Life’s Too Short to Deal With Bad Cables — Mac Geek Gab 1101

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You’ll pick up quick wins this week with smart Mac tips you can use right now. Color-code your USB and Thunderbolt cables so you always grab the right one, and stash them in mesh zipper pouches or a travel organizer so you’re never digging for the right connection. Add Apple Music playlists right to your Mac’s menu bar, trigger Time Machine backups with macOS 26 Shortcuts, and even have ChatGPT read answers aloud to you. Learn how to suss out the speed of your USB-C cables, avoid accidental calls, and know when a higher‑wattage charger is perfectly safe. And remember: when moving from Intel to Apple Silicon, migrate your Homebrew setup properly—Don’t Get Caught re‑installing from scratch.

From troubleshooting with AI without “leading the witness” to discovering that High Sierra is still getting (at least some!) security updates, you’ll walk away sharper than before. We dig into Cool Stuff Found like Dory, a frictionless Mac app switcher, and VueScan, which resurrects old, unsupported scanners. Clean up your cloud clutter, auto‑paste from Messages into any app, and explore apps like Dialed AI to keep your motivation up. Whether you’re traveling, upgrading, or just tidying your digital life, these tips keep you efficient, organized, and ready for anything.

 

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 1:24:01 — 58.6MB)

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Dave Hamilton

Dave Hamilton is a podcaster, a publisher, and a nerd who has spent the past three decades of his career educating thousands of computer users. In addition to Mac Geek Gab podcast (now in its 19th year!), Dave is co-host of Business Brain and Gig Gab, two other shows to check out! Dave is also the co-founder and CEO of BackBeat Media, a boutique network of podcasts and websites that represents fiercely-independent publishers, of which Dave considers himself one. He has been involved in online publishing since 1998, when he co-founded The Mac Observer, a popular Apple news site which was acquired in 2021. Technology isn't the only thing Dave's a nerd about: he's also a drummer, playing in Bitter Pill, Fling, and various other projects in and around the New Hampshire seacoast where he and his wife, Lisa, live and raised their two children. Dave's reachable for a limited amount of paid consulting at DaveTheNerd.com and you can find to him on Mastodon, Bluesky, Twitter, Instagram, and Facebook, too!

3 Comments

Greg H · August 20, 2025 at 1:55 am EDT

Also for traveling I really like to take this with me
It’s the tom Bihn travel tray and they have a small and a large basically what you do is you just put your stuff in there like your keys or just stuff that you would normally put on a table and you just put in there and it keeps things really organized and looks neat. The wife really likes that. https://www.tombihn.com/products/small-travel-tray

Reply

    Dave Hamilton · August 20, 2025 at 11:48 am EDT

    That’s brilliant, Greg. Thanks! We’ll share on the show.

    Reply

Greg H · August 20, 2025 at 1:47 am EDT

Yeah I think color coating is a great idea. I use a little sticker that’s different colors. I bought on Amazon for my Samsung SSD so I have a different color for my iMazing Backup drive, photos, Backup, Carbon Copy Cloner, etc. and recently I got this thermal label maker that uses no ink makes labels with heat and it’s awesome and I could use the special labels that they have that kind of look like price tags on a necklace or jewelry price tag but it works great and they have different sizes up to 3 inches and smaller sizes and I’ve been organizing my boxes, etc. it’s rechargeable battery. It’s portable. They have their own app. It’s awesome
Phomemo 220 the thermal label maker

Reply

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