Table of contents for Autumn 2024 in MacFormat

By the time you read this, Apple will have revealed its next major upgrades for iPhone – with big things expected for the iPhone 16, iPhone 16 Pro and iPhone 16 Pro Max, from improved cameras to all-new chips that will help you make the most of the features in iOS 18 – including Apple Intelligence. To that end, this month’s lead feature (p20) will help you discover the major changes found there, whether you’re upgrading your iPhone to the latest model or not. We hope you find it useful. Whichever iPhone you own, shooting videos of friends, family, days outs and holidays are a great way to capture precious memories of special events, but are you making the most of them? On p62, you’ll discover the best ways to…

Apple has spent the last few years experimenting with different iPhone sizes – think the mini and Plus models of recent times – but next year it’s apparently going to try something different: a slimmed-down model. This would sit between the iPhone 17 and iPhone 17 Pro, Bloomberg’s Mark Gurman says, offering something “snazzier” than the standard iPhone without the performance (or cost) of the pro-level devices. This mystery product will be called the iPhone 17 Air, Gurman believes, and it will come with a much thinner chassis than any iPhone that Apple currently sells. Eventually, Gurman says Apple wants to bring this design to all of its iPhones, but this won’t happen until 2027 at the earliest. If you’re in the market for a new Apple phone but aren’t…

Apple Intelligence is free to use, but that might not always be the case. According to Bloomberg’s Mark Gurman, Apple is considering whether to introduce a paid-for tier with added benefits at some point in the future. Gurman says one of Apple’s ideas is to keep the base system free and launch something akin to “Apple Intelligence+” with extra features. So far, Gurman hasn’t elaborated on what Apple Intelligence’s paid-for extras might be. Other analysts have suggested it could cost $20 (about £15) a month and would be aimed at corporate or education users. Apple has been framing Apple Intelligence as the biggest revamp to its devices in years, and it’s likely that all the research that went into it – as well as the ongoing server costs – will…

The days of Macs being virtually invulnerable to malware are long gone, so there’s good reason to install some form of antivirus to protect you. We’re big fans of Bitdefender AntiVirus – visit bitdefender.co.uk/solutions to cover all the devices in your household. Before splashing the cash, give the program a test run by downloading a free 30-day trial from bitdefender.co.uk/solutions/antivirus-for-mac – follow the prompts and set up a free Bitdefender Central account when prompted. After purchase, you’ll use this account to download Bitdefender on all your home’s devices if you need to. Once installation completes, the dashboard will appear and you’ll be asked to allow all Bitdefender security modules to run – click ‘Open System Settings’ followed by ‘Allow’ to give permission to the Bitdefender Agent. Now scroll up and…

You’ll find iMovie can do so much more than enabling you to trim your clips and re-order them. It can also make the story flow by adding one of 24 transitions that mix, wipe or slide from one clip to another. A movie without titles and captions is like a cake without icing! We’ll show you how to customise the title’s font and colour to complement your video’s subject and add information to get social media followers up to speed on what they’re watching. Audio tends to be the weakest part of most video productions, so we’ll demonstrate how to replace your clip’s unwanted sound with music that helps link the collection of clips into a unified story. You’ll also learn how to add a voiceover to add narration to your…

Most users don’t need anything more than an Apple Mac or iPad to work effectively from home. With the right software, you should be able to complete the vast majority of tasks with ease – but that doesn’t mean you won’t benefit from investing in any number of accessories. Find a comfortable keyboard or mouse that best suits your needs and you may find yourself working faster and more efficiently. Switch to a top microphone and you might feel more confident in projecting yourself in online meetings. A tidy desk can lead to clearer thinking while a decent printer can make reports more professional. So let’s take a look at the add-ons that can make a real difference. 1 Lofree Flow100 keyboard > $169 (about £153) > lofree.co > For…

