Table of contents for Autumn 2021 in MacFormat

We love this time of year–every autumn brings new devices, from iPhones to iPads, Apple Watches to Macs, and the promise of new versions of our favourite operating systems with which to use them. And this time around, it’s time for iOS 15 to take centre stage. Turn to p20 and you’ll discover all the new features of this latest iPhone update, plus the tips, tricks and how-to advice you can employ to make the most of them. Best of all, you don’t even need to buy a new iPhone–every model released since the iPhone 6s will get its fair share of iOS 15 glory. Huzzah! Talking of glory, turn to p62 and you’ll discover the best ways to make sure your Mac is ready for its next free upgrade,…

WE ASKED… Which rumoured new Mac are you most looking forward to? Log on and see next issue’s big question! twitter.com/macformat facebook.com/macformat Apple Watch to grow in size? The Apple Watch Series 7 is just around the corner, and it could be due a design overhaul that sees it come in bigger sizes, according to a picture posted by Twitter leaker DuanRui. The image apparently shows part of an Apple Watch strap with ‘45MM’ printed on it, but whether it is genuine is (at the time of writing) unknown. A second leaker going by the name UnclePan on Weibo has also claimed the smaller Watch will bump up to 41mm alongside the 45mm model. Those posts line up with reporter Mark Gurman’s contention that this year’s Apple Watch will get…

Apple supplier TSMC–the company responsible for manufacturing most of Apple’s custom chips used in its iPhones, Macs, and more–is raising its prices. That could have a knock-on effect on the cost of Apple devices like the iPhone 13. In a warning to its clients, TSMC announced it would raise prices by 10% on chips made using 7-nanometer processes and lower, and by 20% on chips created with 16-nanometer processes and higher. The change will take effect in January 2022. According to DigiTimes, Apple could pass the cost on to its customers, potentially as soon as the iPhone 13 is launched this September. And now that Macs run on Apple silicon made by TSMC, they too could be affected. Apple has some of the highest profit margins in the industry, so…

IT WILL TAKE 15 minutes YOU WILL LEARN How to edit and annotate with Markup YOU’LL NEED Mac OS X 10.10 or later Don’t we mean Markdown? Nope! Markup has been a part of macOS since Yosemite and it enables you to do things like add annotations to PDFs, draw shapes and speech bubbles on photos and much, much more. Markup is one of our favourite macOS features: it enables you to perform a variety of tasks on images, PDFs and documents without having to open a dedicated editing app. There are several ways to use Markup. You can access it from Finder by holding Control and clicking, then selecting Quick Actions > Markup; you can use it inside Quick Look by clicking on the Markup icon; and you can…

Flyover puts you on an aerial tour of a city in Maps. First, check which cities work with Flyover on Apple’s website: bit.ly/MFflyover (this link is case sensitive). Search for a location that is compatible with Flyover, then click it in the sidebar. Its information card will appear. On the card, click Flyover Tour. The Flyover tour will now begin. This converts the map to a satellite view (if it wasn’t already) and cycles through major attractions from a drone’s perspective. Details of each location are at the bottom of the window.…

IT WILL TAKE 5 minutes YOU WILL LEARN How to get discounted food and help fight food waste YOU’LL NEED Too Good To Go, iOS 10.3 or later Food waste is a big problem. Not only do huge amounts of food go uneaten every day, but all the energy expended in creating it goes to waste too. One of the main areas this happens is not at home but in restaurants and shops. At the end of the work day, heaps of food that could not be sold must be disposed of–a process that repeats every day in every city and town. Fortunately, there is a way to help. The free Too Good To Go app connects you to local shops that want to avoid squandering food they can’t sell…

IT WILL TAKE 20 minutes YOU WILL LEARN How to use FamilyWall as an organiser YOU’LL NEED FamilyWall (free, IAPs), more than one iOS/iPadOS device Organising children is like herding cats, only harder. There are meals to plan, lunches to buy, playdates to attend, kit to wash… the list seems never-ending. Thankfully apps such as FamilyWall can help even the most harassed parent organise everything. At its heart FamilyWall is a shared calendar system that works across everybody’s iPhones, iPads and iPod touches. You can quickly create events that include some or all of your family and their circle of friends, set reminders and add notes, and if you’ve enabled location services you can also use the app to see the location of your family circle members. The app also…

