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How to maximize your buying dollars It is no secret that Apple products are expensive. Some of us save money by buying used products but you usually can’t find the latest products that way and there is always the unknown of something used. There is another option that can save money on newer products. Apple offers “refurbished” products on their website. Unlike some of the other sites that claim to have refurbished products, these are refurbished and guaranteed by Apple. You get the same warranty as a new product and can even get Apple Care. Availability is constantly changing so if you are looking for something specific you may have to check back later. The link below will take you to an article that covers this in more detail. https://www.macworld.com/article/3238012/how-to-buy-refurbished-macbook-refurbished-iphone-refurbished-ipad.html?utm_source=Adestra&utm_medium=email&utm_content=Title%3A%20How%20to%20buy%20a%20refurbished%20Mac%2C%20MacBook%2C%20iPhone%2C%20or%20iPad%20from%20Apple&utm_campaign=Macworld%20MacWeek&utm_term=Editorial%20-%20MacWeek&utm_date=20200115212813

If you have an email account from Apple, ending in either mac.Com , me.com , or iCloud.com , you can set up 3 alias email addresses. The email addresses can be used for whatever purpose you decide. If your primary email address has your name, you may want an alias to use on web sites, or for shopping accounts. The only requirement is that the address cannot be in use by someone else. The new email addresses are tied to your primary address so there is no need to add them to your set up, they will just show up in your inbox. We did this on the tech support email. The primary email address is slappleusers@icloud.com but we set up an alias of SunLakesAppleSupport@icloud.com because it was a little more descriptive and easier to remember. The link below shows how to set them up. https://www.macworld.com/article/3512033/how-to-use-icloud-aliases-to-send-and-receive-email.html?utm_source=Adestra&utm_medium=email&utm_content=Read%20more%3A%20How%20to%20use%20iCloud%20aliases%20to%20send%20and%20receive%20email&utm_campaign=Macworld%20MacWeek&utm_term=Editorial%20-%20MacWeek&utm_date=20200115213653

Time Machine - How to Back up a Mac You will need an external hard drive that your Mac can access. This is easiest with a USB drive that can be found at many stores/websites. The simplest way is to simply plug the external drive into your computers USB port and then follow the instructions at the web link below. Alternatively the external drive may be installed on a USB port present on most wireless routers. Some setup may be required to allow access but once done you can use the hard drive to back up any/all Macs you have in your house wirelessly. The external hard drive needs to be big enough to support this. As a rule of thumb, it should be at least twice as big as the drive(s) you are trying to back up. If your Mac has 500k on board storage you should get at least 1TB. If your Mac has 1TB of internal storage you should get at least 2TB. If you have more than one Mac to back up you will need add them up to determine how big it should be. Bigger is better if you can afford it because that will allow for a longer history from which you can recover lost files. Time machine does a full back up the first time (this can take a long time) and then does incremental backups, only backing up things that have changed. When the back up drive is full, it will delete the oldest back ups to make more room. https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT201250