> £663.99 (8TB), £359.99 (4TB) > FROM westerndigital.com > FEATURES Huge capacity with consistent read and write speeds of just under 1GB/sec, full APFS Trim support, NVMe interface, USB 3.2 Gen 2, compatible with macOS 14 and later Enterprise solid-state drives have long been available in capacities of 8TB and more for those who can spare an arm and a leg. This year SanDisk and Samsung have brought them to the consumer, but are they really worth up to four times the price of a hard drive of the same size? SanDisk’s Desk Drive has a distinctive design that won it one of this year’s Red Dot product design awards. It’s intended to sit on the desktop, connected to its own power supply rather than drawing what it needs over…

> £170 > FROM anker.com/uk > FEATURES Six ports, 250W total output, USB-C, USB-A, Bluetooth, Wi-Fi, LCD display, app The business of charging our devices has never been more important, with many of us owning a notebook, phone and tablet too. Anker continues to push charging technology forward with its most advanced model yet, a 250W, six-port device that’s designed to live on your desktop. It’s powered by Gallium nitride (GaN) technology, which allows for higher power in a smaller unit, and this charger can output a serious amount of juice even with several devices connected. It looks like a clock radio and on the front has four USB-C ports as well as a dynamic display that provides impressive and live visual feedback about current power levels. The first port…

> £110 > FROM hp.com > FEATURES 225-sheet cassette, 35-sheet automatic document feeder, Wi-Fi, USB or Ethernet, four separate ink tanks, smart iOS app The quality of home printers has come on so much that specialisation is almost moot. Your average photo printer can pump out text just as well as an office printer, and office printers are surprisingly good with photographs. This particular office printer features four ink tanks: cyan, magenta, yellow and black, all of which are pigment-based. It’s three-function – print, copy and scan – and can connect to your network through Wi-Fi or Ethernet, or directly to your Mac using USB. It prints on paper of up to A4 in size, has automatic duplex for two-sided printing and a document feeder on top that can hold…

Group test Reviewed by NICK PEERS ON TEST… > ExpressVPN > NordVPN > Norton VPN > Proton VPN > Surfshark VPN > TunnelBear For those worried about privacy and security when online, a Virtual Private Network (VPN) is a must. This encrypts all your internet traffic, to not just hide your identity and location from online trackers but also your internet provider. It also protects you when connected to public Wi-Fi hotspots. We’re entering a golden age of VPNs, where there’s little – if any – performance penalty when connected to local servers, meaning you don’t have to suffer slower transfer speeds when using one. But you still need to choose with care to pick the right blend of features and security to always remain protected. You also need to…

> £12.79 > FROM silverliningstudio.co > NEEDS macOS 10.12 or later The Star Named EOS is a point-and-click puzzle game that uses photography to explore the past. Those memories revolve around the protagonist’s mother, a photographer – with her absence now sharply felt, you seek to recapture the images she took and discover the experiences they portrayed. To complete each level, you must discover and unravel the puzzles strewn around the environment. These can involve combining symbols to open a lockbox or moving objects to reveal a hidden item. They present a fair degree of challenge but won’t keep you up all night scratching your head. Some puzzle props are fleeting, but others weave their way throughout each chapter, reappearing right up to the game’s conclusion. Your camera plays a…

Apple’s affordable iPhone SE is heading for a major revamp in 2025, with a fresh design, a speedy chip and support for Apple Intelligence all rumoured. According to X leaker Ice Universe, the iPhone SE 4 will come loaded with an A18 chip – the same as the one in the iPhone 16 – as well as either 6GB or 8GB of memory. Interestingly, those specs will make it compatible with Apple Intelligence, bringing Apple’s AI platform to even its cheapest phone. Rumours have also claimed the iPhone SE will finally get an all-screen design, meaning it will ditch the Home button, too.…