Use complex characters and symbols In Pages documents, how can I use characters not in the Character Viewer, such as the maths symbol for average, which is an x with a bar on top? by MOIRA LEWIS A There are two ways to create compound characters, depending on how you deliver them: in text or set in a laid-out format such as a PDF. Unicode, used in all text on Macs and Apple devices, handles these using Combining Diacritic Marks, including accents and scientific symbols, such as the overbar for denoting average. Although hard to add through the keyboard, you can do this using the Character Viewer window from the Keyboard menu bar item. First type ‘x’, then open Character Viewer. In the list at the left select Unicode, and…

Like insurance, backing up before upgrading is essential to ensure you don’t need those backups: when an upgrade goes well, they should seem a waste of time and effort. But try skipping them, or relying on old or incomplete backups, and when something does go wrong you’re likely to lose hours or days as well as some of your most important files. Backups made before upgrading to Monterey cover three potentially sticky situations. While the installer will always try to join up the new System with your existing Data volume, that may not work out, in which case you’ll need to migrate your documents, apps and other files from your copy or backup. Updates also bring a lot of reorganisation, in the process sometimes dumping files into folders of relocated…

When system and user files shared a single volume, it was often better to perform a clean reinstall when upgrading to a major new version of macOS. That ensured all the system files were in fine fettle, and any confuddling or corruption was cleaned up. Changes in startup volumes have now removed any benefits that reinstalling once had in terms of ensuring that macOS is in pristine condition. Like Big Sur, Monterey divides your startup disk between several different volumes, the System volume containing only macOS system files, which is sealed to guarantee its integrity. That’s not even used as a regular volume, but is frozen into a snapshot, and your Mac runs its system software from that snapshot, containing special firmlinks to your files, which are stored on the…

As long as you’re already familiar with using Big Sur, with its new human interface, you’ll notice relatively little change in design, layout or controls in Monterey. If you’re coming from an older version of macOS, you may be shocked to discover what’s happened, particularly in the top of windows. Small windows with lots of tools can make it hard to find anywhere that’s safe to use to drag the window around, but you’ll develop that skill in time. New features depend on the Mac model you’ve upgraded. M1 users do best of all, getting the whole set, but if your Intel Mac only just made the cut for macOS 12, you may not get Universal Control, and there’s uncertainty over support for AirPlay to Mac too. On Intel Macs,…

The ‘sharing’ bit of Family Sharing is obvious–it shares your iCloud storage, purchases and eligible subscriptions–but what about the ‘family’ bit? As far as Apple is concerned, a family group can be up to six people, each of whom can be authorised on up to 10 devices. Your family members don’t need to share the same physical location, genes or surname, but they do all need to have or sign up for an Apple ID. Here’s how it works. One person–that’s you!–is the Family Organiser, and that person invites other family members to join their family group. You can only run or be in one family group at a time, although you can transfer accounts from one group to another. That’s useful if you’re sharing with lodgers or housemates who…

IN PRINT ON iPAD & iPHONE ISSUE 369 OCTOBER 2021 Become an Apple Genius Boost battery life on all your devices Master drag and drop in Files Edit your home videos with iMovie ISSUE 368 SEPTEMBER 2021 Ultimate guide: iPhone photography The evolution of Apple TV Get started with Keynote Do more with HomePod mini ISSUE 367 AUGUST 2021 57 amazing Apple projects NEW APPLE KIT TESTED: iMac 24in, iPad Pro 12.9in, Apple TV 4K What’s coming in macOS Monterey To order back issues of the print magazine, go to bit.ly/macformat_backissues or phone +44 (0)330 333 1113 and we’ll post them out to you. Download back issues onto your iOS device at any time and keep them forever in your personal library. bit.ly/macformatipad NEVER MISS AN ISSUE! SUBSCRIBE TODAY! IN…

£280 FROM uk.anker.com FEATURES 90W MacBook charging, 20W Power Delivery, triple 4K display support Anker’s latest dock for Intel MacBooks comes with a 120W external power supply and Thunderbolt 4 cable, which carries both data and up to 90W of power. It also supplies 20W to its USB-C port with Power Delivery, so you can charge your Mac and iOS device at full power at the same time. In addition to the main Thunderbolt 4 and USB-C port on the front are an audio jack, a power button and an SD card 4.0 UHS-II slot for fast data transfers. The rear has four USB-A ports; two USB 2.0 and two USB 3.0, all powered suitably for charging smaller devices, and a Gigabit Ethernet port. Then there’s a second Thunderbolt 4…

