Roman Loyola

On Wednesday, hard drive manufacturer Seagate announced that it will acquire a controlling interest in LaCie. Seagate has agreed to purchase 64.5 percent of LaCie's outstanding shares, according to a LaCie press release.

The acquisition is the latest in a series of mergers of storage companies. Last March, Western Digital finalized its acquisition of Hitachi GST. In December of last year, Seagate acquired Samsung's hard drive business.

Last week in Mac Basics we showed how to launch apps automatically at startup. On a related note, there's a way to quickly access apps, files, and servers you've recently used. Under the Apple menu, there's an option called Recent Items, and when you select it, you'll see a pop-up list of apps, files, and servers you've used recently.

Recent Items is a great way to quickly open what you want. (Some apps have a similar feature called Open Recent, which is often found in the app's File menu.) The list of Recent Items changes over time, and to make the Recent Items list more useful, you can set the number of apps, files, and servers that appear on the list. Here's how to customize the setting in Lion.

The annual expo for Mac and iOS users has evolved to focus on the user community, but the Macworld | iWorld exhibit hall where companies show off their wares is still a huge part of the show -- you might even say it’s the most important part. Hundreds of products are on display, but a few stand out from the rest. We call these products the Best of Show.

Macworld's editors use their market knowledge and expertise to determine the candidates. After some back-and-forth among editors, a list of the winners is created. Here are the recipients of the 2012 Macworld | iWorld Best of Show awards.

Apple distributes updates to Mac OS X and some of its applications (such as iLife and Safari) through a feature in the operating system called Software Update. To run Software Update, click on the Apple () menu and select Software Update. It may take a minute or two for this feature to run, longer if there are updates available for download and installation. (You may need to restart your Mac, so it's a good idea to run Software Update when you aren't doing anything else. You do have the option to cancel if you're in the middle of something.)

By default, Software Update runs automatically on a weekly basis. You can change the frequency, or even turn it off-the settings for Software Update (for both Lion and Snow Leopard) are found in System Preferences; the Software Update icon can be found in the System section. Here's how to customize Software Update to your liking.

At the Apple education event on Thursday, Apple executives Eddy Cue and Jeff Robbin unveiled the iTunes U app, a new way for students and teachers to manage course material for classes on an iPad, iPhone, or iPod touch.

While the iTunes app provides access to the content that’s available in the iTunes U section of the iTunes Store, it also offers a means for teacher and student interaction. The opening interface looks a lot like Apple’s iBooks app, with a bookshelf that hosts icons representing your courses. Tap on a course, and you’ll see a list of topics on the left, such as Overview, Instructor, and Outline. These topics can be customized with additional topics. Teachers can post a syllabus, notes, and assignments to the class, and students receive notifications when new posts are available. With the assignment lists in the iTunes U app, students can mark off when an assignment is done.

Looking to print a few flyers for your garage sale this weekend, or maybe print a few things for your upcoming Halloween party?

If you use a Canon or FujiXerox printer, you probably should use one of the new drivers released by Apple on Thursday.

Siri, the new voice command feature on the iPhone 4S, is a handy new feature that's pretty amazing. But it could also be used by someone to play a rather mean trick on an unsuspecting person.

The Kodak PlaySport Zx3 ($150 as of July 24, 2011) is a waterproof pocket camcorder that can handle dives down to 10 feet underwater. It captures some of the best videos and photos we've seen, but it has a design flaw in its button layout.

The PlaySport Zx3 is an average-size pocket camcorder, measuring 2.3 by 4.4 by 0.8 inches. Everything you need to operate the camcorder is on its body; it doesn't offer touchscreen controls. On its back are a 2-inch LCD, a record button, a playback button, a delete button, a settings button, and a navigation button ring. On its right side, hidden behind a pop-out panel, are an HDMI port, a USB port, and an AV-out port. On the left, also hidden behind a panel, is the removable, rechargeable lithium ion battery. Below the battery slot is the SD/SDHC card slot (a card is not included).

Whenever Apple announces a new product, a rich system of accessories and peripherals is sure to spring up around it. Scosche Industries proved the point Wednesday, following the debut of the iPad 2 with the announcement of its own line of cases designed for the new device.

The cases include the new the foldIO p2 series, a $45 folio case that comes in four different models-black or white, carbon or leather-and provides three different landscape viewing options in addition to suede interior. The company's cheaper options for protecting your new iPad 2 include the glosSEE P2, a line of $40 translucent rubber cases, and the $30 snapSHIELD p2 line of hard-shelled polycarbonate cases. (Scosche is also offering three different types of screen protectors ranging in price from $20 to $50.)

Apple includes a pair of alkaline AA batteries with its Magic Mouse, but I recommend eventually replacing them with rechargeable batteries. And if you do, you'll want to get four: one set for the mouse, and a second set charged and ready for when the batteries in the mouse run out of power.

Mobee's $50 Magic Charger offers an attractive alternative to this setup. The Magic Charger is a combination of the Mobee Battery Pack, a rechargeable battery pack specifically made for the Magic Mouse, and an inductive charger. With the battery pack installed in the Magic Mouse, you simply place the mouse on the charging pad when you're not using your computer, and you'll never have to worry about running out of battery power again. (If you've got more than one Magic Mouse, you can purchase additional battery packs for $30 each, although you'll be able to charge only one at a time, given the charger's size.)

The iMainGo X is the latest in Portable Sound Laboratories' line of "speaker cases" for the iPhone and iPod. The iMainGo X is more versatile than the company's iMainGo 2, ( Macworld rated 4 out of 5 mice ) while offering a similar combination of protection and good sound.

Since the original iMainGo, released back in 2007, Portable Sound Laboratories hasn't strayed much from the initial design of its product. The iMainGo X still uses a two-part, clamshell case that zips closed. One half houses the amplifier, speakers, and battery, while the other half holds your device. (You connect the iMainGo X's audio cable to your iPod or iPhone's headphone jack, adjusting volume with your player's own volume control.) When closed, the iMainGo X measures 5.7 inches long, 3.8 inches across, and 2.4 inches thick; it weighs 1.5 pounds.

At a special event in San Francisco Wednesday, Apple unveiled the iPad 2, the follow-up to the original iPad it released last April. The iPad 2 features an all-new design along with new features including built-in cameras and a new gyroscope.

At the heart of the iPad 2 is a 1GHz dual-core Apple A5 processor, which should provide a boost over the 1GHz single-core Apple A4 in the first iPad. Apple says the A5 is two times faster than the previous processor, while graphics performance is nine times faster--welcome news for everything from games to video-editing apps like the soon-to-be-released iPad-optimized version of iMovie.