Cambridge Audio Evo One > £1,299 > From cambridgeaudio.com > Combining retro chic with high-tech features, the low-slung Cambridge Audio Evo One has everything you need to really make your music and movies sing. Chief of these is its 180-degree sound array, which uses 14 speakers to deliver sounds in all directions, and you can even use it as part of a multi-room setup, thanks to its support for AirPlay 2, Google Home and Roon. Made from 50% recycled materials with a FSC-certified real wood walnut veneer, it also includes a 6.8-inch colour display that can be used to show album artwork, a clock, or digital VU meters. Onboard you’ll find Bluetooth, HDMI and RCA (phono) stages for connecting to your other devices, a TV, and even to a turntable. Plus,…

Apple TV+ is successful. Creatively, at least. In July, Zack Van Amburg, Apple’s head of Worldwide Video, proudly responded to the streaming service’s 72 Emmy Award nominations across 16 shows. “It has been an immensely rewarding morning,” he said, going some way towards justifying the $20 billion Apple has spent on original programming so far. Yet all is not entirely well. That huge sum has paid for a relatively small number of shows, certainly when compared to Apple TV+’s rivals, notably Netflix, Disney+ and Amazon Prime. From the start, Apple decided to go for quality over quantity, yet despite spending big to snap up high-profile talent, the service has only a 0.2% share of TV viewing in the US. Apple is now reassessing its strategy. According to a report by…

Frustrated that some games aren’t available for your Mac? Just because a native Mac build hasn’t been released doesn’t necessarily mean you can’t play that game. There are two ways to run Windows software on your Mac: one is to use virtualisation software like VirtualBox or Parallels Desktop, but while this produces a complete Windows environment to work in, there’s a performance penalty that makes many games unplayable. The alternative is to try a form of emulation known as a ‘compatibility layer’. This attempts to run software using your Mac’s native hardware, ensuring it runs at maximum performance. The best-known example of this kind of emulation is Wine (winehq.org), but while it’s free, Wine is difficult to use. If you’re serious about running Windows games on your Mac, we recommend…

When it comes to battery life, we’re living in a golden age of Apple hardware: while the processors in our Apple devices have become ever more powerful and capable of doing ever more things, that doesn’t mean we’ve had to sacrifice the all-day battery life we’ve got used to over the last decade. Whether it’s an Apple Watch, a pair of AirPods or a MacBook Pro, the batteries in your Apple kit have serious stamina for even the toughest tasks. But while tech has improved dramatically in recent years, even Apple can’t change the laws of chemistry – and those laws say that over time, every battery will lose capacity. Eventually so much you need to replace it. The good news is that Apple has taken steps to prolong those batteries’…

You may have hours of footage taking up valuable space on devices such as a digital SLR (DSLR) camera, an action camera and of course your ever-present iPhone. Video formats such as an. mp4 file from a GoPro Hero 12 or. movs from a DJI Osmo Action 4 pose no challenge for iMovie to work with them. Your iPhone has an advantage over other cameras because it can shoot in modes such as Cinematic. You can then adjust a Cinematic clip’s background blur amount (and even focal point) in iMovie. Whatever the source, iMovie can read most formats, so you can import, edit and share clips regardless of what they were filmed on. Most devices shoot clips in 1080x1920 High Definition (HD) or at the larger 4K resolution. iMovie can…

Although more companies are encouraging workers to head back to the office, lots of people still work very effectively from home. Many employees now have a home office or at least a dedicated space at the kitchen table. But regardless of your present setup, chances are your working environment can be improved with products that boost productively and encourage greater efficiency. Our guide seeks to help you build the home office of your dreams, or at least enhance the space in which you’ve chosen to work if you’d rather take a more flexible approach. We’re going to examine desks that seek to minimise distractions while providing maximum comfort – ones which will look great in your home and help to reduce clutter. We’ve also paid great attention to chairs which…

IN PRINT ON iPAD & iPHONE ISSUE 408 OCTOBER 2024 > Pick your perfect Mac and more with our Ultimate Apple Buyer’s Guide > Restore your vintage photographs > What’s next for Apple CarPlay ISSUE 407 SEPTEMBER 2024 > Get ready for macOS Sequoia! Plus iOS 18, iPadOS 18, watchOS 11, and more > Apple Intelligence: the pros and cons > Boost your Apple device security ISSUE 406 AUGUST 2024 > Introducing Apple Intelligence > 101 ways to make iCloud truly great > On test: M4 iPad Pro, M2 iPad Air > Take amazing holiday photos 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…

