Apple unveiled its thirteenth major desktop operating system, Sierra, at WWDC in June 2016, surprising some by ditching the OS X naming convention in favour of a return to Mac OS, or, rather macOS as it is now.

The OS was made generally available as a free upgrade in September 2016.

Here you can find out everything you need to know about the new operating system and its latest updates.

macOS Sierra: latest news

23/03/2017: Night Shift mode has made in appearance on Macs in macOS Sierra 10.12.4 beta 8, which has started rolling out to developers and public beta users.

Night Shift mode, which first appeared on iOS 9.3 reduces the blue light coming from Macs, which means your sleep will hopefully not be disturbed by the blue spectrums radiating from your device.

"Night Shift adjusts the color of your display after sunset," Apple's Night Shift blurb explained. "Many studies show that exposure to bright-blue light in the evening can affect your circadian rhythms and make it harder to fall asleep. After sunset, Night Shift will shift your display colors to the warmer end of the spectrum, making the display easier on your eyes. In the morning, your display returns to its regular settings."

Those testing out Apple's newest OS can enable Night Shift mode by heading to the Display settings from Preferences. If you don't want to enable it forevermore, but just for the time being, you can do this from the Notifications Centre or Siri.

Other new features in the beta include updates to Siri, with a wider range of sports updates such as Indian Premier League or the International Cricket Council.

MacRumors also revealed Apple has released new languages to its dictation tool, better support for PDFs with its PDFKit API and iCloud Analytics options.

macOS Sierra: name

It was widely rumoured beforehand, and those rumours proved accurate - Apple has changed the naming convention of its desktop operating system. Ditching the 'OS X' label, the company has instead reverted back to the name used in its first products: macOS.

This brings the desktop software back into line with the rest of Apple's 'xOS' family, such as iOS, tvOS and watchOS. However, Apple is still naming the different iterations after areas of California, with the first edition of the new macOS labelled 'macOS Sierra'.

macOS Sierra: features

MacOS Sierra introduces a raft of new features for desktop users, including new functionality through Siri. Apple's virtual assistant now lives in an icon in the app dock and can also be launched via keyboard shortcut.

As expected, Siri can perform all the functions available to iOS users, such as web searching and messaging. This will also include any functionality introduced by developers making use of the new open Siri SDK.

In addition, users can take advantage of Siri to perform complex file queries, including multiple criteria, all using conversational language.

There are also numerous productivity features introduced in macOS Sierra too. Macs now support automatic unlocking, using your Apple Watch to verify your identity and unlock your Mac.

The Universal Clipboard function is cross-device compatible, meaning that users can access data they've copied on any of their Apple devices. iCloud Drive also lets users access all their files from any of their Mac devices, including files stored on the desktop.

Optimised storage allows users to free up space on a hard drive by moving older or less used files to iCloud.

The OS also supports Apple Pay, although you will need to have a paired iPhone or Apple Watch to actually authorise the payment. Apple Pay buttons will appear on supported sites and will prompt you to authorise purchases by scanning your fingerprint on your connected device, or on the touchbar of the new MacBook Pro.

There is also a picture-in-picture mode that will display a small window running a video that stays on top of the screen and is open at all times. Picture-in-picture works with web vide and Apple will provide an API to developers to make this feature available to visitors.

Finally, third-party apps and programs will now support browser-style tabs, allowing you to group multiple instances of the same program into one window.

macOS Sierra: price & release date

For the past several years, the latest version of Mac OS X has been available as a free upgrade to users of the previous version of the operating system and the latest macOS release isn't any different.

MacOS Sierra arrived to Apple users on 20 September 2016. Prior to this, Apple released a public beta available to anyone on 7 July. The golden master version for developers - approximately the same OS that released on 20 September, was released on 9 September.

macOS Sierra: previous news

17/02/2017: Microsoft has added support for the MacBook Pro's Touch Bar to its Office for Mac software, allowing users to take advantage of touch-based shortcuts.

In Word, the Touch Bar hosts a variety of shortcuts, including the ability to change paragraph and text formatting, insert objects and hyperlinks, and copy and paste. It can also launch 'Word Focus Mode', a new mode that makes your document full-screen and removes all ribbons and toolbars.

In Excel, users can access the most recently used functions via the Touch Bar, as well as borders, cell colours and recommended charts, for easy formatting and layout.

The new shortcuts for PowerPoint users are built predominantly around managing the graphical elements of a presentation, including the ability to reorder and rotate objects. When in presentation mode, the Touch Bar can also be used to control your slides, and features a timer to make sure you stay on schedule.

Finally, Outlook has been updated to feature the most frequently-used email and calendar commands. Not only that, but it will also display a list of recent documents when composing an email, allowing you to include them as an attachment or link. The Touch Bar will display your daily schedule too, from where you can join a Skype for Business meeting.

The update adds a greater level of business functionality to the Touch Bar, increasing the utility of a feature that was initially in danger of being little more than a gimmick.

21/09/2016: MacOS Sierra is finally available to Mac users via the Mac App Store.

The update brings with it a slew of iOS-like features. Among the highlights are Auto Unlock with Apple Watch, Universal Clipboard, Desktop and Documents Sync, Picture in Picture mode, a customised version of Siri (voice assistant) for Mac and many others.

The update also brings Apple Pay to the Mac. You will still need an iPhone or iPad with Touch ID to complete a transaction but it now means that websites can offer the payment method for online shopping via the Safari browser.

The Photos app also gets new search and highlights options to match updates in iOS 10. iMessage on the Mac also gets larger emojis and web page previews.

The latest version of Apple's desktop operating system is the firm's first rebrand of operating system since Mac OS 9.

The following Macs will be able to download and install MacOS Sierra: MacBook (late 2009 and later), iMac (late 2009 and later), MacBook Air (2010 and later), MacBook Pro (2010 and later), Mac Mini (2010 and later) and Mac Pro (2010 and later).

The update is available from the Mac App Store.

New Mac malware that locks people's files and recruit their laptops for botnets has been discovered by cybersecurity researchers.

The malware, known as Backdoor.MAC.Eleanor', was uncovered by Bitdefender, and it is the second bug found to specifically target the Mac OS X the first being KeRanger ransomware, which was discovered in March.

Bitdefender found Eleanor available on the busy software portal, MacUpdate, masquerading as a free app called EasyDoc Converter'. It claimed to convert a user's FreeOffice and SimpleStats docs to Microsoft Office (.docx) files, but performed no such action when it was run.

Instead, it offered hackers a way to blackmail users and take control of their devices.

"This type of malware is particularly dangerous as it's hard to detect and offers the attacker full control of the compromised system," said Tiberius Axinte, technical leader of Bitdefender Antimalware Lab.

"For instance, someone can lock you out of your laptop, threaten to blackmail you to restore your private files or transform your laptop into a botnet to attack other devices."

MacUpdate has since blocked the software on its site. Also, the app has not been issued with a certificate assigned to a registered Apple developer. For Mac users, this means it will be slightly tougher for them to be exposed to the malware, as, by default, Mac OS X does not open or install uncertified apps. However, committed users can bypass the security measure.

When the app is run, it first checks for the presence of online check-in masker, Little Snitch. If this app is not found, it then downloads malicious code onto the user's computer.

The malware installs three Mac LaunchAgents in the user's home folder, as well as a hidden folder with executable files.

The LaunchAgents files are named as Dropbox fragments, and include:

~/Library/LaunchAgents/com.getdropbox.dropbox.integritycheck.plist

~/Library/LaunchAgents/com.getdropbox.dropbox.timegrabber.plist

~/Library/LaunchAgents/com.getdropbox.dropbox.usercontent.plist

~/Library/.dropbox/

The three LaunchAgents files activate a Tor hidden service, a web service and a Pastebin agent, according to Bitdefender.

The Pastebin agent lists a victim's Tor address to the Pastebin text repository, where it could be retrieved by attackers.

Hackers using the Eleanor malware can access a computer's file system and administrator database, remotely execute script, and hijack email and email attachments.

Bitdefender's report claims the first upload to Pastebin by this malware occurred on 19 April the malware appears to have been listed on MacUpdate since 16 March.

Advice from cybersecurity firms is to download applications from reputable websites or directly from the developer, and avoid old or abandoned apps.

El Capitan is the next version of Apple's Mac OS X 10.11operating system.

The new OS is all about experience' and performance,'Craig Federighi, Apple's senior vice president of software engineering, told delegates at the company's WWDC 2015 opening keynote on 8 June.

OS X 10.11 El Capitan news

08/06/2016: Apple has disturbed its second OS X El Capitan 10.11.6 preview through the Mac App Store for developer and public beta testing.

OS X 10.11.6, like most of the previous updates to Apple's current OS, appears to be a minor revision, centred on bug fixes and security improvements that many not be visible on the surface.

The first testing round for this version of El Capitan was released on 23 May.

New headline features are expected to be revealed for OS X 10.12 at next week's WWDC press conference. Apple is rumoured to be considering a name change for OS X to macOS to bring it in line with its newer iOS, watchOS and tvOS product names.

Alongside this Mac update, the company has also released tvOS 9.2.2 beta 2 for Apple TV.

17/05/2016: Apple has released its latest update for OS X El Capitan, which includes a number of fixes for system software, and alongside this a fresh look for iTunes in a separate update.

This release, the fifth since El Capitan's release last September, is likely to be one of the last updates before the arrival of OS X 10.12.

Improvements in OS X 10.11.5 are mostly performance revisions.

They include fixing an issue where applying a configuration profile to set allow SpotlightInternetResults' to False' would cause Spotlight to use large amounts of CPU time, an issue where applying a configuration profile to set ShutDownDisabledWhileLoggedIn' to True' would have no effect and an issue where only a single NetBoot image would appear in the Startup Disk pane of System Preferences, even if multiple NetBoot images were configured on the server.

Released alongside this new OS X update is iTunes 12.4. Released seven months after the last iTunes update, 12.4 includes a redesigned interface that's intended to be simpler to navigate and reintroduces the much-called-for sidebar.

This latest iTunes update may also include safeguards to protect users from the alleged bug that has caused some users of iTunes and Apple Music is lose their entire music libraries.

More information on this OS X and iTunes update can be found on Apple's support page.

OS X 10.11 El Capitan release date

The full release ofOS X El Capitan is now available for download from Apple's website.

The Mac operating system update, which brings a host of new features to the software, has been in public beta since July.

Users can now experience the full release although waiting for the first wave of bug fixes is often recommended when dealing with new OS updates.

OS X 10.11 El Capitan features

Apple is introducing several modest user interface improvements that should improve the experience' of using a Mac, including improved windows management. Two full-screen apps can be used simultaneously using a feature called Split View, which is highly reminiscent of Windows Snap in Windows 8.

Split View lets you position two apps side-by-side so you can use both apps without the distraction of minimising or having to toggle controls.

Even when using a single app full-screen, such as Apple's default Mail app, multitasking has been improved with the ability to have tabbed windows within the full-screen app. The Mission Control feature for managing windows has also been improved with new gestures for switching apps into Split Screen or Full Screen simply by dragging and dropping.

There are plenty of improvements in El Capitan's built-in apps too. Catching up with Chrome, Safari now has the ability to pin tabs as well as mute audio on a tab-by-tab basis. Spotlight now has natural language capabilities which also extend to apps that use Spotlight for their own search features. So you should be able to search for documents in the Finder by typing documents I worked on last June.' Apple's Mail program now has the same gestures as its iOS counterpart for quickly deleting and archiving messages.

Much like the 10.6 Snow Leopard release of yesteryear, performance has apparently been improved in 10.11 El Capitan. Federighi claims app launching is now 1.4x faster, app switching is 2x snappier' and PDFs are opened 4x faster in Apple's Preview app.

The new OS also supports the Metal graphics API that first debuted in iOS 8 and is apparently superior to both the OpenCL and OpenGl APIs favoured in previous OS X versions. Using Metal, Adobe was apparently able to make rendering 8x faster in After Effects.

Adobe executive David Wadhwani claimed his company is committed to adopting Metal on our OS X apps. With performance increases up to 8x, we are excited about what Metal can do for our Creative Cloud users.' 3D graphics should also benefit from Metal with the Epic Unreal engine allegedly benefitting from 50 per cent faster performance.

Apple also confirmed that El Capitan will feature enhanced international language support, including traditional and simplified system options for Chinese fonts.

This article was original published on 08/06/15 and has been updated multiple times, most recently on 17/05/15.

Latest news:

19/04/2016: Apple has updated its 12in MacBook with a 2016 iteration boasting 12th generation Intel processors and up to 10 hours of battery life.

Available in rose gold as well as the traditional silver, gold and space gray, the new 12in MacBook will measure 13.1mm in thickness, and weigh just 2lbs.

Its 12in Retina display boasts a resolution of 2304 x 1440 pixels, while its trackpad will incorporate Force Touch, which monitors the pressure you place on the trackpad to give you better control over the computer.

Coming in two price ranges, the $1,299 12in MacBook will boast a 1.1GHz dual-core Intel Core m3 processor, while the $1,599 version will come with a 1.2GHz dual-core Intel Core m5 processor. Storage comes in two sizes - 256GB flash and 512GB flash respectively.

The new MacBook will also ship with 8GB of onboard memory.

08/02/2016: The latest rumours say that Apple will launch revamped 12in MacBooks with the latest Skylake processors from Intel. The new Core m3, m5 and m7 processors are the successors to the original Broadwell-class Core m used in the MacBook reviewed here, so we'd expect Apple to adopt them. MacBooks allegedly equipped with these new Core m processors are rumoured to appear at an Apple launch on March 15th which makes sense as this would be almost a year after this laptop was first announced.

Apple is no stranger to jettisoning what it sees as old and outdated technologies in favour of newer, more efficient ones. From abandoning floppies in favour of USB in the original iMac to jettisoning PCI-Express slots in favour of Thunderbolt 2 in the current Mac Pro, Apple isn't afraid to leave the past behind even if its customers are more reticent. Apple has done it again with its latest ultra portable laptop, the 12in MacBook Retina.

Apple MacBook Retina 12in review: USB-C

Aside from a headset jack, this laptop has just one port a completely new type of USB port. USB 3.1 Gen 1 has the same speed as USB 3.0 (5Gbit/s, although Gen 2 will raise this to 10Gbit/s), but what it lacks in speed improvements it more than makes up for in increased versatility.

USB 3.1 Gen 1 has a new smaller connector, Type C, which is reversible so it doesn't matter which way up you plug it in. Plus it's the same connector at both ends of the cable, so it doesn't matter which end you plug in either. These sound like small improvements, but we've seen plenty of confused users fumbling around with their USB cables. USB 3.1 Gen 1 can also natively handle video output so, with adapters, it can be used to connect monitors, projectors and TVs without impacting on processor performance as with older versions of USB.

Of course, the Type C connector means you'll need adapters to use existing USB peripherals and displays. If you still rely on Ethernet, you'll need an adapter for that too. Plus, as there's only one port, you'll need a multiport adapter or hub to connect multiple devices simultaneously. Apple's vision is that you won't need to do this often, if at all, as you'll use wireless peripherals and, in the case of storage and storage-hogging software, the cloud.

A standard USB 3.0 Type-A connector (left) compared to a USB 3.1 Gen 1 Type-C connector (right).

It's a compelling vision, but not practical for everyone. Cloud-related compliance issues aside, even if you're willing to undertake the expense of deploying wireless peripherals in your office, you'll have to make sure they're properly secured. On top of that, you'll still need a gaggle of adapters for use in the outside world. Sadly, USB Type C isn't magnetised like the MagSafe charging connectors on other MacBooks, so there's a greater chance that someone tripping over the charging cable will send the laptop crashing to the ground.

Apple MacBook Retina 12in review: weight and build

This dramatic reduction in the number and type of ports has allowed Apple to make the 12in MacBook remarkably lighter and slimmer than any other laptop we've seen 12in or otherwise. It's around the same thickness as three copies of Time magazine stacked on top of each other and weighs just 920g. This makes it almost effortless to tote around. Despite its svelteness, the metal casing is just as rigid and robust as we've come to expect from a MacBook. Like the iPhone 6 and iPad Air 2, the MacBook is available in grey, silver and gold with the latter far less garish than we expected.

However, like most of Apple's other Macs, serviceability and upgradeability are non-existent. The memory chips are soldered into place, while the proprietary connector on the SSD makes it difficult and costly to replace or upgrade yourself.

Apple MacBook Retina 12in review: performance and battery life

Despite the MacBook's slenderness, Apple has squeezed in a huge battery made possible in part by the Core M processor and its smaller-than-usual motherboard. The battery lasted 14 hours and 26 minutes in our light usage test and six hours and 52 minutes in our more strenuous YouTube playback test. Only the 13in MacBook Air and 13in MacBook Pro Retina last longer no Windows ultraportable we've seen can match it.

This exceptional battery life is also due, in large part, to the power efficient Broadwell-based Core M processor. The trade-off is performance. While the 1.1GHz dual core 5Y70 is more than fast enough for office tasks, JPEG editing and light HD video work since it can Turbo Boost to 2.6GHz and is paired with 8GB of memory, it's not ideal for anything more demanding. In our video editing and multitasking benchmarks, it was only around a third the speed of our reference PC with a Core i5 3570K desktop processor.

Apple MacBook Retina 12in review: keyboard and touchpad

One consequence of the MacBook's incredibly thin profile is its dramatically redesigned keyboard. As there's less space for the key switches, the keys have far less travel than almost any laptop keyboard we've ever used. We thought we would find this hatefully awkward, but to our surprise we found typing fast, accurate and very comfortable indeed. This is because the keys give plenty of feedback when pressed as well as a satisfying clicky sound. The keyboard still takes getting used to we found we had to type with less force or risk arm ache, for example but it's quick to acclimatise too. The only real annoyance we encountered was the up and down cursor keys, which are smaller than the others and therefore hard to tell apart when touch typing.

The MacBook's touchpad is large, accurate and responsive. What sets it apart even more from the touchpads on Windows laptops is its Force Touch pressure sensitivity feature, something which it shares with the MacBook Pro Retina laptops. Pressing down harder on the touchpad causes different things to happen, depending on which program you're using and the context. Doing this in Safari while a word is highlighted will show you a definition for that word, while force clicking on a meeting attendee in Apple's Calendar app will show you the contact details for that person.

We don't find any of Apple's uses for Force Touch to be particularly compelling most simply replicate what can achieved more easily in a right-click menu. The Force Touch touchpad does have another trick up its sleeve though. It can give you feedback by vibrating gently, which feels like a gentle tapping against your fingers, although the number of programs that currently support this are very limited. One clever third-party app that combines both of these unique touchpad features is Inklet which lets you use the touchpad as a basic graphics tablet.

Apple MacBook Retina 12in review: Retina screen

We had no complaints about the 12in screen. Although it has a resolution of 2304x1440 pixels, you see the same amount of text as you would on a 1280x800 screen. The extra pixels are instead used to render text very sharply so much so that they look like print. You can change the resolution to 1440x900 pixels giving you extra working space, but at the expense of making everything illegibly tiny. Regardless, image quality was top-notch with eye-watering brightness as well as good colour accuracy and contrast.

Apple MacBook Retina 12in review: conclusions

Apple's 12in Retina MacBook is a stunning ultra-portable laptop. Its sturdiness, battery life, screen quality and touchpad are rivalled only by Apple's other laptops. If portability is absolutely paramount, then the MacBook's light weight and battery life make it a superb choice, but its unique one-port configuration and reliance on wireless peripherals may make it challenging to fit into how you work at least in the short to medium term. It's a great buy, but misses out on an Editor's Choice award.

This review was first published on 26/05/2015 and has since been updated, most recently on 08/02/2016.

Verdict

Apple’s ultra portable laptop is stunning, but the compromises made to achieve its low weight and slender profile won’t suit everyone

Processor: 1.1GHz Intel Core M 5Y70

Graphics processor: Intel HD 5300 integrated

Memory: 8GB

Storage: 256GB SSD

Connectivity: 802.11a/b/g/n/ac, Bluetooth 4.0

Ports: 1x USB 3.1 Gen 1 Type-C, 3.5mm headset jack

Screen size: 12in

Screen resolution: 2304x1440 pixels

Operating system: Mac OS X 10.10 Yosemite

Dimensions: 13x280x197mm (HxWxD)

Weight (with charger): 920g (1.1kg)

Warranty: One year

Pedro Vilaa, a researcher from specialising in Mac OS X at SentinelOne, claims to have found a critical flaw in all versions of the desktop operating system that can bypass all Apple's built-in security measures, notably System Integrity Protection.

According to Vilaa, who will be presenting his findings today at SysCan360 2016 in Singapore, the flaw is a non-memory corruption bug that allows for local privilege escalation by executing arbitrary code on any binary.

"We informed Apple of the vulnerability and it has since been patched with El Capitan 10.11.4 and iOS 9.3. However, from Apple's Security Bulletin, it seems that other versions do not appear to have a patch for this specific bug, which could suggest that they are still left vulnerable to this specific bug," Vilaa told IT Pro. "The only real way to mitigate this threat is to upgrade to El Capitan 10.11.4. Anything else is left vulnerable to an attack."

IT Pro contacted Apple for further clarification but had not received a response at the time of publication.

According to SentinelOne, any exploitation of the flaw would require the attacker to compromise the system, which could be achieved via spearphishing or exploiting the user's browser. Once this first step had been carried out, the attack on the OS itself would be "virtually impossible" to detect.

"The nature of this particular exploit enables it to evade defenses by utilising very reliable and stable techniques that traditional detection mechanisms, looking for more obvious warning signs, would miss," the company said, adding it "could typically be used in highly targeted or state sponsored attacks".

A bad week for Apple

It has been a bad week for Apple when it comes to bugs in its operating systems. Just a few days ago, Johns Hopkins University discovered a serious flaw in Apple's iMessage platform that could give attackers access to visual media sent via the service.

It was also revealed midweek that the FBI may no longer need the help of Apple to break into an iPhone 5c belonging to one of the San Bernardino shooters after an "outside party", allegedly Israeli data forensics firm Cellebrite, came forward with a way to access the data held on the device.

The new super-slim Apple MacBook laptop may have grabbed all the headlines recently, but this latest update of the MacBook Pro may well have more appeal for business users.

Last year's price cut hasn't been repeated, so the entry-level 13in MacBook Pro reviewed here remains at 833 (ex. VAT). The new model also looks virtually identical to its predecessors. But, under the bonnet, the new 13in MacBook Pro has been given a fairly major overhaul with the introduction of a 5th generation Broadwell processor and Apple's new Force Touch touchpad.

Latest news

10/03/2016: PCIe SSD upgrades are now available for the MacBook Pro, courtesy of Other World Computing (OWC).

OWC is offering the drives as part of its Aura range, available with 480GB and 1TB of storage. Both SSDs have a max write speed of 446 MBps and a top read speed of 763 MBps.

They come with just the SSD, or as part of an upgrade kit with all the necessary tools and a USB 3.0 enclosure for data migration, starting at $348 for the 480GB version or $598 for the 1TB model.

The company is one of the few third-party vendors that offer replacement SSDs for MacBooks, due to the proprietary form-factor Apple uses for its drives. These are the first third-party SSDs that have been released since Apple's move to PCIe interfaces in 2013.

Familiar Design

The MacBook Pro hasn't changed dramatically in appearance since the introduction of the high-resolution Retina display back in 2012. It retains the familiar unibody' aluminium chassis that measures just 18mm thick and weighs 1.6Kg. That's heavier than the 920g of the new 12in MacBook, or the 1.35kg of the 13in MacBook Air, but the MacBook Pro is still slim and light enough to carry around in a briefcase without too much trouble.

The 2560x1600 resolution of the 13.3in Retina display also remains unchanged. That may have been surpassed by Windows rivals, such as the eye-popping 4K display of Toshiba's P50T, but the Retina display still provides a detailed, bright image that makes the MacBook Pro an excellent choice for Photoshop and other graphics and design applications.

Connectivity and Upgrades

Apple laptops are often criticised for their limited connectivity options the 12in MacBook Retina only has a single USB-C connector for both power and peripherals. However, the 13in MacBook Pro fares better, with two USB 3.0 ports, two Thunderbolt 2 ports, HDMI and a slot for SD memory cards.

You'll need those connectivity features too, in order to compensate for the MacBook's non-existent upgrade options. A set of 10 pentalobe screws on the base of the laptop makes battery replacements and other repairs unnecessarily difficult. Even worse is the fact that the standard 8GB of memory is soldered onto the motherboard, so your only option for upgrading the memory is to spend an extra 160 at the time of purchase in order to increase that to 16GB.

