Must have apps 2020?

Joined
Jan 3, 2020
Messages
4
Reaction score
1
Points
3
Hi everyone just purchases a macbook pro 2019 15inch and was wondering what are the top must have applications you recommend. Been using a PC for most of my life so don't know what to get.

Currently: Magnet, Spark, Fantastical2

Uses: Work and personal
 
M

MBAmtloin

Guest
depending on what you need to create or be entertained with, there are music apps like Bose that work really well interfacing both MacBooks and PC laptops to adjust songs, volume and artist. If you photograph, camera manufactures like nikon has great software to adjusting pictures. Image capture is an Apple that seems to work but not as the manufacture's one. Macbooks do run linux programs you might be used being a windows user.
Have fun!
 
Joined
Jan 1, 2009
Messages
15,452
Reaction score
3,808
Points
113
Location
Winchester, VA
Your Mac's Specs
MBP 16" 2023 (M3 Pro), iPhone 15 Pro, plus ATVs, AWatch, MacMinis (multiple)
Not so much what to get, but what to avoid. Don't use an antivirus, no need as there are no viruses in the wild for Mac at this time so A/V software pretty much just slows down the Mac for zero benefit. Avoid things claiming to clean, speed, tune or in any way "improve" your Mac performance. Most of them are rubbish, some are positively harmful. EDIT: One exception is OnyX, from Titanium Software | Operating system utilities for Mac - Home . Either OnyX or Maintenance are useful to run every few months or so. Get the proper version for your version of the operating system.

OK, that said, if you browse a lot and are bugged by ads on websites, there are some handy tools for that: Ghostery, AdBlock+ and a couple of others.

Password managers are handy and can keep you from slipping into bad habits of easy passwords. 1Password is what I use, but there are other good ones out there.

If you think you have been hit with some sort of malware (browser hijacker, dns redirect, popups, etc), DirectX Swift is a mighty good destroyer of those things. I think there is a free version, but I liked it so much I paid for it.

To do better searching on the Mac, either Find Any File or EasyFind will do a better job than Spotlight.

For now, that should get you started. Welcome to the Mac world!
 

krs


Joined
Sep 16, 2008
Messages
3,555
Reaction score
610
Points
113
Location
Canada
In addition to what Jake posted, I would get VLC which plays pretty much any video you can throw at it, including DVD's, and also a second browser in addition to Safari.

Other than that, I would suggest to post back here if you need an application for a specific task that the Mac can't do out of the box.
 
Joined
Sep 30, 2007
Messages
9,962
Reaction score
1,235
Points
113
Location
The Republic of Neptune
Your Mac's Specs
2019 iMac 27"; 2020 M1 MacBook Air; macOS up-to-date... always.
My personal must-haves:

AdGuard for Mac. Ad blocking software is a must-have, but a lot of it out there is rather sketchy. AG4M isn't free, but I got a lifetime license while on sale and was well worth it. It covers all apps on your Mac, not just the web browsers.

IINA. It's a media player that will take anything thrown at it. It's faster and more efficient than VLC and is based on mpv, which is wildly popular today on Windows and Linux in particular, and for good reason.

Keka. It's an archive extraction and compression utility that excels at what it does. It replaced another popular extractor, The Unarchiver, because it handles certain rar archives flawlessly that TU chokes on.

AppCleaner. This app helps remove applications and most of the helper files that they create when used. There are several apps that do the same thing, but this one has proven to be more thorough for me than most.

Find Any File. Literally, you can find any file on your Mac using any of a variety of criteria. I've used it to root out app leftovers that even AppCleaner didn't catch, but it's useful for other needs.

Carbon Copy Cloner. It's an indispensable backup utility that literally can clone your internal drive to an external drive or disk image, then just update any files that have changed over time.

DetectX Swift. Malware is a reality on macOS, but dedicated antivirus software is overkill, especially since macOS does have built-in protections and screening. A second opinion never hurts and this app can watch the different places where apps are set to launch on login so you can get a heads-up when they are modified, whether legitimately or not.

Onyx. Already mentioned, but a good utility to run if you are having issues with your system. I usually run it after a macOS update to rebuild the cache in particular.

TinkerTool. This app can let you modify "hidden" features of macOS. It's free and very handy. It has a sister application, TinkerTool System, that isn't free and while it replicates a lot of the features of Onyx, it has a few other nifty tricks up its sleeve. Not necessarily "essential", but I mention it so you don't confuse the two TinkerTools.

Xee³. It's a graphics viewer that is IMO the best available for macOS. It's not free, but not crazy expensive either.

1Password. It's for storing and managing passwords for websites, as well as other things like software license codes. The reality today is that you cannot re-use the same password on multiple sites on the internet because if you do and one site gets compromised, then you are compromised everywhere. There are other options available, and while I have long used and prefer 1Password, their pricing is getting to be a bit crazy by pushing people to subscriptions, something you can avoid if you carefully review all their purchase options.

