Best cases for Moto Z Force

What are the best cases you can get today for the Moto Z Force Droid Edition?

The Moto Z Force Droid Edition was just recently released, but that’s not going to stop you from getting a case that’s perfect for your new phone. And it needs a case; the Moto Z Force is less than 7mm thick and it’s on the slippery side. A good case, paired with the Moto ShatterShield that’s exclusive to the Moto Z Force, will keep your phone safe and ding-free for a long time. We’ll update our list once the phone’s been in your hands for a little while, but for now, we have some excellent contenders for best cases.

• Moto Style Shell
• PLESON ultra slim crystal clear case
• LK ultra scratch resistant protective case
• Cimo shockproof heavy duty case
• LK luxury wallet flip case

Moto Style Shell

The Moto Style Shell is a magnetic attachment, just like the Moto Mods, that snaps onto the back of your Moto Z Force. They’re an easy add-on to your pre-order and they range in price from roughly $20 to $25.

These shells come in fabric, wood, and leather options that add a little extra texture to the back of your phone, and they offer some protection for the raised camera edges. They also help to keep fingerprints and other gunk off of your nice new hardware, and dissipate the heat that has been known to radiate from the back of the Moto Z Force.

The downfall of the Moto Style Shell is that none of the shells wrap around the edges of the phone, they only protect the back. The ShatterShield will do its part to protect the Moto Z Force from drops and bumps, but you may want some extra protection for the rest of the body. Nonetheless, these shells do offer a unique look for your Moto Z Force and won’t add any bulk to the slim frame.

See at Motorola

PLESON ultra slim crystal clear case

To show off the hardware of your Moto Z Force, a clear case is the perfect choice. This is especially true if you decided to go for the white and fine gold or black and rose gold combinations that are just too beautiful to hide.

The PLESON ultra slim crystal clear case is ideal for keeping the phone’s slim profile while adding on some grip and drop protection. The soft TPU bumper offers raised edges and corner protection to keep the screen and camera extra safe when you’re having a busy day or a clumsy moment, and the precise cutouts don’t sacrifice ports or button usage.

The clear case from PLESON is also anti-watermark and anti-fingerprint so you won’t get that foggy, muddied look on your case over time.

See at Amazon

LK ultra scratch resistant protective case

Add a touch of something formal or fanciful to your Moto Z Force with a scratch resistant case from LK. The five color varieties are on the inexpensive side; grab more than one and have a case that matches every occasion! The solid black version pictured here goes with everything.

The smooth, flexible TPU case easily snaps on and off when you’re looking to pop on one of the Moto Mods. The button covers (rather than cutouts) are responsive and provide some extra protection against daily dust and dirt. The non-slip TPU won’t let your phone go sliding off of an uneven surface, either.

LK’s protective case also resists stains and marks that are bound to happen during your day or night, so it’ll last you for as long as you need it.

See at Amazon

Cimo shockproof heavy duty case

Planning on being a little hard on your brand new Moto Z Force? Whether it’s a rough commute or you just plan on being outdoorsy and unpredictable, the Cimo shockproof heavy duty case should be in your case repertoire.

The dual layer shock and drop protection is paired with a textured back surface that provides lots of extra grip without adding a ton of weight and bulk to the phone; just enough for some added padding. Unlike a lot of cases, Cimo’s offers a cutout for the back speakers so sound won’t be compromised a bit during those spontaneous dance parties you’re always throwing (or is that just us?). The raised bezels front and back protect the screen and the camera to boot.

For a more rugged and sporty look for your Moto Z Force, Cimo is a great pick. You can also grab it in seven different colors, like the armor gray pictured here.

See at Amazon

LK luxury wallet flip case

You usually grab your phone and your wallet when you head out the door, right? Get a case for your Moto Z Force that carries the phone, some cash, and three credit cards with the LK luxury wallet flip case. The synthetic leather comes in five colors, from the sleek and subtle black to the vibrant sky blue pictured here. The magnetic closure is secure and the TPU inner shell is shock resistant, covering the edges and corners of the Moto Z Force.

LK’s wallet case also folds into a sturdy kickstand for hands-free operating. You’ll still have access to all the buttons and ports, including your camera, without removing your phone.

See at Amazon

Which one’s for you?

Which case do you have ready and waiting for your new Moto Z Force? Shout it out in the comments below.

