Note from our Founder, Jeff Mann

It’s a big year for us and there are many great things in the works to bring you an even better service experience. A major part of our DNA is focused on bringing you the best experience available outside of the Apple Store and make getting your Apple® IT needs resolved a pleasure. 

This week I am pleased to announce that we are migrating to a new web address. www.tech-ease.orgis now live and the new home of our website. You will still be able to reach us through the old address and the same is true of our old email addresses. The site itself will be getting updated with new photos, enhanced content and new sections coming very soon. We want to make our website easier to reach and remember while also preparing us for the future. Stay tuned and check back regularly for updates. 

Since we launched it last week, we have enjoyed getting feedback from you through feedback@tech-ease.org. The only way we know if we are doing well is if you let us know when we are and when we are not. If you have a thought, question or comment for us, please let us know. We will also use those questions to help direct future content of this publication so keep those comments coming in! We also want to invite you to share your experiences with others. Visit us at our Facebook page and like it and give us a review. You can also visit our consultants page at https://consultants.apple.com/us/504811 and give us a review there as well.

- Jeff

Apple Inc., Series

As members of the Apple Consultants Network and former Apple employees, we live the Apple culture and want to share that love. Check out this section for interesting Apple history and the latest news. 

Did you know…The Beatles played a big role in how Apple Inc. got its name.

The Beatles’ record company, Apple Corp, has taken Apple Computer to court over trademark infringement repeatedly. The first time was in 1978, two years after Apple Computer was founded. Apple and Apple Corp settled in 1981 with the condition that Apple Computer would never enter the music industry. 

Apple Corp again took Apple to court in 1989 when Apple Computer introduced computers capable of music playback, and then again in 2003 after the iPod and iTunes hit the market in 2001 and 2002, respectively. The companies ultimately reached an agreement concerning the use of the word “Apple” in 2007. This is when Apple Computer, Inc. gained control of the rights to word on the condition that they license it to Apple Corp. This is when Apple Computer, Inc. became the Apple, Inc.  we know today. This agreement in 2007 also paved the way for the Beatles catalog to come to iTunes in 2010 in what has been called the “most lucrative licensing deal in music.”

Next time, we will share the first part of our "Demystifying the Apple Store" series with useful knowledge, tips and tricks for navigating Apple's Retail Store.

- Katie Bee Brantley and Jeff Mann

A Note from Our Founder

As we at Tech-Ease say hello to 2015, I am amazed at what we have accomplished this past year. We have grown wonderful relationships with our clients and laid the foundation to be the best Apple® Consultants in Birmingham. We have worked hard to provide you with superior quality service, and you have rewarded us with extremely positive feedback that lets us know we are doing a good job. The fact that our customers are happy should be enough for us but we are always trying to raise the bar that we set. 

This year is going to be even more amazing. The Tech-Ease team is unified in our goal to make YOUR world a better place through Apple® technology. We have been hard at work innovating new ways to bring you an even better service experience. With that in mind, starting today we are going to be bringing you a  newsletter every two weeks. Each of our team members will be writing pieces to share information that we feel is relevant for you and we hope you like it. 

So as you read this, we want to ask you what you think about it. For us, feedback is essential to good performance and we want you to get involved. This is your experience and we need you to help us understand what you want. Live today is our dedicated feedback channel, feedback@tech-ease.org. Any and all feedback is welcome, anytime, day or night. We want you to send us your questions, your concerns, positive and negative experiences, ideas for new services…we want to hear from you!

This is just the first of many exciting things coming this year and we want to invite you to be our partner. Stay tuned and see what we can accomplish together.
 

- Jeff

Back Ups and Data Transfers: An Easy Guide

Our devices store a great amount of your personal information: documents, passwords, and years of memories in the form of pictures and videos. What would happen if one of your devices fails, breaks, is stolen or gets lost? All is not lost… if you have backed everything up!

This running column will serve as a guide to saving and managing your data. We'll talk about Time Machine BackUps, External Hard Drives, Online Storage on websites like Dropbox, and photo storage like the iCloud photo stream and Flikr. 

Tech-Ease is happy to save you time by performing your backup for you. Services for iMacs and MacBooks include data migration between Macs and computer hard drive removal and recovery. A typical Tech-Ease data recovery costs $160. For iPhones and iPads, our hourly rate stands. If we determine no physical work can be done to your device, only pickup and delivery charges apply.

