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Over the accomplished six months, I’ve arise absolutely a few tutorials to advice Mac users advance the achievement of older computers, as able-bodied as some abundant guides to the best Mac accessories beyond a array of categories. Today, I’m attached them all calm in this handy, one-stop assembly of the best Mac accessories and upgrades.
This adviser walks you through everything: in one place, you can apprentice about the best Mac adamantine drives, RAM upgrades, docks, keyboards, trackpads, stands, bags, and biking accessories out there. And you can additionally get chargeless apps to advance your Mac’s accumulator and responsiveness, acquisition apparent English explanations of your Mac’s abstruse specs, and apprentice about the little aegis screws Apple uses to tamper-proof its machines. There’s a lot inside, so you may appetite to bookmark this allotment for approaching reference!…
It’s attainable to accept a accepted compassionate of what is and isn’t alive well with your Mac: anybody knows how to explain that “the awning is fine” but “the computer is slow.” If you absolutely appetite to accept why the awning is fine, and how the computer could be faster, I’ve decoded Apple’s Tech Specs pages for you (part 1 and allotment 2) to explain the Mac family’s appearance in plain English. Is it account advance your absolute Mac, or affairs a new Mac at a discount? These guides will advice you get a handle on your Mac’s features, and accept how they analyze with currently-available machines.
To amount out how fast your accepted adamantine drive, CPU, and cartoon processor are by allegory with newer Macs, start by benchmarking your Mac with three chargeless downloads: BlackMagic’s Disk Acceleration Test, Geekbench 3, and Cinebench R15. They’ll accord you a faculty of how fast your Mac’s accepted key components are, so you can adjudge whether to absorb your money on a baby advancement or abounding Mac replacement.
If your computer started out fast but has become apathetic over time, it’s absolutely acceptable that your adamantine drive is active with files. I’ve recommended a brace of free, accurate apps to apple-pie and acceleration up your Mac alleged GrandPerspective (above) and OnyX. GrandPerspective bound shows you the files and folders that are bistro best of your adamantine drive space. OnyX deletes airy files, such as OS X and app installer logs, which should accept been deleted automatically.
If your Mac adamantine drive’s still active with content, there are three ways to fix it. You can get rid of space-wasting alike files (including doubles/triples of agenda photos) application a safe, affordable duplicate-finding app. Alternately, you can get an alien adamantine drive to authority your bigger files. Or you can alter the centralized adamantine drive with a newer, faster solid accompaniment drive (SSD), which will radically advance your Mac’s achievement beyond the board.
The Mac bazaar is in the average of a celebrated about-face from acceptable automated adamantine drives to badly faster SSDs that run silent, accept no affective parts, and are abundant smaller. If admeasurement and portability are your top considerations, a thumbdrive-sized SSD such as OWC’s Envoy Pro mini delivers aerial believability and USB 3.0-quality speeds in a Mac-matching metal enclosure.
If you appetite commodity carriageable with a college accumulator capacity, pocket-sized alien adamantine drives such as Seagate’s Seven start at alone $100 for 500GB of “take it anywhere” capacity.
Most desktop Mac users will acquiescently accord up portability for reliability. I’ve spotlighted a accumulating of accomplished alien Mac adamantine drives here, best conspicuously G-Technology’s affordable, fast, professional-grade G-Drive USB. My commodity discusses the allowances and tradeoffs you’ll get from cheaper, higher-capacity drives against added expensive, longer-lasting ones, so you can accept what’s best for your needs.
Although this adeptness assume like a big step, replacing an older Mac’s centralized adamantine drive with an SSD has the greatest likelihood of radically convalescent its speed. To advice anybody accomplish the bandy on their own, I’ve put calm a accumulating of great, easy-to-follow guides.
Apple’s iMacs account the best (and generally the best easily) aback you alter their adamantine drives for SSDs. My adviser to swapping an old iMac’s adamantine drive for a new SSD has been absolutely accepted with readers, and I’ve accustomed so abounding “thank you!” emails that I apperceive how blessed bodies accept been with their new drives.
I’ve additionally accounting guides to installing SSDs central assertive MacBooks, Mac minis, and Mac Pros, which alter in accession complication from “incredibly easy” to “super difficult.” If you’re advantageous abundant to accept a MacBook Air or Retina MacBook Pro with an absolute SSD inside, amount drops and acceleration boosts are authoritative this a abundant time to bandy the MacBook Air/Pro SSD and advance the capacity.
If you appetite to apprentice added about the appropriate screws Apple uses on its computers, I’ve accounting this adviser to accept and alleviate Apple’s Mac aegis screws. The TL;DR version: get this 54-Bit disciplinarian kit and you’ll be attainable for appealing abundant annihilation your Mac has alfresco or inside.
And you don’t accept to bandy abroad your Mac’s old adamantine drive. You can put it in an affordable alien USB asylum and accumulate it about as a advancement or spare. Good enclosures are in the $40 range.
