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When it was first released, the MacBook Air was an innovative device. But now everyone and their mothers are making ultra-slim laptops. The MacBook Air still has a lot going for it, but unless Apple unveils a brand new and revamped design of the MacBook Air this year, you may just want to pick up a standard MacBook instead. Consider these three things when deciding whether you want a MacBook Air rental or a MacBook rental.

The Death of the 11 Inch Air

Apple stopped producing 11 inch MacBook Airs last year. To understand why this fact is so terrible you first have to ask yourself, “Why do people buy the MacBook Air?”. To answer your question, people bought the MacBook Air because it was compact, lightweight, and still managed to be powerful.

But Apple discontinued the 11 Inch MacBook Air, effectively eliminating one of the three main reasons anyone would want to specifically rent or buy a MacBook Air in the first place. But only the 11 Inch MacBook Air was discontinued, meaning that Apple is still actively selling their 13 Inch MacBook Airs.

Weight of the Devices

Contrary to the device’s name, the MacBook Air is no longer the lightweight champion of MacBook devices. Maybe if Apple continued making new models of the 11-inch MacBook Air, the Air would still be the lightest MacBook but, as listed above, Apple sunk that model. However, Apple has not stopped pursuing slim and lightweight designs. The 12-inch MacBook released back in 2015 manages to be lighter than both the 11-inch MacBook Air and the 13-inch MacBook Air.

Device Capabilities

The MacBook Air and the MacBook have pretty similar hardware capabilities. The main differences between the two devices are that the MacBook Air comes equipped with better a processor, graphics card, and battery life (battery life only applies to the 13 inch model), while the MacBook is lighter weight, has better screen display (retina display) and resolution, and more flash drive storage space and RAM by default.

Conclusion

If you are looking for a device strictly on the grounds of what is currently the most lightweight and compact MacBook, get the 12-inch MacBook. If you need a better graphics card or longer battery life, get the 13-inch MacBook Air. At the moment I cannot tell if there is an objectively better device between the MacBook and the MacBook Air, but the fact that the MacBook is lighter, more compact, and almost as powerful processor and graphics card wise is somewhat concerning when thinking about the future of the MacBook Air family.

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When will Apple release its new iOS 11 operating system for iPhone and iPad, and what new features will iOS 11 bring to Apple’s tablets and smartphones? I’ve gathered some of the rumors and evidence given about the new iOS and here are a few.

It is almost certain that iOS 11 will be released to the public in September 2017, after the beta get released in June 2017. Rumors speculate that iPhone’s 5c and up will be able to run the new OS.

Some new rumored features of iOS 11 include, a finger detecting dynamic keyboard with finger hover detection for improved typing, a more “natural” sounding Siri, a Dark Mode, App-specific Pass-code or Touch ID lock and the most exciting feature for most, group FaceTime calls. There has also been rumors on a new layout or look for iOS 11 but nothing has been confirmed yet.

If you are interested in testing out these features but you have an android or dont want to buy an iPhone without knowing you want it, you can rent iPhones at rentacomputer.com today.

Ten years ago, Nokia was the world’s largest phone maker. Microsoft was getting ready to drop Windows Vista, and the best products featured at CES included a wireless TV and an MP3 player that streamed internet radio. Then on January 9, 2007, Apple CEO Steve Jobs unveiled a device that went on to change the world- a $499 iPhone with 4 GB of storage. It was a mobile phone with a music player, and internet connect-ability. Interested in renting an iPhone ? contact rentacomputer.com for all apple product rentals.

Here are some ways the iPhone has changed the way we live:

We’re always on:

You used to have to fire up your computer, wait for Wi-Fi to connect, then open up your browser to get the the site you wanted. Now we’re connected to the internet all the time. If you’re not on Wi-Fi

Tablets, Watches and Headphones:

Countless devices are either tied to the iPhone or exist because the phone was created such as the iPad or Apple Watch. There are also accessories spurred by the popularity of the iPhone such as; cases, Bluetooth speakers, headphones, and charging docks.

