Table of contents for April 2019 in Macworld UK

We’ve been waiting for Apple to announce a spring event this year, as the company often makes at least one major announcement before its Worldwide Developers Conference in the summer. According to BuzzFeed’s John Paczkowski, we could be hearing about a spring event soon. He reports that Apple is working on an event for 25 March, which will be held at the Steve Jobs Theater at Apple Park. Sources tell BuzzFeed that the event headliner will be a new Apple news subscription service that works with the News app in iOS and macOS. Coincidentally, the Wall Street Journal reported in February that Apple wants a whopping 50 percent of the revenue that publishers generate through the service – a cut they won’t accept. The WSJ also states that publishers don’t…

Price: £39.99 from fave.co/2VJQBOo Forget about the cringeworthy name; ESET Cyber Security Pro is a solid anti-virus suite for Mac. AV-Test (fave.co/2EVDaoR) gave ESET CSP a perfect score on its widespread and prevalent malware test in December, the most recent test available. Our own checks produced a similar result when testing ESET CSP on a MacBook running macOS Mojave (AV-Test used High Sierra). ESET had no trouble blocking most of the threats on WICAR’s test site (fave.co/2EXj11N) of prevalent web-based attacks. The only issue we noticed was that ESET didn’t detect the Adobe Flash hacking team leak; however, we tested on Safari without an active Flash plug-in. Moving over to spot checks with malware from the Objective See repository, ESET immediately detected trojans, back doors, and ransomware. These threats were…

Price: £129 from fave.co/2u1wFLd A battery case offers double protection, from physical knocks and drops to saving your anguish when the phone’s battery starts fading fast. Apple didn’t release a case for the iPhone X, leaving the market open to Chinese manufacturers. Indeed, it didn’t officially release one for its iPhone 8, although the Apple Smart Battery Case for iPhone 7 did fit the 8. More than a year later, Apple has finally addressed the situation for its latest Smart Battery Case. It looks like the firm’s previous offering, with the humpback and clever charging routine. Compatibility The Smart Battery Case for iPhone XS will fit the older iPhone X, which has the same dimensions. The camera bump on the XS is slightly bigger than it is on the iPhone…

Many printers are cheap to buy, but there’s a very good chance that you’ll spend much, much more on ink or toner cartridges than you did on the device itself. So, is it worth trying to save a bit of money by buying cheaper refills or should you stick with the more expensive genuine manufacturer cartridges? We explain these options, so you can decide which is best for you. Genuine ink and toner Whichever model of printer you buy, the company that made it will have specific ink that it recommends you use. Of course, this is also most likely made by the said company and can be seen as something of a money grab due to the fact that it’s always more expensive than third-party rivals. And just expensive…

Save email downloaded to an iPhone or iPad via POP3 or a local iOS mail folder It’s easy to think that an iOS backup would include all the personal data stored on your iPhone or iPad. But Apple explains in a support page that some things aren’t copied off your phone, because they’re stored elsewhere. This includes “data stored in other cloud services, like Gmail and Exchange mail”. What if you download messages from an email account to your iOS device and they’re deleted from the server? Those emails are gone for good when your iPhone or iPad is restored from backup or dies. Apple doesn’t mention this in the support note or elsewhere, even though it can affect people who store certain messages locally on their devices instead of…

Apple has been long-rumoured to have a TV service in the works. Now, according to a new report from CNBC, the service is nearly ready to launch. It claims that Apple is finalizing its deals and software, with an expected launch in April or May. A separate report from Bloomberg says that Apple invited big Hollywood names involved with Apple’s original TV series to attend a 25 March unveiling of the service. The stars include Jennifer Aniston, Reese Witherspoon, Jennifer Garner, and J.J. Abrams. It would correspond with a new TV app for iOS and Apple TV devices that lets users subscribe to streaming services right within the app, and all their content consolidated within it. In that way, it will be similar to Amazon Channels, though we hope it…