Feel the Force

The external appearance of the MacBook Pro may not have changed, but this new model does include a number of important new features, including the debut of Apple's Force Touch' touchpad. This looks just like a standard Apple trackpad, but underneath it, there are four sensors that can measure the amount of force you apply when pressing down on the surface of the trackpad.

Instead of using one click on the trackpad to select an item, and two clicks to open a file or an app, the new touchpad also allows you to perform a force-click' that consists of a gentle click, followed by an increase in pressure. The force-click can perform a number of different tasks, such as using Mac OS X's Quick Look option to preview the contents of a file, or looking up the definition of a word that you force-click in a text document. It's not the revolution that Apple's marketing executives claim, but it's a handy, alternative way of speeding up some common tasks.

Pricing Options

The starting price for the 13in MacBook Pro remains at 833 (ex. VAT), but the 2.6GHz Haswell chip used in last year's model has been updated to a new dual-core Broadwell i5-5257U processor running at 2.7GHz (up to 3.1GHz with Turbo Boost). The integrated Iris 5100 graphics steps up to the newer Iris 6100.

That's not a bad price compared to similar high-end Windows laptops, such as Dell's Precision range. However, the MacBook Pro's limited upgradability means that you're forced to pay high prices for Apple's own upgrades when you purchase the machine. As mentioned, upgrading to 16GB of memory costs a hefty 160. Storage upgrades are equally expensive, costing 200 to upgrade the SSD to 256GB, or 400 for 512GB. The latter option offers a minor consolation in the form of a small processor speed bump to 2.9GHz, but the top-of-the-range model with a 3.1GHz processor will add a further 250 to the price, for a grand total of 1441 (ex. VAT).

Broadwell Battery

We've not seen many laptops that use Intel's new Broadwell processors, so we were a little disappointed to see that the new MacBook Pro didn't perform any better than its Haswell-based predecessor. In fact, it only managed an overall score of 78 per cent in our benchmark tests, compared to 81 per cent for last year's model.

However, the Iris 6100 did perform well for 2D graphics work, scoring 95 per cent in our Photoshop tests, and was only let down by its weaker performance in 3D graphics (53 per cent) and video rendering (63 per cent). To be fair, that performance isn't bad for the price, but if you want a more powerful quad-core processor or discrete graphics card for 3D design work then you'll have to step up to the 15in version of the MacBook Pro Retina.

Battery life was exceptionally lengthy as we've come to expect from Apple laptops. It lasted just under 22 hours in our light usage test and an impressive ten hours and 21 minutes when playing a high definition YouTube video. The increase over its Haswell-based predecessor are small, but this lengthy battery life, combined with the laptop's light weight, make this MacBook a good choice for working on the move.

Verdict

The 13in MacBook Pro isn't quite in the mobile workstation class and, try as we might, we don't find the new Force Touch trackpad as innovative as Apple seems to think it is. Even so, it provides solid performance at a competitive mid-range price as long as you don't need to buy too many upgrades and its outstanding battery live ensures that it will really earn its keep when you're on the road.

Verdict

Its performance won’t break any records, but the improved battery life provided by Intel’s new Broadwell processor is genuinely impressive.

Processor: 2.7 GHz Intel Core i5-5257U (3.1GHz Turboboost)

GPU: Intel Iris 6100 (integrated)

Display: 13.3in IPS display, 2560x1600 resolution

Memory: 8GB DDR3L

Storage: 128GB solid-state storage

Optical: N/A

Connectivity: dual-band 802.11ac Wi-Fi, Bluetooth 4.0

Ports: 2 x USB 3.0, 2x Thunderbolt 2.0, 1x HDMI, 1x SD card reader, 1 x headphone

Dimensions: 314 x 219 x 18 mm (WxDxH)

Weight: 1.6kg

KeRanger, the first fully-functional Mac OS ransomware found in the wild, only affected about 6,500 computers, it has been claimed.

Speaking to Forbes, John Clay of the Transmission Project, which hosted the ransomware-infected files, revealed the site's main server had been compromised, allowing the attackers to distribute their malware in the guise of a legitimate Transmission BitTorrent client download.

However, Clay claimed that only around 6,500 Macs would have been affected.

"Of those, our presumption is that many were unable to run the infected file due to Apple quickly revoking the certificate used to sign the binary [the file], as well as updating the XProtect [Apple's anti-malware technology] definitions," said Clay, although he added that the company is still waiting for confirmation from Apple to back up this assumption.

07/03/2016: The days of Mac OS as a virus-free system are truly over, following the discovery of the first fully operational ransomware for Apple's operating system.

KeRanger, as the malicious program has been called, encrypts users' files and demands a ransom to unlock them, according to researchers from security firm Palo Alto Networks, who discovered the malware on Friday.

According to a blog post by researchers Claud Xiao and Jin Chen, version 2.90 of the Transmission BitTorrent client installer for OS X was infected with the ransomware just hours after being published.

When opened, the compromised downloader (.dmg file) sits on the user's system for three days before contacting its command and control (C2) servers over the Tor network. It then encrypts the user's files and demands the equivalent of $200 (141) in Bitcoin to release those files.

The malware also attempted to encrypt Time Machine files, should a user have one connected, however this piece of the KeRanger code was apparently incomplete, so this part of the attack would not work.

Perhaps most worryingly, the ransomware application was signed with a valid Mac development certificate, meaning it could bypass OS X's Gatekeeper protection system.

The certificate has since been revoked by Apple after Palo Alto Networks notified it of the issue, so anyone attempting to open the compromised .dmg file now will be unable to do so.

However it is unclear how the valid certificate was obtained in the first place and Apple has declined to comment on the matter.

Transmission has also released an updated version of its client, which is free of KeRanger.

Additionally, it is unclear how the downloader became infected in the first place, although Xiao and Chen suggested Transmission's official website may have been compromised, allowing the attackers to replace the legitimate .dmgs with the malicious ones.

Greg Day, Palo Alto's EMEA CSO, told IT Pro the emergence of Mac ransomware was, in many ways, inevitable.

"The simple reality is that at home and in the workplace, more and more people are using Macs. With volume adoption, typically we see cybercrime follow the mainstream," Day said.

Day added that ramsomware has, over the past few years, become the most prevalent form of attack, as it offers greater ROI for cybercriminals and that KeRanger was a confluence of these two trends.

Independent security analyst Graham Cluley largely agreed, telling IT Pro that Mac ransomware had not, until now, been a priority for attackers.

"They've been doing 'very nicely, thank you' successfully extorting money out of Windows users, and it's easier to write a new ransomware variant for Windows (based upon the thousands of existing samples) than start from scratch for OS X," said Cluley.

"However, as Windows users become more savvy about ransomware, some criminals might regard Mac users as a softer target," he added.

As usual in these situations, those who have been compromised are recommended not to pay the ransom and to restore their OS from a secure backup, assuming they have one.

In order to protect themselves, users should also always ensure that their anti-virus is up to date, that their OS is patched, and that their computer is backed up.

(This article was first published on 07/03/16 and has since been updated to reflect new developments, most recently on 08/03/16)

It's been five years since Microsoft last launched a new version of Office for OS X, which makes it long overdue an update not least since a tablet version of the productivity suite has debuted in the meantime. As it turns out, Microsoft is updating both Mac and Windows versions of Office at more or less the same time for the first time in, well, ever with Office 2016 for Mac and Office 2016 for Windows released within weeks of each other.

Interface changes

Mac users have arguably had an easier time with Office than their Windows brethren over recent years, though that's largely due to the lack of updates. Microsoft's Ribbon UI made its first appearance on OS X with Office 2011, but its implementation was very diluted. Windows users, on the other hand, have been subject to countless cosmetic tweaks that last resulted in a ruthlessly flattened and desaturated interface.

Thankfully, Office 2016 for Mac continues this trend and not a great deal has changed, interface-wise, beyond a general streamlining and polish. The UI is flatter and Retina-ready, and the layout much more logical than that of Office 2011 (Mac) and 2013 (Windows).

Word 2011 for Mac (top), Word 2013 for Windows (middle), Word 2016 for Mac (bottom)

It also adheres to operating system conventions more closely than Office 2013, with a menu bar and a largely standard File Save/Open dialog box, rather than the window-swamping Backstage' that Windows users are saddled with.

Just bear one thing in mind before you rush to upgrade. Office 2016 for Mac needs OS X 10.10 Yosemite and while Apple's latest operating system might be a free download, it only runs on Macs of a certain age.

Not-quite-complete cloud storage support

Office 2016 for Mac consists of Word, Excel, PowerPoint, OneNote and Outlook Access and Publisher are only available in the Windows version of the suite. As with Office 2013 for Windows, support for Microsoft's own cloud storage services (Office 365, OneDrive, OneDrive for Business and SharePoint) is built in just click the Online Locations' button in the Open/Save dialog box to switch between storage types.

Noticeably absent, however, is integrated Dropbox support, despite its inclusion in Office for iOS. Office documents stored in Dropbox can still be opened in Office Online via its web interface, but that's really a workaround rather than a solution.

Shared editing made simpler

Even so, one thing that Office 2016's cloud support greatly simplifies is collaboration, whether co-authoring documents or merely giving feedback.

Once a document is saved to the cloud, additional users (using Office 2013 or later) can then be invited to view or edit it. Multiple simultaneous edits can then be made in real time, but they don't appear on a local document immediately. Instead, they're only rolled out to everyone else when the editor document is saved, at which point they see a clickable notification to see them.

The problem is that remote edits aren't tagged by the user who made them they're merely highlighted. Highlights from one round of edits also disappear as soon as the next round rolls out, which makes it difficult to keep track of what's going on when three or more people are typing.

This makes Office 2016's collaborative editing confusing at times, so it's really only useful for certain situations, such as creating a document from scratch when a handful of people need to combine their ideas quickly (and without endless Cc'ed emails). Fortunately, it's also a problem that's largely solved simply by enabling Office's Tracking feature to show who's changed what and when.

Cloud storage makes collaborative editing much simpler, but there are still plenty of kinks to work out.

Sharing edits with edit tracking

Edit tracking really comes into its own when there's only one centrally stored document being worked on, and it's vastly preferable to emailing multiple copies back and forth and trying to combine changes from several people. Better still, Office 2016 now supports the same nested comments as Office 2013 for Windows in Word and PowerPoint, and clear in-document conversations also take much of the pain from collaborative editing.

Unfortunately, all of the above only applies to Word documents. In PowerPoint, changes made by other users aren't highlighted, they merely appear, and there's no equivalent to Word's Tracking feature to help make sense of them. Excel is even worse. Share a sheet with another user and they see a "This file is locked for editing by [another user]" message when it's opened via the cloud, even when the sheet is appropriately configured via the usual Share Workbook option.

Admittedly, simultaneous shared editing via the cloud is perhaps most useful in Word, but there are many circumstances where other types of document would benefit from the feature. As it stands, Google Docs does a much better job of cloud collaboration and it's disappointing for Office 2016 to lag behind.

Outlook 2016

Email is still the main stalwart of 21st Century office communication, of course, and managing it is a task that still falls to Outlook in Office 2016. Users with an Exchange account should be up and running within moments, but while the necessary settings for an Outlook.com or IMAP account are automatically configured, two-step verification isn't natively supported not even for Microsoft's own Hotmail and Outlook.com services. So it's the rigmarole of creating per-app passwords all round if you're security minded.

Outlook 2016 is little changed from before, but the inbox now has one-line message body previews.

Otherwise, not a lot has changed in Outlook 2016 compared to the previous version and upgraded users shouldn't miss a beat. One minor but nonetheless welcome change is a first-line preview of message bodies in the inbox, but there's no delayed delivery of messages and it's a shame Microsoft didn't introduce the Ignore' feature from Outlook 2013 for muting email threads you have no interest in. There isn't even the option to use the OS X Contacts list for the Outlook address book, although that probably isn't an issue for most Exchange users.

Word 2016

Many of the changes in Word are under the hood; the most surreptitious being support for common Windows keyboard shortcuts Ctrl + C to copy selected text, for example (these also work in Excel). The usual OS X shortcuts still work, but this clever move makes the Mac suite less finicky for someone switching platforms. Speaking of which, pinch-to-zoom now works in Word, Excel and PowerPoint, too, which helps smooth the transition between the Mac and iOS suites.

Another improvement of note is that the floating Toolbox palette is now a docked sidebar that's much easier to use, with Styles, Reference tools and other options appearing as required. Unfortunately, the Scrapbook and Citations manager didn't make the cut for this redesign, so you'll need another option if you relied on those two features.

Office 2016's cleaner interface is a joy to use, with no irritating floating palettes in sight.

The DTP-lite Publishing Layout view has gone, too, and Word 2016 still doesn't support OS X's three-finger trackpad tap for an instant pop-up word definition. Word's Smart Lookup' option does at least present a list of readable results, though, rather than the awkward one-at-a-time of Office 2011.

Excel 2016

The impact of Excel's changes will depend on how you use the application. Power users will certainly appreciate the addition of PivotTable slicers for filtering data, Data Analysis ToolPak and Solver add-in support, and a slick integrated equation editor to replace the clunky separate utility of Office 2011. There's still no Mac support for Pivot Charts, however, and the Power Pivot add-in is reserved for Windows users.

Excel 2016 placates power users, too, with new pivot table and add-in support, plus a new built-in equation editor.

For everyone else, perhaps the most noticeable change is a new animation when selecting and working with cells. A couple of new hand-holding options should make Excel's more sophisticated features more accessible. In addition to a host of new types, the Recommended Charts button only presents charts that are appropriate for the selected data. You still need to know what you're doing, but the option might help avoid mocking from chart boffins in meetings.

The Formula tab has also been cleaned up and made much more accessible to neophytes, with the helpful Formula Builder now appearing by default in a sidebar as soon as a formula button is clicked.

Excel 2016 has lots of new features to help novice users, including a formula builder sidebar that appears automatically.

PowerPoint 2016

PowerPoint perhaps gets the biggest benefit from the cleaned-up and rejigged interface, and the Ribbon now make much more sense to unseasoned users. The bulk of creative options now reside on the Design and Transitions tabs, for example, rather than the Themes, Tables, Charts and SmartArt tabs of old.

The new Animations sidebar is also a welcome addition for those that don't know PowerPoint inside out. It appears once an animation has been applied to an object on a slide, and aggregates the options previously found on the Animations tab (which is still present) and the easily overlooked Custom Animation floating Toolbox.

The streamlined interface makes PowerPoint much more user friendly, with slide animations in particular now much easier to deploy.

Presenter View has been spruced up, too, and the addition of a Switch displays' button alone might tempt some PowerPoint users to upgrade particularly those who've inadvertently displayed their web browser session to an auditorium full of people while scrabbling for the less-obvious option in PowerPoint 2011. Don't go looking for the Save as Movie' option, though it's gone.

Visual Basic for Applications

Finally and definitely only of interest to those aforementioned power users a few words on macros and Visual Basic for Applications (VBA). In short, there are changes and the good news is that the VBA Editor has been rewritten. The bad news is that even in Office 2016's release' state, the Editor remains largely unchanged from the early previews and is functionally inferior than that in Office 2011.

So for the time being, at least, the VBA Editor is intended solely for debugging existing macros for compatibility issues, of which there will be many as a result of the sandbox security measures imposed by OS X. Even so, the spartan interface, with no way to insert new modules or UserForms, will stymie many. So the prevailing advice for developers is to stick with Windows and debug on a Mac as required until the monthly update cycle (if you're bought the Office 365 subscription version as opposed to the standalone perpetual licence) hopefully addresses the situation.

Visual Basic for Applications gets short shrift in Office 2016 and the revamped Editor is really only useful for debugging existing macros not creating new ones.

Verdict

There’s a lot to like about Office 2016 for Mac and certainly an improvement on the 2011 suite — even with the many omissions and shortcomings, both standalone and compared to the Windows suite. So Mac Office 365 subscribers have little reason to delay a download, and the interface parity of the Mac and Windows versions should make both 2016 suites appealing to business users, too.

Operating system: Mac OS X 10.10 Yosemite RAM: 4GB Hard drive space: 6GB Display: 1280 x 800

Microsoft kicked off its Build conference by unveiling Visual Studio Code, a free code editor that works across Windows, Linux and even OS X.

Visual Studio Code is a lightweight editor for writing web and mobile apps. It's the first in the Visual Studio software line that's truly cross platform, with the original Visual Studio app remaining Windows only.

S. Somasegar, Microsoft's corporate vice president of its developer division, told TechCrunch: "A lot of people use Windows as their development environment, but we are also seeing a lot of people on Linux and Mac. Instead of making them go to Windows, we want to meet them where they are."

That report said Visual Studio Code would support Git Hub, and features rich code assistance for a wide variety of languages, and includes the usual code editor features including syntax highlighting, customisable keyboard bindings and more.

What is Visual Studio Code?

This is a cross-platform source code and text editor. It marks the first time Microsoft has offered developers a cross-platform editor.

As well as debugging support and Git control it features intelligent code completion (also known as IntelliSense). The editor is also customisable; users can change theme, keyboard shortcuts and preferences. It also include syntax highlighting, auto indent, bracket matching and snippets.

The editor is based on Electron, a piece of software that is based on Chromium, which is used to deploy io.js applications.

Developers can use the tool to build web applications in JavaScript, TypeScript, ASP.NET 5, among others. It will also help developers integrate with Microsoft's Azure and Visual Studio Online. Microsfot said the tool seemlessly integrates with package managers and code repositories.

The tool is based on files and folders. Users can open a file or folder that contains project files or code. The user interface comprises an editor, viewbar, status bar and sidebar. IT also supports side by side editing so up to three editors can be opened up together.

An explorer window can be used to manage folders and files and here these can be created, moved, deleted or renamed. Auto save can be enabled to automatically save chages to disk.

Also featured in the tool is a search function allowing users to search for text in code or files.

The preview of Visual Studio Code is available here for free.

Over the years I have been on the receiving end of many an email-bashing for suggesting that Apple needs to take security more seriously. So it may come as something of a surprise to discover I disagree with the conclusion of newly released research which appears to suggest that Mac users have inadequate protection against attack, and that this is particularly concerning given the number of high severity security vulnerabilities for Mac OS X.

The research from San Francisco based managed infrastructure and security specialists Opswat(www.opswat.com), which has a high SMB/enterprise market share for peer-to-peer file multiple antivirus engine scanning and document sanitisation (deployed to more than a 100 million endpoints), included data from Macs for the first time. This enabled the company to make a direct comparison between Windows and Mac devices, and that's where it gets interesting and, in my opinion, goes a bit astray.

OK, let's get the nitty gritty out of the way first. The market share report included data for peer-to-peer file sharing products, the use of file sharing, antivirus software and RTP (Real Time Protection) between both Windows and Mac users. Because it included Mac device data, it drew comparisons between the security practices of the two.

While 75.5 per cent of Windows users had at least one antivirus product installed, only 50 per cent of Mac users did. The conclusion drawn being that many Mac devices are left without adequate protection given "the number of high severity security vulnerabilities for Mac OS X." Windows users also outperformed Mac users with their use of RTP, 61 per cent of Windows AV with RTP enabled against 35 per cent of Mac AV, an important part of protecting a device from malware and other Potentially Unwanted Applications (PUAs). There wasn't much difference between Windows (31.1 per cent) and Mac (25.7 per cent) when it came to installed P2P file-sharing installations being found.

Adam Winn, senior manager for Opswat, said "the prevalence of P2P file sharing software in combination with the relatively low utilisation of real time protection is not a good indicator of the overall security status of Windows and Mac computers in BYOD and small business environments. Peer-to-peer file sharing software by itself is generally harmless and can be used very effectively for rapidly and legally downloading files. Unfortunately the P2P installers are usually bundled with adware, and sometimes even malware."

Which I have no beef with, at all, as it does not make a big hoo-ha over the difference in machines. However, I do have a beef (even as a vegan) with the idea that Mac users are insecure because there are vulnerabilities out there and they don't use antivirus.

We are told, time and time again (and I may well be guilty for having repeated this in the past) that the only reason Mac users are not falling victim at the same rate as Windows ones is that the cyber criminals only focus on the Windows market as it's so much bigger and therefore so much more profitable.

Which is good as far as it goes, which isn't very far. Data is data, and Apple users are a pretty wealthy and desirable demographic don't you think? If it were really that easy to exploit a known 'high severity' vulnerability which could give the attacker the keys to the kingdom that, well, someone would be doing it and doing it wholesale by now? And there's the thing, if they were then the media column inches would be full of it, and they are not.

I spoke to Troy Gill, manager of security research at AppRiver, who told me he was not surprised to find that Mac users have a much less proactive approach when it comes to installing AV and using real time file protection.

"One thing I think the data did an excellent job of illustrating is that is seems that if the blackhats were to suddenly (and collectively) shift their efforts to targeting Mac instead of Windows," he said, "then Mac users would likely not fare much better than Windows users have."

But they won't, I'm willing to bet, and not just because it's a numbers game but because the exploits are not out there. Just because there's a vulnerability does not mean there is an exploit. Just because that vulnerability is similar to a Windows one does not mean that writing an exploit is as simple. Just because, just because, just because!

We should really be concerned about the number of successful exploits per platform rather than the number of unexploited vulnerabilities. Now, can someone take that Apple Fatwa off my head?

Apple's annual Worldwide Developer Conference (WWDC) took the wraps off a vast array of software-related announcements, with much for developers and end users alike to get excited about.

Scroll down for our live blog and links to key announcements, but if you want a quick overview of the main news, look no further:

• Apple has taken the wraps off OS X 10.11 El Capitan. It will make the user experience even more intuitive and speedy.
• OS X El Capitan available to developers now, with public beta in autumn.
• New version of watchOS also on the cards. Will be dubbed watchOS 2 and come with many many enhancements and new features.
• Next version of iOS will be iOS 9. Will include enhanced intelligence, in search and Siri that suggests things for users based on contexual information.
• Siri continues to improve and learn - it is 40 per cent more accurate now.
• New multi-tasking features in iOS 9 will boost iPad users' productivity.
• Public transport directions coming to Maps soon.
• Apple Pay coming to the UK in July.
• You'll also be able to pay for London transport travel using Apple Pay.
• Passbook has been rebranded as Wallet.
• Apple launches Apple Music with help from supporting cast of famous names.

In the meantime, we run down what you can expect to hear from Apple at WWDC 15 and what it means for you.

OS X 10.11 (El Capitan)

For the past 11 years, Apple has used the opening keynote of WWDC to show off the latest version of its desktop operating system, OS X, and this year is was no exception.

As predicted by MacRumours, OS X 10.11 - now dubbed El Capitan - is not a a massive departure from OS X 10.10 Yosemite in terms of look and feel because Yosemite was itself a far-reaching overhaul of the UI.

Credit: Yosemite National Park by Chase Lindberg

The name is also indicitave of this: El Capitan, pictured above, is an iconic large rocky outcrop in Yosemite national park, rather than a separate "beautiful place in California" in its own right meaning that it is to Yosemite what Snow Leopard (OS X 10.6) was to Leopard (OS X 10.5) - a release with increased stability and a few new functions to further improve the end user experience.

A beta of the new OS is available to developers immediately. The public can get their hands on the beta in autumn with a full version available soon after, but you can find out all the details of OS X 10.11 El Capitan's features here.

iOS 9

As with OS X, a new version of iOS has been a staple of WWDC for the past seven years, and it was widely expected that iOS 9 would be confirmed during the WWDC keynote.

It was also thought that, like OS X 10.11, iOS 9 would focus on stability and optimisation, rather than radical new features or design changes. However, while the interface has remained largely the same, Apple released a wide-ranging set of new features.

Ther is a new split-screen mode, enhanced multi-tasking support for the iPad, plus tweaks to Siri and Apple Maps among other things. Furthermore, security remains paramount, with Apple saying it has tried to enhance the user experience whilst keeping security and privacy and its core.

Additionally, as anticipated by 9to5Mac before last night's event, Apple has reduced the amount of memory required to download the OS to 1.3GB, compared to iOS 8's 4.6GB. This means iOS 9 will be available to the same range of devices as iOS 8.

Apple also surprised the audience by announcing the latest version of its moble programming language, Swift 2, will be open source.

Take a look at our iOS 9 hub for all the news and views on Apple's latest OS.

Apple WatchOS 2

With Apple Watch only having released in April, many thought it was unlikely there would be many, if any, major new announcements regarding the smartwatch or its operating system. However, contrary to these rumours, Apple showed off watchOS 2, an updated operating system for Apple Watch that boasts a number of new enhancements designed to please users, including a nightstand mode, time and location-contextual animated watch faces, Time Travel and support for native apps.

You can find all the details about the Apple Watch and watchOS 2 in our dedicated hub.

Apple Pay

Apple Pay was launched last September alongside the iPhone 6 and has seen strong adoption by consumers in the US, racking up three million registered credit cards in the first three days after it became publicly available.