Apps:

Most might not remember this now, but when the first iPhone was dropped there were no such things as third-party apps or the App Store. This changed in July 2008 when Apple dropped the iPhone 3G and its iPhone 2.0 software. There are now more than 2 million apps in the App Store, and lots of industries have spawned that couldn’t exist without smartphones such as, Uber or Lyft for rides, and Instagram or Snapchat for photo sharing.

Mapping:

The introduction of mapping on the iPhone meant you no longer had to carry around a giant paper map when visiting a new city. Google Maps and Apple Maps are two of the most used apps on the store and they’ve steadily added new features over the years, such as public transit directions.

Photographing:

There were cameras before the iPhone, but the gadgets combination of easy internet access and apps like Instagram inspired people to bring out their inner photographer.  The Phones camera also means you have a portable camcorder at your fingertips. The combination of video recording and the phones connection opens up the option for broadcasting video immediately through services like Facebook live, YouTube, and Periscope.

Gaming:

The iPhone reinvented the idea of mobile gaming, through apps like Pokemon Go and Angry Birds that anyone could play using their fingers on the touchscreen. Payment models changed, most games are free to play and instead of charging a sales price developers came up with the idea of in-app purchases and add revenue.

Mobile Pay:

Apple was not the first company to talk about mobile payments but using your phone at checkout is now more common than ever. Apple Pay allows you to use your phone to purchase things. The iPhone’s Wallet app can also be used to store coupons, rewards cards, and tickets to things like movies planes and concerts and its all stored in one place.

Social Media:

Social media has also shifted heavily to mobile devices from desktop computers, letting people feel connected to friends at all times. Facebook said that in its most recent quarter, roughly 84 percent of its $6.82 billion in ad revenue came from mobile ads.

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It is confirmed that Apple will be doing something with Augmented Reality. Apple CEO Tim Cook repeatedly expressed his strong interest in the technology over the more isolating virtual reality over the past year. Apple acquired an AR company over a year ago so why wouldn’t Apple want to bring its own brand of mixed reality to its flagship product?

Rumors began to surface that an employee confirmed that Apple was working on a light pair of augmented reality glasses that may be announced this year. However when annalist  Lance Ulanoff spoke with Apple industry experts about plans for 2017, although Augmented Reality was high on the list of possibilities Apple AR Glasses wont find much support within Apple.

Chances are 2017 will be the year we see an Apple AR Product, it just wont be glasses. Good news for Apple that AR can be applied to any number of existing pieces of hardware and software, if you are looking to rent Apple products contact rentacomputer.com . Some speculate that their next AR product will be The iPhone 8, and an Apple Car.

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Apple’s new Plus-sized iPhone next year may come with different features according to latest rumors out of Asia. Previous rumors claimed apple may name its next phone the “iPhone X” due to it being the 10th anniversary of the device, however others claim it will simply be dubbed the “iPhone 7s”. Apple fans are expecting the next iPhone to be one of the biggest releases ever with a host of rumored new features such as a sightly different dual-lens camera, curved OLED screen, a new body with glass sides on the front and back sandwiching an aluminum band, similar to the iPhone 4 design, and finally wireless charging. Apple is also planning to release the device in 3 different sizes a 4.7-inch iPhone 7s, a 5.5-inch iPhone 7s Plus, and a new 5-inch model.

Rent iPhones and other apple products here.

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MacOS Sierra released officially back in September of this year. However, if you’re still holding out on upgrading for any reason, now is a perfect time reconsider giving your MacBook a Christmas operating system upgrade! Of course, we wouldn’t just tell you to upgrade your operating system without giving you good reasons for doing so. So here are three reasons you should upgrade to MacOS Sierra if you are still running OS X El Capitan.