Price: $119 (around £90) from fave.co/2EWePPO Alien Skin Exposure X4 is a prosumer app targeted to photo hobbyists and enthusiasts who want to kick their photographic output up a notch or two. While the app – which works both as a standalone or a plug-into Photoshop – specializes in raw images, it’s also compatible with a variety of formats including Tiff, Jpeg and Psd. Version X4 offers improved shadow and highlight recovery for improved detail. New, customizable light effects add drama to your compositions while new transform tools let you correct keystone tilt and other skewed perspectives. In addition to photographic features, Exposure X4’s Smart Collections let you more efficiently organize your photo library using keywords, ratings, and colours. A tethered shooting feature, mostly targeted to professional photographers, lets you…

If you’re reading this article, chances are you’re thinking about buying a new Mac and may be in need of a little guidance. Fortunately, we’re quite familiar with Apple’s Macs, and we’re happy to help you choose the right Mac for you. This buying guide provides an overview of all the Mac models available, and what each model is best suited for. MacBook Air The MacBook Air is Apple’s affordable line of laptops. Three 13in models are currently available. It’s ideal for the budget conscious, or for anyone who is always on the go, doesn’t want to be bogged down by a regular-size laptop, and needs a computer that’s more versatile than an iPad. Specifications Two of the Air models have the same 1.6GHz dual-core Core i5 (eighth-generation) processor and…

Browser extensions add specific capabilities to Safari by reading and modifying web content to promote an integrated browsing experience that’s tailored to your needs. There are two places to find Apple-approved Safari extensions: The App Store (fave.co/2EUXfvr) and the Safari Extensions Gallery web page (fave.co/2tVvYTk). With Safari 12 on macOS Mojave and iOS 12, Apple revised the way its native web browser operates with extensions. Whereas in the past, you could easily download an extension from a developer, today you must download and install a Mac app or an Apple approved extension from the Safari Extensions Gallery page. The gallery is still operative for browser versions as far back as version 9, and is still considered a safe way to download and install Safari extensions. Regardless of the browser version,…

Apple announced that the company has no plans to merge iOS and macOS during its Worldwide Developers Conference last year, but it also said it’s working on a way for developers to write apps that work on both operating systems. Project Marzipan, as Apple calls it, wasn’t discussed in much detail at WWDC, but Apple described the News, Stocks, Home, and Voice Memos apps that come with macOS Mojave as examples of Marzipan at work. And we haven’t heard a lot about Marzipan since WWDC. In February, Bloomberg’s Mark Gurman reported that Marzipan could be in the spotlight for this year’s WWDC. According to Gurman, Apple could release a software development kit at the conference that will allow iPad developers to port their apps to the Mac. Then, in 2020,…

Price: $119 (around £90) from fave.co/2tV4xZQ If you’ve ever used a app that accepts an audio input and was frustrated that you can specify only one piece of audio hardware, or if you’ve wanted to route the sound output of an app into a Skype, FaceTime, Google Hangouts, or other conversation, Rogue Amoeba’s Loopback is the program you need. The latest version improves significantly on its predecessor, which itself was quite powerful. The app lets you combine hardware audio – like mics and line input – with the audio output of apps and system-level components, like Text-to-Speech, to create virtual audio devices. A combined audio device appears as a single item you can select as an input in programs like GarageBand or Skype. You can also select it as an…

Printers are so commonplace in homes and offices all around the world that we often take them for granted. But there are so many different types of printers now available that it’s important to make the right choice and buy one that suits your personal needs. We round up the best printers currently available for Mac owners, as well as for those who want to print from an iPhone or iPad. Buying advice Laser printers are still relatively expensive, primarily aimed at business users who need a high-performance device that can cope with the workload in a busy office. For home users, and people who work from home or in a small office, we’d still recommend inkjet printers instead. Inkjet technology hasn’t changed much in recent years, and most inkjet…

The future of the Mac might be Apple-designed CPUs, but the present of the Mac is Intel. Apple is increasingly in charge of its own destiny, adding features like the T2 chip to Macs to handle as much of the system’s security, encryption, and other miscellaneous tasks as it can. Still, we expect Apple to ship most or all of its laptops and desktops this year with Intel inside. The chip giant hasn’t yet announced the specific processors it will ship this year, but it has delivered a few sneak peaks at its road map. Here’s what we know about what Intel is cooking up for 2019, and how it might impact the Mac. Sunny Cove and Ice Lake Intel keeps producing new consumer processors every year, but the fundamental…