Cookie 6. Not essential for "everyone", but if you value your privacy online, this app will help you manage the cookies that websites store to minimize how much they track you.

Brave Browser. Some sites just don't work in Safari quite right so you need an alternative. I'm very happy with Brave, which is based on Chrome but more privacy minded. Firefox is a good alternative also.

I have lots of other essentials for my usage, but we'd need to know more about what you plan to use your Mac for before recommending other apps.
 
Last edited:

krs


Joined
Sep 16, 2008
Messages
3,555
Reaction score
610
Points
113
Location
Canada
Nice list, lifeisabeach.

There are a number of apps I never heard of.

First one that intrigued me was IINA - specifically your comment:
It's faster and more efficient than VLC

I wasn't sure what you meant by that, how faster, it just plays a video...maybe faster to start playing??
And "more efficient" - again, I can't wrap my head around what 'more efficient" means when it comes to a media player.

Anyway, I downloaded it, just squeezed in with my current macOS, ElCapitan, which is the oldest macOS IINA is compatible with.
Download and installation was quick.
Then I tried the first test, playing a DVD (which is one media people are having trouble with occasionally, especially with the rgion settings)
Well, to start with, IINA wasn't fast to start playing the DVD, after I dragged the DVD on my desktop to the IINA window, IINA started cycling through all the VOB folders on the DVD which took well over a minute and at the end, the IINA window just closed - none of the DVD played.

I tried several methods to get a DVD to play using IINA, but it won't - it shows up as you can see in my first screen shot, but all I get is a black window with a faint control screen.
So what is the trick to get IINA to play a DVD?

IINA DVD.jpg

IINA DVD2.jpg
 
Joined
Sep 30, 2007
Messages
9,962
Reaction score
1,235
Points
113
Location
The Republic of Neptune
Your Mac's Specs
2019 iMac 27"; 2020 M1 MacBook Air; macOS up-to-date... always.
Nice list, lifeisabeach.

There are a number of apps I never heard of.

First one that intrigued me was IINA - specifically your comment:


I wasn't sure what you meant by that, how faster, it just plays a video...maybe faster to start playing??
And "more efficient" - again, I can't wrap my head around what 'more efficient" means when it comes to a media player.

Anyway, I downloaded it, just squeezed in with my current macOS, ElCapitan, which is the oldest macOS IINA is compatible with.
Download and installation was quick.
Then I tried the first test, playing a DVD (which is one media people are having trouble with occasionally, especially with the rgion settings)
Well, to start with, IINA wasn't fast to start playing the DVD, after I dragged the DVD on my desktop to the IINA window, IINA started cycling through all the VOB folders on the DVD which took well over a minute and at the end, the IINA window just closed - none of the DVD played.

I tried several methods to get a DVD to play using IINA, but it won't - it shows up as you can see in my first screen shot, but all I get is a black window with a faint control screen.
So what is the trick to get IINA to play a DVD?

To be honest, I've never tried using IINA to play a DVD directly. I only deal with media files I've ripped already. I had long been dissatisfied with VLC, though the specifics escape me but it seems it was largely sluggishness on startup, and skipping around in a media file, at least in comparison to IINA. IINA generally seemed to be more responsive and less demanding of the CPU, but I could be just kidding myself on this since I've been aggravated far too many times with VLC and it's occasional "rebuilding font cache" task that takes forever in particular. That's generally the opinion at large if you read around, although again, having not used it to play a DVD directly, that may be something it does poorly.
 
OP
N
Joined
Jan 3, 2020
Messages
4
Reaction score
1
Points
3
depending on what you need to create or be entertained with, there are music apps like Bose that work really well interfacing both MacBooks and PC laptops to adjust songs, volume and artist. If you photograph, camera manufactures like nikon has great software to adjusting pictures. Image capture is an Apple that seems to work but not as the manufacture's one. Macbooks do run linux programs you might be used being a windows user.
Have fun!

That's a nice read and knowing :) may you share some referral links to find out more cool apps and read more about them.
 
Joined
Feb 1, 2011
Messages
4,407
Reaction score
2,098
Points
113
Location
Sacramento, California
Hi everyone just purchases a macbook pro 2019 15inch and was wondering what are the top must have applications you recommend.

I have a Web site that you might find very helpful:

Free Or Inexpensive Macintosh Software
Free Or Inexpensive Macintosh Software

Most of the stuff on that site is there because it is really really good, and it's free!

Beyond that we need to know what your needs are. Do you need a personal accounting program? A graphics program?

What do you want to do with your computer?
 
OP
N
Joined
Jan 3, 2020
Messages
4
Reaction score
1
Points
3
Reading all the suggestions/posts after a busy weekend :D it will take time, thanks guys in advance
 

Shop Amazon


Shop for your Apple, Mac, iPhone and other computer products on Amazon.
We are a participant in the Amazon Services LLC Associates Program, an affiliate program designed to provide a means for us to earn fees by linking to Amazon and affiliated sites.
Top