Table of contents for March 2019 in Macworld

It seems like it was only yesterday that I first used BareBones Software’s BBEdit, but in actuality, yesterday is so far away—25 years, in fact. With all the twists and turns across more than two decades of Apple as a company, Mac hardware, and the underlying operating system, you might think that BBEdit stands alone as a continuously-developed app shepherded largely or exclusively by the same independent developer—an app without a giant company behind it. As it turns out, BBEdit is one of several apps that’s been around the block more than a few times. The longevity of indie apps is more extraordinary when you consider the changes Apple put the Mac through from the early 1990s to 2018. Apple switched from Motorola 680x0 processors to PowerPC to Intel chips,…

Back in December, I wrote about what we could glean from Apple’s expansion into new physical locations in the U.S.. While studying the company’s personnel moves may cross a bit into reading tea leaves, you can often divine at least some big picture indications from where the company is putting its resources. Make no mistake, Apple’s biggest and most significant resources are its personnel. Granted, those personnel moves are happening on a consistent basis, though they don’t always rise to the level of reported news. They may not always be as splashy as expanding campuses, but there are plenty of hirings, firings, and reorganizations that can point to how Apple is adjusting its operational priorities. Over the last few weeks alone, for example, there have been several stories about Apple…

CyberLink PhotoDirector is kind of a sleeper in the Mac pantheon of desktop image editors. It competes with Apple Photos, Adobe Photoshop Elements, Pixelmator, Luminar, and other consumer imagers. CyberLink is mostly associated with Windows, and PhotoDirector is the only cross-platform item in the company’s suite of multimedia prosumer apps. Like many of CyberLink’s Windows apps, PhotoDirector 10 has its own brand of sizzle that may prove appealing to Mac users, especially those interested in turning their photos into works of art. The latest version of PhotoDirector offers multiple new layer features, keystone correction, content aware clone, the ability to separate imported GIFs into individual frames for multi-exposure or multi-sequence images, and artificial intelligence–based tricks, as well as tethered shooting, soft proofing, template packs, and a new calendar view. That’s in…

For a company that’s mired in its biggest stock slump in a decade, Apple sure isn’t wallowing in its poor sales. Without stepping foot in Las Vegas or making a single announcement of its own, Apple is having one of its best CES conferences in years, as companies turned to HomeKit en masse to boost their smart offerings. While Google Assistant and Alexa controlled their fair share of the CES spotlight, they did little to overshadow Siri. In fact, Apple’s HomeKit was one of the surprise winners of this year’s show, as Sony, LG, GE, Vizio, Belkin, Arlo, Ikea, TP-Link and several others all rolled out products and updates featuring HomeKit integration, an abrupt turnaround from previous shows that all but ignored the iPhone maker’s smart-home ambitions. It’s safe to…

Most of us already know that many apps track our location data to better deliver information about local weather, shops, or movie showtimes. A new report from The New York Times, though, reveals that this data is often frighteningly precise and collected up to 14,000 times per day. It’s so precise, in fact, that it’s possible to figure out intimate details of a person’s life merely by studying it. Worse, some apps sell this data to companies who then use it to push hyper-targeted ads to your phones. Fortunately, the report also demonstrates that we iOS users are better protected than our Android counterparts. Even so, we’re far from immune. If you’re worried that too much of your location data is being uploaded and potentially sold to the highest bidder,…

If you own a notebook equipped with a USB-C port, you’ll want a USB-C hub to enable legacy connectivity with ethernet or an external HDMI monitor. One external monitor. Wait, you want four? Well, Targus has you covered. At CES 2019, Targus showed off the DOCK520USZ, also known as the USB-C Universal QUAD HD (QVHD) Docking Station. There’s a slew of regular ports, including four USB 3.0 ports, a USB-C port with power, gigabit ethernet, a 3.5mm audio jack, and so on. What’s unique about this dock, however, is the four 1080p HDMI outputs, which essentially can be used to create a multi-monitor battlestation as the video shows. Because who doesn’t want to plug into four monitors for work and play? Though we were quoted $129 for the dock, that apparently…