- Braden Wyatt

What's your New Year ® Resolution?

Resolve to connect with AlabamaTech⌘Ease.  At least once in your life, you have started the New Year with the resolution to get in shape. But have you ever made a resolution to use your Apple® technology better? Get in ® shape? Perhaps you have been afraid to make it because you didn't know where to get the right help. Fear no longer.  Whether you are new to Apple® or you weren't even aware there were other products on the market, there's an opportunity to learn something new or do something more with your ® product. This year let AlabamaTech⌘Ease partner with you to find solutions, get training, and help you feel comfortable with your ® gear. Why wait! Book an appointment now.

Yosemite is here! And other tidbits from Tech⌘Ease Techies...

Yosemite is here!

Apple released OS X 10.10 Yosemite this past week and it is time to upgrade your software. It is a free update available in the App Store on your computer. As always, before upgrading be sure to perform a back up of your computer. Rarely does anything go wrong, but if it does you need a back up to make sure your data is safe. There are tons of great new features and integrations with your iOS devices so I would upgrade as soon as you get a chance. Also let us know if you have any questions or need any help with your upgrade. 

Update or Upgrade?

When should I do what? Great question, I’m glad you asked.

Update

The way Apple has decided to update allows both Macs and iOS devices, one can choose to update and still feel good about their tech for several years now. You no longer have to start with the age old tech adage, “I guess it’s time to buy a new computer.” For the majority of users all they have to do is download the new software and begin enjoying it. For others, there maybe a need to update the hardware of your computer (small expense but extends the life of your machine). Typically, the only updates to a Mac you may need to have done is new memory (RAM) or more storage (hard drives or solid state hard drives). A great resource for finding out more about your current machine is built into your machine. On a Mac, click on the Apple logo (top left hand corner) and click on about this Mac. You can also get more details at support.apple.com. And when you need a person to talk it over with, contact your professional friends at AlabamaTech⌘Ease.

Before performing any update to your Mac, make sure you have all the data you couldn’t live without (photos, music, documents, etc) backed up before installing a new update like Yosemite. Your Mac should have an application called TimeMachine installed on it already. TimeMachine along with an external hard drive allows you automagically backup your system so you can easily restore from should something not go as planned. Having trouble or need someone to walk you through it  AlabamaTech⌘Ease is here to help. 

Upgrade

Do you want the newest tech? Have you had your device longer than you can remember? Are you unable to accomplish the things you want to do on your current Mac or iOS device? If you answer yes to those questions, then you are ready to upgrade… Buy new tech. I mean, who doesn’t need a brand new 27” iMac with 5K display? Or a brand new iPad Air 2 for causal web browsing. Whether it is a need or a want, there is nothing quite like powering on your upgrade and getting acquainted with your new Apple. 

Not sure what to buy or want talk through options before making a decision to update or upgrade,  AlabamaTech⌘Ease is happy to assist. We are up to date on what’s new and what’s needed to run the new software. Our aim is to see you happy with your Apple product whether it’s brand new or new again.  

The New iPad Air 2!

Here’s a Tech⌘Ease tidbit you may not have been aware of, your local Apple Store generally has product that is considered End of Life (EOL) for a short period of time after media events and big product announcements. They offer EOL pricing in-store which is a great way to get your hands on new tech for a portion of the price. Great for budget-minded upgrades.

In the October 16 Special Event keynote, Tim Cook asked “What do you do when you make the best tablet in the world? How do you make it better?” Here are some highlights about how Apple has improved upon its tablet with the new iPad Air 2: 

The display on the iPad Air 2 is an improvement from every iPad generation before it: physically tighter, the new display is sharper, more tactile, and less reflective than any tablet that is currently — or ever has been — on the market. The iPad Air 2 is 18% thinner than the iPad Air with the same screen size. It comes in three colors: black/space grey, white/gold, and white/silver. Perhaps most popularly demanded, the iPad Air display also features the touch ID home button.

The iPad Air 2 has the A8X processor, a variation on the iPhone 6 processor made specifically for the iPad air. The A8X processor allows for faster and better computing and graphics than the already industry-leading iPad performance. Thanks to this new processor, application developers can deliver console-level graphics to iOS devices. Even with all this power, though, Apple still ensures all-day battery life with the iPad Air 2.

