We’ve covered how to install OS X Yosemite onto a separate partition of an internal hard disk and dual boot with OS X Mavericks, but many Mac users have wondered if it’s possible to install OS X 10.10 onto an external drive instead, thereby avoiding any modifications to the primary Mac hard drive or partition table. The answer is yes, you can install Yosemite onto an external disk, and yes it will be bootable, we’ll show you exactly how to do that.

Read more »

Have you decided that running an iOS 8 beta on your iPhone or iPad isn’t such a great idea after all? Understandable, considering the beta releases are fairly buggy, mainly for developer testing, and not intended for prime time usage quite yet, so let’s walk through how to downgrade iOS 8 back to iOS 7.

We’ll cover two different methods to go from iOS 8 beta back to iOS 7.1.1. Both will work just fine and you can use whichever you want, though the first method we’ll call the easy way, is typically best for most users. Nonetheless if the first easy approach fails due to an error, we offer a second route that goes through putting the iPhone, iPad, or iPod touch into recovery mode and will certainly work.

Read more »

This weeks featured Mac setup is the powerhouse new Mac Pro workstation shared with us by Alberto G., an Assistant Professor at ITESM (Monterrey Institute of Technology and Higher Education, a university in northern Mexico). Let’s jump in and learn a bit more about the hardware and what great apps get put to use.

Read more »

If you can’t wait until the fall to get your hands on OS X Yosemite, and you don’t want to cough up the $99 to get a Mac Developer Account just for the current Developer Preview access, Apple provides all users with a third option; joining the official OS X public beta program.

The OS X Yosemite beta program is limited to the first one million users who sign up, so if you have any interest in trying out the latest OS X version before everyone else and, perhaps more importantly, offering your own feedback of the beta release before things get finalized, now is the time to join.

Read more »

Apple is said to be launching an all new wearable device with health-monitoring abilities this October, according to two reports from reliable sources. Commonly referred to as the iWatch by existing rumors, the device is said to be a ‘watch-like’ item that is worn by the user.

The Nikkei report is the most detailed yet, indicating that specs and services for the device are still being finalized, but stating the central function will be to manage users biometric information through their smartphone (presumably an iPhone), offering the following description of potential features:

“It will likely use a curved organic light-emitting diode (OLED) touchscreen and collect health-related data, such as calorie consumption, sleep activity, blood glucose and blood oxygen levels. It will also allow users to read messages sent by smartphones.”

Apple is said to be working with Nike to integrate services on future products, according to the report.

Read more »

OS X Yosemite is an amazing update to the Mac operating system that’s really better experienced than seen, but due to it’s current early beta status, it’s generally not a good idea to upgrade your primary OS X volume to the 10.10 beta quite yet. Instead, the safest approach is to install OS X Yosemite onto a separate partition of the hard drive, keeping it separate from your primary stable and productive existing OS X experience.

This allows you to check out OS X Yosemite and dual boot between the OS X 10.10 beta and OS X 10.9 (or 10.8) without each operating system impacting one another, and you can safely switch between the two with a simple reboot process. This also allows you to uninstall Yosemite at any point easily if you want to.

Read more »

If you’ve ever launched the App Store in iOS to discover the “Updates” tab is empty, but you know for certain that an app update is widely available, you may have run into a peculiar and frustrating bug within iOS. Unlike the Mac App Store with Command+R, there is no easy way to ‘refresh’ the App Store in iOS, and while quitting out of the app sometimes works, it often doesn’t, and you’re left with an empty updates screen on the iPhone or iPad.

If you run into an empty Updates section of the App Store despite knowing with certainty that updates are available to your installed apps, try one of the two following solutions to resolve the problem and to download the newest versions of the apps in question.

Read more »

Apple has started running a new iPhone 5S commercial, titled “Strength”, which focuses on using the phone as a fitness aid. A video for the advertisement is embedded below for easy viewing.

The TV advertisement follows people using the iPhone to track fitness goals, participate in physical activity, and serve as a form of digital motivation.