If you’re a MacBook Air/Pro user, or aloof appetite to radically aggrandize the connectivity options of an iMac or Mac mini, there are now a agglomeration of highly aggressive Thunderbolt 2 advancing solutions to accept from. Elgato’s Thunderbolt 2 Dock (shown), CalDigit’s Thunderbolt Station 2, and Kanex’s Thunderbolt 2 Express Dock are all in the aforementioned $200-$250 amount range, with the aforementioned basal features: accompanying Thunderbolt 2 ports, three USB 3.0 ports (across advanced and back), Ethernet, 4K HDMI, and audio ports. Each has a little difference, such as bigger audio support, ESATA adamantine drive support, or a packed-in Thunderbolt 2 cable to absolve the price.
If all you charge is USB expansion, Moshi’s iLynx 3 (shown) and Mobee’s Magic Hub are $50-$60 options that add four USB 3.0 ports to Macs, including one with affirmed iPad/iPhone-recharging power. iLynx 3 works with abounding Mac models; Magic Hub is alone for iMacs.
Installing new and added RAM is one Mac advancement that Apple advisedly fabricated attainable for about every earlier Mac. My adviser to allotment and installing affection Mac RAM explains which Macs are able of actuality upgraded, a bargain way to acutely advance your Mac’s adeptness to run assorted apps at once. It should cost $90 or beneath for abundant RAM to run OS X Yosemite after hiccups, or $180 for abundant RAM to agreement you won’t charge added for years. All you’ll charge is a baby screwdriver and 15-30 minutes, depending on your abundance akin with unscrewing a few screws and inserting a baby ambit lath or two into your computer.
Your Mac adeptness not accept alien with the best keyboard for your claimed needs. I like Apple’s Wireless Keyboard, but abhorrence the connected “low battery” notifications it creates (and the charge to bandy AA cells). Some bodies absolutely adopt ancient keyboards with clickier keys than the ones Apple uses. So this adviser to the best Mac keyboards will advice you aces amid top active and wireless options, as able-bodied as add-on numeric keypads for bodies who like them.
If your Mac came with a abrasion and you haven’t yet switched to a trackpad, you adeptness appetite to accede authoritative the move. Apple’s Magic Trackpad (left/center) is the safest choice, as Apple congenital it and supports it with all of its OS X software, including abounding Multi-Touch gestures. But Logitech’s Rechargeable Trackpad for Mac does abroad with the Magic Trackpad’s assurance on AA batteries, in favor of an chip array with micro-USB recharging. It’s slimmer and easier to bung into a bag, admitting its Multi-Touch abutment is somewhat added bound than the Magic Trackpad’s.
Up until recently, if you ran out of MacBook adeptness and couldn’t acquisition a bank aperture to recharge, you were out of luck. I was decidedly captivated to see ChargeTech’s ChargeAll (shown) arise as a MacBook-ready charging solution, giving anyone admission to 5-7 hours of added Mac run time application a absolutely carriageable AC outlet. Another option, Gbatteries Energy’s BatteryBox, costs added and works about Apple’s MagSafe adapter to action hours of added run time for a MacBook with at atomic some actual power.
Depending on the acme of the board area you’re application your MacBook, as able-bodied as the admeasurement of the MacBook itself, you may acquisition that a angle helps to accomplish the awning or keyboard added accessible. My adviser to the best Mac stands and mounts looks at a accumulating of abundant options, including aggregate from carriageable flip-out stands to anchored desktop alternatives.
My claimed iMac sits aloft one of the best advantageous desk-decluttering accessories I’ve appear across: Just Mobile’s Drawer is made mostly from iMac-matching argent aluminum, abacus a slide-out atramentous artificial drawer ample abundant to abundance peripherals, added change, cables, or whatever abroad may contrarily get broadcast beyond a desk. It’s one of several altered iMac-compatible angle options covered in the best Mac stands and mounts guide.
Some of the added Mac accessories I’ve covered accommodate the best Mac biking accessories, alignment from international biking adapters to two-in-one Lightning/micro-USB cables, MacBook aloofness film, and travel-friendly accustomed cases.
Last year, I recommended my admired set of Mac speakers, Bowers & Wilkins’ MM-1, which can be had new or as substantially-discounted refurbs. They’re a bit of a splurge, but they complete absolutely abundant and do a abundant bigger job of analogous the attending of a Mac than any added speakers I’ve seen. Added recently, I covered Elgato’s Bold Abduction HD60 (below), which lets your Mac abduction and livestream 1080p/60fps videos anon from bold consoles and added video sources — as able-bodied as abacus alive commentary.
If you’re attractive for commodity that hasn’t been covered above, analysis out added of my How-To guides and reviews for 9to5Mac here. Don’t balloon to bang on Earlier Posts at the basal of the folio to see everything!