Data users will be happy to learn that the iPad Air 2 connects to LTE more effectively than any other tablet.

Lastly, the new iSight camera on the iPad lets application builders use the camera within the app to enhance iPad usage. The new FaceTime camera lets in more light, has facial recognition, and features burst selfies.

For more new features and the Apple keynote featuring the iPad Air 2, visit www.apple.com/apple-event/2014-oct-event/ and learn more!

  

Mac Keyboard Short Cuts 

Would you like to be more proficient with your Mac? One way to do that is to use keyboard shortcuts to complete commands instead of using your mouse or trackpad. By pressing a combination of keys on your keyboard, it is possible to print (command+P), to drag a screen shot (command+shift+4), to quit an application (command+Q), among many other functions. The Apple support article on keyboard shortcuts can be found at http://support.apple.com/kb/HT1343

Alabama Tech-Ease brings the solutions to you!

We are your full service Apple® Authorized Consultant. Do you have digital lifestyle problems? We have solutions. Sure, we can help you get matched up with the right hardware and the know how to use it. Did you know that we can also optimize your setup, facilitate purchasing and repairs? How about that photo book or home movie you want to make? Let us do it for you. What about that website you need, that app you want to build, or that branding and marketing campaign for you business? Let us know what your dreams are and we will help you make them reality!

 

Coming soon! iOS 8 feature: iCloud Photo Library and Photos

Today, people rarely go out without bringing their iPhones with them. With social media and photo accessibility, people are constantly taking photos, which means that often times memory fills up the iPhone quickly. Most folks just don’t like to delete photos, even if they are backed up on their computer. We also don’t like to pick and choose which ones to keep with us. So, Apple created an amazing new feature that lets you keep all of your photos on your iPhone. With the newest update, all of your photos and videos will now live on the cloud. The full size originals will upload and leave a smaller version sized for your iOS device. The first 5 GB of storage space will remain free and plans start at $0.99 per month for 20 GB. This means that most people will be able to take all the photos and videos they want and never worry about loosing anything. 

 

Once it is turned on, iCloud photo library automatically keeps all your photos and videos in the cloud. It keeps them at full resolution in the original formats. If you are importing RAW images on your computer, it keeps those too. They can then be accessed from any of your devices and even from the web. 

 

It also allows for organization. Organizing by moments, collections, years. You can drag them into a custom order, create albums and mark favorites. The changes are saved across all of your devices. Edits are also now automatically synced across devices. Crop, enhance, and filter away and Photos will save the changes. The best part is that all changes are non-destructive to the original image so you can always change it back if you change your mind later. 

 

Let’s Back Up

These days we have a lot of choices for backing up our devices, yet many people still do not do it. We tend to not think about how important our data is until we loose it. Without a back up plan, it is often too late to recover. Many users are backing up critical date via the iCloud from our iPhone and iPad but what about the computer? 

While Apple® makes fantastic products with the lowest rate of failure in the computer industry, things can still go wrong. Machines can break, get lost or even stolen and while we can replace the machine. Replacing what it on it can be very difficult or even impossible. 

I have always been proponent of back up and have done so faithfully for years. I even switched over to an Apple® AirPort Time Capsule so that back ups would happen automatically. Then I experienced a break-in a few years back. They took everything electronic in the house…including my fancy wireless router and backup drive. 

Thankfully, my homeowners policy covered my loss of the machines themselves. The one thing that was not covered though was my data on the computers. I was left without an emergency back-up of my back-up. I know this seems excessive but when we live in a digital world with our precious memories and critical data at risk then we should be actively protecting that from disaster. 

I do keep a local back-up but I also keep an online back-up. I still use an Apple@ AirPort Time Capsule to perform a back up at home and it is great, but I also now use an online back up service. For a low monthly price of $5 they continuously back up my computers. It’s always online, it offers unlimited storage, it’s secured with military grade encryption, you can access the data on it from your  iPhone or iPad. It is also recommended and used by the biggest names in the tech world too. 

http://www.backblaze.com/partner/af7756

 

Ask about our customized system maintenance program! Let us create a service program tailored to your individual or organizational needs for the year. Keep everything up to date and running great with Ease!

Need something from the Apple® Store? We offer complementary pick up and delivery with any service.