Read more »

Nearly every iPhone owner who uses their device as a camera will inevitably get the “Cannot Take Photo – There is not enough available storage to take a photo.” alert message at some point, indicating their iPhone is so full of stuff that there’s no room for any additional pictures. While it’s indeed true that the device is full and that Camera app won’t work any longer until some storage has been freed up, you can almost always use a workaround to continue taking pictures anyway, at least for a little while. You may even get a few dozen more pictures out of this, and in a pinch that can be the difference of capturing an important moment or not.

This is really a simple two step process, so the next time you see that annoying alert message on the iPhone, you can usually continue taking pictures for a little while with this simple trick.

Read more »

Wondering if your iPhone, iPad, or iPod touch will be able to run the latest and greatest of iOS 8 when it’s released this fall to the public? Chances are good that it’s compatible, and if your device supports iOS 7 then it can probably run iOS 8 too, well, with the exception of the iPhone 4 at least.

Read more »

OS X Yosemite will be one of the most exciting updates to Mac system software in many years, complete with an all new user interface, major iOS integration, and tons of new features. Of course all the excitement surrounding Yosemite is largely useless if your Mac won’t actually run OS X 10.10 when it launches in a public release this fall, so let’s quickly find out if your Mac can run OS X Yosemite.

Read more »

The first beta of iOS 8 comes with a really nice default water wallpaper of an underwater camera shot, it appears to be sun or light rays shining through the calm surface waves of an ocean. It looks absolutely fantastic on an iPhone, iPad, iPod touch, and even if you aren’t running the latest iOS 8 beta release you can still enjoy it on your iOS device (or Android, no judgements) by downloading the high resolution versions.

Read more »

OS X Yosemite looks great, and the new appearance is certainly helped by the excellent choice of default wallpaper that Apple uses to show off the new Mac look. But why wait for the release of OS X Yosemite before beautifying your Mac desktop with that gorgeous background image? You don’t have to, instead you can grab the new default wallpaper picture of that stunning sunset on that famous granite peak in Yosemite right now. Additionally, you can download the 2x “Hero” image of cloudy El Capitan that is used on Apple’s official OS X Yosemite preview page, which also makes for an excellent wallpaper choice.

Read more »

OS X Yosemite Developer Preview 1 and iOS 8 Beta 1 are both now available to download for users who are registered with the respective Apple Developer Programs. Additionally, Apple has offered a beta release of Xcode 6, and online documentation for the new Swift programming language that was introduced at WWDC 2014.

Though the iOS 8 beta and OS X 10.10 Dev Preview are aimed primarily at users developing solutions for the iOS and OS X platforms, technically anyone can register to be included in the Apple Developer Programs for an annual fee of $99 per OS. Due to the nature of beta releases being buggy and generally incomplete, it is generally not recommended for average users to install beta builds of software unless they have a compelling reason to do so.

Read more »

OS X Yosemite offers a major visual redesign of Mac OS X, with heavy usage of translucency, transparencies, redesigned icons, a new appearance to the Dock, a completely redesigned Notification Center, and so much more. Set to be released this fall as a free download with tons of features to go along with the visual changes, let’s take a further peak at some of the official preview screen shots of OS X Yosemite (versioned as OS X 10.10 for those who were wondering), because it’s really best seen rather than described.

Read more »

Apple’s next major mobile operating system release, iOS 8, is set to launch this fall. Similar to the anticipated desktop release timeline of OS X Yosemite, no specific release date has been announced yet, but Fall of 2014 ranges from September 22 to December 21, providing for a general timeframe of when to expect the iOS 8 public release. As usual with iOS releases, it will be a free download when it does become available.

Read more »

The next major Mac operating system, OS X Yosemite, will be released to the public this fall. While a specific release date has yet to be announced, fall of 2014 officially begins on September 22 and ends on December 21, offering a vague timeline for the launch and to expect when all Mac users will get to download OS X Yosemite.

Read more »

Apple gave everyone a first look at iOS 8 today, the next major operating system for iPhone, iPad, and iPod touch. It’s largely focused on feature enhancements and additions to iOS, with many refinements that are looking to improve the overall experience. There is also increased platform compatibility with the Mac, thanks largely to the new features added to OS X Yosemite.

Let’s take a quick look at some of the discussed iOS 8 features (and pictures) based on the WWDC 2014 presentation.

Read more »