Moto Z and Moto Z Force

• Our Moto Z review!
• Moto Z specs
• Moto Mods custom backs
• Moto Z and Moto Z Force will be Verizon exclusives until the fall of 2016
• The latest Moto Z news
• Discuss in our Moto Z forums

Motorola
Verizon

Best replacement bands for Samsung Gear S2

Which are the best replacement bands for the Gear S2?

When it comes to smartwatches, the Samsung Gear S2 stands out as a fantastic device, even if it isn’t Android Wear. One of it’s biggest pulls is that it’s a fairly small, and stylish computer for your wrist. What if you aren’t a big fan of the watch bands that come with it, or if those bands break?

Thankfully, there are options if you need to replace your Gear S2’s watch bands. While you could take a waltz through the internet to search them out, we’ve put together the best watch band replacements for your Gear S2. Just keep scrolling to check them out.

• Samsung
• V-MORO
• Skylet
• Getwow
• Moretek
• MoKo
• Tevies
• FanTEK
• Henoda

Samsung watch bands

When looking for a replacement Gear S2 band, your first option is to go right through Samsung.

The company has seven different bands that are available for purchase through their website, from leather to stylized plastic, ranging from $39.99 to $59.99. Samsung has also partnered with Atelier Mendini on some unique patterns that are certain to turn heads.

See at Samsung

V-MORO watch bands

If you’re a fan of giving your technology a bit of personal flair, then the V-MORO watch bands should certainly pique your interest. There are over a dozen different bands available, from multiple colors, floral patterns, leather, and even solid stainless steel links.

Depending on the style, these bands are available from $49.99 to $59.99, but you can often find them on sale for a good deal.

See at Amazon

Skylet watch bands

For another dash of personality, Skylet watch bands for the Gear S2 may catch your eye. Each silicon band has its own pattern, from the Fleur de Lis to a rainbow of colors. They’re affordable as well, starting at just $15.

There are currently 24 different bands that you can choose between and each one can add some serious personality to your Gear S2.

See at Amazon

Getwow watch bands

Another great place to look is at the watch bands from Getwow. These rubber watchbands are each unique in their design. Though you won’t find anything particularly flashy in these rubber options, they do sport a number of different patterns.

Each one can be bought for around $40, with bright colors that are sure to catch the eye.

See at Amazon

Moretek watch bands

If you want a watch band that will work well for fitness, or keep you from having a sweaty wrist under the rubber, the Moretek bands might do the trick.

There are four color combinations that you’ll be able to choose from, and each sports a design with cutouts throughout the band, and a two-tone color scheme. These watch bands are available for around $40.

See at Amazon

MoKo watch bands

If you want to avoid clasps, the MoKo band for Gear S2 is a magnetic option that adheres to itself. This means that if you have a wrist larger, or smaller, than the norm you don’t have to worry about it not fitting correctly.

You can pick one up for around $35.

See at Amazon

Tevies watch band

Sometimes when you really want to make a statement with your watch band. If that’s the case then check out these steel link watch bands from Tevies.

There are ten different bands currently available in an array of colors to pick from. A steel watch band doesn’t have to break the bank either; these ones start at around $20.

See at Amazon

FanTEK watch bands

Not everybody can afford to shell out $30 or $40 for a new watch band. Thankfully, FanTEK comes through with affordable watch bands that sport muted designs. Unlike the bright designs on many other watch bands, you’ll find dark colors and simple designs that draw your eye to the Gear S2 without being overwhelming.

Even if you’re not on a budget, the $7.88 price tag is a sweet deal.

See at Amazon

Henoda

Not everybody is looking for a flashy design, or really a design at all, for their watch bands. If all you’re looking for is a watch band with a splash of color, check out the Henoda watch bands.

Available for around $50 these silicon replacement bands come in a solid color. You can choose from one of ten colors to make your smartwatch pop without looking audacious.

See at Amazon

How to replace your Gear S2 watch band

Once you get your Gear S2 replacement band, it’s easy to change it out. Just follow along with our how-to video!

What caught your eye?

These are just 9 of the watch bands for the Samsung Gear S2 that caught our eye. There are hundreds more available online in places like Amazon. Did any of these watch bands have you making grabby hands? Let us know about it in the comments below!