Memory Improvements

MacOS Sierra is designed for helping users to better manage their MacBooks memory. This might worry some users upon hearing, but don’t worry, OS Sierra doesn’t just delete files at random from your MacBook. Instead, OS Sierra prioritizes deleting files which have been trashed for more than 30 days and remind you to remove installation files which users will use once and never again. In addition to deleting files, MacOS Sierra can also move files that you don’t use often off of your local storage and onto cloud storage for future re-downloading.

It should be mentioned that OS Sierra gives you the option of choosing to auto-delete your trashed items after they have spent thirty days in the trash. Your new operating system will not automatically delete your trash for you, unless you open Finder, go to Preferences, and then select “Remove items from the Trash after 30 days”.

Siri on Your MacBook

Siri finally made its way to Mac back in September, and it brought new computer-relevant features. If you have ever wished you could search your MacBook’s files using only your voice instead of any number of clicks, you will now have the option to do so. In addition to searching your file browser, Siri can interface with the Apple Home app and search for specific photos on the internet.

Of course, Siri can still do all of its normal phone functions, like messaging friends, and looking up things on the internet, but now it can do all of those things and more from the comfort of your MacBook.

Device Interconnectivity

Apple has put a whole lot of effort into trying to increase the amount of interconnectivity available between iDevices by improving iCloud. The most important feature to come out of these efforts is the capability of transferring files between your MacBook and other iDevices, such as an iPhone or iPad. However, this is not the only thing Apple has done with their device interconnectivity.

Apple has also rolled out some new security features which improve the usefulness of their smartwatches. If you own a smartwatch you’ll now be able to use it to unlock your MacBook just by approaching it, which will save a few seconds of your life by letting you skip putting in your lockscreen password. Another security feature rolled out with OS Sierra allows you to transfer the last step of Apple Pay authentication to a second Apple device you own to finalize purchases if you ever felt the need to do so.

If none of the three things above compelled you to upgrade to MacOS Sierra for yourself, your opinion may be swayed by knowing that this upgrade is free for anyone who has OS X 10.7.5 or later. Of  course, if you ever needed to get a large quantity MacBook rental, you can expect MacOS Sierra from us as well. Most Christmas presents aren’t free, but you can get your operating system a free update before Christmas. 
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Having trouble with your contacts in Apple’s latest OS X update El Capitan? Trying to get to know your contacts better? With every new operating system Apple releases, there are changes and things you are going to have to tinker with. Here are some helpful tips for improving your contacts in OS X El Capitan.

Add Fields

One of the more useful things you will find in Contacts are Fields. Launch Contacts Preferences and then choose Template. Use the Add Field drop-down menu to add fields to your Contacts. You can add things like Twitter handles for contacts as they aren’t enabled by default. All you have to do is select Twitter in the drop-down list.

Birthday

You can use Contacts in conjunction with Automator in order to automate the sending of birthday greetings via email. This is useful for not only remembering birthdays but also for gaining a little insight into Automator and how it can help you in other ways.

Smart Groups Are The Best

You can create Smart Groups by going to File > New Smart Group. From here you can set up different parameters across the four search fields. You can add additional search filters by pressing the + button and you can use this to also create groups that will automatically be updated. This includes Card Contains Apple or Birthday Is In The Next Week. A majority of users don’t realize that Smart Groups is a thing though it can really help when working on a project or with a group.

Get Rid Of Duplications

Contact Books can easily become overloaded by data that we don’t necessarily need. This includes duplicates of contact addresses. In Contacts go to Card > Link Selected Cards from the Menu. This will minimize everything to a single listing.

Use Contacts Cleaner

Contacts Cleaner, which only costs $4.99 from the Mac App Store, is a fantastic tool that helps you fix problems. It will inform you about errors in your database, including duplicate addresses or bad phone numbers. In addition to that, it also offers to resolve problems for you and allows you to edit records if you want or need to fix problems manually.