It is now coming to the UK and will be available in 250,000 locations - more than when it launched in the US - from July, bolstered by support from the likes of Costa Coffee, M&S and Waitrose, as well as leading banks.

With Samsung and Google now bringing on the heat with their own mobile payments systems,Samsung PayandAndroid Pay, it made sense for Apple to stage a worldwide launch of its own payment system at WWDC 15.

Want to know more about Apple Pay? Look no further than ourdedicated Apple Pay hub, which aims to answer all your questions and more

Apple Music & Beats 1 Radio

As had been rumoured, Apple finally revealed what it intends to do with Beats Music, which it aquired in May 2014.

The overhauled service has been renamed Apple Music, which is made up of three parts: Apple Music, the primary streaming service, Beats 1, a 24/7 radio online station, and Connect, which lets fans follow their favourite artists. Apple Music will cost $9.99 per month in the US (it is thought it may be higher in the UK) for a single user, or $14.99 for a family subscription, which will be based around the existing iCloud Family Sharing feature of iOS.

The rebranding of Beats Music as Apple Music was revealed a few days early by Sony Music's CEO Doug Morris, VentureBeat reports.

According to VentureBeat Morris seemed generally enthusiastic about the launch of Apple Music saying it would represent a tipping point for the subscription music streaming market.

"A rising tide will lift all boats. It's the beginning of an amazing moment for our industry," he said.

For more information about Apple Music, take a look at our article, which follows the service from the Beats acquisition to the present day.

A new variety of malware is targeting users with Macs, iPhones and iPads, according to new research.

Dubbed WireLurker, the malware was discovered by researchers working for Palo Alto Networks, who discovered it targets both OS X and iOS devices.

The malware has been found in 467 OS X applications on the Maiyadi App Store, a third-party Mac application store in China, and the infected applications have been downloaded more than 356,104 times. As a result, they may have impacted hundreds of thousands of users.

WireLurker monitors any iOS device connected via USB with an infected OS X computer and installs downloaded third-party applications or automatically generated malicious applications onto the device, regardless of whether it is jailbroken or not.

"This is the reason we call it WireLurker," said Palo Alto Networks researcher Claud Xiao.

While similar methods to attack non-jailbroken devices have been demonstrated in the past, this malware combines a number of techniques to present a threat to all iOS devices.

The malware exhibits a complex code structure, multiple component versions, file hiding, code obfuscation and customised encryption to thwart anti-reversing, according to Xiao.

He said the malware is capable of stealing information such as Apple IDs and contacts. It also regularly requests updates from the attacker's command and control server. "This malware is under active development and its creator's ultimate goal is not yet clear," said Xiao.

"WireLurker is unlike anything we've ever seen in terms of Apple iOS and OS X malware," said Ryan Olson, intelligence director at Palo Alto Networks' threat intelligence team Unit 42.

"The techniques in use suggest that bad actors are getting more sophisticated when it comes to exploiting some of the world's best-known desktop and mobile platforms."

The security outfit recommends users do not download Mac apps from third-party stores, jailbreak iOS devices or connect iOS devices to untrusted computers and accessories in order to evade the malware threat.

Apple has moved to fix the Bash security flaw that affected many of the company's OS X-running computers.

Also known as Shellshock, the bug could allow hackers to take over a victim's computer. The vulnerability involves the execution of malicilous code within the Bash command shell, which is used in many Linux- and Unix-based operating systems, such as OS X.

Apple said it has now patched the flaw in its OS X Lion, Mountain Lion and Mavericks software. The company also set up a site for users to download the Bash update.

Following news of the vulnerability, Apple quickly moved to deny there was a problem and said the vast majority of users shouldn't be affected by the problem and that it was working to provide a software update for its advanced Unix users.

"Bash, a UNIX command shell and language included in OS X, has a weakness that could allow unauthorised users to remotely gain control of vulnerable systems," Apple said last week.

"With OS X, systems are safe by default and not exposed to remote exploits of bash unless users configure advanced UNIX services."

However, while the patch fixes two vulnerabilities, security researchers have discovered a third. According to Greg Wiseman of IT security firm Rapid7, another flaw.

"Amidst the flurry of activity and interest around Shellshock over the last week, several additional bash vulnerabilities have come to light. The initial fix for CVE-2014-6271 was incomplete, leading to CVE-2014-7169 being found," said Wiseman.

He claims to have found the extra vulnerability with a tool called bashcheck, which tests for vulnerabilities in an installed version of Bash, and that he found it to still be vulnerable to CVE-2014-7186. This could result in a denial of service attack preventing a computer from connecting to other networks, it is feared.

Apple has moved to assure users of its Mac OS X operating system about the security of their machines, in the face of the recently discovered Shellshock (Bash) bug.

As reported by IT Pro yesterday, the vulnerability affects Bash command-line shell used to power Linux and Unix-based operating systems, which include OS X.

This has the potential to be seized upon by cyber attackers to remotely execute arbitrary code on an affected system and, in turn, take control of a person's machine.

Furthermore, it's estimated that around 60 per cent of the world's Apache-based websites also rely on Bash to run background applications, potentially putting them at risk too.

For this reason, Shellshock or the Bash Bug, as some have dubbed it has been dubbed "bigger than Heartbleed", in reference to the OpenSSL flaw that wreaked havoc on the web earlier this year.

However, Apple has been quick to tell users of its OS X desktop operating system that there is no need to panic, as there is a good chance the flaw will not affect them.

Speaking to Apple tech site iMore, an Apple spokesperson said: "The vast majority of OS X users are not at risk to recently reported Bash vulnerabilities.

"Bash, a Unix command shell and language included in OS X, has a weakness that could allow unauthorised users to remotely gain control of vulnerable systems.

"With OS X, systems are safe by default and not exposed to remote exploits of Bash unless users configure advanced Unix services. We are working to quickly provide a software update for our advanced Unix users."

Mac OS X and Linux users could find themselves in the firing line of cybercriminals looking to exploit the Bash Bug vulnerability, which has already been billed as "bigger than Heartbleed."

News of the Bash Bug, or Shellshock as it is also known, broke overnight, with the US CERT sending out an alert warning users of a flaw in the Bash command-line shell used to power Linux and Unix-based operating systems, which includes Mac OS X.

This, it is feared, could be seized upon by cyber attackers to remotely execute arbitrary code on an affected system, or put more simply allow them to take control of a person's machine.

But it's not just Linux and Unix-based computers that are at risk, but also a sizeable portion of the world's Apache-based websites that rely on Bash to run background applications.

Professor Alan Woodward from the University of Surrey said, for this reason, the potential fallout from the flaw has the potential to be even bigger than the Heartbleed bug.

The latter is an OpenSSL vulnerability, news of which broke back in April, which could allow hackers to eavesdrop on web users' internet activities and in turn - steal usernames, passwords and emails without being detected.

"What many people do not realise that over 50 per cent of the active web sites run on a web server called Apache, which runs on Unix, and hence is potentially vulnerable," he said.

"As we have just passed the point where there are one billion active websites that means that something in excess of 500 million sites could be vulnerable to this security flaw, compared to only 500,000 for the Heartbleed bug."

Mark James, a security expert at anti-virus firm ESET, said IT pros can easily check to see if their systems are affected by the bug by carrying out a command line test before rolling out patches.

"Check for any update then check again, run the script and ensure you get the warnings," he advised.

"You should update Bash to the latest version manually. Also please keep an eye on network traffic, take this opportunity to tighten control on any non-essential services and turn them off," he added.

Parallels Desktop 10 has arrived, aiming to reduce drain on system resources whilst adding a raft of options to make it easier to setup and interact with virtual machine (VMs).

The latest generation uses 10 per cent less RAM than it predecessor, now supports 3+ mouse buttons, and touts up to 30 per cent more battery life.

Integration between OS X and the Windows VM has increased to the point where the systems are virtually merged. It's now possible to save directly to iCloud from Office 2013 and share files via Messages and AirDrop, for example.

Do you need Parallels?

Of course, you no longer need a paid-for product to run Windows on a Mac. Apple's Boot Camp enables anyone to install and run Windows from a separate partition on their OS X system and choose which to boot into during start-up. You could also setup Windows VMs using Oracle's free VirtualBox.

So what's the advantage Parallels? The first is ease of use. Setting up Boot Camp takes a little work while installing VMs in VirtualBox is no picnic if you don't know what you're doing. With a simple, Wizard-based approach, Parallels does a great job of taking the pain away.

You can virtualise an existing Windows PC either over the network or using an external hard disk and the Parallels Transport Agent applet. You can also create a new Windows VM just by pointing Parallels at a CD, DVD or ISO image on an external drive or USB memory stick. Just be aware that you'll need to buy Windows separately if you don't own an existing license not attached to a existing and working machine, while you'll also need the relevant media or ISO to install from.

Create a new OS X virtual machine and Parallels can build it from your Mac's recovery disk or from the app store download for the Yosemite beta. You can even create Ubuntu or Chrome OS VMs using the wizard, and Parallels runs off and downloads the files required. It couldn't be much easier.

Whatever guest OS you choose, Parallels will do its best to configure the VM for you, asking you what you want to use a Windows VM for, then fixing CPU and RAM resources plus other preferences for you. Alternatively, you can tweak configurations to your heart's content, allocating CPU cores to the VM, or increasing the RAM allocation. Parallels offers guidance on RAM and warnings if you exceed its estimation but you can set your VM to use more or less, depending on how you plan to use it.

It's not always smooth sailing. While setting up a VM based on Windows 8.1 Enterprise, the installation failed repeatedly on a licensing error, though this was fixed by unticking a checkbox in the setup Wizard.

Tighter OS X integration

Parallels 10 steps up the integration between Windows and OS X. You can run a VM full-screen, so that a Windows 8.1 VM looks and works like a standard Windows 8.1 PC. You do need to install Parallels' Desktop Tools software on the guest OS before you get the right screen resolution and all features working properly. There's an option to do this in the Parallels Desktop menu, so no heavy lifting is involved.

Even in full-screen mode, OS X is available. Mousing to the top of the screen reveals the Apple menu bar, and you can still CMD-Tab between your VM, the OS X desktop and applications, giving you the best of both worlds.

You can also run a VM in its own Window. Perhaps the most interesting option, however, is Parallels' Coherence view. Here each Windows application runs in its own Window, floating on top of the OS X desktop, and with its own icon in the Dock.

The integration goes deeper still. For one thing, you can copy text or objects from an OS X window and paste them directly into a Windows application. It's also possible to set file associations so you a .DOCX Word file opens in a Word for Windows window rather than Pages on OS X, for example.

Parallels also shares specific folders between your OS X system and your Windows VM, and will use the Share functions of OS X to post to Twitter, Facebook and other social networks from within your Windows applications.

Best of all, it can also share cloud storage services between both machines, so that you can install Dropbox on your Mac and then access/add files from the Windows-based folder. And if you use Office 2013 in a Windows VM, then it's perfectly happy working with your SkyDrive account or SharePoint server; as far as Windows is concerned, it's just an ordinary, everyday PC.

Specifications

To get Parallels up and running you're going to need at least an Intel Core 2 Duo processor and 2GB of RAM. At least 4GB of RAM is recommended, and if you'll get the best performance with high-end Core or Xeon processors.

Parallels detects devices connected via USB and offers you the choice of using them under OS X or within the Windows VM. During testing it couldn't find a networked printer using the standard Windows installation method but was capable of using printers already installed in OS X.

Through five days of using Parallels we didn't experience any crashes or major issues while working between OS X and Windows 8.1. It's only once you start messing around with multiple VMs that things come unstuck; asking a Core i5 Mac Mini to handle OS X Mavericks, Windows 8.1, OS X Yosemite and Linux Mint 17, either all at once or two or three at a time, is probably a bit much. It's also worth noting that not all guest operating systems will run full-screen at native resolution or at least they won't without some tinkering with the configuration files.

Other bonuses concern testing, compatibility and security. A web browser running in a virtualised instance of OS X or Windows won't affect your main OS X system should the guest OS get infected by malware or something else go wrong, and you can easily set-up snapshots of your VMs and restore them if you have any issues.

Pitfalls?

If using Parallels has any downside, it's performance. Inevitably, a Windows 8.1 VM won't match the performance of your Mac or MacBook running Windows via Boot Camp, and the same goes for a OS X 10.9 VM and your native OS X 10.9 desktop (though the difference will be smaller).

Being a beta, Yosemite isn't quite ready to be virtualised. Parallel's virtualised graphics drivers have yet to support the new OS, and as a result it feels stutter-prone and unstable. What's more, there's no support for Direct X 11, while OpenGL drive support is stuck at version 2.1, not the modern OpenGL 3.2.

That's an issue for 3D graphics applications and games, but for most business users productivity applications will be the norm, in which case a Parallels VM running on a reasonable configuration two i5 cores and 4GB of RAM on a 2012 Core i5 Mac Mini feels pretty snappy.

We had no issues running Office 2013, DxO Optics Pro 9 and a range of lightweight applications, nor felt that Windows 8.1 rans any slower than usual. In fact, Windows 8.1 worked well as it's comfortable running on a dual-core Atom with 2GB of RAM, so won't give even a modest MacBook Air or Mac Mini any problems.

Typical use cases

Virtualisation products like Parallels Desktop 10 are invaluable to business environments where employees use Macs but need access to old or bespoke applications running on Windows 7 or Windows 8.1 operating system.

Maybe you need to test a product or website on a range of operating systems, including OS X and Windows, but would rather not have to use multiple PCs. Perhaps you need to test different IT setups, so that you can trial, Windows 9 or OS X 10.10 Yosemite before they launch. You might even have old Windows XP applications that you need to access occasionally isn't it better to do it in a sandboxed, virtualised environment than on an old, insecure PC?

Parallels makes easy work of all these scenarios, and running virtualised environments on a Mac gives you more flexibility than running them on a PC. After all, you can run virtualised instances of Windows, Linux or whatever you need on a Mac, but thanks to Apple's control over the OS X platform, you can't say the same with OS X on a Linux or Windows PC.

Overall

Parallels doesn't stand alone in this market Vmware Fusion 7 has only just been released, offering a similar feature set and better Yosemite support.

Still the 10th generation software is an easy package to recommend for business use. If you just need occasional use of Windows packages, then it's worth putting up with the inconvenience of Boot Camp. But if you want to integrate Windows applications and OS X apps on one desktop, then Parallels is an excellent way to do this.

Processor: Intel Core 2 Duo, Core i3, Core i5, Core i7 or Xeon

RAM: 2GB (4GB recommended)

Hard Disk: 850MB plus 16GB per VM

Operating System: OS X 10.7.6 or later

Apple's high prices often restrict Macs to graphics and design departments rather than wide scale enterprise deployment. Throughout 2014, Apple has implemented a strategy to make its products more affordable and the 13in MacBook Pro laptop is the latest device to receive a 100 price cut.

Now starting at 999, the MacBook Pro is comparable to high-end Windows 8.1 Ultrabooks in terms of price. We take a look to see whether it's still got the performance to outmuscle rival devices.

What's new?

Our 999 review unit shipped with a dual-core i5 processor running at 2.6GHz, 8GB RAM and a 128GB SSD. Essentially Apple is shipping devices with the latest batch of Haswell chips for a reduced price because the Intel Broadwell refresh is imminent.

Upgrades can be made at the time of purchase but the cost of a device will escalate rapidly. You'll need to spend 200 to double the storage to 256GB. If money is no barrier, 400 will buy 512GB of storage and a 2.8GHz processor. And a dual-core i7 running at 3GHz is available for 240 if you need the maximum speed.

Our review unit posted a small performance improvement over the late-2013 model, despite the two devices having the same clock speed and RAM. This was down to Intel making incremental improvements to the latest batch of Haswell chips.

Running our benchmarks to simulate office and multimedia work on Windows 7 via Apple's Bootcamp feature - the 2014 MacBook returned an overall score of 81 out of 100 (up from 76). Performance was consistent across a variety of apps used in our benchmarks, and the MacBook Pro only stumbled when it came to demanding 3D rendering. It's acceptable for a laptop costing 999, and the MacBook Pro will be more than adequate for web browsing, running Office or graphics apps such as Photoshop.

The 2014 model lasted 10 hours 20 minutes when running our video playback test at 75 per cent brightness. This was near-on identical to the 2013 model. When you use Wi-Fi, expect uptime to drop by a couple of hours.

And what's the same

The design of the MacBook Pro hasn't changed with Apple sticking with the sturdy, attractive aluminium chassis. It's 18mm thick and weighs 1.6kg, so it's portable.

It's got the same port selection with 2 x USB 3 and 2 x Thunderbolt 2 connections. The lack of Ethernet remains troublesome for business users, so you'll need to pay 25 for a Thunderbolt-to-Ethernet adaptor if you need to connect the laptop to a wired office network.

The lack of upgradeability remains a weakness. The memory in the MacBook Pro is soldered onto the motherboard, so choosing the amount at purchase is critical. The base of the laptop is also sealed with multiple pentalobe screws, which means that storage upgrades, repairs or battery replacements are difficult and may also void the laptop's warranty.

Retina Display

With the mid-2014 model being a minor refresh, no changes have been made to the display either. Apple continues to use the 13.3in IPS panel with a 2560 x 1600 resolution. This produces a bright (374cd/m2) and detailed image that is well suited to tasks such as photo- or video-editing. All Macs also include Apple's Keynote presentation software free of charge, so it's ready to create slick business presentations without having to install Microsoft Office.

On paper the Retina Display doesn't have as many pixels as Windows laptops like Toshiba's P50T, which has a 4k display. But, Windows 8.1 isn't able to scale third-party apps properly so the hardware advantage is lost.

In contrast, OS X provides scaling options for the Retina Display that simulate lower resolutions so that you can choose a setting depending on the app you are using. This means that the MacBook Pro works better with graphics applications such as Adobe Photoshop, even if it can't quite match the higher resolution of some of its Windows rivals.

Overall

There may be Windows alternatives that provide greater performance or screen resolution, but 13in MacBook Pro With Retina Display combines screen quality performance, portability and battery life into a package that is unmatched.

The 999 starting price makes it more attractive to businesses who may be considering deployment.

Verdict

A minor specification boost is coupled with a £100 price cut to make the 13in MacBook Pro (2014) the best all-round laptop on the market.

Operating System: OS X Mavericks (10.9)

Processor: 2.6GHz Intel Core i5-4278U (3.1GHz Turboboost)

GPU: Intel Iris 5100 (integrated)

Display: 13.3-inch IPS display, 2560x1600 resolution

Memory: 8GB DDR3L

Storage: 128GB solid-state storage

Optical: N/A

Connectivity: dual-band 802.11ac Wi-Fi, Bluetooth 4.0

Ports: 2 x USB 3, 2x Thunderbolt 2, 1x HDMI, SD card reader, 1 x headphone Dimensions: 314 x 219 x 18 mm (WxDxH)

Weight: 1.6kg

Microsoft has openly mocked the MacBook Air in comparison adverts with the Surface Pro 3. But if you take a closer look at the specifications of the Windows 8.1 hybrid, you'll see it has more in common with Apple's premium MacBook Pro range.

Hence it's fairer to compare the Surface Pro 3 with a fellow high-end rival like the 13in MacBook Pro (mid-2014). The devices battled it out to see which had the best design, display, input, operating system, battery life, performance, ports, repairability and pricing.

If you're eager to find out which device we recommend - jump to our verdict.

Design and Versatility

Microsoft has designed the Pro 3 as a 2-in-1 hybrid. It's got a detachable keyboard, which can be clipped in to use the device like a laptop. Or the machine can be used as a tablet with the touchscreen.

The built-in kickstand allows the Pro to be propped up on any flat surface and it tilts back to 150 degrees giving you multiple viewing positions.

The Surface Pro 3 has a beautiful and tough Magnesium-alloy chassis. It's got a thickness of 9.1mm and the tablet alone weighs 800g. Realistically, you're going to be spending most of your time with the Type Cover attached, which brings the weight of the device to just over 1kg. But even with the cover, the Pro 3 can be carried about comfortably.

The 13in MacBook has Apple's trademark aluminum finish. It looks great out of the box, but the light colour isn't good at disguising scratches and blemishes. Being the bigger device, the MacBook is bulkier with double the thickness of the Pro 3 at 18mm and a total weight of 1.6kg. The overall footprint isn't too much larger than the Microsoft device - and if you get a cover, this can easily be carried around too.

Designed as a content creation machine, the MacBook has a clamshell form factor. It looks great but it's as not as versatile as the Surface Pro 3 when it comes to viewing angles, with thescreen tilting back a maximum of 140 degrees.

Winner: Surface Pro 3 - It's thinner, lighter and can be used as a tablet or laptop.

Display

The Pro 3's 12in screen is made using reputable Gorilla Glass 3. Microsoft has squeezed in 3.1 million pixels (2160 x 1440). It's fully touch screen enabled and we measured a maximum brightness of 352cd/m2. It's excellent for web browsing and multimedia tasks.

The Windows 8.1 device lays down a high-marker but the MacBook Pro is able to surpass it. Users get a 13in display with 4.2 million pixels (2560 x 1660) and the brightness is a touch higher at 374cd/m2. The only area where it does not match the Surface Pro is touch screen functionality.

Colours are deep and vibrant on both machines, making it possible to use them for multimedia work. The Pro 3 does have more saturation, so colours look more realistic on the Mac.

Apple does more work on optimising the panel with OS X so you won't find scaling issues in the MacBook. Conversely, this is a problematic area on the Surface Pro 3, as current third party apps, such as Adobe Photoshop cannot be used comfortably on the high-res screen as the icons are tiny.

Winner: MacBook Pro - Perhaps the most closely contested category in this head-to-head. There is little to separate the displays but the MacBook offers a bigger, sharper and brighter screen.

Input

The Surface Pro 3 has three forms of input. The touch screen is ideal for web browsing, as you can tap in web addresses, click on links, pinch-to-zoom and scroll. It's also there when you want to switch between apps or close them down.

The keyboard can be clipped in for long-form writing and editing. It's adequate when you're on the move but typing on it all day can lead to wrist and finger fatigue. The trackpad is the weakest part of the Pro 3, but this is compensated to some degree by the touch screen.

Pen input is available for note-taking via OneNote and can also be used to interact with design applications. It's got 256 points of pressure and the implementation is fantastic. You can click the pen-lid anytime and start taking notes immediately.

In comparison, input on the MacBook Pro is restricted to the keyboard and trackpad. The chiclet style keys are well spaced - although travel could be better. The sharp edges on the MacBook can also be punishing on your wrists and we've experienced wrist cramps when using it for long periods. The trackpad is outstanding in terms of responsiveness and there are a number of gesture controls available to switch between apps and desktops. These work flawlessly and aid navigation between multiple apps.

Apple has yet to integrate a touch screen into its laptop devices and there's no pen input either.

Winner: Surface Pro 3 - Both keyboards could be better. The Pro 3 might have a poor trackpad compared to the MacBook but the outstanding pen input and touch screen functionality give it the edge.

Battery Life

Windows 8.1 has closed the gap to OS X devices but MacBooks remain king when it comes to battery life. This is an important consideration as the batteries are sealed into the devices.

Both Apple and Microsoft claim up to 9 hours of battery life. At 75 per cent brightness and with Wi-Fi turned off, we were able to surpass this on the MacBook, but the Surface Pro 3 struggled to live up to the claim.

The Surface is able to creep up to 8 hours, if you lower the brightness below 50 per cent and then continue to turn it down. You'll get close to nine hours of Wi-Fi browsing on the MacBook with 75 per cent brightness.

Winner: MacBook Pro - It's got considerable longer battery life.

Performance

Our review units packed similar specifications, giving a good indication of the performance levels you can expect.

The Surface Pro 3 unit was powered by aCore i5-4300U processor clocked at 1.9GHz with 8GB of RAM and a 256GB SSD.

Meanwhile, the MacBook Pro 13in had a faster 2.6GHz Core i5-4278U, the same 8GB RAM and half the storage capacity with a 128GB SSD.

Boot times were close to identical with the machines ready to roll in 10 seconds from a cold start. Resuming from sleep took a couple of seconds apiece.

Both machines were quick to open and close apps, zipped through web browsing and crunched through light-to-midrange multimedia work. However, the Apple device proved more capable, especially when it came to running multiple applications simultaneously.

Winner: MacBook Pro - For everyday usage there's not too much of a difference, but when it comes to multitasking and responsiveness, the OS X machine is superior.

Operating System

This is the most subjective part of the overall test. Some users prefer Windows, whilst others swear by OS X.