€65 (about £56) FROM OWC, owcdigital.com FEATURES 1x Gigabit Ethernet port, 1x USB-C passthrough (100W), 2x USB 3.2 (5Gbps), 1x HDMI port, 1x SD card reader, 15cm USB-C cable with stowaway groove, 174g weight As Apple charges towards USB-C everything, alternative ports are getting harder to find on its devices. But you might still need USB-A peripherals, Ethernet cables, and more. In that case, you need a hub, and OWC’s Travel Dock E is a good one. This device adds a Gigabit Ethernet port to the company’s regular Travel Dock. It also comes with two USB 3.2 ports (running at 5Gbps), an HDMI 2.0 port supporting 4K at 60Hz, an SD card reader and a USB-C passthrough port that provides 100W of power. It’s one of the only hubs with…

£20.99 FROM Trust, trust.com FEATURES 2x multicolour LED bulbs, 2.4GHz Wi-Fi, 806 lumens, 15,000 hours bulb life There are lots of affordable smart bulbs that can be controlled via Bluetooth on your iOS devices, but Bluetooth does have limitations–including, of course, a range of just 10m. Wi-Fi is a more flexible way of controlling your lights, providing additional features such as remote control when you’re away from home. Wi-Fi bulbs tend to be a lot more expensive though, so we were pleased to find that Trust’s new range of Wi-Fi LED bulbs starts at just £16.99 for two white bulbs, or £20.99 for the multicolour bulbs reviewed here. The bulbs are available with both bayonet and screw fittings, and provide 806 lumens brightness (comparable to 60W for ye olde, pre-LED…

$149 (about £109) FROM Telestream, telestream.net NEEDS macOS 10.15 or later With its advanced feature set and easy-to-use editing interface, ScreenFlow has long been the go-to app for anyone wanting to create slick screencasts. And this major update–the first since November 2019–adds some key new features. While ScreenFlow 9 introduced simultaneous multi-screen recording, 10 adds simultaneous recording of multiple cameras and microphones. This makes it a whole lot easier to record video using a multi-camera setup, knowing that everything will be synced up automatically in the editor. Just connect as many cameras and devices as you need and select them in the screen-recording menu. As before, you can connect iOS devices and record their screens. While there’s no option to use a device’s direct camera feed, you can use an…

DESKTOP SPEAKER Ruark MR1 £329.99 ruarkaudio.com Winner of MF357’s head to head, the MR1 speaker set looks and sounds the business. The dome tweeter and long-throw woofer can handle a variety of audio styles with aplomb. You get a good variety of connectivity options, and we love the chunky function/volume dial too. IN-EAR WIRLESS EARPHONES Sony WF-1000XM4 £250 sony.co.uk The WF-1000XM4 are slightly smaller than their predecessor and the case is 40% smaller–and more eco-friendly. The true wireless earbuds have a good audio ability, support voice-assistant control and the Headphones Connect app provides lots of customisation and ease of use. As well as LDAC, the WF-1000XM4 are compatible with SBC and AAC codecs. KEYBOARD (MAC/iOS) Logitech MX Keys For Mac £99.99 logitech.com If you spend a lot of time at…

[MAC APP] TickTick 4 Free (IAPs Task management and reminders that will bring you up to speed Lots of us do the bulk of our work on our Macs. But with so many distractions readily available on our computers, sometimes it can feel hard to stay on track. For times like that, a to-do app like TickTick is perfect–and there’s good news here, because TickTick has just updated its Mac app to version 4. This update brings a new, ‘more refined’ interface. Modules like tasks and habits have been divided into tabs to make them easier to manage. Common tasks, such as viewing tasks on a calendar, are now more straightforward, with simpler interactions that let you get on with managing your time. Your favourite lists can now be pinned…

We’re now a year and a half into a pandemic, and with many of us still working remotely, the overarching theme of iOS 15 is communication. What may be a surprise–although perhaps not, given that this is Apple — is that the communication is social, rather than business focused. As with macOS Monterey, the chief beneficiary of the iOS update is FaceTime. And, just like on the Mac, FaceTime in iOS gets SharePlay (although not until later in the year in an update to iOS 15), Grid View, and the ability to invite friends who don’t own Apple devices to join the conversation. Elsewhere, several of the other new features are the same as those on the Mac. So there’s a new Focus mode and Live Text. And, of course,…

1 Use Portrait mode Launch FaceTime and tap or search for a contact, then tap the camera icon. When the call has started, you’ll see the image from your camera at the bottom left. Tap it to enlarge it and you’ll see four icons in the corners. 2 Blur your background The icons are, from top left, Portrait, Minimise, Switch Camera, and Effects. Tap Portrait and your background will blur (handy for messy living spaces). If you tap the Effects button, you can swap your face for a Memoji or Animoji. 3 Create a link To FaceTime with someone who doesn’t have an Apple device, you need to create a link to send them. Tap the FaceTime app, then tap Create Link. In the sheet that appears, tap Add Name.…