Suggested Contacts

In El Capitan, Mail can detect when you receive new information for a contact, allowing you to update the contact card from inside the mail app. It also identifies whenever a new person makes contact. You can find contact info in your Contacts app, which identifies itself as “Found in Mail”.

Siri

Nickname and Related Name are two fields that are very handy. Enable either of these and you will be able to define your relationship with contacts or give them nicknames. After you’ve assigned roles or names to your key contacts you can use Siri more effectively with your iOS device.

Organization

Try organizing your existing contacts into different groups using File > New Group. Create a name for the group and place the appropriate amount of contacts there. Then you can decide what the groups are for, i.e. friends, colleagues, family, etc… This makes it easier for you to find and manage your contacts.

Check Your Default Account

If you don’t seem to be getting regular updates to your Contacts then you should ensure that you have the correct default account configured across all of your Macs and devices. Open Contacts and go to Preferences > General and look for the lowest item in the list marked as Default Account. Set this to iCloud as this is where the new contacts will be added by default.

Links

Duplicate contacts can cause problems, especially when using multiple email accounts. You could very well see two entries for the same person in your address book, one for Gmail and another for iCloud. To eliminate this press Command and select the cards. Then choose Card > Link Selected Cards from the Menu. This will make them a single listing.

That’s really all there is to it. If you are having problems with your Contacts or you simply want to make them easier to navigate and more organized then follow these tips and you’ll have them all sorted out in no time!

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Trying to use your new Magic Trackpad 2 on your Mac desktop? Well if you’re having trouble then let me be of assistance. The Magic Trackpad 2 requires you to be using a Bluetooth 4.0-enabled Mac desktop with OS X v10.11 or later. Obviously this means that not every Mac is going to be able to take advantage of this peripheral. If you’re wondering about your Mac, most made in 2012 or later and some made in 2011 should be compatible with the Magic Trackpad 2. There are a few notable exceptions, including the late 2011 MacBook Pro models and the late 2011 iMacs. There are reports that you can finagle the trackpad to work on these older devices though Apple doesn’t recommend it.

So, if your Mac is compatible then you should connect the trackpad to the Mac using the Lightning to USB cable. Once you’ve done this, switch the trackpad on and the device should automatically pair with your Mac in Bluetooth Preferences. Once you’re all setup the trackpad works similar to an iPhone, offering you a Force Touch surface that you can use to move the pointer and issue gesture-based commands. In addition to that, the trackpad is also capable of telling the difference between non-imperative hand rest positions and actual commands. You can set up gestures and even create your own optional commands by going to System Preferences > Trackpad.

If you’ve used Force Touch on the latest Apple laptops then you will already have a feel for how this trackpad works. The UI features allow you to access items while reducing the steps it takes to get there. Multitouch is also supported and there are different commands you can issue, including Click, Force Click, Two-Finger Click, Pinch-to-Zoom, and Swipe. Click allows you to press anywhere on the trackpad and utilize it like a mouse click. You can also enable “Tap to Click” in the preferences. Force Click allows you to firmly click anywhere on the trackpad until you feel a deeper click. Use this to have more contextual information about an on-screen item or to access things like word definitions or a preview on Maps. Two-Finger Click allows you to click with two fingers to open shortcut menus. Tapping with two fingers allows you to do the same thing if you have Tap-to-Click enabled. Pinch to zoom works the same as it does on the iPhone. If you swipe left or right with two fingers you will scroll through web pages, documents or iBooks.

In addition to tall of that, the trackpad also offers a lot of tools for getting around apps. If you pinching closed with four or five fingers allows you to open Launchpad to find and launch apps. Swiping left or right with three or four fingers will switch between full-screen apps, and swiping up with three fingers will gain you access to Mission Control. If you go to Help > Mac Help in the finder menu and search for “Trackpad” you can access more information about using the device.

Hopefully, this helps you get through using your trackpad on a Mac. None of these things are really complicated and it should be easy for almost anyone, even those unfamiliar with Mac devices, to jump right in and start using their new Magic Trackpad 2 right out of the box with no hassles.

