Macworld Team Blog

The Mac that time forgot

news@macworld.co.uk (Simon Jary) — Mon, 04 Mar 2013 12:16:00 GMT

Apple is, for the moment at least, no longer selling the Mac Pro in Europe. Is Apple annoyed with us for still buying BlackBerries or siding with Samsung in the courts? No, it’s because an amendment to the IEC 60950-1 regulation increases requirements around electrical port protection and the fan guards in the system.That’s almost as boring as the Mac Pro itself. Boring? The mighty Mac Pro? How so? See: Mac Pro review

Can Microsoft kill the iPhone?

news@macworld.co.uk (Matt Egan) — Thu, 10 Jan 2013 18:45:00 GMT

Can Microsoft kill the iPhone? Let me answer that with another question. Why did we stop asking if Google can kill the iPhone? Because it found a niche of its own. For all the lawsuits and talk of thermonuclear war, Apple and Google know that this town is big enough for the both of us.But while Google’s Android platform sits (fairly) neatly alongside the iPhone, fans of both are left wondering aloud: what exactly is the point of Windows Phone 8?

Apple’s bad cable manners

news@macworld.co.uk (Simon Jary) — Wed, 09 Jan 2013 10:23:00 GMT

After an 18-month wait Apple is finally shipping a new range of iMacs, and very nice they are, too. I bought one of the 27-inch iMacs because our home iMac bores the pants off me when it tries to handle a few hungry Adobe programs and bad-boy iPhoto at the same time. See: Apple iMac (27-inch and 21.5-inch) review (Late 2012)First you get the excitement of unpacking, setting and backing up, and finally migrating all that data from your old Mac to the shiny new Mac.

Apple's bad cable manners

news@macworld.co.uk (Simon Jary) — Wed, 09 Jan 2013 09:23:00 GMT

Stephen Wildstrom - Microsoft's Surface is great news for us all

news@macworld.co.uk (Stephen Wildstrom) — Sun, 16 Dec 2012 17:29:00 GMT

For the past two and a half years, the iPad has ruled the world of tablets. But with the entry of Microsoft into the fray – including the Surface and an assortment of third-party Windows 8 and RT tablets – the business is about to get a lot more interesting.I start from a simple premise: that only competition keeps the tech business driving forward and that, in the absence of effective competition, products stultify.

Trending: Name your children after Apple products

news@macworld.co.uk (Simon Jary) — Fri, 30 Nov 2012 14:01:00 GMT

Now that Apple products are mainstream Apple fanboys have been joined by Apple fangirls, and they’re having babies. How do we know they’re Apple fanatics? They’re naming their kids after Apple products.US pregnancy and parenting website BabyCenter has revealed 2012’s most popular baby names. The name Apple for girls climbed a total of 585 spots in the most popular list this year, a rise of 15 percent. See also: Apple A-Z

Craig Grannell - The Guessing Game

news@macworld.co.uk (Craig Grannell) — Sat, 13 Oct 2012 15:35:00 GMT

Analysts don’t deserve that title, nor not being catapulted out of the window, argues Craig GrannellThere’s a painful inevitability before and after Apple releases a new product that is mirrored in a crushingly depressing manner at almost every waking moment between Apple releasing said new products. I call this the ‘curse of the guesser’. From news reports, you might know guessers as analysts, but I think that term’s too kind for the vast majority of these cursemongers.

Andy Ihnatko - Why BBEdit rules

news@macworld.co.uk (Andy Ihnatko) — Thu, 11 Oct 2012 06:00:00 GMT

Let me run through a list of things that I’ve recently used BBEdit for.1. I’m continuing to develop my website. But I’m kind of a dope, meaning that every working scrap of CSS and PHP that I write is the result of trial and error. So I use BBEdit as my code editor: It lets me edit my site’s files directly on the server; it previews everything in place; and when I’m about to move on to the next line without fixing an unbalanced bracket, the app gently coughs and points, rather than making me feel like an idiot.