1 Activate Focus Go to Settings and tap Focus. Toggle the switch to choose whether to sync the Focus status across your devices. Tap Do Not Disturb or Sleep, then tap People to specify notifications from contacts that can override Focus. 2 Choose people Tap the ‘+’ and then check the box next to contacts in the list that appears to allow notifications from them. Tap Calls From, if you want to be able to receive calls from specific contacts while Focus is switched on. Tap Done. 3 Choose Apps Tap Apps, then tap the ‘+’. Check the box next to the apps whose notifications you want to allow to override the Focus. Tap Done. To allow time-sensitive notifications, such as those from delivery apps, toggle Time Sensitive to on.…

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IT WILL TAKE 10 minutes YOU WILL LEARN How to create your own keyboard shortcuts YOU’LL NEED HotKey, Mac OS X 10.10 or later One of our favourite kinds of app is the one that’s clearly a labour of love, and it often comes into being when a developer spots a feature Apple hasn’t provided and steps up to offer it. HotKey is a brilliant example of that. Peter Vorwieger has created a simple, free and really useful utility for macOS that enables you to quickly and easily create all kinds of keyboard shortcuts–not just for apps but for folders and the clipboard too. So if there’s a particular folder you’re always opening or an app you often need to call up, you can create a keyboard combination for it…

IT WILL TAKE 15 minutes YOU WILL LEARN How to use the Selective Color and Color Balance panels, and Desaturate brush YOU’LL NEED Pixelmator Pro 2.1.2, macOS 10.14 or later By default, your iPhone’s Camera app can capture true colours in a range of different lighting conditions such as direct sunlight or under artificial tungsten lights. However, there are times when you might want to adjust a particular colour’s hue, saturation, brightness and balance to produce more creative looks. By selectively darkening the brightness of a sky you can make it look more dramatic and cause clouds to stand out in contrast for example. Or by reducing the saturation of a range of colours you can draw the eye to a fully saturated subject, such as a red bus against…

IT WILL TAKE 15 minutes YOU WILL LEARN Everything you need to know about Files YOU’LL NEED iOS 11 or later, or iPadOS 13 or later Before iOS 11 came along, file management on the iPhone, iPad and iPod touch was a real pain–and something that meant spending far too much time swearing at iTunes. And then Apple released Files, which made it easy not just to access the files on your device, but to access cloud services and iCloud Drive too. In its current incarnation Files is very like Finder, and it has extra powers beyond just organising and displaying files. You can use it to scan documents with your iPad’s camera, to annotate PDF files with Markup (see p38), to play music files including high quality FLAC files…

Make a custom emoji keyboard Q I use emojis a lot, but few apps help me type them in without using the Character Viewer. How can I make a custom keyboard containing those emoji? by ABI BAX ENDALE A There are two good ways to do this: create an Input Source, which is quick but requires a different way to produce the emoji, or you can make a complete custom keyboard. Input Sources are used for languages such as Chinese where each ‘character’ is produced by a series of keystrokes. To use these, you’d switch to your source using Control+[spacebar], then type a few characters, which you’ve set to generate one of your emoji, such as ‘egrin’ for ⚫, then switch back to your regular keyboard with Control+[spacebar] again. Your…

1 Set the destination Connect the external drive on which you’re going to store the backup. If necessary, format it in APFS using Disk Utility. Then open the Time Machine pane, click the Select Disk button and choose your external drive. 2 Set exclusions Click the Options button to exclude any items from the backup. Consider adding huge Photos libraries, virtual machines, and massive apps like Xcode, which could make backing up take hours or even days to complete. 3 First full backup In a couple of minutes, Time Machine will make its first and full backup of your Data volume. It takes a long time to prepare, but once it gets going, backing up to APFS is quick if you’ve excluded problem items. 4 Copy the Data volume In…

1 Reset the NVRAM If an Intel Mac is generally out of kilter when you log into Monterey, try resetting the NVRAM by holding Command+Option+p+r during startup. Unfortunately there’s no equivalent procedure for M1 Macs. 2 Start up in safe mode Another general panacea which fixes many glitches is to start up in safe mode. The Shift key does that for Intel Macs, but M1 models need to enter it through Recovery, using the Shift key with the selected disk. 3 Boot from another disk If your Mac has more serious problems after upgrading, and you have an external drive which can start it up, that can be an alternative to booting into Recovery mode. Tread gently or you could cause more problems. 4 Repair the Data volume Replace broken…

