Macworld June 2021

Apple on Monday released macOS Big Sur 11.3, an update to the Mac operating system. The update includes improved support for AirTag, iPhone and iPad apps on Apple Silicon Macs, new Safari features, and more. VULNERABILITY FIX Among the many new features detailed below, the macOS 11.3 Big Sur update fixes several security issues, including one where “A malicious application may bypass Gatekeeper checks” (CVE-2021-30657) and another where “A malicious application may be able to bypass Privacy preferences” (CVE-2021-1849). According to Ars Technica, CVE-2021-30657 was actively being exploited in the wild to suppress macOS security warnings. IMPROVING iPHONE AND iPAD APPS ON M1 MACS If you have a Mac with Apple Silicon (the M1 chip) and have been running iPhone and iPad apps, this is an update you’ll want to install. The update has…

We were somewhat surprised when the new iMac arrived with an M1 chip at Apple’s Spring Loaded event. We had heard rumors that Apple was working on the successor to the M1 processor, and Apple’s all-in-one seemed like a great place to debut it. That didn’t happen. Instead, we got the same M1 chip that is in the MacBook Air, right down to the cheaper option with seven GPU cores instead of eight. Granted, it’ll still be a very fast machine, but we were really hoping to get a glimpse of the second generation of Apple silicon. Now it seems that chip is on the way. According to Nikkei Asia, the next generation of Apple silicon chips has entered mass production and shipments “could begin as early as July for use in…

The M1 Mac’s inability to run Windows might seem like an obvious limitation, but it’s actually a major issue for a lot of Mac users. Boot Camp is gone, so you can’t run Windows natively, which means you need to use a virtualization app. A few months ago, Parallels previewed its Parallels Desktop for Mac virtualization software on M1 Macs, and in recent weeks the company announced that Parallels Desktop 16.5 for Mac—which brings full native support for both M1 and Intel Macs—is out of beta and now available to the general public. If you want to run Windows on your M1 Mac, you can launch Parallels Desktop 16.5 to run the Windows 10 ARM Insider Preview, the only version of Windows that can run on Apple silicon. To get the…

Despite all the intriguing new devices that Apple showed off this week, it’s never too early to start musing on what might be up the company’s sleeves next. As ever, you can glean a lot about the direction Apple is heading in by seeing what kind of things it is focusing on, especially when it’s rolling out new products with new capabilities. Features and technologies that we haven’t seen before can often point to places in which the company has invested significant time and energy—and, in many cases, it’s with an eye to more than just a single device. One of Apple’s great strengths, after all, is a “build once, deploy anywhere” mentality that lets the company bring the same features to many products. With the first event of 2021 behind…

The sleek Corsair TBT100 Thunderbolt 3 Dock ups the game for a Mac laptop, Mac mini, or iMac by providing a full complement of ports for those that lack them and offering additional—and more easily accessible—ports for those that already possess many. The compact dock, which weighs in at a pound (0.5 kg), provides ready access to useful jacks while offering a solid design contrast that doesn’t imitate Apple’s aesthetic. The $259.99 price is right in line with the array of options. The TBT100 has five high-speed data ports: two USB Type-A SuperSpeed (3.2 Gen 1 or 5Gbps), two USB Type-C SuperSpeed+ (3.2 Gen 2 or 10Gbps), and one Thunderbolt 3. That Thunderbolt 3 port, however, is reserved to connect to a Mac, as the 40Gbps throughput is necessary to power all…

You may have noticed that external SSDs from top-tier vendors are pricey—especially when they’re Thunderbolt. If you’re looking to lessen your financial pain a little, then OWC’s $79 Envoy Express T3 (Thunderbolt 3) enclosure might be just what the doctor ordered. Populate it with a budget M.2 NVMe SSD, and you’re on your way to external storage nirvana for a very reasonable price. The kicker is a clever caddy that adheres (semipermanently) to your computer, laptop, or display and allows you to keep the drive handy, but securely in place and out of harm’s way. DESIGN AND SPECS The Envoy Express measures approximately 4.1x1.6x0.5 inches and weighs around 3.3 ounces—including the SSD. The metal case is all black with a brushed-metal stripe down the middle bearing the name and OWC logo. Though shown in…