Simon Jary - Apple's stainless stealing

news@macworld.co.uk (Simon Jary — Mon, 20 Aug 2012 11:20:00 GMT

Everyone’s always copying Apple. We know this because Apple is forever suing other companies and sometimes even children who dare to infringe on its copyrights. Don’t get me wrong… the company is completely within its rights to protect its intellectual property. But the whole industry spending more time in courts than in research labs is getting beyond a joke.Apple clearly has the best designers in the tech business, and so it’s ripe for others to take a long look and start selling their own versions of its products. Whether that’s Microsoft with the Mac OS or Samsung with the iPad Apple’s competitors just can’t help themselves copying rather than coming up with something original themselves, it seems.

Alec Meer - Batman is not the answer

news@macworld.co.uk (Alec Meer — Thu, 09 Aug 2012 16:12:00 GMT

The front page of the App Store is the easiest way to find new iOS games - but you’re only selling yourself short if you settle for all those naff movie adaptations and remakes.Games have forever been bought in droves based on what's on the cover of the box, but with the move to mobile it's no longer a matter of a browsing the top 40 shelves at Woolworths (God rest its reasonably-priced soul). The App Store may be many wonderful things, but a separator of wheat from chaff it is not. Flicking through its charts or its featured titles entails being advertised to, and your biases as a consumer being coolly appealed to.

Lex Friedman - A False Choice

news@macworld.co.uk (Lex Friedman — Mon, 06 Aug 2012 09:00:00 GMT

Like his predecessor, Apple CEO Tim Cook occasionally invokes the idea that we’re living in a post-PC world: one in which, for many people, the iPad is enough of a computer that they don’t need an actual PC. In the same vein, friends and family often ask me whether they could get by with “just an iPad” instead of buying a new laptop.You’re likely to have your own take on this question. But to me, what makes the iPad vs PC question really interesting is the fact that people ask it in the first place.

Philip Michaels - Apple's ads preach to new customers, not the choir

news@macworld.co.uk (Philip Michaels — Thu, 02 Aug 2012 06:20:00 GMT

About six years ago, Apple rolled out an ad campaign featuring Justin Long and John Hodgman doing their best imitation of an old-timey comedy team. The “Get a Mac” campaign—where Long played the titular Mac, with Hodgman as his bumbling PC counterpart—would run for another three years and some 66 installments, and, in the process, garner some ad-industry awards and join the stable of iconic Apple advertisements that the company’s become famous for in the past three decades.And I really didn’t much care for the ads.

Armando Rodriguez - The end of do it yourself

news@macworld.co.uk (Armando Rodriguez — Thu, 26 Jul 2012 06:40:00 GMT

Once upon a time, if something broke, you could fix it yourself. Most gadgets were easy to take apart, and a trip to the local Radio Shack or computer specialty store was all you needed to get your computer or television back into tip-top shape. But, as the years have gone by, it's become harder and harder to get into the gizmos you own, and repairing them now requires you to purchase special parts and tools from overseas. Even then, only a few parts can be swapped out, and of course you void your warranty.Cell phones, tablets, and laptops—the items most likely to become damaged because they are carried everywhere—are the biggest offenders. It makes sense that you'd need a special tool or kit to replace a cracked screen, but why should I have to send away my laptop in order to upgrade the hard drive? Why should I have to be without my phone or tablet for a week while the battery is replaced because it will no longer hold a charge? Not all devices are like this, but the latest and greatest phones, laptops, and tablets of the last year (like the latest MacBook Air) have been composed largely of unopenable hunks of plastic and metal.

Karen Haslam - iPhones just can't take the heat

news@macworld.co.uk ( — Tue, 24 Jul 2012 16:02:00 GMT

Just in time for the Olympics, it’s finally hot in the UK (for those of you reading this from the US, we’ve been having the wettest summer and spring in forever, and we know you are in the middle of the worst ever heatwave…)A few of us have been winging about the heat (nobody is ever happy with the weather). It seems that iPhones are also complaining. We’ve just heard from a reader who's iPhone is requesting that he lets it cool down.

Christopher Breen - Go outside and play

news@macworld.co.uk (Christopher Breen — Mon, 16 Jul 2012 07:00:00 GMT

In this month’s How To section, I write about how to configure an old iPad for a child. While I hope most readers will react positively to that story, I also expect a few will insist that exposing a child to an iPad will lead to a machine-dependent future devoid of fresh air and human interaction.We can all agree that spending 18 hours a day glued to any one thing – a social network or an online game – is the sign of a problem. But in my daughter’s case at least, I’d argue that iOS devices have enhanced her life.