> $200 (about £184) > FROM soundblade.com > FEATURES Two front-firing full range drivers, 80mm woofer, 120W peak power An iMac or mid-range monitor actually does a passable job of audio playback despite the physical limitations of their thin design. But as with TVs, you’re never going to get really big sound or deep bass out of them. The Soundblade is essentially a soundbar that’s designed to sit under your iMac or monitor and solve this problem. Available in five colours, it has a fairly plastic but solid enough feel and comes with a remote control as well as having some touch-sensitive buttons to one side of its top surface. There are three connectivity options and cables are supplied in the box for USB-C, USB-A and 3.5mm audio, while pairing…

> £200 > FROM soundcore.com > FEATURES 100W output (140W with bass boost), IPX7 water-resistance, Bluetooth 5.3 with AAC, 44x15x23cm, 3.8kg We liked the compact and portable Motion X500 speaker Soundcore launched a few months ago (#MF399), but new Boom 2 Plus is a different proposition altogether. Like the Boom 2 (#MF404), it’s portable – just – but it’s much larger and more powerful than the X500, and fully lives up to its boombastic title. The speaker weighs a hefty 3.9kg, but it does have a built-in handle and a detachable shoulder strap to help you carry it around. It’s sturdily built, with metal grilles on the front and back and an IPX7 rating that can cope with total immersion in water up to 1m deep. There’s a rubber flap…

This newcomer scored highly in every area. We were impressed with virtually all the VPNs on test – things have changed a lot in the last few years, particularly in terms of extra features and connection speeds, which are no longer hobbled thanks to the latest encryption protocols. Four VPNs were neck-and-neck, but ultimately Proton VPN won thanks to excelling in virtually all areas. NordVPN ran close, but its failure to include key features in its standard package ultimately cost it. Surfshark deserves mention for its raft of unique features, but its performance tailed off on distant servers. ExpressVPN had no such problems, but its bare bones approach offset its admirable commitment to providing regular security audits. TunnelBear and Norton VPN both lagged sadly behind, but TunnelBear does have its…

> One-month free trial, then £4.99/month or £49/year > FROM apple.com > NEEDS iPadOS 17.4 or later, iPad with A12 Bionic chip or later The app gets a new Stem Splitter tool which can analyse any music track and split it into vocal, bass, drums and ‘other’ elements Almost exactly one year ago Apple released Logic Pro for iPad, along with Final Cut, the first app it had created for the platform that could legitimately wear the ‘Pro’ badge. Indeed, Logic incorporated a great many features of the desktop version in a touch-friendly interface and was comfortably the most powerful and advanced Digital Audio Workstation (DAW) app ever made for iPad. Version 2 is an iteration, bringing some cool new features while not altering the core of the app much…

BEST BUYS… EXTERNAL DISPLAY Philips 27B1U7903 £ 999, philips.co.uk > An excellent monitor that satisfies on every level. It’s expensive, but you do get a lot of quality for your money. MF392 BLUETOOTH SPEAKER Marshall Middleton £ 270, marshallheadphones.com > Meaty, beaty, big and bouncy, the Middleton knows how to rock. MF391 NAS DRIVE Asustor Lockerstor 2 Gen2 AS6702T £ 469, asustor.com > Excellent and versatile mid-range network storage. MF390 OUR TOP 3 MESH NETWORK DEVICES ASUS ZenWiFi XD5 > £ 209.99 > MF398 > asus.com/uk TP-Link Deco X55 > £ 219.99 > MF398 > tp-link.com/uk/ Devolo Magic 2 WiFi 6 Starter Kit > £ 219.99 > MF398 > devolo.co.uk > OUR TOP 3 PORTABLE SSDS Crucial X8 > £ 212 > MF388 > uk.crucial.com SanDisk Extreme > £ 100…