The Surface Pro 3 ships with Windows 8.1 Pro (64-bit). It's defaulted to boot to the Start Screen with the Live Tiles but this can be bypassed in the settings menu. Unless your business has developed an app in-house, you're unlikely to spend much time in this portion of the OS.

Windows remains suitable for business deployment as it supports all commonly used programs and admins are used to managing it. However, security remains a concern and machines will need to be pre-installed with anti-virus software, which in turn can affect end user performance.

The MacBook Pro is currently shipping with OS X Mavericks, which has the classic desktop interface. If you're switching over from Windows, you'll need to get used to the keyboard and menus. But it is intuitive and overtime we find there's less performance degradation than with Windows devices.

Apple has been rolling out desktop updates on a yearly basis and the latest - OS X Yosemite - will be available in the autumn for free. Microsoft has also been keen to adopt a more regular update cycle. Windows 9 will reportedly be announced on 30 September.

Winner: MacBook Pro - Apple has kept the desktop interface simple and easy to use. The firm also has a yearly refresh cycle in place, whereas Microsoft update process remains jumbled.

Ports + Connectivity

Neither device is bursting with physical ports. The Surface Pro 3 includes a microSD card reader and a Mini Displayport to hook up a display. However, it's got just one USB 3 connection and this isn't enough when you want to use this in the office as desktop replacement.

Being a laptop, you'd expect the MacBook to have significantly more USB ports, but it maxes out at two. There are 2 x Thunderbolt 2 connections and an HDMI port. Plus there is space for an SD card.

Wireless connections are tied with Wi-Fi 802.11ac/a/b/g/n together with Bluetooth 4 included as standard. There are no options to have 4G connectivity integrated.

Winner: MacBook Pro - It's got more USBs (only just) and HDMI as standard.

Repairability

The beautiful unibody designs come with a catch. They are difficult to open and once you're inside you'll find key components, like the battery, are fastened with glue. You can easily cause more damage when trying to replace components and this results in the devices sharing a repairability score of 1/10 on teardown site iFixit.

Choose your specification wisely at the time of purchase because you won't be able to upgrade or repair it without splashing out.

Winner: Draw - Both are a nightmare to open and repair.

Pricing & Warranty

There's a big gap between the entry-level pricing for the products but all is not as it seems. The Surface Pro 3 starts at 639 for the standalone tablet with a Core i3 processor, 4GB and just 64GB of internal storage. Then you have to factor in 110 for the Type Cover, so realistically the minimum amount you'll spend on a Surface Pro 3 is 750.

Apple's 13in MacBook Pro (with the Retina Display) starts at 999. However, it has a faster Core i5 processor as standard, double the RAM (8GB) and 128GB SSD.

When you compare like-for-like specifications, the Apple device ends up being cheaper. The 13in MacBook with a Core i5 processor, 8GB RAM and 256GB SSD retails at 1,199.

The Surface Pro 3 model with Core i5 processor, 8GB and 256GB SSD is 1,109 plus the 110 for the Type Cover. This bring the total cost of the Pro 3 to 1,219.

Warranty options aren't as comprehensive as business OEMS like Dell and HP. Apple offers a standard 1-year warranty and 90 days of telephone technical support. It's also possible to drop in to an Apple Store for help during this period. Extended warranties are available via the AppleCare Protection service.

Microsoft offers a 2-year limited warranty and Microsoft offers 90 days of technical support. We haven't seen any options to extend this.

Winner: MacBook Pro - The Apple device is cheaper when the specs are compared.

Verdict

To recap, the MacBook Pro has taken this with a convincing 6-2 victory.

The Apple device won the following categories: Display, battery life, performance, operating system, ports and price.Microsoft's Surface Pro 3 was victorious when it came to design/versatility and input. The devices drew when it came to repairability.

Despite being a solid 2-in-1 hybrid, the Surface Pro 3 isn't able to match the performance and battery life of the MacBook. And based on our experience with both operating systems, the Apple device is going to have longevity and represent a better investment.

OS X Yosemite Developer Preview 6 is now available for developers to download from the Mac App Store, though the normally concurrent beta version for iOS 8 is notably absent.

The release includes various tweaks to the operating system, including a slightly altered System Preferences screen and taskbar battery icon.

There's now also a Do Not Disturb option situated in the Notification centre, as well as some fresh wallpapers.

A sixth beta release for Apple's iOS 8 was also expected to arrive along with the one for OS X, but it was missing from Monday's updates.

Back in July, it was announced that Apple was planning to release the two operating systems at separate times, despite the focus on integration and continuity' between the two.

This will reportedly result in iOS 8 landing in September, with Yosemite following in October.

The main features of the new OS include a revamped design, improved search functionality, the ability to make and receive calls from your Mac and much, much more. Details were unveiled at the WWDC 2014 conference in June.

OS X Yosemite beta 5 was released on 11 August.

Apple has released a security update to fix seven vulnerabilities found in Safari's Webkit framework.

The update can be found on the Apple support page now for OS X Lion v10.7.5, OS X Lion Server v10.7.5, OS X Mountain Lion v10.8.5 and OS X Mavericks v10.9.4. It applies to Safari 6.1.6 and Safari 7.0.6.

According to Apple, several memory corruption issues were present in Webkit that have been addressed with improved memory handling.

The US-based company said: "Visiting a maliciously crafted website may lead to an unexpected application termination or arbitrary code execution."

The global tech giant refused to comment on whether hackers have exploited the vulnerabilities. It said: "For the protection of our customers, Apple does not disclose, discuss or confirm security issues until a full investigation has occurred and any necessary patches or releases are available.

Even so, the United States Computer Emergency Readiness Team (US-CERT) is urging IT managers to install the updates as a matter of urgency.

"Users and administrators are encouraged to review Apple security update... and apply the necessary updates," its advisory states.

Problems with Webkit are not uncommon. It is the open source framework behind Safari, Google Chrome and other OS X applications such as Mail.

While Google Chrome frequently reports vulnerabilities in Webkit, Apple had to release a variety of browser patches in July that also covered problems with the framework.

Apple's annual Worldwide Developer Conference (WWDC) will kick off later today in San Francisco, and there are plenty of rumours about what might be revealed.

CEO Tim Cook labelled 2014 as the year in which Apple would showcase "amazing new hardware, software and services", so what can we expect to see at Cupertino's biggest showcase?

iOS 8

Apple has all but confirmed iOS 8 will be showcased at WWDC.

Much of the speculation around iOS 8 has been centred on one of its apps called "Healthbook". Leaked screenshots have shown it appearing next to the other debutant apps called Preview and TextEdit. The app will be based on the design of Passbook and will include a number of tabs relating to various health categories. Healthbook will reportedly work together with the forthcoming iWatch, which 9to5Mac's sources claim is "well into development."

iOS 8 is likely to include split-screen functionality for the iPad, too. Users will be able to run two applications at once, similar to the "snap" multitasking features in the Microsoft Surface line. The ability to multitask is popular in business and enterprise, and put the Surface forward as a true laptop replacement. Apple is trying to go one further by providing developers with tools to design apps that can interact with each other when run simultaneously.

OS X 10.10

Apple has confirmed that it will show off the next version of OS X at WWDC, named Syrah. The update is expected to convert the look and feel of iOS 7 across to the Mac. The desktop OS will enjoy a larger presence at WWDC than iOS 8, according to Mark Gurman at 9to5Mac and will feature an end-to-end redesign.

For those worrying that their Mac might be turned into a glorified iPhone, Gurman says that Apple won't move too far towards iOS, instead taking the best features and designs from the handeld OS and importing it to desktop.

iPhone 6

Apple is expected to continue with its annual smartphone release cycle. A Taiwanese newspaper claimed that the next Apple range will be set for release in August.

The new models, according to the Economic Daily News' sources, will feature increased screen sizes (between 4.7in and 5.5in) to rival Samsung's Galaxy series. Though the newspaper's source is shady, the even-numbered iPhones tend to see redesigns, so it could be possible that an announcement at least will be made in June.

Apple customers are so sure that a new model will arrive soon that they have apparently stopped buying the iPhone 5s. Sales for the model are reported to be slowing as WWDC approaches. A survey by 451 March revealed that 40 per cent of Americans said that they would buy the next iPhone, compared to 33 per cent that said the same in 2012.

Straight outta' Cupertino

Beats co-founders Jimmy Iovine and Dr. Dre will reportedly join Apple's board following the $3.2 billion acquisition of Beats headphones. The two will be taking executive roles at the company according to sources close to the company. Might they be making an appearance at WWDC 2014?

Apple TV

The television market has always been more of a hobby for Apple than anything. The last major update for Apple TV came in 2012 and competitors have seized on the opportunity: Amazon, Google and Western Digital have all released their own versions, making the set-top market highly competitive.

References to a fourth-generation Apple TV were discovered in iOS 7 configuration files, while analysts reckon that it will be released in the latter parts of 2014. Despite this, there are no concrete ideas on what the new version of Apple TV might look like: a set-top box, a USB or a whole television itself.

Re/Code reported that that WWDC won't be used to reveal Apple TV or preview any software for it, according to its sources. With the two new operating systems on the way Apple does have a lot on its plate. Perhaps the company is writing up a rain check to give Apple TV its own event?

iWatch

Apple has said nothing about the potential release of its own smartwatch but that hasn't stopped widespread reports. With Microsoft looking into wearables, and with Google announcing its Android Wear, it would be a perfect opportunity for Cupertino to trump its rivals and steal some thunder.

The iWatch is rumoured to be a companion to the incoming Healthbook app, recording biometric data like pulse, calories burned and steps taken that will be stored within the iPhone for analysis.

If Apple was considering the release of an iWatch, it is more likely that it will wait until the public release of iOS 8, which, if Apple follows tradition, won't be available until September 2014.

Retina MacBook Air

Despite Apple updating its Air line-up rumours still persist that a new model could be on the way. A Retina-enabled Air featuring a 12in high-resolution screen could be forthcoming, designed to phase out older models. The 13in MacBook Air will then be replaced by the Retina-enabled 13in MacBook Pro.

Whispers also suggest Apple will drop the trackpad in favour of optical sensors and new touch gestures. The model is also supposed to be feature a fanless processor design.

Connected home software

Sources recently told the Financial Times that Apple is gearing up to enter the smart home market, with plans afoot to launch a software platform that will allow users to control the heating, security and lighting systems in their homes with their iOS devices.

This information is based on a patent application Apple made in November 2013, which suggests the firm is planning to use location-based technology to activate/deactivate lights or security systems whenever someone enters or leaves a property.

With the likes of Google and Samsung already making a big play in this area, we wouldn't be surprised to see some news from Apple at WWDC about this later today.

Apple has carried out a minor refresh of the MacBook Air - increasing the clock speed of the processor by 100MHz and dropping the price by 100.

But is it worth investing more in an older MacBook Pro with Retina Display? We break down the key differences between the laptops to help you decide. Categories include:

Which Mac is best for you?

MacBook Pro vs MacBook Air - Pricing and Verdict

8 reasons to switch to Mac

Display/DimensionsPerformance Battery lifeWireless connectivity & portsRepairabilitySoftwarePrice

Display & Dimensions

There is a huge difference in display quality between the two ranges. The MacBook Airs don't include Apple's Retina Display technology so are not ideal for video/image editing and multimedia. In terms of dimensions, it's closely run.

MacBook Air - Available in 11.6in and 13.3in sizes, these are the smallest laptops Apple offers.

The 11in Air weighs in at 1.08kg, making it the lightest Apple laptop. However, it also has the lowest resolution 1366 x 768, which isn't going to cut it for anything other than basic word processing and web browsing.

The 13in model ships with a better 1440 x 900 resolution and isn't too much heavier at 1.35kg.

MacBook Pro w/Retina display - The starting size of this machine is 13.3ins, with a larger 15.6in model available. This latter, in particular, can be used as a desktop replacement.

As their name indicates, the Pro models ship with Apple's best display technology. The 13in (2560 x 1600) and 15.4in (2880 x 1800) are streets ahead of the Airs in quality terms.

The 13in Pro is a couple of hundred grams heavier than its Air equivalent at 1.57kg, but it's still portable. However, the 15in device is noticeably chunkier at 2.02kg.

Winner - MacBook Pro w/Retina Display

The MacBook Airs are lightweight, but have inferior screens. The 13in Pro strikes the balance between portability and high-res screen technology.

Performance

Varients of Intel's 4th Generation Core (Haswell) chipset are used to power all MacBooks.

The latest Airs have received a minor performance boost over the previous generation but are still designed for basic tasks. The Pro series is capable of handling taxing applications like video editing and design.

MacBook Air - Now available with a choice between a 1.4GHz dual-core Core i5 processor or dual-core i7. RAM is configurable up to 8GB and the maximum storage size offered is a 512GB SSD. Basic graphics are provided by an integrated Intel HD 5000 chip. There is no option for a discrete card here, so this is not the machine for graphically intense applications.

MacBook Pro w/Retina Display - The Pro series offers more grunt. The base 13in machine is powered by a 2.4GHz dual-core i5 processor, and is configurable to a dual-core i7 chip running at 2.8GHz.

The 15.4in model is powered by 2GHz, 2.3GHz or 2.6GHz chips. These are all quad-core i7 processors.

RAM is configurable up to 16GB and a maximum of 1TB SSD can be installed in these machines. The standard built-in graphics are Intel's flagship Iris Pro range and it's possible to request an Nvidia GeForce GT 750M with 2GB of GDDR5 memory in the 15in model.

Winner - MacBook Pro w/Retina Display

Battery

Apple MacBooks lead the market when it comes to battery life and are usually able to match claimed figures. However, all batteries are sealed into the device so they're not user replaceable.

MacBook Air - Featuring efficient components, Airs have the longest battery life.

The 11.6in model touts up to nine hours of Wi-Fi browsing or video playback.

Meanwhile, the 13in model has a larger battery and Apple claims it lasts up to 12 hours. We will update this review once we've tested the machines.

MacBook Pro w/Retina Display - Battery life is sacrificed to offer better performance. However, it's still up there in terms of longevity.

The 13in model offers up to nine hours of Wi-Fi browsing and video playback (we measured 10 hours and 27 minutes).

Meanwhile, the 15in device is capable of providing up to eight hours of Wi-Fi browsing and video playback (we measured 8 hours 51 minutes).

Winner: MacBook Air - It's been configured for all-day use and is the longest lasting Mac on the market.

Wireless connectivity & ports

Both machines pack identical wireless connections in the form of 802.11ac Wi-Fi and Bluetooth 4. There is a difference in physical ports though.

MacBook Air - The Airs have limited space on the 17mm chassis. The 11in features 2 x USB 3 ports and a single Thunderbolt connection. The 13in model has the same ports and with the addition of an SD card slot.

MacBook Pro w/Retina - There's more space on the thicker Pros so they include 2 x USB 3 ports, 2 x Thunderbolt ports and an HDMI connection. Every Pro device also includes an SD card slot.

Winner - MacBook Pro w/Retina Display - Wireless connectivity is equal, so the Pro wins thanks to the greater number of physical ports.

Repairability

MacBooks are hard to repair as key components such as displays, batteries and RAM are glued in place. Choosing the amount of RAM is critical at the buying stage, as it's impossible to upgrade after purchase.

MacBook Air - The 2014 models have yet to be given a tear-down, but previous generation Airs scored 4/10 on iFixit and, with little changes to the device, we expect this to remain the same.

MacBook Pro w/Retina - The Pros have a paltry repairability score of 1/10, with the trackpad and display assembly proving problematic to replace.

Winner - MacBook Air - Repairing MacBooks is not straighforward, but the Air is a little easier to fix.

Software

All MacBooks ship with the OS X Mavericks operating system. Apple throws in the iWorks suite - Pages, Numbers and Keynotes - as well as iPhoto, iMovie and Garageband free of charge.

Apple will offer free operating systems upgrades every year and the products on test should be supported for at least the next five years.

Winner - Draw - There is nothing to separate the laptops when it comes to pre-loaded software.

Price and Verdict

The MacBook Airs are the cheaper devices as they are designed for portable use, while the Pros are designed for performance.

MacBook Air - Prices start at 749 for the entry-level 11in model, rising to 1,349 if you want the maximum specs available - 1.7GHz dual-core processor, 8GB of RAM and 512GB SSD.

The 13in Air starts at 849. The maximum specification is identical to the 11in except for the screen size and costs 1,449.00.

MacBook Pro w/Retina Display - As expected the MacBook Pros are more expensive because they have faster processors, more RAM/storage as well as more pixels inside the screen.

Prices for the 13in start at 1,099. This will buy you a 2.4GHz dual-core i5 processor, 8GB of RAM and a 256GB SSD. The maximum specification costs 2,239 and includes a 2.8GHz dual-core i7 chip, 16GB of RAM and a 1TB SSD.

The 15in is the most expensive device in this comparison. It starts at 1,699 for a 2GHz quad-core Intel Core i7 processor, 8GB of RAM and 256GB SSD.

If you want to max out the device with an Nvidia GeForce GT 750M discrete graphics card, 16GB of RAM, 1TB SSD and a 2.6GHz quad-core processor, you'll need to fork out 2,799. This is the option when you want a desktop replacement.

Winner - MacBook Air - The Airs are the cheaper device but make sure they can fulfill your needs before ruling out spending more on the Pros.

So which MacBook is best?

The devices drew when it came to software and managed to win an equal number of categories:

The Air triumphed in the areas of battery life, repairability and pricing.

Meanwhile, the Pro with Retina Display offered the better display performance and ports.

The MacBook Air is cheaper and has longer battery life, so it's ideal for users who want a machine for basic content creation and multimedia.

The Pro series is the more powerful and versatile machine. We also feel the higher specifications on offer give it a longer life-cycle. The 13in Pro, in particular, has a good balance between battery life, performance and portability. If we were to recommend a MacBook, it would be this one.

Overall winner - MacBook Pro with Retina Display

Apple has introduced MacBook Air models with faster Intel Haswell processors and has also cut the price.

Rumours suggested Apple would release two new entrants into the MacBook Air line-up, but the "new" models turned out to be upgraded versions of the original range.

There are no significant exterior changes. However, the latest MacBook Airs now ship with a improved processor.

Processor speed of the Core i5 CPU has increased from 1.3GHz to 1.4GHz. Other hardware remains as standard: Intel HD Graphics, resolutions of up to 1440 x 900 pixels, 802.11n Wi-Fi, 4GB of memory and a choice between flash storage.

As well as the processing upgrade, each model has undergone a price cut. The 11.6in MacBook Air dropped from 849 to 749, while its 13.3in cousin fell from 949 to 849. The higher end, 246GB versions of the Air series have also seen price drops of around 100.

Configure-to-order options include a 1.7 GHz Core i7 with Turbo Boost, an upgrade to 8GB memory and 512GB flash storage.

The most expensive MacBook Air, following these cuts, is now the same price as the cheapest MacBook Pro (without the Retina Display).

The MacBook Air series has also seen an increase in its bundled software, upgraded entrants to the line will now include office applications Pages, Numbers and Keybone as well as iPhoto, iMovie and Garageband.

Whether you're new to the Mac platform or have been using it for a number of years there are always tricks and tips you may be unaware of, which can boost productivity.

Below we list 14 tips and tricks to help you get the best out of Apple's desktop operating system.

1. Useful shortcuts

If you're coming across from a Windows machine you'll need to adapt to the new shortcuts on Mac. There are bucketloads of features so we've included ten useful ones to get you started.

Command + Tab Cycles through apps

Command + ` Switches between application windows

Command + , Opens up application preferences (may not work with everything)

Command + H Hides current window

Command + Option + Esc See running apps and force quit if necessary

Shift + Command + 3 Screenshots entire screen and saves as a picture

Shift + Command + Control + 3 Screenshots entire screen and is copied to clipboard

Shift + Command + 4 Screenshot a designated area with the mouse

Option + Shift + Command + V Pastes text with no formatting

Option + Shift + Command + Space - Opens a windows with spotlight so you can search for files on the Mac.

2. Make sure TrackPad gestures are activated

If you're using a MacBook then chances are you've got the gestures sorted. If you're using a desktop it's a good idea to invest in the Magic TrackPad accessory so you can also benefit from smooth transitions between apps, desktops and windows.

We prefer unticking the natural scroll direction - but it's worth experimenting to see what you find comfortable.

3. Screencast recording

OS X has a built-in screen recording facility allowing users to capture everything on the display. This is handy for making instructional videos and can even be useful in compliance situations. To record a video open up QuickTime Player and from the file menu, click on "New Screen Recording". Then choose the audio source such as the internal mic and whether you want to include mouse clicks.

When ready, hit record and make your video. It's possible to record the whole screen or a selection. Afterwards, you can edit it and upload it to YouTube.

4. Resize, crop, fine-tune images & add a signature

The Preview app is more than just an image viewer.It can crop, edit andadjust the colours of an image/

From OS X 10.7 onwards, the Preview app allows you to add your signature to documents and mail them digitally.

In Preview preferences, navigate to the Signature tab and click on the "+" button. Write your name in black ink on a blank sheet of white paper and hold it to the Mac's webcam, and watch as it magically appears onscreen.

To put your signature to a document, bring up the Edit toolbar and click on the signature icon. Draw a box and add your signature to the form. You printing, signing and faxing days will be a thing of the past.

5. Dictation

Voice dictation was built into Mountain Lion and has now been improved within Mavericks.

To enable dictation, go the System Preferences and choose "Dictation and Speech" and make sure the radio button for Dictation is "On". Then to use dictation, just press the Fn key twice in succession and start talking. You can also change this shortcut to whatever combination of keystrokes works best for you.

In Mavericks, there is an "Enhanced Dictation" tool. Clicking on the check box downloads a 700MB language file so all speech processing is done on the Mac locally instead of through Apple's cloud servers. This also means the thirty-second limit on speech you dictate is no longer applicable and you can chat to your heart's content.

6. Add website clips to Dashboard

Dashboard is the half-forgotten feature of OS X and only ever pops up when you accidently swipe too far left.

You can add web pages as widgets and put them on the dashboard for future reference. To do this, open up Safari and make a clip of a website, open it in Safari, then choose "Open in Dashboard". Use your mouse to select the area of the webpage you want on the dashboard and then click add (on the top right of the window).

This then puts the clipping onto the dashboard (there's an "I" in the bottom right of the clip that allows you to change the frame appearance). The clip should automatically update, but if it doesn't appear to Command + R will refresh the clip.

7. Kill the Dashboard

Perhaps having web clips isn't your thing. You can get rid of the Dashboard by opening up the Terminal app and typing "defaults write com.apple.dashboard mcx-disabled -boolean true", then hitting enter. Relaunch the dock by typing in "killall Dock" and you'll never see this feature again.

8. Remote control a Mac

OS X has a built remote sharing feature called Back To My Mac.

You need to ensure the Mac you want to remotely connect to is on and synced with your iCloud account (this is done via the Systems Preferences app). You should also make sure that Back To My Mac is enabled by ticking the box. In the sharing preferences part of system preferences, make sure the remote management is enabled on the Mac you need to connect to as well. On the router the remote Mac is connected to ensure that UPnP is enabled. All of this should then allow your remote Mac to check in with Apple's server to let them know its internet location.

From the Mac you are working on make sure that iCloud is turned on and you are logged in with your account to that service, turn on Back To My Mac as well as sharing. It's important to make sure you are using the same Apple ID on both computers. Then it is just a case of clicking on the remote Mac on the sidebar in a Finder window and clicking on Share Screen. A window will open and display the remote Mac's screen.

9. Copy Files to and from a remote Mac

Back To My Mac not only lets you share the screen but lets you copy files to and from a remote Mac. If you have followed the previous process to share the screen, to access files, you need to enable File Sharing under the Sharing icon in System Preferences.

In the Finder window go to the remote Mac you wish to share files with and you click on "Connect As". Type in your Apple ID and password and now you have access to the hard drive. You can move files between the two systems as you would with a remote server.

10. Merge all finder windows

This is one for Mavericks users. Finder now supports tabs so you can consolidate multiple panes into one window. Instead of dragging them all together one-by-one, in the Finder menu choose Window the click on Merge All Windows and you're done.

11. Share a DVD drive with others

The latest Mac desktops and laptops don't have optical drives but it you need to use physical media it's still possible. If you have an old Mac with a Superdrive you can set it up to share this with your driveless devices.

To do this, open up System Preferences on the Mac with a DVD drive, click on Sharing and in that window tick the box marked "DVDor CD sharing". Then insert the disc you want to share. Go the driveless Mac (making sure it is on the same network) and open the Finder window. Look at the sidebar for "Remote Disc" in the Devices section. Click on it and then double-click the computer you want to connect to.

12. Find another printer

Working in a large department you may find a printer to be busy churning out a large document. You can set up your Mac to print to the next available printer if there is more than one on the network. To do this, go into System Preferences and click on Printers and Scanners.