Apple fans don’t typically have a lot to look forward to from CES, but we were treated to a surprise announcement from Samsung that it will bring the iTunes video store to its smart TVs, complete with Bixby support. But Samsung isn’t the only TV maker working with Apple—AirPlay 2 and HomeKit support are coming to other smart TVs. Apple has updated its AirPlay page with a focus on TV entertainment and special mention of smart TV support. What’s more, individual TV manufacturers have started to announce support for AirPlay 2 and HomeKit. In LG’s announcement of its new Signature OLED R TVs, it announced support for AirPlay 2 and HomeKit. Users can use their own voice to get things done with Amazon Alexa, a new addition to LG’s AI TV lineup…

You need a good turntable to enjoy the warm, intimate sound of vinyl records. But albums and 45s don’t make good travel companions, so what’s a mobile music lover to do? With Audio-Technica’s AT-LP120-USB turntable, you can listen to your records when you’re home, and digitize them for playback on your smartphone or portable digital audio player when you’re away. DIRECT DRIVE DESIGN The AT-LP120-USB is a direct-drive turntable, which means there’s a motor beneath its spindle turning its platter. Direct-drive turntables deliver fast start and stop times and excellent torque, and there’s no belt to worry about wearing out over the years. The traditional drawback in a direct-drive design is that vibrations produced by the motor can be transferred to the platter and record. Many audiophiles prefer belt-driven turntables,…

Whatever else you may say about 2018, the year proved that plenty of developers still take the Mac seriously as a gaming platform. I’m fond of saying that we as Mac gamers enjoy quality at the expense of quantity, and standout titles like Subnautica and Pillars of Eternity 2: Deadfire—both of which released at the same time as their PC counterparts—serve as proof of that. Nor did I have to struggle for this list: There are plenty of new enjoyable games like The Banner Saga 3 and The Elder Scrolls Online: Summerset that deliver hours of entertainment but fall a tad short of the greatness of the following entries. Whether you’re looking for blockbuster action or retro-styled platformers, this year’s crop of games has many wonders to choose from. RISE…

Premiere Rush CC, a brand-new video app from Adobe, emphasizes speed in the creation and sharing of online video targeted to the social media crowd. Unlike Premiere Pro, Premier Elements, and Premiere Clip (Adobe’s other desktop and mobile video apps), Rush operates across devices with nearly identical desktop and mobile versions that can save all footage in the cloud. Your movie is accessible anytime, anywhere via an auto sync feature that you can enable if you choose, or you can save your video locally. Rush, powered partly by Adobe’s Sensei artificial intelligence framework, is compatible with the latest version of Premiere Pro. Rush is super simple to use. You can shoot video from within the app on your mobile device or you can import video from your Camera Roll. Either…

GJEMENI COUCH USB charging ports are showing up in all sorts of places, and Gjemeni puts them in the most useful places of all: Furniture. The company’s articulating couch has USB ports that are rated to deliver 1.5 amps of power, so they’re not capable of fast-charging devices. It’s also outfitted with a 110-volt grounded AC outlet on each side of its backrest. The couch’s backrest is split down the middle, so you can recline each side independently of the other. A ratchet mechanism allows you to set the backrest in three positions: Slightly upright, slightly reclined, or fully flat.—MICHAEL BROWN BOSE FRAMES Bose Frames have of Bluetooth micro speakers integrated into the bulked-up arms of eyeglass frames. Stylish though not stylistically groundbreaking, Frames deliver surprisingly substantial sound without requiring…

Let us pity them—the sad, devoted lovers of the iPad mini. In the wake of every Apple iPad event since 2015, you can find them frowning in the crowds or, later, rushing to Reddit to weep in collective misery at the absence of their beloved device’s Fifth Coming. But I say there’s no cause for all that melodrama. I say Apple has already given us the latest iPad mini: It’s just calling it the iPhone XS Max. EXTRA PADDING This would have been a weaker argument as recently as a year ago, when Apple’s largest phones remained saddled with chunky bezels. Now, we’re seeing a reversal of the old order. In 2010 it was popular to joke that the iPad was little more than a massive iPhone, but with the…