Around this time every year, speculation starts mounting about which new Macs Apple is on the cusp of releasing. This year, though, that speculation has ramped up even more than usual, as not only are new chips just around the corner, but we could see even more Macs get a tasty upgrade than usual. Let’s start with the Macs we expect to see first. This autumn, it’s likely that three key Mac ranges will get upgraded to the M4 chip series at an October event: the MacBook Pro, the iMac and the Mac mini. Every MacBook Pro is in line for a new M4-series chip Starting with the MacBook Pro, every model is in line for a new M4-series chip. That means an entry-level 14-inch MacBook Pro with M4 chip,…

[MAC APP] GoodLinks 2 £9.99 Save your links for later If you’ve ever found a link or article that you just don’t have time to read right now, GoodLinks is the app for you. It lets you save these links for later consumption, complete with a focussed, ad-free reading experience, customisable tagging tools and superb organisational abilities. In version 2 of the app, GoodLinks adds highlighting and notes. Now you can emphasise important information in your links, making it simpler to bring key highlights to the fore. These notes can be exported in Markdown format for increased compatibility with other apps, too. The updated version also adds support for new Shortcuts integrations that can retrieve, edit, open and delete your highlights. And there’s a new optional GoodLinks Premium subscription that…

Are you excited? This year’s update to the iPhone’s operating system is iOS 18, and there are some major changes coming. The most important update is the introduction of Apple Intelligence, which Apple describes as “the personal intelligence system for iPhone, iPad, and Mac”. It’s integrated into the operating systems of all three device categories, and it offers opportunities to create text and pictures right there on your iPhone. The Home Screen and Lock Screen have been overhauled, with great new ways to customise your iPhone. You can even change the colour of the app icons. Control Centre also gets a boost, with greater opportunities to adapt it to your own needs. You can add far more controls, and spread them across multiple pages too. The popular Photos app gets…

Music, movies and TV shows are often more fun when they’re a shared experience – but we can’t always be in the same room as all of the people we want to listen or watch with. That’s where SharePlay comes in. It enables you to share the same tracks from Apple Music or movies and shows from Apple TV with other people, and to chat while you listen or watch. As we’ll discover, it’s very easy to set up and just as easy to use. What SharePlay doesn’t do SharePlay doesn’t transmit the audio and video from your Mac over FaceTime. Instead, it synchronises your Mac, iPhone or iPad with everybody else so that their Music or TV app plays the same thing at the same time, including any pauses,…

Freeform may well be one of the most entertaining apps Apple has ever created. Released in late 2022 for iOS 16, iPadOS 16 and macOS 13 and updated several times since, it’s now also available on Vision Pro, and whatever device you use it on it delivers instant, effortless sharing. Altogether that makes it a great tool for brainstorming, for collaborative projects and for trip planning for multiple people because not only can you all share images, diagrams, annotations and text, but you can also share links to external sites and apps. In this tutorial we’ll explore how to create and edit a new board using Freeform’s intuitive tools, how to add things from other apps, and how to share what you’re doing with friends, colleagues or family members. We’ll stick…

While you could stick with the default wallpapers available on your iPad, iPadOS includes plenty of customisation options to help make your iPad feel truly yours. Head to Settings > Wallpaper, tap ‘+ Add New Wallpaper’ and you’ll be shown the Wallpaper Gallery. There you can choose from a huge range of colourful options, from Collections to Kaleidoscope, Astronomy to Weather, each of which can be customised to suit the look you want to achieve. Better still, you can turn favourite images from your Photos library into a wallpaper that can be shown on your iPad’s Home and Lock Screens, and if you use Photo Shuffle you’ll see a different image every day, every hour or when you tap or lock the screen. While Photo Shuffle normally shows selected images from…