Select the printers from the list that you want to be in the pool (To select multiple printer, hold down the Command button and click on additional printers. Click on Create Printer Pool and give it a name. Click OK.

Then next time you print a document, you can choose the printer pool from the pop-up menu.

13. Give your guests safe access to a Mac

Guest accounts are great if you want to let someone borrow your Mac to check email or browse the web.

This can be enabled by going into System Preferences and clicking on Users and Groups. This then puts the Guest User account on the login screen. Guests can use this account and once finished it wipes that session.

14. Find out what your Mac is up to

Sometimes you may find the Mac is running slow and you have no idea why. There is a handy little app that lets you see what exactly is going on under the hood.

Activity Monitor can be found in the Utilities Folder. This has columns showing CPU usage of individual apps and processes and how much memory it is using. If you find a problematic app hogging resources, you can click on Quit Process to shut the offending app down. You can also use this utility to look at usage graphs as well.

Around a fifth of all Macs could be at risk from hacking and malware following the withdrawal of updates for the Snow Leopard operating system. Recent updates to OS X patched flaws in the three latest versions of the desktop operating system: Lion, Mountain Lion and Mavericks, but neglected to include updates for Snow Leopard, which was launched in 2009. The withdrawal of support after four-and-a-half years makes the OS the second-longest supported Apple OS after Tiger. The OS is estimated to running on almost a fifth (19 per cent) of Macs, which mean these computers could now run the risk of being exploited by hackers and malware. Apple's last security update for Snow Leopard was in September last year. Apple's normal patching policy is to put out updates for the present OS and the previous one. Support for the "n-2" OS normally finishes on the launch day of the latest OS version. However, with Snow Leopard, this lasted a lot longer for.

The latest update means that Lion (the n-2 OS) also got a patch, signifying the OS's continued popularity and the seriousness of the flaw itself. Apple may have a hard time getting people off Snow Leopard, though. The OS was the last to support applications written for the PowerPC chip using the Rosetta translation utility and users are showing no signs of wanting to give these up and upgrade their software.

As reported by IT Pro, Apple was forced into an update of OS X to patch a flaw with its encryption. The OS X Mavericks v10.9.2 patch fixes a vulnerability that alters the way Mac devices handle encrypted communications, and means critical checks on the validity of a site's SSL certificate are overlooked when users try to establish a secure connection.

Apple has hit back at critics who accused the firm of abandoning the enterprise with its latest Mac Pro.

The late-2013 model crams unprecedented levels of power into a gorgeous and portable 5kg frame. The 10in tall chassis is powered by an Intel Xeon processor and 2 x AMD FirePro graphics cards as standard. It's also capable of housing up to 64GB of RAM and an SSD up to 1TB in size.

The redesigned chassis is eye-catching but don't let the black colour fool you into thinking it's made from plastic. Apple's cylindrical box is crafted using premium Aluminium - which is anodised and coated to give it a gloss finish. It's so shiny, you'll be able to see your face it in.

This isn't the first cylindrical computer case - but when the internal layout is examined you'll see the implementation is unique.

Place the Mac Pro on your desk and you're guaranteed to get colleagues coming over to catch a glimpse. Members of the IT Pro team were imaginative with descriptions of the Mac Pro, comparing it with everything from wine coolers and ice-buckets, to biscuit tins and space-age dustbins. But they loved it really.

The heart of the beast

The single piece of machine Aluminium slides off without the need to detach any screws to reveal the innards.

Our review unit was made up of a single quad-core Intel Xeon E5 processor and 2 x AMD FirePro D300 graphics cards.

The processor was flanked by user accessible slots for RAM. We had 16GB of memory, and the Mac Pro is capable of housing up to 64GB of memory.

In typical Apple fashion, components have been customised to slot together neatly with rounded corners. The bespoke SSD (256GB in our case) was affixed onto the graphics card with a single screw.

The internal design of the Mac Pro is where the engineering team earned its money. Apple's "unified thermal core" is triangular. This shape acts as a funnel and allows all components to be cooled using a solitary fan on top of the device. In comparison, the previous generation Mac Pro had eight fans.

You may think a single large fan would make the Mac Pro loud, but this isn't the case. You'll struggle to hear the device even when it is being taxed to the maximum. If you're sitting in an air conditioned environment, the chances are you won't hear it at all.

Ports

A workstation needs to be kitted out with plenty of ports and the Mac Pro has a great selection. There are 4 x USB 3 connections, 2 x Ethernet jacks, 1 x HDMI and 6 x Thunderbolt 2.0 ports.

Thunderbolt 2 does bring advantages. The interface supports channel aggregation so two separate 10 Gbit/s channels can be combined into a single logical 20 Gbit/s channel. Each Thunderbolt port on the Mac Pro can support up to 6 storage devices - and a maximum of 36 devices can be daisy chained together.

Thunderbolt 2 is also able to transfer 4K video whilst displaying the ultra-high resolution content on a monitor at the same time.

You can connect up to three 4K displays to the machine - ideal for those carrying out complex tasks like editing video or 3D modelling. If you're not using 4K resolution, it's possible to hook up 6 cinema displays (2560 x 1400).

There's one disadvantage about having all the connections packed together. Once you start plugging in multiple cables, they can get tangled in a web and look messy. But this isn't going to affect the performance of the device.

Performance

When you're forking out over 2,000 for the unit, performance is expected to be top notch and the Mac Pro does not disappoint.

There's a choice between a 4,6,8 and 12-core Xeon processor and the graphics start with the AMD FirePro D300 series, upgradeable to the D700 range.

Apple claims its PCIe SSD provides read speeds of up to 1.2GB/s and write speeds top out at 1GB/s. We achieved maximum sequential read and write rates of 950MB/s and 780MB/s using the Blackmagic disk speed test for Mac. The speed is blistering - and it's noticeable when you're using VMs, and transcoding large files directly to the SSD.

When loading up the FurMark stress test - we were able to get a maximum of 80 FPS with our AMD FirePro D300 graphics cards (2GB vRAM each). This was 6x faster than the last 2013 MacBook Pro, which has Intel's integrated Iris graphics (1GB RAM).

The ability to render effects in real-time is where the Mac Pro stands out too. There's no waiting around for hours. Videos can be edited and processed quickly - especially if you're still using HD and haven't made the jump to 4K.

When using the Mac Pro for heavy workloads we saw temperatures top out at 71 degrees - with the outer shell becoming warm to the touch. However, even when under load for extensive periods of time - the fan remained whisper quiet. Most HD TVs and laptops are louder.

Bootcamp & Parallels

Despite attempts to benchmark the device using our standard set of tests - we were unable to install Windows on our Mac Pro using the BootCamp tool. During every Windows installation we were greeted with the error "Windows could not update the computer's boot configuration" and even a Windows recovery USB was unable to fix this problem.

This issue doesn't seem to be plaguing other devices as our sister site PC Pro was able to get Bootcamp to work on a 12-core model - and there aren't any reports in the Apple forums.

We didn't have any problems using Windows 8 via Parallels - so this is a workaround if you're in urgent need of Microsoft's OS.

Anyone buying this machine will be using OS X Mavericks - and we had no problems with Apple's defacto software. Besides, if you want to use Windows as your primary OS, the Mac Pro isn't for you.

Upgradeability

One of the core areas where the Mac Pro differs from other Apple products is upgradeability. This is the most end-user accessible product Apple has made, and we're sure Steve Wozniak would be proud to have his name attached to this machine.

Apple hasn't used any proprietary screws or glue. Core components like the fan, RAM and SSD are replaceable with minimum effort. Even the CPU is user-replaceable, although more fiddly.

Teardown website iFixit has given the late-2013 Mac Pro model a score of 8/10 - unheard of for Apple products especially when compared to the firm's other products. The MacBook Pro (late 2013) scored 1/10 and iPad Air was awarded 2/10 - making them a nightmare to repair.

Use cases

The Mac Pro will excel at video editing because it's dual-GPUs are setup to run with Final Cut Pro X. It's ability to handle 4K streams also gives it a degree of future proofing.

However, the Xeon CPU, AMD graphics cards and lightening quick SSD can also be used in a variety of other business sectors where large chunks of data need to be processed. We wouldn't be surprised to see this pop up in oil and gas industries or financial sectors.

Pricing

The Mac Pro isn't going to be for everyone - and this is reflected in the price point.

The base configuration starts off at 2,500 inc VAT. This buys you an Intel Xeon E5 quad-core chip running at 3.7GHz and with 10MB of L3 cache, 12GB of DDR3 ECC RAM and a 256GB PCIe flash storage drive. Graphics come in the form of two AMD Dual AMD FirePro D300 GPUs with 2GB of GDDR5 VRAM each.

Our review unit started at 2579 - and was equipped with the baseline quad-core Xeon E5 3.7GHz processor, 2 x AMD FirePro D300s with 2GB of vRAM, 16GB of RAM and a 256GB SSD.

The maximum spec will set you back an eye-watering 7779 - and this doesn't even include accessories.

Then you've got to factor in the cost of displays. Apple is selling a Sharp 31.5in 4K (3840 x 2160) display for 3,500. The firm also offers 27in Thunderbolt cinema displays for 900. Of course cheaper alternatives are available.

The Mac Pro might be expensive when when compared to Windows counterparts but it's not extortionate. A rival Dell Precision T5610 workstation packing a Xeon E5 six-core processor (2.1Ghz), Windows 7 Pro, 8GB of RAM, a 500GB hard drive and 3GB Nvidia Quadro K4000 graphics card costs 2,284.29. It might be cheaper, but it doesn't have SSDs or expandability via Thunderbolt.

Warranty options

Apple's after-sales support might not be as comprehensive as other vendors, but you still get online and 90-day phone support within the first year of the Apple warranty.

If you fork out another 199, you get three years of Applecare coverage - this includes onsite-repair requests and technical support over the phone. The Mac Pro, it's accessories such as SuperDrive and the power adaptor as well as RAM and Airport functionality are all covered under this.

Overall

Yes it's expensive - but after testing we feel the Mac Pro is worth it if you will utilise it to its full potential. Workstations have never looked so good and you get performance, upgradeability and portability as well.

The Mac Pro will work best for those in the video editing and 3D modelling fields but it is a versatile machine. If your business is using OS X products to process heavy duty workloads, then it will serve you well.

Verdict

If the Mac Pro was a sentient being, it would live by the mantra: Eat. Sleep. Conquer. Repeat. It’s not for everyone, but if you’re in the business of creating high-def multimedia or analysing large volumes of data you’ll struggle to find a better designed, portable, and powerful machine.

Processor: Intel Xeon E5 (3.7GHz) configurable up to 12-core processor (2.7GHz)

RAM: 12GB up to 64GB supported

Graphics: Dual AMD FirePro D300 graphics processors with 2GB of GDDR5 VRAM each. Customisable up to D700 with 6GB vRAM each

OS: OS X Mavericks 10.9.1

Storage: 256GB SDD up to 1TB SSD supported

Connectivity: 802.11ac Wi-Fi wireless networking; IEEE 802.11a/b/g/n compatible, Bluetooth 4

Ports: 4 x USB 3, 6 x Thunderbolt 2, Dual Gigabit Ethernet, 1 x HDMI 1.4

Weight: 5kg

Dimensions: 251mm height, 167mm diameter

The battle between Windows and OS X is one of the fiercest in technology, with advocates from both sides insisting their OS is superior.

Both have their advantages, and we aim to help you find out which is best suited to your needs. We've used Windows 8 and Mac OS X Mountain Lion as the basis for our comparison. With upgrades including Windows 8.1 and OS X Mavericks due to land later this year, we've also included features you can expect in the forthcoming releases.

User Interface

Most PC users have grown up with the classic Windows desktop UI, including the Start menu, taskbar and windows. That's all changed with Windows 8: the desktop is hidden behind the touch-focussed Start screen, and the Start button was scrapped in the initial release.

Windows 8 is one of the biggest changes in the history of the OS, and a clear indication of Microsoft's intentions to try and modernise the UI. The focus is on the large finger-friendly Live Tiles and finger-friendly menus.

The desktop remains largely unchanged, to the relief of power users. Microsoft's changes mean the new OS works well with touchscreen devices but, for business users without touch functionality, it's awkward: the Start screen is tricky to use with a mouse and keyboard, the Start screen's full-screen apps aren't conducive to multi-monitor working, and we're no fans of switching between the Start screen and the desktop.

Thankfully, Microsoft has listened to some of the scathing feedback and changes will be released in the autumn via a Windows 8.1 update.

The free update will allow Windows 8 to boot directly to the desktop, which bypasses the Start screen entirely. A Start button has been added, although it's still impotent compared to the original. A left-click allows users to jumps back between the Start screen and desktop. A more useful right-click brings up a set of shortcuts to access features such as the Control Panel or Task Manager. However, the list of programs appears gone for good.

The Start screen itself hasn't been left alone, with more versatile split-screen options to aid multitasking, more Live Tile sizes and better search.

The end result should be an OS that's a more comfortable mix between traditional Windows and the touch-focussed future, even if it's more of a compromise than Microsoft would like. That means Windows 8.1 will be much easier to use for office workers who use keyboard and mouse, prefer multiple monitors and like to work with several applications at once.

Apple doesn't make sweeping changes to OS X, instead introducing incremental upgrades every year. The latest version retains the familiar taskbar full of icons at the bottom of the screen, and the OS remains based on a traditional desktop full of windows. The Finder app is used to navigate documents, applications and the file system, and a bar at the top of the screen houses notifications, networking information and menus unique to each application. Ironically, some Windows users may feel more at home with OS X than Windows 8, at least initially.

The current version, Mountain Lion, introduced the Notification Center, Messages app and automatic application updates. MobileMe was replaced by iCloud, which handles storage and synchronisation of email, contacts, photos across OS X and the iOS platforms.

Mavericks is the next version of OS X and it will be the first to be named after Californian places rather than big cats. Multiple display will support be upgraded, the Mission Control app supports multiple workspaces, and Finder now works with tabs. Mavericks will also add iBooks and iMaps apps to the desktop, and brings several other tweaks including interactive notifications and an encrypted iCloud Keychain. The latter aims to encrypt passwords, save them and then automatically populate them.

It's no coincidence that many of OS X's latest features have been borrowed from iOS, but OS X's UI is firmly rooted to keyboards and mice. Concessions to touch have been made, but they've sensibly been left on trackpads: slick gestures can be used to scroll, zoom and open the Mission Control app.

If Microsoft wasn't introducing the upgrades with Windows 8.1 then Apple would be taking home the prize in this category. But Microsoft's changes including boot-to-desktop, more Start screen versatility and the return of a Start button give Redmond the edge. Just.

WINNER: Microsoft

Software

Windows and OS X come bundled with a range of basic software to handle email, media and tasks such as word processing.

Both systems have email clients that support Microsoft Exchange ActiveSync, Yahoo, Gmail and Hotmail, but Apple's software edges ahead due to its versatility. It's got better tools for organising email into different folders and categories and, unlike Windows 8's Mail app, Apple's software supports POP3 mailboxes. Windows 8.1 will improve the native Mail app, but we're not sure that it'll be enough to overhaul the native OS X client.

Several Apple applications are wrapped in to its iLife package. The iMovie utility is more versatile than Microsoft's pre-packaged Movie Maker, and Windows 8 offers no serious rival to the GarageBand audio recording app. Windows 8's photo app can't compete with iPhoto either. Apple's software includes better editing options, but we do expect the gap close in Windows 8.1 thanks to an editing app with Android-style radial controls.

OS X also includes the program everyone loves to hate - iTunes. This hosts the biggest media store on the planet while Microsoft's selection of media is still up and coming. Microsoft has done itself no favours by removing DVD codecs from Windows 8. If you want to watch DVDs you'll have to download a third-party app or spend 7 on Windows Media Center. While Apple is removing optical drives from many of its computers they can currently still play DVDs if you hook up a drive.

Windows 8 and OS X have equally competent contact-management tools. Microsoft's acquisition and integration of Skype allows it to counter Apple's Messages tool. Neither operating systems have a true advantage when it comes to office tasks: both have basic word processing software installed, so you'll have to pay for the good stuff.

Both systems also place plenty of stock in cloud integration. A Microsoft account syncs contacts and docs across devices to SkyDrive and 7GB of free storage is available as standard. It's also available as an app for Windows Phone 8, Android and iOS. Apple's iCloud only works with fruit-themed devices, but it handles contacts, calendars, mail, photos, music, bookmarks, apps and documents. The Mavericks update will include password storage and encryption.

Web browsing is handled by Internet Explorer 10 and Safari, respectively. The former's Modern UI version is clunky to use and the desktop version has a built-in Adobe Flash player, while the latter provides synchronised browsing across OS X and iOS devices and improved privacy features. Windows 8.1 is expected to introduce Internet Explorer 11 but, aside from development changes, nothing's known about the new browser. The next version of Safari promises performance together with improved integration with social networks.

To install Windows 8's Modern UI apps you'll have to head to the Windows Store. At the moment it's not a pretty sight due to a dearth of high-quality software, and it pales in comparison to Apple's Mac App Store, which has better content and is also used by Apple to distribute updates. Windows 8.1 will see a redesigned Windows Store launched, but that won't immediately fix the lack of quality.

Both operating systems have the tools to get going on day one, but it's Apple that takes the victory in this category. Its Mail app and much of its media software is better than Windows 8's equivalents at least at the moment and it's got a better app store.

WINNER: Apple

Different editions

There's no doubt OS X is easier to understand when it comes to the different versions because there aren't any. Mountain Lion is version 10.8, and it costs 14 to upgrade as long as your device runs OS X 10.6 or later.

It's a different story when it comes to Windows 8. Microsoft sells four versions: a standard edition, Pro and Enterprise releases, and an ARM-based RT variant. None are cheap: the standard version costs 70, Pro software is 108 for an OEM version, and the Enterprise edition is only available by talking to Microsoft directly. Volume licensing options are available, but at least you don't have to buy an expensive Apple machine in order to run the software.

The basic version of Windows 8 is designed for home users, the Pro variant adds Remote Desktop, Windows Server options, encryption tools and BitLocker, and the Enterprise edition installs Windows To Go, virtualisation utilities and several tools designed for bigger businesses.

Windows 8 RT is a cut-down version of the OS designed for devices powered by ARM processors. It only comes pre-installed on tablets and hybrid machines, and includes touch-optimised versions of Office 2013's Word, Excel, PowerPoint and OneNote applications. The downside is that RT only runs apps installed from the Windows Store, so desktop apps won't work.

Apple takes the crown on simplicity, upgrade price is cheaper than Microsoft's current offerings. There's no chance of getting confused by different OS X versions that pack in different features and work on different hardware.

WINNER: Apple

Business features

Microsoft has its roots in business, so it's no surprise that the Pro and Enterprise versions are packed with features design to thrive in the office.

Pro users get Remote Desktop for both client and host, BitLocker and EFS, partial app sideloading, VHD booting, domain and group policy tools and Hyper-V. Enterprise users get a little more: AppLocker, Windows To Go, BranchCache and virtualisation tools are all included.

The standard version of Microsoft's OS has multi-monitor support, an improved Task Manager and Exchange ActiveSync support not strictly business features but ones that help end users.

It's a good start, and Windows 8.1 will add even more. There's support for wireless secondary displays, auto-triggered VPNs, NFC pairing with printers and the ability for devices with mobile broadband to function as wireless hotspots. IT departments will also be able to standardise Start screen apps across swathes of corporate computers.

Apple used to differentiate its consumer and enterprise software with separate OS X Server releases but this stopped with the release of Mountain Lion. Instead, the tools and administration utilities included in the OS are now rolled in to a 20 management app called Server. It's the same situation for Mavericks, which will feature improved networking options and performance tweaks.

Apple's lack of different OS X versions means it's not quite as stacked with business features as Windows 8, so it's Microsoft that still takes the crown in business.

WINNER: Microsoft

Performance

Apple designs and makes all its own hardware and is more ruthless when it comes to cutting off hardware support compared to Microsoft. Only devices that run OS X 10.6 or above can upgrade to Mountain Lion, which means nothing released before 2007 can officially use the latest OS. The forthcoming Mavericks release will be compatible with the same hardware.

This approach theoretically guarantees a base-level of performance when running OS X, and we've never experienced sluggishness when using Apple gear. The latest MacBooks and iMacs have all been beefy enough to handle intensive applications, and OS X has been consistently smooth.

Battery life depends on hardware, but MacBook owners should take longevity into account if they're planning on dual-booting a machine with OS X and Windows using Boot Camp. While battery life is about what we'd expect in OS X, it drops dramatically in Windows: our last MacBook Pro review saw an OS X battery life of 10hrs 34mins drop to 4hrs 32mins when running Windows on it.

Mavericks won't be released until the Autumn, but we've no doubt it'll run as smoothly as Mountain Lion. Features already announced include the ability to "sleep" apps that aren't being used and compress RAM data from inactive apps to free up memory for use elsewhere.

Microsoft has worked hard to make Windows 8 run at acceptable levels on a huge variety of devices, and the versatility of the new OS is commendable. However, the sheer number of products with varying specs using Windows 8 means that it's not always a smooth experience. The Start screen judders when it's using weak processors, and low memory makes search and navigation feel slow.

It's a close-run thing between operating systems that are designed with different performance goals in mind: Windows 8 is built to work on everything from low-powered ARM and Intel's Atom chips to the beefed up Core i7s and for the most part it works well, despite occasional performance hiccups. OS X is only allowed near the fastest Core i5 and Core i7 parts and is often given a helping hand by high-end graphics cards and SSDs.

Apple's software is slick and responsive, but Microsoft should be equally applauded for building a system able to run across such a wide variety of devices. It's a draw.

WINNER: Draw

Security features

Security is a sore point for Windows fans and a weakness which Apple devotees use to claim OS X is superior. Apple's OS is rarely subjected to attacks because of its UNIX underpinnings and smaller user base.

However, the growing popularity of Apple hardware means hackers are trying harder than ever to find vulnerabilities in OS X. Cupertino has responded with Gatekeeper, which is a system that checks the unique codes in each application you install to your Mac in order to prevent malicious software from sneaking in.

Elsewhere, Apple uses its App Sandbox to filter out malicious code, runtime protection, encryption options, parental controls and privacy and phishing tools in Safari. There's also iCloud, which can be used to track down stolen or lost hardware.

Microsoft is trying to beef up security too. It's built in Defender app works in the background to protect against spyware and malware, but its free Security Essentials antivirus tool returned "dire" results when tested by our sister title PC Pro it's simply not good enough to protect your PC.

Options included in the standard version of Windows 8 are understandably designed for consumers. Secure boot prevents malicious software from accessing the PC before Windows even loads, picture passwords can be used with gestures to log in, and PIN numbers can also be used. There are parental controls, too.

Other security features are only available to those who use Pro and Enterprise versions of Windows 8. Encryption, Group Policy and domain options are only supported by Windows 8 Pro, and AppLocker, Network File System tools and Group Policy options are only available to Enterprise-level users.

OS X is the more secure of the two operating systems, but Apple hasn't rested on its laurels and has introduced several security tools and features. Microsoft has plenty of its own tools as well as several business utilities, but the awful performance of its Security Essentials package means that this round goes to the Mac.

WINNER: Apple

The Future

Equipping an office with computers means it's worth considering the future for your OS of choice. If you've bought Windows 8 then you're in luck: Microsoft won't be ending mainstream support until January 2018, and extended support won't run out until all the way in 2023 so you can safely use Windows 8 even though it will have been superseded by newer versions of the OS.

Apple will likely support Mountain Lion and Mavericks for many years to come, but Cupertino's locked-down approach means that you'll only be able to upgrade to later versions of OS X if your hardware's good enough. So when your colleagues are running a fully supported version of Windows 8 at the start of 2018 it's extremely unlikely that you'll be able to upgrade to the latest version of OS X.

Apple's software will continue to run smoothly on high-end hardware, but it also means that OS X-based machines will lag behind in just a few years. Microsoft's approach wins for business thanks to machines that can be maintained and supported for over a decade.

WINNER: Microsoft

Verdict

So it's 4 - 4 in the categories, but which OS do we pick as the overall winner?

Apple OS X has better apps, tighter security and works well on high-end hardware, so it's ideal for smaller businesses, sole traders, creative types and those don't need the corporate features served up by Microsoft. Windows still has the better UI, more versatility, enhanced business features, and longevity making it better for bigger medium and larger businesses.

We're quite capable of installing our own security software so we don't have to suffer with Microsoft Security Essentials and, when it comes to productivity, a copy of Office running on Windows is superior to the Mac alternative.