Moshi designs some of the best-looking phone accessories on the market. One look at the Moshi Porto Q 5K Battery Pack ($85 on Amazon), and you can tell the company takes pride in its overall approach to product aesthetics. The Porto Q 5K is covered in a cloth material. A complementary rubber ring found on top of the power bank holds your smartphone in place when the wireless charging feature is in use. This prevents notifications and general vibrations from nudging the phone off the pack and onto the floor. The Porto Q 5K sports two ports: a USB-A port to charge another device, and a USB-C port that’s used solely to charge the battery pack itself. The USB-A port is capable of up to 12W charging speeds, but falls…

Products like the Satechi Aluminum Bluetooth Keyboard grant us a peek at the Apple that could be—in this case, an Apple that remains enamored with space gray aluminum but also committed to keyboards with generous key travel. And the Satechi keyboard is a decent effort, weighty and pleasant for typing, and it lets you pair it with up to three different Bluetooth devices. Viewed from across the room, it readily looks like it spawned in the mind of Jony Ive. Yet I never felt a strong connection to the Satechi keyboard, mainly because it always struggled to connect with my Mac. Maybe we can see this as a reminder that an Apple logo really does translate into quality, but first it’s also important to keep in mind that the logo’s…

Just how big is Amazon’s recent announcement that Apple Music is coming to Echo devices? It all depends on if you see it as something larger about how Apple is prioritizing its subscription services compared to its traditional focus on making money by selling hardware. The cold war between Amazon and Apple seems to be thawing at last. Amazon’s Prime Video app finally arrived on Apple TV late last year. Apple devices are widely available on Amazon thanks to a new deal between the two companies. And now there’s this new wrinkle, in which Amazon will become the second third-party speaker vendor (after Sonos) to offer support for Apple Music. The potentially larger wrinkle is the idea that Apple’s stated quest to rapidly grow its Services revenue line—encompassing the App Store, iCloud,…

For over a decade, V-Moda has worked hard to carve a niche for itself in the oversaturated world of personal audio. Sharp angles abound in its audacious headphone and earphone designs. The build quality of its products could be compared to that of the personal audio gear churned out by its British rivals Bower & Wilkins: everything feels right; everything feels sturdy. When I think of its products, the word “misstep” isn’t one that comes readily to mind. Unfortunately, it feels like the right word to apply to V-Moda’s Forza Metallo wireless earphones, the company’s first attempt at a wireless in-ear audio product. While they offer a lot to like, these earbuds come with enough quirks that you may feel buyer’s remorse. DESIGN As they’re made by V-Moda, we’re not…

Rumor has it that Apple is planning to produce its own CPUs and GPUs for Macs. Those T2 processors we have today are just a tiny first step—the big leap is to take something like the A12X and build a MacBook around it. It makes sense from the perspective of both power-to-performance ratio and a cost-to-performance ratio. Perhaps more importantly, it puts Apple fully in control of its whole platform, and allows the company to innovate in ways it can’t when it cedes the very heart of its computers to other companies. For these reasons and more, I think it makes sense to begin transitioning macOS to ARM and for Apple to produce computers with its own CPUs and GPUs inside. But that transition will take years. While that’s going on,…

Designed with on-location video production in mind, Sony’s PSZ-RA4T Professional RAID is not the fastest RAID box we’ve tested, but it’s certainly fast enough. Made for travel, the PSZ-RA4T is thoroughly ruggedized and especially easy on the eye. Add the ability of this dual-drive unit to function via Thunderbolt 2 or USB 3.1 on your cohort’s or client’s Windows machine as well as your Mac, and you’ve got a winner. DESIGN AND FEATURES The PSZ-RA4T has enough deft design flourishes that leave no doubt that folks who work with such products supplied more than a little input. Or there’s simply an especially brilliant and practical designer at Sony. Kudos to the company, whatever the scenario. The silicon jacket surrounding most of the PSZ-RA4T is the most salient evidence of…

After years and years of prognosticating doom and gloom for Apple, the analysts finally got it right: iPhone sales are slumping. It was bound to happen sooner or later, and there was enough smoke to suggest that Apple’s quarter would be a dumpster fire for iPhone sales. Tim Cook placed much of the blame on China in a letter to investors, and while there may be some truth to that, plenty of other factors contributed to the declining sales. Here are five reasons why the iPhone hit a sales snag and how Apple can fix them all. SIMPLIFY THE iPHONE LINEUP There was a time when choosing which iPhone to buy was a matter of deciding whether you wanted one in black or white. Those days are long gone, of…

