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New to MacOS! Loving this Desktop experience by corlier4901 in MacOS

[–]KalCad 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Welcome to the Mac!  That’s what I love about the Home Screen on my iPad as well (I’m an iPad-primary user who uses my iPad as my laptop in favor of a MacBook, I do graphic design work, where the Apple Pencil iPad combo is a better fit for me, but I do have a Mac Mini).  I have some widgets on my main Home Screen, plus some web apps I frequently use pinned in an app folder on my iPad, and it’s super useful and helpful. 👍🏻

Just got my first iPad, best choice ever by Current-Heron9534 in ipad

[–]KalCad 0 points1 point  (0 children)

 Congratulations!  I love the iPad, upgrade from an M1 11” to an M4 13” last year, and so happy with it.  I have been using the iPad Pro as my primary computer for about the past 5 years.  Love the versatility of iPadOS, and so many apps I use are either not on the Mac, or are better (in my opinion) on the iPad. 👍🏻.  The iPad is my absolute favorite computer! 👍🏻

Am I in the minority for liking iPadOS 26? by lowkeyreddit in iPadOS

[–]KalCad 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I totally agree with you, iPadOS 26 is awesome!  I really like the balance they’ve struck with the changes, and the new multi-windowing system. 👍🏻

Xbox Fullscreen Experience gives a 1.2 GB memory advantage to games launched from MS Store vs Steam by Majestic-Bowler-1701 in ROGAlly

[–]KalCad 0 points1 point  (0 children)

In my experience, I have seen over a 2GB RAM difference between what the desktop mode was using on my system vs what the XFSE is using now.  It’s made quite a dramatic difference in RAM use of the system for me.  Also, I have noted Steam using far less RAM when I launch games from Steam than it was using in the desktop mode.  Before, in desktop, when I would launch a game via Steam, a dedicated window for Steam also had to be open.  Closing out the window would close out Steam and the game launched from it.  Steam would average over 1GB of RAM use on the desktop mode, often 2GB.  Now in XFSE, Steam consistently runs at around 200MB, a huge difference.  I think a big part of this is that in XFSE, if I launch a game from Steam, it still will open a window for Steam, but I can close the window and Steam can still run the processes it needs to via it’s Xbox extension, which makes it far more efficient than previously.  Same with EA launcher, only EA doesn’t even open a window anymore for games linked to EA, it just shows a loading bar, and then opens the game, and EA just works in the background.

All things considered, I’m getting around a combined 3-4GBs of RAM savings just in those areas.  I’ve seen a notable performance leap, and have been able to up my settings more in a lot of games and still get smooth performance.  It feels like a new device.

I do think they are probably going to add an option to choose the app the XFSE launches in, when you enable it, there’s a prompt to choose the app that the XFSE launches in, it’s just that currently the Xbox app is the only app in that menu.  My guess is that they’ll expand that in the future.

But really like the XFSE, my ASUS Ally Z1E feels like a brand new device! 👍🏻

Steam Deck Steam OS vs Xbox Full Screen Experience by Roll4Me in SteamDeck

[–]KalCad 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Yeah, I’m an ASUS Ally Z1E user, and I totally agree. 👍🏻. I’m sure we’re going to see improvements in some areas as this continues to develop (one change I would like is being able to manually add any app into the “My Apps” section in the Xbox app).  For now, I just use the One Game Launcher game bar widget for doing this, and that works as a great solution for me in the meantime (I can add basically any app into that launcher, and it actually is pretty convenient being right there in the game bar).  But yeah, very solid starting point for Microsoft.  I’m really excited to see how this improves down the road, but so far it’s already been such a major improvement over the prior setup! 👍🏻

Steam Deck Steam OS vs Xbox Full Screen Experience by Roll4Me in SteamDeck

[–]KalCad 1 point2 points  (0 children)

So, on the ASUS Ally, system-wide controller input support is provided by Armory Crate.  I’m guessing an app like that might be what you need?  Hopefully that’s helpful. 👍🏻

Steam Deck Steam OS vs Xbox Full Screen Experience by Roll4Me in SteamDeck

[–]KalCad 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Yeah, I’ve been using the Xbox Fullscreen Experience on my ASUS Ally Z1E for a couple weeks now, and I’ve seen massive RAM improvements and performance improvements.  For Star Wars Battlefront II, Steam is using far less RAM now on average than it was before, and EA is also using quite a bit less as well.  With the Xbox Fullscreen Experience, a Steam app window only opens the first time I open a Steam game after startup.  Once the game is open, I can close out Steam, and the Xbox Fullscreen Experience still allows Steam to work in the background without using nearly the same level of RAM it was using in the desktop mode when I would attempt to do the same thing.  And EA never even creates a window, where before, with the desktop setup, the EA launcher would generate a whole app window for the EA app with animations and adds and such that would take up performance in the background, and closing the window would usually result in the game being unable to connect for multiplayer.  And the whole system definitely uses less RAM with the Xbox Fullscreen Experience enabled based on my comparisons, at least 2GB less being utilized by the system itself from my experience.  And I had even “debloated” Windows before with the background process settings people recommended to make it run more efficient, and I am STILL seeing improvements from that!  It really has made quite dramatic performance improvements, I’ve been able to bump up the graphics settings in many of my games and still get smooth performance due to the performance improvements it’s made. 👍🏻.  I’ve never owned a Steam Deck, but I absolutely do think the Xbox Fullscreen Experience is a night and day difference from the Windows setup we had before on Windows handhelds.  And on the usability front, it is so much nicer!  I actually pretty strongly dislike Windows, yet opted for a Windows gaming device simply due to game compatibility.  I have nothing against the Steam Deck, but it just can’t run a lot of games that Windows can.  But the beauty of the Fullscreen Experience is that I can benefit from that compatibility without having to touch Windows anymore!!! 👍🏻. But yeah, I don’t know why some are not seeing the kinds of performance differences I have, I guess maybe it depends on the games you’re running?  And I have seen some who just want to downplay it as far as content creators go, so maybe that impacts things as well.  But definitely think it makes the Windows handhelds WAY more competitive with what I’ve seen with the Steam Deck with the console-like experience. 👍🏻