Windows pulls ahead in other important areas, too. Its business features lead the way, and Windows 8.1 irons out several of the issues we initially had with the UI while making the controversial Start screen more versatile and less intrusive.

OVERALL WINNER: Microsoft

Apple has released a fix for its mid2013 MacBook Air range to tackle three problems including a flickering screen bug, volume inconsistencies and Wi-Fi connectivity issues.

"This update fixes an issue that in rare instances may cause an intermittent loss in wireless connectivity, an issue with Adobe Photoshop which may cause occasional screen flickering, and an issue which may cause audio volume to fluctuate during video playback," the firm said in the release notes.

Users began to experience the flickering screen when the brush tool was set to over 100px in Photoshop, and it was suggested the issue was related to either a driver or the GPU.

Meanwhile, the Wi-Fi connection issue appears to be more widespread than Apple is making out. Several hundred users have taken to the Apple forum to share their problems and the thread has been viewed over 86,000 times.

Some users report that Wi-Fi drops out after a few minutes of connection and they need to restart their machine to fix the problems. Others report the signal still shows full strength but there is no connection.

This network issue appears to be related to the use of the latest 802.11ac Wi-Fi standard, which aims to boost connection speeds and bandwidth.

It's not like Apple to leave one of its machines without any design changes from one year to the next, but that's exactly what's happened with the latest version of the Mac mini.

Although things may appear the same on the outside, things have been beefed up within.

The key upgrades include the debut of the Fusion Drive and introduction of Intel Ivy Bridge processors. These help to ensure this is the best-performing Mac mini ever, but you wouldn't know it at first glance - this year's model looks identical to its predecessor, and its dimensions have remained the same: 197mm wide, and with a height of just 36mm.

It's not ugly or dated: the curved corners, flat top and aluminium construction ensure it's better looking than every small-form-factor business machine. Build quality is beyond reproach too.

Fusion Drive was introduced in the latest iMac, is the Fusion Drive. The concept is similar to Intel's Smart Responsive Technology, but it goes one step further by strapping a 128GB SSD to a 1TB hard disk. That's double the amount of space supported by Intel's system, and it works in a much more advanced way: OS X and key applications are stored on the SSD for increased responsiveness, while rarely-used software is relegated to the hard disk to preserve system performance.

OS X manages interaction between the SSD and hard disk by itself, so there's no way for the user to intervene. Out-of-the-box, the OS and several of Apple's key apps are installed to the SSD, and the system monitors your behaviour over time - if apps aren't used, they're moved to the hard disk. New software is automatically installed to the SSD as long as there's room.

Windows users aren't able to access these benefits, however. Those installing Microsoft's OS via Apple's Boot Camp are only able to partition the hard disk.

The benefits of the Fusion Drive will only become obvious over time, but we're still able to test the raw speed of the SSD thanks to OS X benchmarking tool Xbench. The drive scored 277MB/s and 315MB/s in Xbench's sequential read and write benchmarks - much quicker than even the fastest hard disk, even if it's not able to match the 302MB/s and 364MB/s of the Fusion Drive in the latest iMac.

Specification and performance

Apple's other hardware update also follows in the iMac's footsteps, with Ivy Bridge processors replacing the Sandy Bridge technology employed in older Mac minis. There's no sign of desktop chips here, though - this PC is too small, so Apple has had to turn to Intel's mobile parts.

That's not to say the Core i7-3720QM used in this particular Mac mini is found wanting in the power department. Its base clock of 2.6GHz is reasonable, it's got four physical cores, and its Turbo Boost stats are impressive: all four cores can hit a peak of 3.4GHz, with one core able to go an additional 200MHz faster.

The chip is aided by 4GB of DDR3 RAM and scored 0.93 in our benchmarks. That's barely behind the 0.96 scored by the latest iMac, and it's a much more impressive score than the 0.72 result of the Core i5 chip in 2011's machine.

There's enough application power to handle all but the most demanding of business software, but don't expect the Mac mini to handle graphical tasks just as well. Intel's HD 4000 graphics chip scored a mediocre 57fps in our Low-quality Crysis test, and there's now no option to included a discrete GPU. That's a poorer result than the last Mac mini, which had an AMD Radeon HD 6630M and scored 69fps in our Low-quality benchmark.

It's easy to see why Apple hasn't chosen more powerful parts than the Core i7 included here - when tested in both OS X and Windows, the quad-core chip peaked at around 100C. That's almost at the thermal envelope of this particular part and, while the system never became unstable, it's a cause for concern. Power draw was more impressive, though, with the system idling at just 18W and peaking at 73W.

Familiar surroundings

The ports are still collected on a black panel across the rear of the machine. This year's quartet of USB ports have been upgraded to USB 3, and they're partnered by HDMI and Thunderbolt connections. There are Gigabit Ethernet and FireWire sockets, two 3.5mm audio jacks, and an SD card reader.

Internal access is limited like all Apple products, but the Mac mini is still more accessible than say an iPad or an iPhone. The Mac mini is opened by rotating and removing a black plastic disc from the base, and at first glance only the two memory sockets are accessible. They were both already occupied in our review model, but they're able to accept up to 16GB of DDR3 memory. It doesn't have to be Apple memory, either, which is handy - upgrading from 4GB to 16GB of RAM at the point of sale adds a hefty 240 to the cost.

The hard disk can be accessed, but this is trickier - the fan on top of the processor has to be removed, and this part of the machine is held in place by Torx screws.

Upgrades

The expensive memory upgrade isn't the only choice to be made at the checkout.The basic 499 version includes a Core i5 processor and a 500GB hard disk, and the more expensive 679 machine includes a 2.3GHz Core i7 chip and a 1TB hard disk.

The cheapest model can only be enhanced with the expensive memory upgrade, and the 679 machine is more versatile. Upgrading to the 2.6GHz Core i7 we've tested adds 80 to the price, fitting the 1TB Fusion Drive costs an extra 200, and adding a 256GB SSD and foregoing a hard disk at all will cost an additional 240. None of these upgrades are cheap, and it brings our review sample in at 959 - almost twice the amount we'd expect to pay for plenty of other small-form-factor systems.

The third of this year's Mac mini models is designed for businesses. The server edition includes the 2.3GHz Core i7 processor alongside a pair of 1TB hard disks and a copy of OS X Server, but the price starts at a formidable 849. It's gots its own high-end storage upgrade, too: fitting the machine with a pair of 256GB SSDs adds 480 to the price.

Conclusion

Apple's upgrades don't come cheap - and we're not sure of their worth to most businesses. The Fusion Drive and Core i7 processors are impressive bits of hardware, but they're luxury additions - in every day use, the more modest Mac mini will be ample for almost everyone.

Although our review unit offered up high performance the 799 ex VAT price is not going to attract mass deployment. We'd opt for the 499 version as you're still getting much of what makes the Mac mini great: unmatched build quality, great design and plenty of power.

Verdict

Apple's Mac mini doesn't look any different to last year's version, but this doesn't matter because the design and build quality is outstanding. The Fusion Drive is a luxurious addition and Ivy Bridge upgrades provide plenty of power but these optional upgrades don't come cheap - unless you've got money to burn, the low-end models are more affordable and almost as impressive.

OS: Apple OS X Mountain Lion

PROCESSOR: 2.6GHz Intel Core i7-3720QM

RAM: 16GB DDR3

STORAGE: Apple Fusion Drive

CONNECTIVITY: Gigabit Ethernet, dual-band 802.11n WiFi, Bluetooth 4.0

PORTS: 4 x USB 3, ThunderBolt, FireWire, SD card reader

DIMENSIONS: 197 x 197 x 36mm (WxDxH)

Apple continues to make headway into the business environment with every release of the Mac, but there are times when you still need Windows. To get the best of both worlds it is possible to run Windows virtually on OS X.

The latest version of Parallels Desktop 8 for Mac support major versions of Microsoft operating system up to and including Windows 8. The software has also been updated to take advantages of new features following the release of Mountain Lion.

Parallels 8 allows you to run Windows 8 on your Mac

Parallels is well-designed and allows beginners and advanced users to switch between running Windows and Mac without having to reboot. As with most, if not all, virtualisation products, the amount of memory you have on your computer will determine how fast the guest OS will run or how many instances you can run at any one time.

At 39 (on Amazon), Parallels is considerably more expensive than VMware Fusion 5 (priced at 12.99) and Oracle's Virtualbox, which is available for free. So is the price worth the install? Well one factor is the ease at which you can install the guest OS.

After installing the virtualisation software the software provides a few options to create a virtual machine. These are: install Windows, install an OS from DVD or image file, migrate Windows from a PC, or use Windows from Boot Camp.

There are other options for non-Windows OSs such as Chrome, Ubuntu, or the Android OS, installing OS X Lion using the recovery partition, or adding an existing virtual machine.

We installed the software on a Mac running OS X Lion, and then loaded up Windows 8. The software then asks if you want to configure the guest OS to run like a PC or a Mac.

The latest version works well to integrate Windows apps with the Mac. In Coherence mode, apps can be put on the Mac Launchpad and run in its own window on the Mac desktop. You can run Windows in its own separate desktop window, if you wish to as well. In either case, you can drag and drop icons and files as well as cut and paste between the Mac and Windows.

Parallels 8 is optimised for Mountain Lion so will feature tweaks such as an "open in IE" button in OS X Safari as well as support for Mountain Lion Notifications and gestures. New Dictation features across both Mountain Lion and Windows can be used as well as sharing Bluetooth connections across Windows and Mac devices.

Working with Windows 8 running virtually on a Mac is functionally no different to running it on bare metal. The virtual PC can join Windows domains in the same way without any problems. Any USB devices attached to the Mac can be configured to connect to the guest OS. Inserting a USB device prompts Parallels to ask if you want to use it with the Mac or Windows.

As with previous version, Parallels 8 lets users take snapshots of the guest OS, so that should the worse happen and the OS gets trashed you can roll back to a previous working version of the OS and continue working with as minimal impact as possible. This is handy given Windows propensity towards malware as well as for testing beta software.

Overall, this is a reasonable attempt at giving users virtualisation on the desktop while keeping it simple. As operating systems and applications tend to use more memory with every new version, this runs better with more memory, even if Parallels itself has a small footprint.

Parallels 8 may be easy to use but other virtualisation products for Mac (such as VMware Fusion and Virtualbox) offer more options in terms of customisation.

Verdict

An easy to use piece of software which supports Windows 8, but Parallels 8 is let down by the price, especially when competiting products offer more functionality.

Intel-based Mac with Intel Core 2 Duo processor or higher required (Intel Core Solo and Core Duo processors are no longer supported)

Minimum 2GB of RAM (4GB or more recommended)

700 MB hard drive space for Parallels Desktop installation, plus space to allocate your virtual machine

A DVD drive

Backup software included

Requires Windows or other operating system (not included)

Apple's OS X 10.8 Mountain Lion update was overshadowed by the company's iOS 6 update for iPad and iPhone at WWDC 2012.

However, we've had a chance to have an in-depth look and it's one of the most substantial Mac updates yet and the cheapest.

Download and installation

Apple firmware updates are usually plagued with problems, whether you're trying to update your iPod, iPhone or Mac. So we weren't surprised to see Mountain Lion had installation issues.

As soon as the update was released, we tried downloading it via Apple's App Store (the only way you can purchase the update) on our mid-2011 iMac running Snow Leopard, but lo and behold, we kept getting an error.

A Twitter follower suggested we update all the other apps using App Store. After agreeing to some new terms and conditions and updating payment details, the download finally sprang into life.

The monster 4.34GB update took an hour to complete and 30 minutes to install. We've never been so happy to see the welcome screen after which we were prompted to enter our Apple ID details.

Upon checking our storage space, 4GB extra capacity had been freed up, and this will be welcomed by users, who have a device such as a MacBook Air where internal storage is limited.

User interface

Mission Control's neat interface makes it a cinch to check which windows you have open and switch between apps if you want more detail than just to see what's open.

Launch Pad is much the same as on Snow Leopard, allowing you to see all your downloaded apps in one place. We did find many of the apps were repeated in there if we'd installed a new version, and there's no way to de-dupe these we could find.

The search bar is located just above the iTunes icon on the screen

There is now a search bar at the top of the Launcher, which makes it much easier to find something rather than scrolling through never-ending pages of applications.

The final notable interface tweak is that the spinning wheel has changed colour. It's no longer a multi-coloured assault on your eyes, but a shaded blue circle, making it much less frustrating when you have to wait for a slow application to kick into action.

MessagesApple has updated iChat with its Messages application, which works fantastically and could be useful it you're looking to set up a company-wide IM infrastructure.

It works with iMessage so can be used with iOS devices, plus third party programs such as Google Talk, AIM, Jammer and Yahoo. You can, of course, send files via Message, but be warned some file types aren't compatible across all devices.

iChat is compatible with Google Talk, AIM, Jammer and Yahoo clients making cross platform communication possible

A Word document will not be compatible with an iPhone, for example. If you wanted to share a document, you would need to convert it to the Pages format and ensure the recipient has Pages on their iOS device.

Security

Mac OS X Mountain Lion features two new security features in the form of Gatekeeper and Find My Mac.

Gatekeeper blocks you from downloading applications from anywhere other than the App Store, which may not be so useful if your IT department installs software. You can of course tweak the settings to override this, but it defeats the object.

We found it best to adjust the settings on Gatekeeper

A third setting is your best bet it allows you to download applications from the App Store and those from recognised developers, but these developers must have signed a certificate, which is reverting back to the old school ways of ensuring apps are harmless.

Whether all high profile software manufacturers will be on-board is yet to be seen.

The good news is any of the applications you already have running on your computer before the update will automatically be signed off, as will those you install from other sources and give the OK to manually.

Find My Mac forms part of the iCloud service and for the first time on a Mac update, you're prompted to set up the service when you install Mountain Lion. Although the software does not seem as relevant on a Mac computer. An iPhone, more likely to be stolen/lost, plus there's also the problem that if an iMac is stolen, for example, it wouldn't remain on and traceable whilst in transit.

The management feature allows you to lock or wipe your Mac remotely, when it is connected to the internet. As soon as it is located, you can send a message to the computer that will flash up as a dialogue box to warn the thief you know where it is.

Safari

Safari has been updated in Mountain Lion for the handful of users who still have it set as their default browser. Apple's built in browser has struggled to keep up with its competition in the form of Chrome and Firefox, so the revamped interface and features are welcome here.

The Tabbed view displays all the open tabs in a smartphone multitasking-style interface. The open tabs are presented side-by-side and you can swipe through these if you're using a MacBook with multitouch, or the Magic Mouse. It's not the most intuitive way of navigating, but it soon becomes second nature.

It is possible to swipe through tabs with the latest version of Safari

The updated Reading List function allows you to download pages rather than just bookmark them, so if one article runs over a certain number of pages (like this review), Safari will detect this and download the whole article, not just page one.

iCloud integration allows you to view all the tabs you have open across all your iCloud devices, so if you have four tabs open on your home Mac, the function will mirror these on your desktop. Apple understands that not everyone will remember to add a page to their Reading List, so this allows you to read the content if you didn't manage to finish an article before leaving for work. It only works when your computer is online though, so we recommend using Reading List to the max.

Sharing options include the ability to share articles on Twitter or send the whole article, rather than a link, via iMessage in a Safari Reading List rendered page layout. It's handy to have this extra option, because you can't guarantee everyone will click on the link in an email or message.

Syncing and account management

Apple is pushing iCloud with Mountain Lion, and the move to the cloud is welcomed, especially with competitors such as Google and Microsoft increasing rolling out services.

You are asked to add your iCloud details when you first install Mountain Lion and we recommend you do, because you get a whole lot of bang for your buck here almost eradicating the need to install Microsoft's Office 360 suite.

All your iCloud synced documents are organised in the iCloud Document Library. If you use TextEdit for typing or Preview to view PDFs, it's a godsend, allowing you to store your text docs and PDFs directly to your iCloud account.

These will then be synced to any iCloud device (iPad, iPhone, iPod Touch) to view and edit on the move. It does make productivity on a Mac top class.

An irritating aspect of iCloud is that unlike Dropbox or similar cloud storage products, you don't get one universal cloud documents folder. Instead there is one for each application. It's presented in that way to make it feel more like the applications are in the cloud rather than just the documents.

Notifications

If you use all of Apple's built-in applications, such as Reminders (yes, Mountain Lion has the iOS 5-style Reminders application too). Messages, iCal, Mail and Facetime, it's a fantastic addition to keep you up to date with everything, whether you're working in an app, browsing your desktop or on a Skype call.

Pop ups will appear when you receive new mail or there's a notification for you to take care of. You can also access the notifications bar by clicking on the icon in the top right hand corner toolbar. Click on an individual notification, and that app will open.

If you don't want to be disturbed, you can turn the notifications off with a toggle switch. They will automatically turn back on 24 hours later just in case you forget to reinstate them.

We've been using Growl for the past year and it doesn't seem to do a whole lot more than that, but having a built-in feature is not something to be growled at.

The notifications bar looks identical to the one in iOS, with the hatched backdrop, so it will feel familiar (if a little 70s) to iPhone and iPad users.

Dictation

The speech is supposed to be translated instantly, but we found this feature to be unimpressive. After hearing the double dings, we spoke, pressed done and nothing happened. After five attempts, we gave up.

We have read you're only limited to a couple of sentences per dictation, which limits the uses of the function severely.

Overall

With the exception of Messages, Gatekeeper and Notifications, none of the updates make the device more suited to businesses. Messages is useful if your business deploys iOS device and Gatekeeper is handy if your company has an open installation policy as it limits the damage that can be done by untrusted applications. Notifications are great if you don't already use Growl.

We were disappointed to see dictation didn't work, as this could prove particularly useful if you use a MacBook and want to take notes. Downloading and installing the software is also a tedious process, but thankfully it is only needed once a year.

IT Pro verdict

Verdict

Mac OS X Mountain Lion brings more than 200 new features to the table. Apple has done a good job of porting over core iOS features such as Notifications.

However, the majority of the changes are hidden, we didn't notice any boost in performance and Dictation was disappointing. We felt Mountain Lion makes things look a more like iOS, but £13.99, it is still worth the upgrade.

OS X v10.6.8 or later

2GB of memory

8GB of available space

Compatible models:

Mac (Mid 2007 or newer)

MacBook (Late 2008 Aluminum, or Early 2009 or newer)

MacBook Pro (Mid/Late 2007 or newer)

Xserve (Early 2009)

MacBook Air (Late 2008 or newer)

Mac mini (Early 2009 or newer)

Mac Pro (Early 2008 or newer)

Software vendor Adobe has announced an update for its popular Flash Player.

The new version fixes a number of security holes, including critical vulnerabilities that could result in memory corruption, stack overflows, security bypasses, null dereferencing and DLL hijacking.

Most of the addressed flaws deal with problems that could help hackers execute code on a user's machine.

These updates address vulnerabilities that could cause a crash or allow an attacker to take control of an affected system.

It also includes enhancements to the security of the code on a variety of platforms.

For instance, the Windows version of Flash Player now sports a production version of Flash Player Protected Mode for Firefox. This sandboxes the code in the browser, making it more difficult for hackers to access other processes on a user's machine.

"These updates address vulnerabilities that could cause a crash and potentially allow an attacker to take control of the affected system," said Adobe in an advisory.

Mac users get silent updating in the background. This runs a daemon on the machine every hour to check for updates on Adobe's servers. When updates are available, it downloads them once a response has been obtained.

This feature can be disabled in the Flash Player preferences menu.

Adobe has also signed the code on the Mac version in readiness for the Mac OS X release of Mountain Lion.

The next version of Apple's operating system will feature "GateKeeper". This is designed to protect users from malware while downloading applications on to their computers.

"Starting with Flash Player 11.3, Adobe has started signing releases for Mac OS X using an Apple Developer ID certificate," said Brad Arkin, Adobe's senior director of security, products and services, on a company blog.

When the Gatekeeper function is set to 'Mac App Store and identified developers,' end-users would "be able to install Flash Player without being blocked," added Arkin.

Flash Player on Windows and Macintosh will get updated to version 11.3.300.257, while Linux gets updated to 11.2.202.236. All previous versions should be treated as vulnerable to attack from criminals.

A flaw in Apple's new OS lets those with access to a Mac running Lion change passwords without knowing the user's login details, a researcher has claimed.

In previous versions of the Apple OS, users wanting to change passwords had to enter their login information before making alterations.

Why crack hashes when you can just change the password directly?

Now that step is not needed, thanks to insecure permissions in the Mac OS X Lion's local directory service, researcher Patrick Dunstan said, writing on the Defense in Depth blog.

"Why crack hashes when you can just change the password directly?" Dunstan said. "It appears Directory Services in Lion no longer requires authentication when requesting a password change for the current user."

Dunstan also claimed it was possible to access other users' password hashes and therefore steal their login information.

In previous versions of Mac OS X, only those with root access were allowed to view so-called shadow files, which contain hashes and salts used to encrypt passwords.

Although non-root users cannot access the shadow file directly, they can still gain access to information in it by extracting data from the directory services on the OS. All that needs to be done is type in the right command into Terminal to get that information, the researcher claimed.

"The interesting thing about this? Root privileges are not required," Dunstan added. "All users on the system, regardless of privilege, have the ability to access the ShadowHashData attribute from any other user's profile."

A brute force attack could be used to crack passwords once the hash and salt are acquired.

Comments on the blog showed some claiming to have exploited the flaw successfully, whilst others were unable to do so.

At the time of publication, Apple had not responded to a request for comment on the alleged vulnerability.

Microsoft may rule the roost when it comes to desktop operating systems, but Apple has been staging a strong fight back with the combination of OS X and its desirable hardware. Now, with the latest version of the Unix-based OS, 10.7 or Lion, we thought it was time to compare the two to see what they have to offer and find out which is best for business.

It's a little strange to compare the two operating systems directly, as Apple's OS can't be divorced from its hardware and you can't buy Lion separately to install instead of Windows 7. That said, if you're looking at changing the computers you've currently got you may be wondering if it's time to switch people over from Windows to OS X, or vice versa.

Licensing

Microsoft offers discounts for Volume Licensing for businesses, with a wide variety of different options. It can be a little tricky to navigate the confusing website to find out which package you need, but prices for Windows 7 Professional start at 123.53 per license for 20 PCs. These licenses aren't actually full versions, but upgrade versions of the OS, requiring that your existing PCs already have a licensed version of Windows already installed.

OS X Lion costs 21 per computer to upgrade.

By comparison, OS X Lion costs 21 per computer to upgrade, which sounds considerably cheaper. For companies purchasing Lion through Apple's Volume Licensing scheme, there is a minimum 20 seat order. However, OS X 10.7 Lion can only be upgraded from 10.6 Snow Leopard, which is itself a 26 upgrade. This means the actual price of Lion costs between 21 and 47 a computer depending on which version of OS X you have. There are no further discounts from Apple, and there's just the one version of OS X for consumers and businesses alike. It's fair to say that Mac hardware is more expensive than standard PC hardware, so you need to factor in this cost, too.

Installation

Installation of Windows is one of its strong points, particularly for businesses. With slipstreaming, it's possible to create new installation media that contains the latest updates, while Microsoft's own Automated Installation Kit tools let you create custom automatic install discs. For businesses, this is extremely important, as it means that getting the OS to install is no longer a pain-staking process. Once you've got your install disc set up, it's pretty easy from there on.

Lion is the first OS X update that is distributed exclusively through the App Store.

With OS X Lion, installation is a little bit trickier. Technically speaking, OS X Lion requires an OS X Snow Leopard installation, as it's distributed using the Mac App Store (or with a new computer), which was only introduced with Snow Leopard. In addition, the license agreement states that only Snow Leopard computers can be upgraded to Lion; if you don't have this version of the OS, you have to upgrade to Snow Leopard first.

There is a way round this, as once OS X Lion has been downloaded from the App Store, the image can be extracted and burnt to DVD. This DVD can then install Lion on any compatible Intel-based Mac with any version of the OS (apart from the new Sandy Bridge Mac Mini and MacBook Air models). For copies of Lion purchased through the Volume Licensing scheme, Lion can be deployed using a mass deployment/installation tool. Regardless of these short-cuts, you'll need to have a valid Snow Leopard license for the computer you're upgrading.

User Management

The one thing that's clear about Windows 7, and previous versions of Windows, is that it's designed to be used in corporate environments and managed centrally. Add a Windows 7 computer to a domain and the administrators can completely lock it down using the Group Policy Editor, centrally manage permissions to network resources and even remote install software.

If you want to lock down your client versions of Lion, you'll need the Server edition of 10.7 and its Profile Manager feature.

In its default state, domain users only have restricted use of the computer that prevents them from messing with settings and installing new applications. It's a reliable and rugged system that's been refined and developed over the years.