As parents we know just how much kids love Apple devices–and unfortunately we’re also well aware of the problems that can cause. Hands up if you’ve ever had to hide the family iPad, changed the Wi-Fi password without telling the kids or discovered an inappropriate item or app on a family device? Us too, which is why Screen Time is so useful when you’ve got Family Sharing set up on your iCloud account. Screen Time enables you to set per-person restrictions and time limits, and as we’ll discover it has lots of useful options that give you a great deal of control over your children’s Apple experience. You can use it to encourage better bedtimes by limiting the times when apps can be used. You can use it to block…

Our ratings Our reviews are totally independent; we’re not affiliated with Apple or anyone else, nor are we influenced by advertisers. A truly exceptional product. Award given solely at the discretion of the editor. The best example of its kind when pitted against comparable products. A brilliant thing Strongly recommended Worth considering Notable flaws A waste of your money BUYING ADVICE Our authoritative reviews help you make more informed choices Contact us Email your queries and your questions to letters@macformat.com…

£599 FROM apogeedigital.com FEATURES 192kHz recording, Symphony ECS Channel Strip NEEDS macOS 10.15 or later, USB-C The Duet 3 is the newest member of Apogee’s pro audio family, a supremely portable high-end audio recording interface for Mac and PC, though iOS is not supported. Beautifully constructed, its low profile is decidedly Apple-like. It has two USB-C ports and is bus-powered, the second port being usable for external power if you’d rather not power from your Mac. USB-C and A cables are supplied. To maintain its compact frame, I/O is mostly handled via a breakout cable. The proprietary plug splits off to two instrument inputs and two line outputs as well as two mic/line inputs in XLR format. A headphone output can be found on the body. So despite its small…

Native Union Rise Laptop Stand $29.99 (about £21) FROM Native Union, nativeunion.com FEATURES Folding design, fits 13-to 16-inch laptops, 0.12kg 1 Like a Japanese work of art, Native Union’s Rise transforms from flat (it’s 2.5mm thick!) to a MacBook stand in seconds, with an origami-style folding centre section that raises your machine. Made from nylon and glass fibre, the stand weighs next to nothing, and seems flimsy, but in practice it works well. It’s not as stable as a solid stand, but definitely more portable. The only minor downside of the Rise is the fact you have to stick it to the underside of your MacBook, using the stand’s built-in adhesive gel–revealed when you peel off the plastic backing. Some might not like the idea of semi-permanently tethering it to…

£69.99 (upgrade £39.99) FROM Parallels, parallels.com NEEDS macOS 10.13 or later, 4GB memory Choice is limited on an M1–Windows 10 and 11 for ARM, four Linux distros and macOS 12 but not 11 More than a year ago, among the software shown when Apple demonstrated its prototype Apple silicon Macs was an early demo version of Parallels Desktop for the new models. It has since taken 14 months for Parallels to release Desktop 17, the first virtualisation software to make full use of M1 Macs. Apple silicon has posed serious problems for those wanting to run Windows or older versions of macOS in a virtual machine (VM). As ARM processors in the M1 and later chips aren’t compatible with Intel processors, virtualisation software such as Parallels Desktop can’t run regular…

£4.99/month (Apple Arcade) FROM Blindflug, stellarcommanders.com NEEDS macOS 10.15 or later In small doses Stellar Commanders provides you with a fistful of frantic fun Stellar Commanders involves fast-paced planetary battles where you must destroy your enemy’s domain before you lose your own. Each planet is divided into territories–and those you control can house defensive batteries or missile silos, while you expand into unoccupied tiles. Don’t take too long though; games last a maximum of seven minutes, at which point the planet disintegrates and whoever controls the most territory is deemed the winner. A range of different units add a decent degree of strategy. Should you go aggressive and focus solely on missiles, or rapidly expand and try to smother your opponent? You can choose which units make it into the…

PLUS: macOS 12 tips and tricks iPod at 20 How Apple’s innovative media player changed the world–and the shape of the music business Back to basics Master Mail–be a communications pro! + ALSO INSIDE… Working with layers in Pixelmator Pro Sync and share media with Infuse 7 Master Apple’s spatial audio … and much more! Contents subject to change DON’T MISS IT–SUBSCRIBE TODAY! IN PRINT & ON YOUR iPAD Our print and digital bundle gets you the paper magazine as well as our iPad edition magazinesdirect.com/macformat-magazine-subscription ON YOUR MAC Read digitally on your Mac: subscribe with Zinio at bit.ly/ziniomacf ISSUE 371 ON SALE 19 OCT 2021…