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A massive update is in store for the standalone products offered by Apple. This includes the company’s keyboard, mouse and trackpad, with ways of making each device a lot better than they used to be. One of the key changes coming to all the devices is the fact that they are all ditching their AA battery requirements in favor of built-in batteries that charge via Lightning cable. These new batteries are expected to last for about a month on a single charge and are supposed to quickly charge enough for nine hours of use after just two minutes of being plugged in.

Aside from the battery changes, each device is getting a design change with some being more than others. The trackpad is getting the biggest change in the fact that it is no longer terrible. The new trackpad comes with a flat metal base and a white top that slopes downward back to front. The surface of the trackpad is wider and has a more rectangular shape and also comes with some new tricks. Force Touch is now supported and, the feature that most people will love, you now have the ability to click the trackpad literally anywhere on its surface. However, all of these new bells and whistles come with an increased price tag as the new model runs $129.

The next thing to see a big change is the Apple keyboard. The new keyboard looks far different from its predecessor, having a single piece of metal that gently slopes down from top to bottom, much like the trackpad. As a matter of fact, the trackpad and the keyboard actually fit perfectly side-by-side. The keys themselves are slightly wider than the older model, reducing the air gap around them though their placement is identical. The function keys also see a change in size, shifting from tiny rectangles to full square keys that are very satisfying to press on.

Even though the keys are in the same place, they feel very different. These new keys are far shallower than their predecessors, which might not seem like a big difference until you factor in the slope of the keyboard. Each row of keys is closer to being level with the row next to it, meaning you have to move your fingers slightly more to reach certain keys. I’m sure you’ll get used to this quickly though you shouldn’t expect perfect typing right out of the box. This new keyboard is also getting a price hike to $99.

The Apple mouse sees the least amount of changes compared to the trackpad and keyboard. The new mouse looks practically identical to the old one, with the same flat top that looks like no other mouse on the market. The new one is slightly longer, which makes it feel less awkward in your hand. The biggest change is on the bottom of the mouse, where there is no longer a thin, removable plate covering where the batteries would be. This is significant because that thing was a pain to remove. Apple has also noted that it has redesigned the “rails” the mouse slides on though they seem pretty much the same. Like the other two products, the new mouse is increasing in price to $79.

All three of these products are also receiving slightly new names as well. The trackpad is now known as the Magic Trackpad 2 instead of the Magic Trackpad, the Magic Mouse is now known as the Magic Mouse 2, and the keyboard is called the Magic Keyboard. Why not the Magic Keyboard 2 you might ask? Well, because the old keyboard was simply known as the Apple Wireless Keyboard. Magic or not, I think the new one should be called the Magic Keyboard 2 for continuity purposes. All three products are currently available from Apple.

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As if Apple’s bumper September launch event wasn’t good enough, with the new iPhone 6s and 6s Plus, as well as a bumper-size iPad Pro and Apple TV top box device, now the Cupertino company is said to launch a new 21.5-inch iMac this week.

According to multiple sources, 9to5Mac’s Mark Gurman says Apple will be releasing the new iMac desktop as early as Tuesday! Apple hasn’t actually announced any news yet, but Gurman has a great connection when it comes to rumors and leaks from Apple.

The new iMacs apparently will have 4,096 x 2,304 of resolution and better graphics cards compared to their predecessors, with 1,920 x 1,080 of resolution. They will also be slightly more expensive.

There have been hints dropping about the 4k iMac since June. Code in a beta version of Apple’s latest desktop operating system, El Capitan, includes support for an iMac with a display of 4,096 x 2,304.

Apple has been continuously updating their devices to have high-resolution Retina displays, starting with iPhones all the way to MacBooks and iPads. Since Apple launched the larger-screened 27-inch iMac to have a 5K Retina display, it looks like the 21.5-inch iMac is their next project. The 21.5-inch iMacs are starting at $1,099.

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