Windows allows for some flexibility in the way it works. Domain users can be added to the local administrators group of a PC. This way, a user can be given rights to their own computer, but prevented from logging on to another computer and changing settings and installing applications on that computer. With Windows Server 2008, updates to the OS can be downloaded centrally and distributed over the network, saving bandwidth in the process.

By comparison, while Apple computers can be added to a Windows domain, there's not the same level of control that you get with a Windows computer. Domain users can be restricted in what they can do, but security isn't as good as with Windows. So, a restricted user may not be able to install an app to the Applications folder, but they can usually just drag and drop an application package into a folder they do have access to - completely bypassing security.

OS X Lion Server can help improve the situation. It's a simple upgrade to an existing Lion computer that costs just 35 and gives administrators more control over the Apple computers connected to the network. Of key interest is the Profile Manager, which restricts what Apple users can and can't do on their computers. It's effectively the Mac equivalent of the Group Policy Manager and gives administrators that extra control that's missing. In other regards, OS X Lion Server is a little bit too simplistic for many environments, particularly as there's no rack-mountable hardware available. As a result, a large organisation may just want one or two Lion servers for Profile Manager.

User Interface

Both Windows 7 and OS X Lion are advanced operating systems with largely equivalent features, despite what either camp may have you believe. The differences between them will only matter depending on the tasks that you want to use your computer for.

Launchpad is Apple's attempt to make applications easier to find and open, but it's a bit too simplistic.

Both operating systems have fast searching built in. With Windows this is directly in the Start Menu - just click it and start searching to find files and applications. With OS X Lion, it uses Spotlight, which you can access by pressing Command+Space or clicking the Spotlight icon in the menu bar. Both search tools will also search through email messages and contacts.

The Start Menu has long been a strength of Windows, giving you quick access to all installed applications. With Windows 7, it's gone one step further, and supported applications, such as Office, now have sub-menus from their shortcut icons that give you access to recently accessed files.

OS X has always been comparatively poor in this regard, with applications sitting in the Applications folder although programs can also be launched using Spotlight. Apple has attempted to fix this with Launchpad in Lion, which brings an iOS-style apps home screen to OS X. We find it rather simplistic to use and it doesn't have any of the advanced features of the Windows 7 Start Menu, such as the recently accessed documents list. Recent files and folders can be viewed in the Finder and Go menus respectively, but this is system wide and not specific to an application.

Dock/Task Bar

Applications that you use a lot on OS X can be pinned into the Dock, which also doubles as a Task bar for running programs. It can be hidden out of view and the size reduced, magnifying just the part that your mouse hovers over. We like the way that file stacks can be added, giving you quick pop-up access to folders of your choice.

Jump Lists let you access an application's features quickly.

Windows 7's Task Bar is a more complicated version of this. Any app can be pinned to the Task Bar, giving you a quick shortcut to run it. Hover the mouse over any open application and you get a thumbnail view (Aero Preview) of every open window, which can make switching tasks easy. It's what you can do with the right-click and Jump Lists that's particularly impressive, though.

On any supported open or closed application, right-clicking an icon gives you a Jump List. This can include recently accessed documents, or access a program's features, such as starting an Incognito window in Chrome. Once you start using them, they're a valuable and fast way of interacting with applications and their extra features. Application icons in the OS X Dock can have contextual menus similar to Jump Lists, but few applications actually do.

Windows Management

One of Windows 7's strengths is its clever windows management and support for multiple monitors. With the latest graphics cards, you can even run up to six monitors from a single computer.

Aero Snap - Windows 7's windows management is fantastic and well suited to multiple monitors.

As Windows 7's applications have their title bars integrated into each window, working on multiple monitors is easy and natural; by comparison, with OS X Lion, each application's title bar appears on the main display. Working on a second monitor means frequent trips back to the primary display to access menus.

Windows 7 also has the advantage when it comes to managing open windows. Apple may have finally added the option to resize a window by dragging any side, rather than the bottom right, but Windows has had this for ages. In addition, in Windows 7 you can maximise a window to any monitor and use Aero Snap to resize windows automatically. Using the keyboard shortcuts or dragging a window to either side of the monitor you can make it fill half the screen; dragging to the top maximises it. The result is that it's easy to compare two windows side-by-side, which becomes extremely useful for some tasks, such as copying files from one window to another.

With OS X Lion, arranging windows is still a laborious manual job, although with Lion it's now possible to resize a window from any edge, rather than just the bottom-right corner. There is now the option for full-screen applications, but these work on just a single monitor and aren't as easy to manage as applications in Windows.

Task Switching

That said, for the most part OS X Lion doesn't require its window management to be as good as in Windows, as its task switching is far superior. With Mission Control (the replacement for Expose) you can quickly zoom out and view all of your open applications and windows, quickly switching between them. It makes Windows 7's antiquated task switching or poor Flip 3D look antiquated in comparison. We find it a little strange that Apple turns off Lion's App Expos switching by default, which lets you view just the windows belonging to the application you're currently using. It's easy enough to turn on and is brilliant, for example, for switching between two spreadsheets quickly.

Mission Control lets you switch between tasks easily.

OS X Lion's task switching comes into its own when you've got a touchpad, either on a laptop or on the desktop using the Magic Trackpad. Using multi-touch gestures you can access Mission Control, switch between full-screen applications and scroll without having to touch a scroll bar or reach for the keyboard. Once you get used to this, using a Windows 7 laptop where you don't have these features suddenly feels very old fashioned.

For Lion, Apple has changed the way that the Dashboard works. Rather than a screen overlay, Dashboard now sits as its own special full-screen application although you can revert to the overlay mode if you wish. It lets you add new widgets, such as for checking flight details and a calculator. It's a similar idea to Windows 7's Gadgets, although by housing them on a single screen, Apple's implementation looks a little neater. In practice, both systems are as easy to use - in Windows 7 pressing Windows+G brings all Gadgets to the foreground.

Desktop

OS X's Mission Control also gives you quick access to multiple virtual desktops. These can all have their own individual wallpaper and contain their own running applications. Having virtual desktops can help segment and organise different work tasks.

By default Windows 7 doesn't have this facility at all, although it's not hard to find a free application that gives you these features. Even so, even the best add-on isn't quite as smooth as having the option built in from the start.

Bundled apps

It's hard to beat Apple when it comes to bundled applications, particularly when it comes to work support. In particular, Mail, Address Book and iCal all work with Exchange servers natively; with Windows 7, you're forced into buying the full version of Outlook.

It's hard to beat Apple when it comes to bundled applications Mail, Address Book and iCal all work with Exchange servers natively.

It's important to note that Apple's clients only support Exchange Web Services (EWS), rather than the full ActiveSync protocol. This requires Exchange Server 2007 or newer to work. It's the same restriction that Microsoft has put on Outlook 2011 for Mac, as well.

There are ways round this, both for PC and Mac, with the free DavMail Gateway. This small utility lets you connect an IMAP email client via DavMail to the Exchange webmail interface to get your email. It also supports CalDAV and LDAP for calendars and address books respectively.

In other regards Apple is way ahead of Microsoft, with iPhoto and iMovie providing much better photo and video editing than the optional Windows Live Photo Gallery and Windows Live Movie Maker applications. However these apps are only bundled for free with new Macs they're separate purchases if you download Lion from the Mac App Store to upgrade older Macs.

Auto Save and Versioning

One of the best new features of OS X Lion is Auto Save. This automatically saves documents in compatible programs, and maintains versions that can be browsed in a Time Machine-style user interface. The only downside of the system is that an application has to support Auto Save and Versions. Sadly, Microsoft Office 2011 currently doesn't although it does have its own auto save function.

With Auto Save and Versions-enabled applications, Lion protects your files with ease.

Talking of Time Machine, Apple's backup software is surprisingly easy to configure and takes a complete image of a computer, along with every document and file. Windows 7 has its own backup tool, but the imaging and file backup components have to be configured and scheduled independently and manually. For Windows, it's more likely that you'd want to rely on network shares or a network-manageable application, such as Norton Ghost.

Resume

Apple completely changed the way that applications are handled now, automatically saving the last state used. After a reboot or shut-down applications restore to their exact last state complete with files and windows open as they were. It's a brilliant way to save on battery life and means that rare system restarts are less painful to deal with. Restarts can take a little while for all of the windows and applications to restart properly, but it's possible to turn off the feature using the Shutdown menu option, so you can quickly give your computer a clean restart. By comparison Windows 7's closest feature is Hibernate, which saves system state to hard disk, but isn't immune to reboots.

Backwards Compatibility

Microsoft has the clear upper-hand in terms of backwards compatibility for applications and has done so for a long time. In part, this is because it's evolved each version of Windows from compatible code and has had the safety of using the same hardware instruction set for years. As a OS that has traditionally been used in business, Microsoft knows the value of making sure that old software continues to run on its new operating system.

...and you'll never see Rosetta, or your PowerPC applications again, if you upgrade from Snow Leopard to Lion.

Many applications will simply run on Windows 7 in the same way they did previous versions of Windows. However, if that's not the case Windows 7, as with older versions of the operating system, has Compatibility settings that can be applied to any installed application. This lets you fool an application into thinking it's being run on an older version of Windows, down to Windows XP. It can even be used to reduce the number of screen colours, lower the screen resolution and disable advanced desktop animations and graphics.

Should any of these settings fail, Windows 7 has a trick up its sleeve with Windows XP Mode. This feature of Windows 7 Professional, Enterprise or Ultimate creates a special XP virtual machine that's pre-configured. The clever part about it is that any software installed in the virtual machine is automatically made available via the Windows 7 Start Menu. It's a simple and effective way for companies to upgrade and ensure that their old software will continue to work.

Unfortunately, backwards compatibility wasn't high on Apple's list for OS X Lion. In fairness to the company, in the last 10 years it has moved its OS codebase and switched from PowerPC to x86 processors, complicating the matter. Still, with Lion Apple isn't helping and has removed support for Rosetta, which allowed PowerPC apps to run on Intel hardware. Even more annoyingly, it did so silently without making any announcements informing existing OS X users who may still use many PowerPC programs which can't be upgraded for a variety of reasons.

For home users, this isn't likely to be much of an issue and there are bound to be new versions or replacements to old apps available. At work, it's a different situation, particularly if your company is relying on a bit of bespoke software. Unless you're willing to get this replaced or rewritten, upgrading to Lion will completely break any software that was written for PowerPC.

Virtualisation isn't necessarily going to help, either. While Apple changed the license agreement to allow virtual instances of Lion to be run, the same doesn't apply for Snow Leopard. Snow Leopard Server can be virtualised, but this is an extra step that will require a license upgrade for every computer.

The difficulty with Apple's decision is that new hardware will come pre-installed with Lion and can't be downgraded. If your business relies on older Mac hardware and software, moving to Lion could be a step too far.

So what's our verdict?

Verdict

It's very hard to pick a winner from the two operating systems, as both have their strengths and weaknesses. Apple's OS X is generally a bit easier to use, particularly on a desktop, but its support for multiple monitors and backwards compatibility is inelegant and clunky at best. OS X Lion is cheaper than Windows 7 per license, but Apple's hardware is more expensive. For that reason, Windows computers are generally a bit cheaper to buy. If you've got users that just need email, word processing and web browsing, Windows 7 computers are probably the best bet: they'll be cheaper, and the domain integration makes them easier to lock down. If you've got Mac-specific applications, OS X Lion is a great operating system, but make sure you get a Lion server on the network to help lock the machines down.

WINDOWS 7 Processor: 1GHz or faster 32-bit (x86) or 64-bit (x64) processor RAM: 1GB (32-bit) or 2GB (64-bit) Hard disk space: 16GB available (32-bit) or 20GB (64-bit) Graphics card: DirectX 9 compatible with WDDM 1.0 or higher driver BitLocker requires Trusted Platform Module (TPM) 1.2 Windows XP Mode requires an additional 1 GB of RAM and an additional 15 GB of available hard disk space. MAC OS X LION 10.7 Mac computer with an Intel Core 2 Duo, Core i3, Core i5, Core i7 or Xeon processor RAM: 2GB minimum Operating system: Mac OS X v10.6.6 or later (v10.6.8 recommended) Hard disk space: 7GB available

Server software isn't the first thing that comes to mind when you think about Apple, but it has a long history. In fact, Mac OS X Server 1.0 was released in 1999, almost a year before the public beta of the client version.

Since then, every release of OS X has had an equivalent server version, and every release has combined simple configuration with increasingly powerful, enterprise-ready features. It combines file sharing to Mac and Windows, email, web and Jabber-based IM services, as well as calendar and address book servers.

With Lion, though, Apple appears to be taking a break from this tradition. What it has produced is, instead, a server OS which is easier and faster to get up and running, but sacrifices some of the more advanced services which had been added to it over the years.

Installation

It's clear even before you have Lion Server installed that Apple has focused on making the process of getting up and running as streamlined as possible. Like its client sibling, Lion Server is only available as a download from the Mac App Store This means, of course, that you need to be running the Mac App Store, so an up-to-date version of Snow Leopard Client or Server is essential. Lion Server is in fact bought as a download that installs on top of the Lion client.

Lion Server is available exclusively as a download from the Mac App Store.

Unfortunately, this also means there is no supported way of installing Lion Server from a bootable DVD. You can, though, create a bootable external hard drive which you can install from.

Almost everything in Lion Server is configured through a single application, Server.

Set up reflects this focus, too. Even with a minimal amount of server admin knowledge, you can be up and running with a basic server configuration in minutes. Once up and running, almost all of the configuration is done through the new Server app, and most configuration options are extremely simple. The Wiki server's options, for example, consists of a single switch to turn it on, plus an option to limit which users can create wikis.

Profile Manager and iOS

For larger customers, the single biggest new feature in Lion Server is the Profile Manager. Essentially, this allows you to create configuration profiles for Macs and iOS devices and push them out automatically. These profiles include obvious features like VPN, networking and email settings but also group-based permissions for things like access to the Mac App Store and even access to external storage devices so, for example, you could remotely prevent Macs from accessing external hard drives or USB flash drives.

Profile Manager is a powerful way of remotely configuring both Macs and iOS clients, with configuration files pushed to machines.

Configuration is easy and fast, and the 'push' aspect is handled by Apple's tried and tested backend. The only caveat is that the Mac clients you're configuring need to be running Lion (Managed Preferences, the much-less-powerful equivalent from Snow Leopard server, is still included for configuring older machines).

Lion Server also includes additional services for iOS users, such as file sharing via WebDAV (configuration of which can be pushed direct to iOS devices) and push email, calendar and contacts, all of which is handled through Apple's Push Notification service.

You can easily set up share points which iOS clients can access through WebDAV, making it easier to share files to iPad and iPhone.

Missing in action

The drive to simplify Lion Server has had some less fortunate consequences, including the complete removal of some features. QuickTime Streaming Server, for example, is gone completely.

Perhaps more importantly, so is the Print Server, which is "replaced" by CUPS for printing. Yes, that means Lion Server has exactly the same support for shared printers as the client version of OS X. What you lose is the kind of enterprise-level print features which higher-end customers require, such as the ability to set quotas for individual users and prioritise printers in a pool.

Strangely, some features are still there but have had GUI access to them removed. For example, neither FTP nor NFS have any GUI-based configuration tools. Both still exist, but you need to configure them using the command line. MySQL has been replaced by PostgreSQL, but again it has to be configured through the command line.

Lion Server's Wiki server is an example of how Apple has simplified configuration options: there's virtually nothing to configure.

Other services have had their GUI-based configuration options limited, in some cases severely. The Web server is still industrial-strength Apache, for example, but like the Wiki server it's now little more than a switch to turn it on and off and optionally add support for PHP. Anything else requires the command line.

Small business? Enterprise?

For small business customers, the removal of these kinds of feature are unlikely to be noticed. And I think this illustrates exactly what Apple is attempting to do with Lion Server: create a robust, flexible server operating system that works out of the box for small businesses, taking away anything which might make configuration more complicated. Enterprise customers are expected to be able to handle more complex admin tasks via the command line.

For small business customers, the removal of these kinds of feature are unlikely to be noticed but occasionally it makes the life of enterprise admins more difficult.

This works for most things, but occasionally it makes the life of enterprise admins more difficult. For example, consider the simple process of accessing users' access rights to shares. You can't pick from a list of users; instead, you have to search for an individual user or group.

That's fine if you've only got a handful of users, but when you have over a thousand people with multiple nationalities, trying to ensure you've spelt a name correctly isn't easy. You might not know which group you need without scrolling though a list of them all. If your users and groups are in a third party directory such as Active Directory, you can browse the list of users and groups from within System Preferences - but not from within the Server app

Conclusions

Lion Server is a bit of a mixed bag. It remains an incredibly easy server operating system to set up, and the new Profile Manager is extremely powerful (if your installed base runs Lion, of course). But compared to its predecessor, some standard server management processes are actually harder to achieve, and there are elements which used to be catered for by a GUI but which you'll now need to go to the command line for.

compared to its predecessor, some standard server management processes are actually harder to achieve.

For enterprise users, particularly ones who have not upgraded their user base to Lion, there's little to recommend Lion Server over Snow Leopard unless you need Profile Manager. Although there are some nice new elements, more things have either been pushed back into CLI-land for configuration, or simply removed altogether.

These customers, of course, are also the ones most likely to be concerned about the lack of a rack-mounted server from Apple, and least persuaded by the options of using either Mac Minis or Mac Pros. Given, though, that Lion Server can live happily as part of an Active Directory, Windows-based server environment it's arguable that some Lion Servers could find a home even in the enterprise, simply for Profile Manager.

For small and medium business customers, Lion Server is more attractive, particularly for companies without full-time systems administrators who nevertheless need server capabilities. Buy a configured Mac Mini Server, and you can be up and running services for your users with an hour, with minimal configuration afterwards. You'll have something that, out of the box, is more capable than a simple Network Attached Storage device, and can be expanded a lot further too.

In some ways, I wonder if Lion Server isn't Apple trying the same trick that it pulled with Final Cut Pro X: ignoring its existing high-end user base, even taking features out, in order to build the foundations of something better.

So what's our verdict?

Verdict

For small medium businesses, Lion Server is a bargain-priced and easy to configure server operating system. For enterprises, it's not as clear cut given Apple's numerous odd design choices and lack of rack mountable hardware, but the Profile Manager alone may make it worth deploying a single Lion server in an otherwise Windows or Linux-dominated environment. Lion Server won't be suitable for everyone, but at this low price there's little to lose in trying it out for yourself.

Processor: 64-bit dual core Intel processor Memory: 2GB or greater Operating system: MacOS X 10.6.6 or later Hard disk: 7GB required for installation Broadband internet connection

Apple's results, released earlier this week, show just how good the iPhone and iPad have been for the technology company.

Apple's profits were up 125 per cent, driven by a 142 per cent growth in iPhone sales, despite a lack of new models, and by a whopping 183 per cent increase in iPad sales.

But Mac sales look more pedestrian. Many IT vendors would sell their grandmas to see double-digit growth, but in Apple's world, a 14 per cent year on year increase in Mac shipments is merely a blip. The much-vaunted "halo effect," where iPhone or iPad users also buy a Mac to supplement their shiny new device, clearly has its limits. Or does it?

Full virtualisation would be the best way to make Lion really roar for the enterprise.

Break down the numbers and the picture is a little different. Firstly, Apple is the only large-scale computer maker to post a double-digit increase in PC sales at all. Secondly, Apple now has 11 per cent of the US computer market, putting it third behind HP and Dell, according to figures from industry analysts IDC. And this is without allowing for the iPads that are being used instead of computers, in households but also in businesses.

Apple, though, has long had a troubled relationship with IT departments. Any creative professional will testify just how hard it can be to convince IT managers to allow the use of Macs in Windows-dominated environments. And, despite the fact that the Mac OS is now quite a well-behaved client on Windows LANs, Apple sometimes does little to help its own cause.

Think of the decision to cull the Xserve Raid storage system, and then to abandon the rack-mounted Xserve itself. Even the decision to release OS10.7, or Lion, for download only is hardly going to endear Apple to IT managers who need to conserve network resources. And the jury is still out on the server features of Lion, now that server functionality is an app-store add on, rather than a separate product.

At the same time, though, more businesses are allowing their end users to choose Macs, or bring their personal Macs to work. A 14 per cent increase in Mac shipments does not come from consumers alone.

For IT departments, this means it is less a question of accommodating or tolerating Macs, but integrating them. The same applies to iOS devices such as the iPad; iOS 5, in particular, will increase the iPad's potential as a standalone alternative to the PC.

But Apple could also do more to help IT departments. One way would be a more business-friendly approach to software updates, avoiding such faux pas as deleting Final Cut Studio from its range on the release of Final Cut X, even though there are companies that might want to add seats of the current version. Another would be direct support of iSCSI, for access to shared storage.

Most of all, though, IT departments would want to see the Mac OS offering full support for virtualisation, on the desktop and on the server. There are rumours that Apple will, itself, run a virtualised version of Mac OS under VMware as part of its iCloud product. Currently, OS X can only be run under a virtual environment on Apple hardware - a significant restriction, especially in the data centre.

Allowing OS X to run as a guest on non-Apple servers, and even on the desktop under VDI, would bring enormous administrative benefits to companies using Macs and even encourage wider use of the OS. But its impact on consumers, or even business users, wanting an iMac or MacBook would surely be minimal.

Full virtualisation would be the best way to make Lion really roar for the enterprise.

Stephen Pritchard is a contributing editor at IT Pro.

The new Apple Mac operating system will be made available in the UK today.

Mac OS X Lion was announced on 6 June with more than 250 new features over its predecessor.

Apple impressed onlookers with the new pricing of OS X Lion, which will be available for just 20.99. Past versions of the Mac OS have cost around 100 more.

Many of the new features have borrowed from Apple's mobile operating system iOS with multitouch gestures being one significant addition.

A Mission Control panel will give users a "birds-eye view" of everything they're running. This section enables users to zoom in and out of each app they are running, selecting whichever they want from different 'Spaces,' which offer a way of grouping apps and other windows together.

A Launchpad' has also been added, showing up all apps through a simple pinching motion. Within this, users can rearrange icons and create folders, just like in iOS.

Lion also features an API to let developers create full-screen apps. Apple claimed that using full-screen apps can be much more efficient than having multiple apps on-screen at once.

For a comprehensive round-up of what Apple OS X Lion offers, head over to IT Pro's need to know feature.

The release comes a day after Apple announced a hugely impressive financial quarter, in which iPhone sales soared.

Apple has introduced the latest iteration of its Mac OS X software, with more than 250 new features and a cheap price tag.

The most earth shattering announcement came towards the end of the Mac OS X Lion presentation, as Apple said it would be available for just 20.99. Past versions have cost around 100 more.

The OS will not be available to consumers until July, but a developer preview has been made available today.

Amongst the numerous additions to the OS was multitouch gestures, which Phil Schiller showcased during Apple's Worldwide Developer Conference in San Francisco today.

As an example, Schiller showed how full screen apps, such as Safari, work with multi-touch, swiping to revert to the desktop screen, and then swiping again to bring the app back.

"We now build multi-touch trackpads in every notebook, and we have a desktop tool. So we build it in to OS X now," Schiller said.

Another addition is the Mission Control panel, which gives users a "birds eye view" of everything they're running.

From Mission Control, users can zoom into each app they are running, selecting whichever they want from different 'Spaces' which are a way of grouping apps and other windows together. Any open app can be dragged into a Space, and these Spaces can be destroyed or created instantaneously.

A Launchpad' has also been added, showing up all apps through a simple pinching motion. Within this, users can rearrange icons and create folders, just like in iOS.

A Resume' feature means that with each app, users are returned to how they left their apps, even after shutting down the entire computer.

In a similar vein, auto-save ensures no documents are lost when users forget to save. It effectively means users no longer have to click save whatsoever.

"From the beginning of using computers, we've had to remember one thing: save, save, save," Schiller said during the keynote.

"The one time you forget, something goes wrong. Why should you have to remember? That's what Lion does. Lion automatically saves in the background without you having to do anything."

AirDrop, meanwhile, attempts to solve the problem of sharing data via USBs by offering a P2P network to transfer files. It appears as a new option within Finder, allowing you to see what others are using AirDrop for in real time.

Users just need to drag the document to anothers' picture, before being asked if they want to do so. Then they just need to confirm. For added security, the data itself is encrypted.

Another update with Lion is Mail, which comes with search suggestions. With this Mail recognises whether the search term is a person or a subject to improve results.

Conversation View within Mail now means users can interact with others vis a thread and is compatible with other email clients.

Face-tracking technology within Mac OS X Lion means users running Photobooth or other apps using a web camera will get better shots.

Apple promised there was plenty more to sell about the OS, with 3,000 new APIs, but could not go into detail, claiming there were simply too many.