The stream of Mac rumours has continued to flow recently, giving us an increasingly clear picture of what to expect in Apple’s next batch of laptops and desktop computers. The most prominent of the rumoured products is the MacBook Pro. This is expected to undergo a wide-ranging redesign, with the 13-inch model being replaced with a 14-inch version with slimmer bezels and a larger display. That display will include a super-high-quality miniLED panel, while the chassis will feature a flat-edged design inspired by the iPad Pro. We can also expect more port variety, with the return of HDMI and MagSafe. The 16-inch MacBook Pro will not miss out either, and will get most of these new features too. Internally, both flavours of MacBook Pro will be kitted out with improved…

The last 12 months have not been happy ones for the App Store. But the storm has not yet passed, as a slew of new allegations and obstacles have assailed the digital storefront. The first is a report from the non-profit watchdog group Campaign for Accountability, which claimed to reveal “major weaknesses in Apple’s App Store child safety measures” that would allow underage users to gain access to adult content. The group created an Apple ID for a fictitious 14-year-old user. Despite registering their age, the account was able to access apps with restricted content very easily. When downloading adult apps, the user was asked to confirm they were over 17. But doing so merely involved tapping ‘OK’, granting access to the app, despite their age clearly falling below the…

Apple was mired in controversy when, in August, it announced plans to scan for collections of known Child Sexual Abuse Material (CSAM) on iCloud Photos, along with other child safety measures in Messages. Yet weeks later, it changed tack, pausing both programmes to “take additional time to collect input and make improvements before releasing these critically important child safety features.” The timing of Apple’s August announcements certainly caused confusion. It was the CSAM scanning that provoked the biggest backlash from privacy advocates, with the American digital rights campaign organisation the Electronic Frontier Foundation calling it a “backdoor to your private life.” What was Apple doing? The important thing to note was that CSAM detection for iCloud Photos was intended to look for matches to known CSAM images. These matches were…

What’s new in Safari When Apple announced iOS 15 back in June, one of the biggest changes to the interface was in Safari. Just like in macOS Monterey, the URL bar (or tab bar as Apple now calls it) hosts both the address field/search bar and the button for switching tabs. However, unlike Monterey, where it still sits at the top of the page, it moved and initially hovered above the web page at the bottom of the screen. The immediate consequence was that the design hid the reload and Reader view buttons, much to the bemusement of many early preview users. Since then, Apple has made changes so that the reload button is visible, and the Reader view control appears when that mode is available. More importantly, the bar…

1 Grab text from a photo Tap Photos and scroll through your library until you find an image with text you want to copy. Tap and hold on the text you want to select and drag the selection handles so that they cover all of the text you want to use. 2 Use all text in an image Instead of manually selecting text, you can select all the text in an image that iOS recognises. To do that, when you tap and hold on text, instead of dragging the selection handles, tap Select all in the menu. 3 Copy or share text Once you’ve selected the text you want, you can interact with it just as you would any text, so you can tap Copy to copy it to the…

1 Choose different photos Launch Photos. Tap For You. Next to Memories, tap See All. Scroll to the Memory you want to customise. Tap it to play, then tap the circular ‘… icon. Tap Manage Photos, then tap a photo to select or deselect it. Tap Done. 2 Audition new Looks Select the Memory you want to customise. Tap it and while it’s playing, tap it again. Tap the musical note icon at the bottom left of the screen. Swipe left to scroll through Looks to see them and hear suggested music. 3 Choose a new Look You can tap a Look to select it and the suggested music. Or, tap the three overlapping circles at the bottom right to see all Memory Looks. Tap one to select it, then…

1 Add to Home Screen Tap and hold anywhere on the Home Screen you want to add the Widget to. When the apps shake, tap the ‘+’. Scroll down to Contacts and tap it. Swipe left until you see the Widget you want to use. Tap Add Widget. 2 Choose the Contacts By default, the Widget adds your Favourites. If there’s space, it will add other contacts, too. Tap and hold on the Widget and choose Edit Widget. Tap the Contact you want to remove, then tap the contact you want to add. 3 Use the Widget The Widget displays a contact’s image and their location, if they are in your Find My app. Tap a contact and you’ll see the usual buttons for calling or messaging them. And also…

IT WILL TAKE 15 minutes YOU WILL LEARN How to use Apple Maps’ extra features to get more out of the app YOU’LL NEED Apple Maps, macOS 11 or later Every year, Apple makes Maps more and more capable. While it can get you from point A to point B, there is much more under the hood when it comes to navigational goodies. For instance, Maps has its own Street View rival, named Look Around, that lets you take a stroll around the neighbourhood, while Flyover gives you a bird’s-eye view of a huge number of cities and locations, highlighting their prominent attractions in three dimensions. And you no longer need to feel a stranger in a new place–just use one of Maps’ built-in guides to quickly learn all the…