I probably used the original Apple Pencil for no more than an hour. I don’t draw. I avoid writing by hand whenever possible. My penmanship is awful. The moment my teachers began accepting printed essays, I stopped writing them in longhand. I have never had a good relationship with pens and pencils; why should the Apple Pencil be any different? And yet…something funny happened upon the release of the new 11- and 12.9-inch iPad Pro models with the second-generation Apple Pencil. I gave the new Pencil a try. And I’ve used it more in the past five weeks than in the three years that I kept the original Apple Pencil…well, it’s around here somewhere, if I can find it, but it’s probably not charged, anyway. FOR ALL THE REASONS YOU’D…

COMIXOLOGY Comixology is an Amazon-owned company that lets comic book fans buy and read titles from a wide range of publishers, not just Marvel and DC. Annoyingly, the app doesn’t let you import comic files that you may have downloaded from elsewhere. Tapping through an issue almost feels like an animated story, due to the fluid movement across the page. It’s an entirely different reading experience from flicking through a book. Flowing transitions from panel to panel gently move you through the story, with the option to customize reading settings. There’s also a letterbox option, which makes just a single panel visible across the page instead of multiple panels. MARVEL UNLIMITED Marvel’s official app is a great starting point for people looking to get into comics, especially if they’re already…

At the Apple Worldwide Developers Conference keynote last year, Apple introduced a revamped App Store app. During that unveiling, it was revealed that the apps in Microsoft Office 365 would be coming to the Mac App Store “later this year.” Well, it didn’t happen in 2018, but if the company meant within a year of WWDC, then it’s on time—Microsoft Office 365 is now available in the Mac App Store. The Office 365 apps are available from the Mac App Store with a free one-month trial. The full Office 365 bundle includes six apps: Excel, PowerPoint, OneDrive, OneNote, Outlook, and Word, though you can download individual apps. Once the free trial is over, the subscription price for the six-app bundle is $69.99. If you already have an Office 365 subscription, you…

While smart outlets are rapidly becoming a dime a dozen, smart power strips remain a bit more uncommon. Koogeek’s O1US expands the alternatives beyond what TP-Link’s Kasa Smart offers, but comes up a bit short in comparison. First let’s look at the hardware: The O1US includes three independently controllable three-prong outlets, plus three always-on USB charging ports. Two of these USB ports (labeled “iPhone/iPod) are rated for just 1.0 amps each, while the third (labeled “iPad”) is a 2.1-amp socket. The lower-power USB ports are a head-scratcher, but the power outlets are an even bigger issue. With just three outlets, the O1US simply doesn’t give you room to grow. Competing smart surge protectors almost invariably include four power outlets or more (the Kasa Smart offers six). This limitation alone will be…

People are on the go more than ever, and they want to take their music with them. So, it’s no surprise that portable, battery-powered, Bluetooth speakers are proliferating like crazy. Among them is the new Xtreme 2 from JBL. Let’s find out if it can get the party started during your next outing. FEATURES The JBL Xtreme 2 is a nearly cylindrical unit measuring 11.3 x 5.4 x 5.2 inches (width x height x diameter). The extra height is due to the feet that prevent it from rolling around on a flat surface. It tips the scale at a hefty 5.3 pounds, thanks to its sturdy metal construction and tough fabric covering. It comes with a woven nylon strap (with an inline bottle opener, no less!) that lets you sling…

SAVE EMAIL DOWNLOADED TO AN iPHONE OR iPAD VIA POP3 OR A LOCAL iOS MAIL FOLDER It’s easy to think that an iOS backup would include all the personal data stored on your iPhone or iPad. But Apple explains in a support page that some things aren’t copied off your phone, because they’re stored elsewhere. This includes “data stored in other cloud services, like Gmail and Exchange mail.” What if you download messages from an email account to your iOS device and they’re deleted from the server? Those emails are gone for good when your iPhone or iPad is restored from backup or dies. Apple doesn’t mention this in the support note or elsewhere, even though it can affect people who store certain messages locally on their devices instead of…