Simon Jary - Apple vs Microsoft – it's back on

news@macworld.co.uk (Simon Jary — Fri, 13 Jul 2012 07:00:00 GMT

With the announcement that Microsoft is to launch its own iPad-killing tablet, the tech world is thrilled at the prospect of a rekindled war between old enemies. Apple versus Microsoft is the classic tech battle. Microsoft is Apple’s Moriarty. The two tech giants are almost mirror images of themselves – Microsoft forever the evil copyist, Apple the plucky innovator.In the beginning Apple and Microsoft were bosom buddies. Bill Gates was pretty enamoured of the Mac: “To create a new standard, it takes something that’s not just a little bit different. It takes something that’s really new and really captures people’s imagination and the Mac, of all the machines I’ve ever seen, is the only one that meets that standard.”

Simon Jary - Zugzwang and other Apple Zs

news@macworld.co.uk (Simon Jary — Thu, 12 Jul 2012 06:00:00 GMT

Concluding my 26-letter A-Z compendium of all things AppleApple has always been too cool to be wacky or zany. Look at dull old Microsoft – it tries to be zany every now and again, with cringeworthy results. Steve Jobs appeared the very opposite of zany, although not deathly dull like his successors John Sculley, Michael Spindler and Gil Amelio. Steve was cool, not fool.

Simon Jary - Apple's dodgy Y chromosome

news@macworld.co.uk (Simon Jary — Wed, 11 Jul 2012 06:00:00 GMT

Nearing the end of my 26-letter, non-stop A-Z compendium of all things AppleSteve Jobs didn’t seem the ostentatious sort. Indeed he lived for a long time in a house with practically no furniture, let alone a gold-lined Jacuzzi. For his last 20 years he lived modestly with his family in a simple country house in Palo Alto. Nicer than your house, yes, but not somewhere Donald Trump would feel at home.

Simon Jary - Apple’s dodgy Y chromosome

news@macworld.co.uk (Simon Jary — Wed, 11 Jul 2012 06:00:00 GMT

Simon Jary - Apple's X Factor Talent Show

news@macworld.co.uk (Simon Jary — Tue, 10 Jul 2012 17:32:00 GMT

Continuing my 26-letter, non-stop A-Z compendium of all things AppleApple had been planning to completely rewrite its Mac operating system since 1987, and had got itself in a right old mess with a project called Copeland that was about as successful as a North Korean rocket launch.

Simon Jary - Apple’s X Factor Talent Show

news@macworld.co.uk (Simon Jary — Tue, 10 Jul 2012 17:32:00 GMT

Karen Haslam - Apple's grammatical mistake in product name shocker

news@macworld.co.uk (Karen Haslam — Wed, 27 Jun 2012 14:03:00 GMT

Apple has made a serious gramatical error in the naming of its products [irony], as one reader has gone to great lengths to point out to us. Who’d have thought a simple story about Apple’s MacBook Pro with Retina Display could offend a Macworld reader so greatly.

Karen Haslam: Apple's grammatical mistake in product name shocker

news@macworld.co.uk (Karen Haslam — Wed, 27 Jun 2012 14:03:00 GMT

Kerio, nominated for a Macworld Award

news@macworld.co.uk (Karen Haslam — Thu, 21 Jun 2012 16:13:00 GMT

We love Kerio, in fact we nominated Kerio Connect 7.4 (reviewed here) for a Macworld Award.So, understandably, we were mortified when we realised that they got missed out of the presentation last week at the Macworld Awards!

Jason Snell - A syncing ship

Thu, 14 Jun 2012 06:00:00 GMT

When Apple introduced iTunes in 2001, it served one purpose: it was a music jukebox. But that was a long time ago. These days, iTunes is simultaneously Apple’s most important and most problematic product. It’s a music and video player. It’s a store where you buy music, videos, ringtones and apps. And it’s a syncing system, connecting the Mac to a range of Apple devices, from the iPad, iPhone and iPod to the Apple TV.Apple has packed almost everything relating to media and app management, purchasing and playback into this single app. As a result, iTunes is now bursting at the seams. The app has become a complete mess, and needs an overhaul.