Apple – 40Tech

December 28, 2019

AirPods Pro First Impressions From a Non-Audiophile

Here’s my super quick first take on the AirPods Pro:

Fit and Comfort

As you probably know, you can change the size of the tips. If the default tips pass the Fit Test, you will still want to try the other tips. Both the default tips and the smaller tips gave me a good seal and passed the Fit Test, so I went with the smaller ones as they were more comfortable. I must have a generic ear size, as the comfort of the AirPods Pro is about the same as my AirPods, and I can’t shake them out. I know some reviewers found that the AirPods Pro didn’t stay in as well as the AirPods, but that wasn’t my experience.

Audio quality

I hesitate to even mention audio quality, as I haven’t yet done a side by side test, so my impressions on audio quality are just quick first impressions. That said, the sound quality didn’t immediately blow me away as noticeably different from my first generation AirPods. Keep in mind that I’m not an audiophile, I haven’t done a side by side comparison, and I mostly listen to spoken word.

Latency

Latency is improved over the first generation AirPods. I have an AirFly Classic wireless audio transmitter hooked up to the TV by my treadmill, for when I’m watching sports or other shows on the TiVo instead of using the Apple TV. The latency with the first generation AirPods, when connected to the AirFly, was so severe as to be too distracting to use. In my limited use of the AirPods Pro, the lag is still there, but improved. I can live with it.

Noise Canceling

Assuming the noise canceling is similar on a plane (which other reviews suggest it is), it will be good enough for me to no longer have an interest in buying a high-end pair of headphones. I had a funny moment when I activated noise canceling while walking on the treadmill, nearly eliminating noise from the treadmill. I thought the treadmill had stopped until I realized my legs were still moving.

Overall

If I never flew, my first generation AirPods would be fine. But since I’ve been considering noise canceling headphones for flights, having a pair of jack-of-all-trades earbuds is a win.

September 12, 2019

DEVONthink 3 Review, From a Lawyer’s Perspective

Readers of this blog know how important DEVONthink is to my workflow. I use it as a central repository on my Mac for almost every piece of information in my professional and personal life, including as a place to store personal and business records, deposition data, jury verdict reports, legal research, trial notebooks, and more. I’ve been using DEVONthink 2 for over 7 years, during which time the program has seen frequent updates and improvements. Now, though, DEVONtechnologies has released an entirely new version of DEVONthink for the Mac.

July 25, 2019

Make Your CAPS LOCK Key Do Double Duty As a Modifier Key and Caps Lock

Your Caps Lock key might be underused on your Mac. If you’re a big automation geek, why not use it for something else, in addition to its built-in functionality? Karabiner Elements is a Mac tool that lets you customize the keyboard on your Mac, including the Caps Lock key. In this post, I’ll talk about how I’ve set up my Caps Lock key to be used as an extra modifier key (similar to the Command, Control, Option, and Shift keys), while at the same time preserving its normal functionality.

March 5, 2019

TECHSHOW “Mac Mastery” Downloads

In addition to attending great sessions and meeting interesting people, I presented two sessions at the ABA TECHSHOW in Chicago last week. One of them, Mac Mastery: Top Mac Workflows Used By Real Attorney, featured a few automation workflows and other processes I use in my practice. I shared a link to a page during the presentation, and indicated I would later publish downloads of the various workflows to the page. That page is now populated with the downloads and other information:

TECHSHOW 2019 – Mac Workflows

February 17, 2019

BBEdit to MarsEdit (AppleScript)

You can never own too many text editors. Okay, I can never own too many text editors. I recently splurged on BBEdit, the venerable HTML and text editor for the Mac. There’s something pleasurable about tweaking BBEdit to use it as a blogging tool. One such tool I hacked together is an AppleScript to send a post from BBEdit to MarsEdit for final publishing. Here’s how you do it.

Paste the following text into the Script Editor app on your Mac (warning: I’m no coder, and did this through trial and error based on other scripts, so this script probably contains some completely unnecessary code):

on run
	tell application "BBEdit" to set theFile to file of document 1
	
	
	set appleScriptPath to theFile as text
	set currentURL to POSIX path of appleScriptPath
	set currentURL to ("file://" & currentURL)
	
	tell application "MarsEdit"
		activate
		make new document
		tell document 1
			set body to theFile
		end tell
		activate
	end tell
end run

Compile then save the AppleScript. For the final step, you need to move this AppleScript to the BBEdit scripts folder. Get there by clicking on the Scripts icon near the far right of the BBEdit menu, and choosing “Open Scripts Folder.”

Once the AppleScript is in place, it will appear at the bottom of the dropdown when you click on the Scripts icon. Selecting it will take the text in BBEdit, and open it in a new MarsEdit document. I wrote the initial draft of this post in BBEdit, before using the AppleScript to send it to MarsEdit for final edits, adding of the image, assigning tags and categories, and sending off to WordPress.

Category: Apple (page 1 of 38)