anyway with the a-JAYS Four. These earbuds sport a flat rubber cable that just doesn’t tangle. I really tried, too. I balled them up and shoved them in my pocket, let them roll around in the bottom of my bag, never used a carrying case—I even wore them in bed a few times. The cable is just wide and flat enough to resist knotting, and it simply doesn’t catch on itself when you…

How Apple could ever think that the four USB 2.0 ports on an iMac or Mac mini would be enough for all of the digital cameras, external hard drives, and iOS devices in our lives is beyond us. MacBook users are even worse off. Two USB ports? Seriously? Fortunately, there’s a cure to the too-few-ports blues: the Satechi 12-Port USB Hub. It’s powered, lightweight, and wicked useful. If you know anything about USB, there’s not much to see here spec-wise. Like other USB 2.0 devices, the Satechi’s 12 ports can transfer data at speeds upwards of 480 megabits per second. Since the hub is powered, you’ll be able to charge most devices, including an iPhone or iPod. But this is standard—what makes the Satechi a good buy are the other…

When Apple refreshed its laptop line in June 2012, the entry-level price of the 13-inch MacBook Air came down by $100, to just $1,199. Surprise, that’s also the price of the entry-level 13-inch MacBook Pro. We can’t remember Apple having two entry-level machines like this—in the days of the white plastic MacBook, that was always the rock-bottom-priced option, and until this revision, the MacBook Air was always slightly more expensive than the MacBook Pro, since the Air’s fancy, shrunken innards cost a premium. So now the question becomes how to choose. We took the entry-level $1,199 mid-2012 2.5GHz Core i5 MacBook Pro for a spin, and compared it against a $1,499 1.8GHz Core i5 MacBook Air just purchased by a staffer. (The specs on our $1,499 Air are nearly identical…

A wise man once sang that time keeps on slippin’ (slippin’, slippin’) into the future. But when you’re at work, it’s crucial to not let time, or expenses, slip through the cracks. OfficeTime is a robust time and expense tracker that scales from a single person to a small business. It’s great for tracking billable hours, creating invoices, and generating quick expense reports, and it syncs seamlessly between your Mac (or PC), iPhone, and iPad over the local network. The Mac version has tons of thoughtful touches. When you step away from your computer and then return, a handy dialog offers to subtract the idle time from the open session, keep the time, or move it to another category. The list of projects and time/expense categories is easy to customize,…

Surprise! Grandpa left you underpants Losing a loved one is hard. Sometimes, all you’re left with is a few items, handed down so you might look upon them and remember the good times you once had together. But in the case of Tiny, the tech-head protagonist of Tiny & Big: Grandpa’s Leftovers, an heirloom can mean so much more than fond memories. It’s a matter of legacy, and even magical power. Also, it just happens to be a pair of old underwear. The first full game from indie developer Black Pants, Grandpa’s Leftovers follows the adventures of hero Tiny as he travels through the desert to reclaim his grandfather’s tighty-whities from his nemesis, Big. Luckily, Tiny has three helpful devices at his disposal: a grappling hook, a rock-splicing laser, and…

Disk space is a precious commodity. Whether you’re running OS X off of a solid-state drive, or have a ridiculously large hard drive that’s filled to the brim with partially downloaded media files, it’s nice to do a little house cleaning from time to time to ensure that your system is running at full speed. Oh, and it’s not always those apps that are the culprit—there’s a ton of hidden resources that are usually left behind, even after you’ve banned an application to the Trash. We’ll show you how to get rid of stuff, get your files in order, and regain disk space without losing your mind. WHAT YOU NEED Patience 1 Delete Apps For apps downloaded from the Mac App Store, you can simply delete them from Launchpad. Click…

Our iPhones and iPads are ubiquitous devices that come with us wherever we go, but because of this they can get clouded up with data that we might not actually need. Take email for example: sometimes you just want to wipe your phone clean of all that superfluous data and face the day with a fresh, clean slate. You can do so in just a few steps. >>> WHAT YOU NEED » iOS 5 and later 1 Delete Messages One at a Time There are two ways that you can delete one message at a time. First, if you are in Inbox view, you can swipe using one finger on the message from left to right. A small Delete button appears to the right of the message. Tapping this button…