Protecting Your Privacy in Safari for OS X El Capitan

Every time you visit a website you are sharing information about yourself with the outside world. This article runs through a number of methods you can use to gain more control over what gets shared, and who it gets shared with, whenever you use Apple’s Safari browser to access the web on a Mac.

It also covers methods you can use to prevent traces of your browsing history from showing up on your computer. While you may trust friends and family not to go searching through your web history, it’s possible for them to unintentionally discover what you’ve been looking at, just by using Safari or performing an innocent search on your Mac. If you’re interested in a similar overview covering Safari on iOS, check out this guide.

This guide assumes you are using the latest public release of OS X El Capitan (10.11.6 as of initial writing), which you can check by clicking the  symbol in the menu bar at the top left of your screen and selecting “About This Mac”. The version number appears beneath the OS X version name. If you’re not up to date, you can download and install the latest version of OS X via the Mac App Store located on the Dock or in the Applications folder.

Cookies, Location Services, and Tracking

Many websites attempt to store cookies and other web page data on computers used to access online content. Cookies are small data files that can include things like your IP address, operating system, web browser version, the date you last visited the site, as well as any personal information you may have provided, such as your name, email address, and any relevant preferences. This information is used to identify you when you revisit a site, so that it can offer tailored services, provide specific content, or display targeted ads.

Websites are increasingly upfront about their use of cookies – you’ve probably seen notices on popular sites requesting that you acknowledge their use. That’s largely because EU law requires sites based within its borders to get consent from visitors to store or retrieve cookie data, and as of September 2015, Google requires that any website using its advertising products complies with the law if any of its visitors are inside the EU, regardless of where the site itself is based.

By default, Safari accepts cookies and website data only from websites you visit, and attempts to block third-party cookies that try to target you with ads or create a profile of your online activities. If you don’t like the idea of being tracked at all, you can selectively block the use of cookies by following the steps below. Note however that some pages might not work unless you allow the use of cookies, so if you run into login problems or other issues on familiar sites after adjusting these settings, then you might want to dial back the changes.

Additionally, you may have noticed how Safari asks if you want to share your location whenever you visit a geolocation-enabled website. If you don’t expect the site to provide helpful location-based services such as regional weather information or local amenities, you can deny the request and continue to do so like this on a case-by-case basis. Alternatively, you can change Safari’s behavior whenever it encounters such a site, as described in the following steps.

Lastly, Do Not Track is a feature you can enable to prevent websites from tracking your site visits across the web. With the feature turned on, Safari specifically asks sites and their third party content providers (including advertisers) not to track you. In reality, it’s up to the website to honor this request, but it’s an option worth enabling for a potential extra layer of privacy.

Here’s how to change Safari settings for cookies, location services, and tracking:

From Safari’s menu bar, select Safari -> Preferences…, and click on the Privacy tab.

Select how Safari should deal with cookies and website data by clicking on the relevant button. Your options are: Always block, Allow from current website only, Allow from websites I visit (the default setting), and Always allow.

This tab also lets you check any existing website data stored in your browser cache. You can get more information on it, as well as remove data for individual websites, by clicking the “Details…” button.

To remove all data completely, press the button on the Privacy tab labeled “Remove All Website Data…” and confirm with “Remove Now”, or click “Remove All” from within the “Details…” dialog.

In the section labeled “Website use of location services”, choose from: Prompt for each website once each day; Prompt for each website one time only; and Deny without prompting.

To enable the Do Not Track feature, check the box at the bottom of the Privacy tab next to “Ask websites not to track me”.

Enable Private Browsing

By enabling Private Browsing, you can prevent Safari from remembering the pages you visit and any AutoFill information, while any tabs you open within a private window won’t be stored in iCloud. Safari also automatically asks sites and third-party content providers not to track you, prevents sites from modifying any information stored on your Mac, and deletes cookies when you close the related tab or window.

In Safari’s menu bar, select File -> New Private Window. You’ll notice the Safari address bar appears dark instead of light in a private window, indicating that Safari will not cache your browsing history, store snapshots of pages you visited or save your search history, and any AutoFill information will be lost after the window (or tab) is closed.

If you want to default to private browsing, you can set Safari to open a new Private Browsing window every time the app is launched. Choose Safari -> Preferences…, click General, select the “Safari opens with” pop-up menu, then choose “A new private window”.

Clear Browsing History

Safari for Mac enables you to remove all records of your browsing history including cookies and other cached website data over a specific timeframe of your choosing.