Another way to target and tweak specific colours is to go to the Color Balance panel and select the ‘3-Way color’ option from the drop-down menu. This gives you access to three colour wheels that enable you to independently change the colour balance of a shot’s shadows, midtones and highlights. Drag on a control point to shift the colour balance of a particular tonal range. Here we’ve added a warm magenta hue to the highlights while adding a cooler cyan to the midtones and shadows. This produces a creatively graded version of our photo.…

IT WILL TAKE 5 minutes YOU WILL LEARN How to save and organise phrases in your books using the Highlighted app YOU’LL NEED Highlighted (free), iOS 14 or later If you enjoy reading, you’ve probably got shelves of books with folded pages, scribbled notes, and highlighted phrases running through them. It’s a good bet that the more of these you have in a book, the more loved it is. The problem with this is that all this loving defacement can, well, deface your collection. But there’s another issue: with notes and highlighted passages in the books themselves, there’s no central repository for all the interesting and insightful things you have saved. But there is if you use an app called Highlighted. Get this on your phone and you can add…

Both VPNs and Private Relay require you to transfer trust from your ISP to the service in question. When you log into your VPN account, the provider gets your details and can see everything you’re doing online, making it theoretically easy to log all your activities. Mindful of this, VPNs have always played up their privacy, with no-logging policies. Major providers have signed up to the VPN Trust Initiative (vpntrust.net) to establish baseline practices for security, so make sure your provider is one of them. Private Relay attempts to get around this major issue of trust by forwarding your encrypted data through two servers from different providers. This separation of knowledge is designed specifically to protect you: the Ingress Proxy knows who you are, but not what content you’re forwarding,…

This year’s major new version of macOS is all about consolidation rather than the deep structural changes we’ve seen in recent years. That doesn’t mean that it’s only a minor upgrade, though, and careful preparation is needed if you’re going to move up and take advantage of new features, such as Universal Control to integrate your Mac and iPad or automatic text recognition with Live Text. If you’re already running Big Sur, these changes won’t be dramatic. Apart from the updates to all bundled apps, pretty much everything that ran in macOS 11 shouldn’t miss a heartbeat when you ask it to work in macOS 12. Although Monterey has more polish and maturity than Big Sur, at its heart it still brings the same fundamental changes, including the ‘sealed’ snapshot…

Check all your key apps are known to be compatible with Monterey before upgrading. Don’t press ahead only to discover that one won’t work for a couple of months yet. This applies particularly to Adobe apps and others whose update cycle lags Apple’s. Bring those key apps up to date before upgrading. If an app can’t start up properly in Monterey, it’s going to be harder to update later. Ensure the disk you’re upgrading has ample free space. The installer needs extra room to unpack and prepare macOS 12, and is best given a minimum of 40GB or so to work with. If you’ve got time, do your housekeeping to remove old apps, duplicates, and unwanted media and other documents before upgrading. This is a perfect opportunity to ditch those…

1 Connect disks If you’ve got sufficient ports to connect them, start by hooking up both the disk containing your backup and an empty USB ‘thumb’ drive of at least 16GB capacity, which you’ll turn into your bootable installer. 2 One disk, two partitions If you’d rather use just the SSD containing your backups, use Disk Utility to change its partitions and add a 50GB partition. However you create it, the installer must be formatted in Mac OS Extended (Journaled). 3 Create the installer Follow Apple’s instructions at support.apple.com/HT201372 for typing the correct command into Terminal to run the command createinstallmedia in the Monterey installer app, turning your drive or partition into a bootable installer. 4 Boot from the installer On Intel Macs, restart with Option held and select your…

If your family is an Apple family, you’re going to love Family Sharing. It enables you to share all kinds of things with your household, and it can save you lots of money: other family members can access your app and content purchases without having to buy them again, and if you have family-friendly Apple subscriptions to services such as Apple Music, Apple TV+ or an Apple One bundle you can share those too. Some third-party app subscriptions also support Family Sharing. Family Sharing enables you to share your purchases and subscriptions with up to five other people in your household, and each family member can authorise up to 10 devices each. In addition to sharing content and apps, Family Sharing has some other useful features. You can set up…