Your iPhone does a great job of capturing a scene’s colours and tones, but occasionally a shaded location may look under-exposed and cold (blue). We’ll show you how to ‘grade’ a clip to counteract colour casts and reveal more shadow detail, without blowing out brighter highlights. As well as being a non-linear editor (where you can swap the running order of clips to tell a story), iMovie enables you to edit in layers, opening up a host of creative effects. In this video sequence the girl mounts her iPhone on a gimbal to film. Using iMovie’s layer based ‘Picture in Picture’ (PiP) effect we can see the girl filming, plus view the footage from her iPhone in the same shot. These layer-based effects enable us to tell a more visually…

Desks If you’re working from home, you’re more likely to be organised and focussed if you have a desk. Aside from providing ample space for your Mac, monitor, iPad and the various accessories and piles of paper needed for your day-to-day work, a quality desk should provide you with a comfortable working environment and allow you to immediately get down to business. Since many desks can be height adjusted, they can also improve your posture and even let you work standing up. But if space is at a premium and you really do need to work on a standard table, don’t worry. You can still boost your productivity and avoid strain on your body, as we’re about to discover. 1 Oakywood Standing Desk Touch > From £952 > oakywood.com > For…

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…

> £199.99 > FROM logitech.com > FEATURES Bluetooth, 12 Function keys, five-month battery with backlight off (keyboard); Bluetooth, seven buttons, two wheels, 70-day battery (mouse) A few years have passed since we reviewed Logitech’s MX keyboard and mouse, and both devices have continued to sell well since their launch in 2020. However, Logitech recently updated both devices, with the new MX Keys S and MX Master 3S, which can be bought individually, or together as the MX Keys S Combo For Mac that we’re reviewing here. It’s worth noting, though, that there are two versions of each product available, with the standard MX Keys S and MX Master 3S offered for Windows users (although they are still Mac-compatible as well), while the ‘For Mac’ models are, of course, intended for the…

> $300 (about £280) > FROM satechi.net > FEATURES Thunderbolt 4, USB-A 3.2 Gen 2, HDMI 2.0, Ethernet, SD 4.0, audio jack Docks have become increasingly essential for many Mac users who want to connect more peripherals than Apple’s computers allow by themselves. Satechi’s newest model fits an astonishing amount of power into its very compact but solid frame and is perfect both for a home studio or office setup or for those working on the move. With its smoothed edges and aluminium build it complements your MacBook, and thanks to its bundled 180W power supply it can send 96W directly to your notebook, enough to charge even the largest models, as well as 2x15W to smaller devices like iPads or iPhones. There’s a total of 11 ports starting with…

> Free; full feature set £2.99/month; £14.99/year > FROM mercuryweather.app > NEEDS iOS/PadOS 16 or later, macOS 13 or later Even if you don’t scroll, Apple’s Weather app will provide you with a lot of at-a-glance information. It’ll show you the current temperature and conditions, let you see how both unfold over the upcoming five hours and display part of the 10-day forecast while allowing you to see how likely it is to rain. But although the information is clearly presented, Mercury Weather does a better job. Not only does the iOS app find space to add humidity, wind speed and the UV index, it plots the hourly forecast as a graph over an eight-hour period, letting you swipe left to view a full 24 hours. It also makes it…

macOS Sequoia What’s inside your next FREE upgrade + top tips and tricks PLUS: Your must-read iPadOS 18 superguide – secrets revealed! ALSO INSIDE… > Rise of the robots – are domestic droids the Next Big Thing in tech? > Create a shareable slideshow in Photos – we show you how! > Bring it back – how to work with Versions in Pages … and much more! Contents subject to change ISSUE 410 ON SALE 15 OCT 2024 DON’T MISS IT – SUBSCRIBE TODAY! IN PRINT & ON iOS > Your print subscription includes the paper magazine and the digital edition for iPad and iPhone bit.ly/magazinesdirect_macformat ON YOUR MAC > Read digitally on your Mac: subscribe with Zinio at bit.ly/ziniomacf…