A little-noticed fact about M1-based Macs has started to get some attention. If the Mac’s internal drive is dead or fully erased, you can’t boot from an otherwise valid external drive. Why would Apple make that choice? Security, security, security.

Prices for SSDs and Thunderbolt 3 enclosures have plummeted, so Glenn Fleishman finally bit the bullet to upgrade the storage for his lagging 2017 iMac. Doing so probably extended the useful lifespan of his iMac by years.

After working through the failure of his iMac’s SSD, Adam Engst shares the lessons he learned with regard to backing up, restoring, and eking out the most life from old hardware. Hint: waiting to upgrade hardware and software can make troubleshooting and recovery more difficult.

Along with the news of revised MacBook Air and MacBook Pro models, Apple has cut SSD prices across the Mac lineup.

macOS High Sierra switched to APFS (Apple File System) for Macs with solid-state storage, but what does it do? Jeff Carlson explains why Apple made the change, how APFS works, and what it can do for you.

A little over a year since the last update, Apple has now released new MacBook Pro models with quad-core and 6-core CPUs, an option for 32 GB of RAM, a True Tone display, a quieter butterfly keyboard, and an Apple T2 chip that enables Hey Siri.