In recent months there has been a rash of stories about Apple’s approach to identifying and removing horrific illegal content from its services, and that has led to concerns that Apple is scanning people’s iCloud Photos for illegal images. At the time of writing Apple doesn’t scan iCloud photos or backups, although it does scan incoming and outgoing iCloud email attachments. Many cloud services do scan everything, not just for illegal images but for anything that breaks their terms of use.…

£1,699 FROM XGIMI, uk.xgimi.com FEATURES 4K projector (3840x2160), 2200 lumens, Android TV, dual-band Wi-Fi, Bluetooth, Ethernet, 2x HDMI, 208x218x136mm, 2.9kg The Pro’s automatic focus and keystone correction work a treat The cinemas may be open again, but if you’re still a bit wary of watching a film with a couple of hundred people breathing over your shoulder, then you could consider buying a projector to set up your own personal home cinema system. Admittedly, XGIMI’s Horizon Pro is very much a high-end option, costing a whopping £1,699. However, it offers 4K resolution (3840x2160), with dual-band Wi-Fi, Ethernet and Bluetooth connectivity, and many other features. It’s worth pointing out, though, that the Horizon Pro uses Android TV as its operating system. That may deter some Apple-centric households, but does ensure that…

£99 FROM Nothing, nothing.tech FEATURES Bluetooth 5.2, Hybrid Active Noise Cancelling, touch controls, up to 34 hours battery life (headphones and case, ANC off), wireless charging car (QI wireless charging compatible), USB-C port, splashproof to IPX4, needs iOS 11 or later The noise cancellation left a lot to be desired, and we could hear every click-clack of our keyboard The Nothing Ear (1) burst onto the market after months of hype as the first true wireless earbuds from OnePlus co-founder Carl Pei’s new company (with backing from iPod creator Tony Fadell). What’s more they’ve been pitted as a more affordable rival for the Apple AirPods Pro. Sadly, the Ear (1) haven’t quite lived up to the hype. While they boast a transparent design that shows off the inner workings of…

$39.99 (about £29) FROM GameSir, gamesir.hk FEATURES Fan with cooling pad, controller-style grip, built-in joystick, kickstand Apple’s iPhones are adept at handling games, but after a while they can get hot, and that in turn can impact performance in the long run. GameSir’s F8 Pro Snowgon is an attempt to combat that. It’s a controller-style mount for your iPhone that has a small fan strapped to its back. This cools a silicone pad which in turn presses on your iPhone and lowers the temperature. It’s not just for games either, as the included kickstand is also handy for viewing content while avoiding the heat There’s a problem, though. Whenever we mounted our iPhone 12 Pro, the fan speed dropped dramatically and often stopped. GameSir told us this was due to…

ON TEST… Canon PIXMA TR150 Canon SELPHY CP1300 Epson WorkForce WF-110W HPRT MT800 HP OfficeJet 250 HP Tango X With MacBooks, iPads, and iPhones selling in considerably greater numbers than iMacs and Mac minis, you’re now more likely to own a mobile computing device than a desktop one. Printer technology however has traditionally remained largely confined to the home. But a new generation of mobile printer has evolved, designed to be portable, often with battery power, and free to work without a local Wi-Fi network. They also have dedicated iOS apps for printing from an iPhone or iPad, and for device setup and management. A portable printer can be ideal if you work on the move, whether you’re a freelancer or a member of a business. We spend so much…

One-year licence $29.95 (about £21.84)/Lifetime licence $59.95 (about £43.72) FROM softorino.com NEEDS macOS 10.13 or later It’s easy to use, and ideal for storing content locally rather than being reliant on the cloud Transferring media between your Mac and an iOS device is still something of a chore, despite Apple’s Files app making life somewhat easier. Apple restricts the types of media file formats and codecs that its operating systems will play back natively, and there are plenty of video and audio files out there that don’t meet its criteria. WALTR PRO aims to remedy this by simplifying the process of converting and copying files between macOS and iOS. Begin the process by booting the Mac app, then connect your iOS device to your Mac once via USB. Once that…

The Apple IIGS, released in September 1986, was the final model of the Apple II range. It was a groundbreaking machine in several ways. Most notably, it was the first Apple computer with a colour Graphical User Interface (GUI). There was also the availability of Super-High Resolution graphics mode. This made possible a greater number of colour choices than both the high-resolution and double high-resolution modes of previous models. Its sound also had a massive upgrade, powered by an Ensoniq 5503 Digital Oscillator Chip (DOC). This allowed up to 32 voices–Apple paired them to create 16 richer sounding voices, taking it well beyond the arcade-like sounds expected of computers in the mid-1980s. So significant were these upgrades that the device was named after them–the GS in the title stands for…