Lion comes available on the Mac App Store only and will not come on an optical disc, as Apple looks to offer the "easiest upgrade ever".

Apple will reveal details of its much-anticipated cloud service at the company's annual Worldwide Developers Conference (WWDC) next Monday.

Chief executive (CEO) Steve Jobs will come back from sick leave to give the WWDC keynote and provide more information on the iCloud.

Little is known of the iCloud, yet many have speculated it will be used to give people the ability to have iTunes accounts interact with the cloud.

Google and Amazon have already announced their own cloud-based music offerings, so Apple would be coming a little late to the party.

The move could also take Apple into more direct competition with Amazon, which has not been on the former's radar outside of music and book sales.

During the event, Apple is set to unveil its next Mac Lion operating system and the latest version of iPhone software - iOS 5.

No further details on the announcements have come out, but there have been plenty of rumours circulating the web on what will feature in iOS 5.

A patent filed by Apple this year indicated Spaces an application which allows the user to segment their apps for easier navigation could be included.

WWDC will run for five days starting Monday as developers swamp Cupertino to learn about new Apple technologies from more than 1,000 of the company's engineers.

Citrix has made it possible for users to operate Android apps on Windows devices, the company announced at its Synergy 2011 conference in San Francisco today.

The virtualisation player showed how an add-on known as BlueStacks integrated within Citrix Receiver can enable Android app use on Windows machines.

Receiver is Citrix's client for managing apps running either in house or in the cloud on one interface.

"BlueStacks is aimed at addressing a market need that is only going to grow as the adoption of Android devices increases," said Rosen Sharma, founder and chief executive (CEO) of BlueStacks.

Gus Pinto, from the iOS, Mac and Android development team at Citrix, said it was the same concept as bringing Windows apps to the iPad.

"We looked at Android and said it's not fair these apps are confined to one form factor," Pinto said.

The technology will be available with Citrix's software client in beta form from the third quarter of this year.

It all forms part of Citrix's "any, any, any" outlook, as it hopes to allow workers to access any application on any device from anywhere in the world.

Mac OS X virtualisation

In another big "wow moment" at the Synergy conference, Citrix showed how it could allow IT departments to deploy virtual Mac OS X desktop to Receiver users.

This would mean users could use any Receiver compatible device, such as a Windows PC, and run a virtual Mac OS X machine.

In a demonstration, Citrix showed how its HDX technology could power the delivery of the Apple OS for a "seamless" experience, using the example of the Angry Birds game to show how the visual and audio performance were sharp.

"For a long time we've talked about any, any, any," Mark Templeton, Citrix chief executive (CEO), added.

"We're now really pushing the envelope here."

There was no word on when the Mac OS X virtualisation capability would be available.

Apple has promised an OS X update to protect its products against the Mac Defender fake anti-virus (AV) threat.

Last week a number of reports claimed the software was running rife through the Mac community, as more and more users were tricked into downloading the fake AV.

As a result, users gave up cash and credit card details, whilst being left with infected machines.

Apple has remained quiet about the threat up until now, but today posted advice on its website, alongside the promise of an imminent OS update.

"In the coming days, Apple will deliver a Mac OS X software update that will automatically find and remove Mac Defender malware and its known variants," the support document read.

"The update will also help protect users by providing an explicit warning if they download this malware."

For those who have already downloaded Mac Defender also marketed as MacProtector and MacSecurity Apple has provided a step-by-step guide of how to remove it manually.

"Apple provides security updates for the Mac exclusively through Software Update and the Apple Support Downloads site," the support document concluded.

"Users should exercise caution any time they are asked to enter sensitive personal information online."

Click here to read the advice and instructions.

The Mac Defender fake anti-virus threat should come as no surprise, given the sharp rise in attempts on Apple Mac systems, according to security experts.

Many Mac users have been duped into downloading the fake software, which has spread thanks to SEO poisoning attacks.

The perpetrators convinced users their systems were infected and needed protection, asking them to download the Mac Defender application for a fee.

Mac Defender also automatically opened web pages for pornographic sites, most likely to convince the user their system was infected, security firm Intego explained in a blog post.

This kind of attack has plagued Windows systems for years, but the fact it has targeted Macs should not shock anyone, said David Emm, senior security researcher at Kaspersky Lab.

"This is not a surprise as the number of Mac-specific threats, while very small compared to those targeting Windows systems, has been growing rapidly over the last two years," Emm told IT PRO.

"Given the success of cyber criminals' rogue anti-virus programs, the emergence of rogue anti-virus programs for the Mac platform comes as no surprise."

Security professionals have increasingly called for Mac users to be more vigilant, as more and more cyber criminals turn their attention to the platform.

The days when Macs were considered highly secure on their own appear to be at an end, many in the industry have said.

This isn't actually the first fake AV to target Mac users, though it's easily the most successful.

Earlier this month, what was believed to be the first ever Mac OS X crimeware kit was spotted.

However, attacks on Mac users have largely relied on tricking users rather than exploiting systems themselves, as Mac Defender did, said chief executive of Small Blue-Green World, David Harley.

"This isn't actually the first fake AV to target Mac users, though it's easily the most successful," said Harley, who is also administrator of his company's Mac Virus blog.

"There have always been Mac threats, though OS X virtually eliminated the virus problem. What OS threats there are target users rather than the operating system: that is, they normally rely on social engineering rather than vulnerabilities in the OS."

Emm agreed the Mac Defender attack did not exploit any actual vulnerabilities within the Mac OS, although this was standard in fake anti-virus attacks.

"Like any rogue anti-virus program, the danger lies not in the impact the program has on the system (though we know from experience that they aren't easy to remove manually), but in the fact that people are tricked into parting with their money to remove threats that aren't really there," Emm added.

"To defend against these programs, people should avoid the temptation to click on random pop-ups or buttons that purportedly claim to detect and/or clean malware, and should proactively install internet security software to block such programs."

The first ever crimeware kit targeting Apple's Mac OS X has been spotted, featuring stark similarities to the popular Zeus toolset targeting Windows PCs.

The DIY kit can grab forms from Firefox running on the Apple OS, meaning passwords could be taken, alongside other information the victim types in the browser, Danish security firm CSIS reported.

Consisting of a builder and an admin panel, the kit has been advertised on a number of closed underground forums.

"The kit is being sold under the name Weyland-Yutani BOT and it is the first of its kind to hit the Mac OS platform. Apparently, a dedicated iPad and Linux release are under preparation as well," said Peter Kruse, partner and security specialist at CSIS, in a blog post.

Kruse said the kit only enabled web injects and form grabbing in Firefox at the current time, but warned both Chrome and Safari "will soon follow."

"CSIS finds this crimekit to be quite disturbing news since Mac OS previously to some degree has been spared from the increasing amount of malware which has haunted Windows-based systems for years," he added.

"This could have resulted in a false sense of security that might make Mac OS user especially vulnerable to a sudden and highly sophisticated attack."

Mac issues

Mac users can expect increasing numbers of attacks in the future as hackers look towards a wider range of platforms, according to experts.

Sophos today warned of a poisoned Google SEO attack affecting both Mac and Windows users.

A number of search terms have been targeted, including ones based around global warming and more current topics like Osama bin Laden's death, attempting to lure users into downloading a fake anti-virus program called MacDefender.

Even after infection, the user will be repeatedly bombarded with fake warning messages to encourage them to pay for non-existent threats to be removed, Sophos said.

A variety of new threats targeting Mac users emerged last year, with a significant number of Mac OS X threats rearing their ugly heads.

An Intego report has looked back at thre various threats affecting Apple technology, which are often believed to be inherently more secure than other systems.

For instance, there was the HellRTS piece of malware, which ooened a backdoor to allow remote users to take control of infected Macs.

Spyware affecting Macs was also spotted last year, such as OpinionSpy, a tool that was designed to collect data on users browsing habits.

It was not intended to be malicious, Intego explained, but it contained features that could open backdoors and inject code into applications.

The security company also picked up on a Mac version of the Koobface worm.

Whilst Mac OS X is more secure than Windows, Intego said, the Apple operating system still has its flaws.

Last year, Apple issued 38 security updates for Mac OS X, Apple software and company hardware.

"Apple has to constantly keep on its toes to issue several dozen security updates each year, to Mac OS X in general, as well as to specific parts of Mac OS X that are often found to contain vulnerabilities," the Intego report read.

A Panda Security report from last year discovered Mac OS vulnerabilities had skyrocketed.

Indeed, threats affecting the Apple OS had increased by over five times in less than a year.

Apple has fixed more than 130 vulnerabilities with a Mac OS X update, many of which could be exploited by hackers if users do not get the latest version of the operating system.

Mac OS X 10.6.5 includes fixes for a wide array of problems, from issues in QuickTime and Image Capture to a large number of vulnerabilities existing in the Flash Player plug-in.

"Multiple issues exist in the Adobe Flash Player plug-in, the most serious of which may lead to arbitrary code execution," Apple warned in an advisory.

There is also a fix for a memory management issue in the operating system's kernel, which could allow a local user to cause an unexpected system shutdown, and the update includes MySQL version 5.0.91 that plugs numerous security holes.

"Many of the vulnerabilities could be exploited by malicious hackers to run unauthorised code on your Mac computer, opening you up to the potential of being spied upon, having information stolen, or cyber criminals commandeering your Mac into becoming part of a botnet," warned Graham Cluley, senior technology consultant at Sophos, in a blog.

"So, don't delay. Investigate rolling this update onto your Apple Macs as soon as possible."

Mac security flaws have skyrocketed this year, according to figures from Panda Security.

In 2009, 34 vulnerabilities were detected in the Mac OS and so far in 2010 this has risen to over 170, the security firm reported in October.

Many experts have this year challenged the belief that Macs are inherently safe.

The Mozilla Foundation has released Firefox 3.6.4, a security and stability update that adds crash protection to the browser.

The new feature isolates third-party plug-ins when they crash or freeze, allowing the browser itself to continue running unaffected. Refreshing the page will see Firefox attempt to restart the plug-in.

According to Mozilla, third-party plug-ins are responsible for an estimated one in three Firefox crashes.

However not all plug-ins are covered by the latest update. Only Adobe Flash, Apple QuickTime and Microsoft Silverlight. It's not clear whether support for further plug-ins will be added in the future.

"Mozilla recognises that third-party plugins provide important functionality in many of today's websites," the company said, announcing the update. "At the same time, plug-ins can lead to problems for users as they browse.

"With the ability to automatically alert users when they have out-of-date plug-ins, and now crash protection, Firefox 3.6.4 allows users to experience all the content they love without any of the hassles."

Firefox users will no doubt welcome the new-found stability, but they have had to wait for it. The feature has been present in Google's Chrome browser since it launched back in 2008, and more recently has appeared in Safari 5 too.

Aside from crash protection, Firefox 3.6.4 is the typical mix of patches and fixes to address various performance and stability issues. A total of ten vulnerabilities are addressed in seven updates, four of them critical.

For now the update and its crash protection feature is only available in Windows and Linux variants, with Mac OS X having to wait until Firefox 4 arrives later this year.

The Firefox 3.6.4 update can be downloaded directly from Mozilla, or through the Check for Updates feature in the browser itself.

Apple has released the latest update to its desktop operating system, Mac OS X 10.6.4.

After last week's Worldwide Developers Conference (WWDC) was entirely dominated by the new iPhone 4 and [a href="https://www.itpro.com/622291/apple-ipad-review]iPad, Apple finally gave its desktop products some much-needed attention, with the Mac OS X update accompanying an overhaul to the Mac Mini all-in-one computer.

Top of the list of fixes in the 315MB software update available in both desktop and server editions is an issue that caused the trackpad to become unresponsive. Apple also addresses problems when running Adobe's Creative Suite 3, while extended support for HTML5 is added to the Safari 5 web browser, together with Reader functionality.

Other issues addressed include problems related to copying, renaming or deleting files stored on SMB file servers, along with playback issues with the Mac's DVD player and problems when editing photos in full-screen mode on iPhoto or Aperture 3. VPN connection reliablity has also been addressed.

Also part of the update are a pair of minor fixes for the early 2010 MacBook Pro, addressing a reported issue where the right speaker sometimes runs louder than the left by default, and display sleep problems.

Apple is advising all Snow Leopard users to install the update for the sake of security, stability and compatibility of their systems, but recommends you should back up first.

Safari users have been advised to update their browser to the newest version after Apple revealed the numerous security holes that Safari 5 and 4.1 have filled.

In a security advisory, Apple pointed to 48 threats that hackers could exploit if users leave the vulnerabilities unpatched.

By updating to Safari 5 or Safari 4.1, users can avoid getting hit by an attacker taking advantage of security holes in older browsers, according to Apple.

Safari 5 requires Mac OS X Leopard 10.5.8 or Mac OS X Snow Leopard 10.6.2 or later, meaning those with older operating systems will need to get Safari 4.1 to avoid any potential problems.

Furthermore, Safari 5 is not available on systems predating Windows XP SP2, Windows Vista or Windows 7.

Those who use browsers with weaknesses could be hit by unexpected application termination or arbitrary code execution when visiting a malicious website, among other threats.

"It doesn't matter whether you own a Mac or a Windows PC, if you run Safari the message is clear. Update your browser and ensure that you are protected against hackers exploiting the security holes detailed in the security advisory on Apple's website," said Graham Cluley, senior security consultant at Sophos, in a blog post.

"Safari users should practise safe computing, and update their systems as soon as possible," Cluley added, warning of the "swarm of security vulnerabilities" affecting older versions of the browser.

Apple launched Safari 5 on the same day as the Cupertino company introduced iPhone 4 and the browser is available for download now.

Apple has released its first software patch of 2010 for Mac OS X Leopard and Snow Leopard, and has added support for Windows 7 in the latest version of its Boot Camp virtualisation software.

The patch - or Software Update 2010-001, to use its full name addresses a total of 12 vulnerabilities in Apple's version 10.5 and 10.6 operating systems, including a loophole in the systems' CoreAudio, which leaves the OS potentially vulnerable to malicious code hidden in an MP4 audio file.

Other security issues addressed include similar vulnerabilities in Image RAW's DNG file-handling and the ImageIO software that could be used to execute arbitrary code. The Flash Player plug-in, meanwhile, accounts for seven of the 12 tweaks, and is now on version 10.0.42, matching an update already issued on Adobe's side last month to close a number of security vulnerabilities.

A patch for the OpenSSL network encryption system has also been included as a preventative measure to guard against a known man-in-the-middle vulnerability between the SSL and TLS protocols.

The latest version of Boot Camp, 3.1, brings long-awaited support for Windows 7, in Home Premium, Professional and Ultimate varieties, while also addressing some issues with the trackpad, adding support for Apple's wireless keyboard and its latest Magic Mouse and turning off the digital audio LED when not in use.

Apple says Security Update 2010-001 is "recommended for all users and improves the security of Mac OS X", labelling nine of the 12 issues as potentially leading to "arbitrary code execution".

The version for Snow Leopard comes in at a fairly streamlined 21.9MB, while separate Client and Server options have been released for Mac OS X 10.5 Leopard, weighing in at a meatier 159.58MB and 248.11MB respectively.

However, the first OS X patch of the new decade is less than half the size by the 10.6.2 Snow Leopard update issued in November last year, which fixed a total of 58 flaws and was up to 479MB in size.

The updates are available through the usual Software Update utility, or through the support section on Apple's website. The latter is also where you'll find Boot Camp 3.1.

A great deal has been written about Windows Vista's failings. As an operating system that emerged unwanted and unloved in November 2006, it promptly failed to please consumers or businesses alike, enabling Apple to make hay at Microsoft's expense and push a fair number of users over to the Mac.

While Microsoft has a reputation as a slow moving beast, by January 2009 users were using the beta of a revamped OS that it hoped would repair the damage wrought by Vista Windows 7. Now, the Microsoft OS is already on the hard drives of millions of users that have access to Technet and MSDN accounts, but come 22 October it will be on retail shelves everywhere.

Apple's Mac OS X 10.6 Snow Leopard was revealed in mid 2008, and while rumours hinted at an early 2009 release date, it actually appeared on 28 August 2009, held back some say to spoil Microsoft's Windows 7 thunder.

We look at how the two stack up next to each other. Will Apple sweep the board or will it be a Windows whitewash? Let's find out.

Price

If you're buying a new Mac today Snow Leopard will be preinstalled on the system and if you're buying a PC, from 22 October Windows 7 will be on there. If you're choosing between them, the cheapest route will inevitably be Windows. You can buy a netbook now for less than 300, and Windows 7 will be featured on many. At the time of publication, the cheapest Mac you can buy is the Macbook, which starts at 749. The long rumoured tablet - if it appears - will very likely be cheaper than this, but it would still be pricier than a budget Windows machine.

Of course, the operating system that runs the iPhone and iPod touch is essentially Mac OS X, but optimised for those devices, so you could argue that 149 will gain you access to the OS via the 8GB iPod touch - but for this comparison we're keeping things focused on keyboard-equipped machines.

If you're planning to upgrade an existing machine, on the face of it Windows 7 loses out to Snow Leopard which costs just 29 - almost an impulse buy. Windows, meanwhile, will cost you up to 160 for the full Ultimate version. However, that's not really a fair comparison as officially Snow Leopard can only be installed as an upgrade from Leopard (Mac OS X 10.5) which means that you need to spend 129 on the Mac Box Set'.

Therefore, at 65 from Amazon UK , Windows 7 Home Premium compares very favourably. However, as ever in life, things are complicated by the realities on the ground', which are that Snow Leopard can in fact be installed over Tiger, it's just that Apple doesn't want you to. And yes, students can get Windows 7 for 30, but that's just students, and only till January 2010. Equally, you could argue that Snow Leopard is really, just a service pack' and so should be free, but we'll have to move past that for this article.

With that in mind, the low price for Snow Leopard makes this a win for Apple.

Winner: Snow Leopard

Installation

Upgrading Windows has traditionally been a fraught process, but with every version of the OS, the installation has been increasingly refined. In our review of the Windows 7 beta we noted that on a well specced laptop with a 2.26GHz Core 2 Duo and 4GB of RAM, a clean install tool only 25 minutes. Upgrading is always going to be a more complex, as the OS has to make changes to existing code, look after existing data and won't necessarily be on an optimised hard disk. Therefore, we're going to cut Mac OS X some slack for its 55 minutes install time on a, 2.5GHz Core 2 Duo equipped Mac Book Pro with 4GB RAM. Both processes are effortless though users no longer have to be afraid of upgrading.

Snow Leopard only asks for 5GB of free disk space when installing, whereas Windows 7 wants 16GB. Snow Leopard also gets extra points for freeing up large amounts of disks space. Apple says you'll gain at least 6GB of hard disk space, but in practice you can gain as much as 30GB.

Apple likes to give the impression that this is because Snow Leopard is so much more efficient, but in practice it's down to two things: the removal of many printer drivers that Leopard installed by default but that most people didn't need (now available via download) and the removal of Rosetta', the code that enables software to run on both Intel- and PowerPC-based Macs. Snow Leopard will only run on Intel-based Macs, so there's no need for Rosetta.

Either way though you do gain that disk space back, so it's a win here for Apple.

Winner: Snow Leopard

Interface

For most people this is really going to be killer, as it's the look and feel that differentiates the two operating systems in most people's minds. Apple has clearly been the design and interface leader for a long time, and old-time users will happily argue to the cows come home about how Microsoft allegedly stole the concept of the GUI from Apple in the first place. There's no doubt that Microsoft has made great strides with Windows 7 with a number of small, but when totalled up, significant additions.

Mac OS' Expose has been a tour-de-force of how to get a quick overview access of your system. Just hit a key, and all the open windows on the desktop appear in tile form a feature that has been refined in Snow Leopard. Windows now appear on a grid and if you hover over the app icon in the dock just the open Windows for that app appear.

Windows 7 expands on Vista Aero Glass with Aero Peek, which pops up a thumbnail of each open Window when you roll over it in the taskbar. While the thumbnails are great, there's no equivalent to Expose's All Windows view. You can still Windows-tab for a scrolling 3D view of each Window and Alt-tab has been improved to just show the Windows of the app that you're tabbing through.

Windows does make it easier to arrange apps though and the new Windows Snap shortcut lets you easily snap Windows to the sides of your monitor, which is very useful. Windows Shake, where you can remove all Windows by grabbing the title bar of the one you want is neat too, though we're not sure of the need for it.

Mac OS X also has Spaces, which are simple virtual desktops on which you can place applications.

Apple has tidied up the fonts on the dock, and improved the Stacks feature so you can use it instead of the Finder, but Windows 7 has jump lists, and a much improved taskbar, where you can dock your favourite apps. We like both, but overall, we'd rate Mac OS X as better looking and arguably easier to navigate.

However, as we're comparing specifically to Snow Leopard, the enhancements that have made to it over Leopard are minor, while Windows 7 is a great leap forward from Windows Vista. As such, we're actually giving this round to Microsoft.

Winner: Windows 7

Features

Microsoft probably won't be shouting it to the hills, but the fact is that Windows is based on Windows Vista code - it's still same old Windows under the hood. Windows 7 is, of course, available in 32-bit and 64-bit versions and one of the main thrusts of Snow Leopard is that many of the native applications have been recompiled using 64-bit code. However, 32-bit code is still fully supported on both.

Apple has said that Snow Leopard now deals better than the competition for multi-core CPUs thanks to its Grand Central Station tech, which is designed to take the pain out of coding for multi-core threads. Devs can now code for the OS, rather than create multi-threaded code to start with, which is hard. However, we'll have to wait to see how effective this is, as developers still have to create Grand Central-aware apps.

Microsoft has made much of the fact that it has now baked touch support directly into the OS, and there's little doubt that the launch of the OS will spawn a flurry of touch-related computing platforms. That said, Mac OS has had multi-gesture support for a while, and if you've got a new MacBook Pro you get support for that via the touch-pad.

Delving deeper, while Apple has long offered solid-state drivers in the likes of its MacBook Air, Windows 7 has a step-up on it here with specific support for SSDs, which write data in a very different way to SATA drives.

For media, Apple has introduced Quicktime X, which has a highly minimalist interface that's very effective and a very simple, but also useful, video editing feature built right in. Window Media Player is fine but looks a touch dated now.

We also like the improved information shown in Snow Leopard when you view Wireless networks, but it's also much easier to join a network in Windows 7 than it was in Vista.

Clearly there's some two and fro here so we'll have to make this one a draw.

Winner:Draw

Business use

But what will business users prefer? Apple is clearly making a play for the enterprise with Exchange support built right into the OS. This means that you can use Mail and not Entourage, which is part of Office but it does require Exchange 2007 at the back end. On Windows you need to add Outlook, but overall Outlook still has more comprehensive Exchange support.

As we described in our Windows 7 RTM review, this OS has PowerShell 2.0 system management tools built right in. If you run SharePoint services they will integrate right into Windows 7.

As for Backup, Windows 7 has been improved giving you more control, while Snow Leopard has faster Time Machine capabilities. Apple still wins for simplicity and elegance in execution here.

Nevertheless, despite Apple's efforts and an ever-improving ability to run Macs in a Windows environment, Windows machines are still the default option.

{b]Winner:Windows 7

Security

The headline feature in Windows 7 is the reduced annoyance from the User Account Control feature you can now turn it off and tone it down, and most people will be happy just turning it down a notch.

Windows 7 Ultimate sports Bitlocker to Go, which, if used, will help protect the data on memory sticks. There's also AppLocker, which lets you control applications on a corporate network via Group Policy.

Both have a firewall, but Windows 7 wins for having Windows Defender ready for spyware. Of course a third-party suite is still highly recommended but Snow Leopard's approach to security is still mainly to hide behind the shadow of Windows as a far larger target.

For that reason, we're giving this round, perhaps controversially, to Windows 7.

b]Winner:Windows 7

Overall Winner:

Overall then, we have a draw, two wins for Snow Leopard and three for Windows 7, meaning Microsoft wins our informal little showdown.

Of course, picking a winner in this particular grudge match is fraught with difficulties, and what you ultimately go for depends on your needs.

For serious businesses, who will continue to go with a PC, that will mean Windows 7. However for home users, Snow Leopard continues the trend of making Macs increasingly attractive buys, while the licensing of Exchange will see an increase in Macs in the workplace as business users want the elegance of a Mac while still having access to their work, without having to use BootCamp or virtualisation.

What's also clear from this is that both are forcing the other to innovate, and that's good news for consumers and business users alike.

Verdict

In our battle, Windows 7 places a killer blow over Snow Leopard. Windows is still going to remain the first choice for businesses, but Apple is clearly making strides and many users will want both. This is certainly one battle that looks set to continue for some time yet.