Browsing records that are cleared using the first method described below include any Top Sites not marked as permanent, your Frequently Visited Sites list, recent searches typed into the Safari search bar, web page snapshots shown in the open tab preview screen, download lists (but not downloads), sites you asked to send you notifications, and sites supporting Quick Website Search (the ability to search within specific sites from the Safari search bar).

Note that this method also clears history and web data from any devices logged into the same iCloud account.

To clear all history including cached website data and cookies, select Safari -> Clear History… from the Safari menu bar.

In the dialog window that appears, select the timeframe that you’d like to clear from the dropdown menu. Your options are: the last hour, today, today and yesterday, and all history. Click “Clear History” to confirm.If you want to clear your history but keep cached website data and cookies, hold the Alt/Option key on your keyboard during step 1 above, and the “Clear History…” menu option will change to “Clear History and Keep Website Data”. Choose this description instead and continue on to select your clearance timeframe.

If you only want to remove specific websites from your history, ignore the steps above and instead click “History” in the Safari menu bar, select “Show History”, right-click a site in the list, and then select “Remove” from the contextual menu.

Exclude Browsing History From Spotlight Searches

If you’d rather retain your browsing history but don’t want web pages you’ve visited to appear in system-wide Spotlight Search results, follow these steps.

Open System Preferences and select the Spotlight pane.

In the Search Results tab, uncheck the box next to “Bookmarks & History” (and “Bing Web Searches”, if this is your default search engine).

Switch Search Engine and Disable Safari Suggestions

Just because you cleared your browsing history and web data in Safari or browsed in a Private window, doesn’t mean your searches aren’t still recorded elsewhere. For example, if you logged into a Google account during the session, searches you performed may be logged by Google and later show up as search suggestions when you start typing in the Google search bar in the same account. In fact, your search and ad results may be customized based on your search-related activity, even if you’re signed out of your account.

To get around this issue, either consult the privacy help page of your preferred search engine to learn how to turn off tracking settings, or set a non-tracking search engine such as StartPage as your home page (using the General tab in Safari -> Preferences…). The next series of steps shows you how to set up Safari to use the non-tracking search engine DuckDuckGo when you type search queries into the address bar.

Another thing to reconsider is your use of Safari Suggestions. With this option enabled, your search queries, the Safari Suggestions you select, and related usage data are sent to Apple. Additionally, if you have Location Services turned on, when you make a search query in Safari with Safari Suggestions enabled your location is also sent to Apple. If you don’t want this information shared, turn off Safari Suggestions as shown below.

From the Safari menu bar, select Safari -> Preferences…, and click on the Search tab.

Select the DuckDuckGo search engine from the dropdown menu. You can also choose whether you want search engine suggestions appearing in the Safari search bar using the checkbox immediately below.

Uncheck the box next to “Include Safari Suggestions” in the Smart Search Field options; you can also disable the Quick Website Search function if you prefer by using the checkbox below.

Disable Frequently Visited Sites

By default, Frequently Visited Sites appear below your Favorites whenever you open a new tab or a new Safari window. You can turn this feature off.

There are two ways to prevent frequently visited sites from appearing in new tabs and windows. The simplest way is to click Bookmarks in the Safari menu bar and untick “Show Frequently Visited in Favorites”. The second method described below prevents Favorites from appearing in new tabs and windows altogether, but removes the option to display your Top Sites as well.

From the Safari menu bar, select Safari -> Preferences…, and select the General tab.

In the dropdown menus for “New windows open with:” and “New tabs open with:”, select an option other than Favorites, such as “Empty Page”.

Turn Off AutoFill

Safari’s AutoFill feature remembers text and values you enter into online forms, and can be useful for speeding up logins and registrations as well as online purchases. If other people use your Mac, you might not want this information to show up when websites are revisited. Here’s how to disable AutoFill.

In the Safari menu bar, select Safari -> Preferences… and click on the AutoFill tab.

Uncheck the boxes next to the details you wish to prevent Safari from autocompleting in web forms. You can also edit already saved information by clicking the “Edit…” buttons.

Finally…

If your web privacy concerns extend to a desire for enhanced security and comprehensive end-to-end encryption, consider subscribing to a Virtual Private Network (VPN) service (Private Internet Access and IPVanish are two popular choices) and using Tor browser for OS X.

Tags: Safari, privacy
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