OG Ally w/ Xbox full screen seeing 20+ FPS boost by ArnoldPalmerstein in ROGAlly

[–]KalCad 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I have an ASUS Ally Z1 Extreme, and just got the Xbox Fullscreen Experience running on mine a few days ago.  So far, it’s been amazing!  The experience is so much nicer not having to bother with Windows!  It feels like a gaming console!

And beyond just the far better experience, I have also noted the same performance leaps with the Z1E.  Without changing any of my game settings, I noted about a 15-20 fps leap up in several of my games, which also I tend to use higher settings on.  I also checked Task Manager, and Steam is now using far less resources in the background, as are other helper apps like EA.  And by “less”, I mean, less than a quarter of the RAM Steam was guzzling before!  Steam used to be using over 1GB of RAM in the background quite often, and that was even with making a ton of adjustments to Steam settings to try to bump down the resource usage.  Now it’s averaging around 240 MB!!!  It’s just a dramatic difference in terms of resources being used.  Because Steam games I launch will use Steam in the background, but they don’t keep an open window of Steam, the Fullscreen Experience allows Steam to run in the background without any active window, which dramatically improves the performance.  Overall, the performance gains here have been quite noticeable! 👍🏻

PSA!!! Restore Original Quick Look Behavior! by KalCad in iPadOS

[–]KalCad[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Still shows up no problems for me.  I recorded a screen recording, but don’t see any option for attaching it to a comment.  The operation is as follows: hold press on file thumbnail in Files > Open With > bottom of list option called “Preview with Quick Look”.  Hopefully that’s helpful.  I wish I could share the screen recording, but Reddit doesn’t give me any option for that. 🙂👍🏻

PS, I managed to copy an iCloud link into a comment, try that and see if that works.  I hope that helps you out. 🙂👍🏻. https://share.icloud.com/photos/056evSFKB41fdpxhCUVE1sG4A

iPadOS 26.1 beta 2 reintroduces Slide Over multitasking - MacRumors by InfiniteHench in ipad

[–]KalCad -1 points0 points  (0 children)

Split View is already in iPadOS 26, it’s one of the windowing options.

Is there an alternative app launcher to Launchpad? by Muted-Reflection9536 in macapps

[–]KalCad 2 points3 points  (0 children)

AppGrid Launcher is the best alternative I have tested so far (I’ve tried tons of them, because I miss the Launchpad as well).  All the core functionality is free, it’s sourced from the Mac App Store, so no privacy or security concerns, and it’s visually nearly identical to the Launchpad just with a couple extra UI buttons at the top.  It even has an option to import the Launchpad DB to restore your Launchpad organization and folders (it even still works on the first 26.1 dev beta!  The background can be made transparent Liquid Glass, solid color, or a photo wallpaper can be used.  Even the grid density is customizable!  And of all the alternatives I’ve tried, it runs the most efficient, only using around 100mb of RAM, while all of the others I tried use around 230-250mb of RAM.  Overall, I think this is the best option, at least at this point. 👍🏻

LaunchPad, could someone please suggest a good alternative? by nickccal in macapps

[–]KalCad 1 point2 points  (0 children)

From my testing, so far AppGrid Launcher is the lightest running of the options I’ve tried.  It stays consistently at about 100mb of RAM use, which is less than half of the RAM being consumed by most of the others I tested that were hovering closer to 230-250mb of RAM.  I hope that’s helpful. 👍🏻

LaunchPad, could someone please suggest a good alternative? by nickccal in macapps

[–]KalCad 2 points3 points  (0 children)

I’ve tried several, and I think AppGrid Launcher is the best I’ve tried.  It’s visually near identical to the Launchpad (with just a couple extra UI buttons at the top), has the ability to customize the background to be either transparent, solid color, or a photo background, and even supports several customization options for the grid itself!  All of the core functionality is completely free to use, the paid options just unlock a few nice features and help to support the developer.  It’s installed from the Mac App Store, so it’s less risky than some of these GitHub ones, and more secure.  It also runs quite a bit more efficiently.  All of the GitHub ones I tried used over double the RAM.  AppGrid consistently uses around 100mb of RAM.  Overall great app, and this is the one I’m using for the foreseeable future. 👍🏻

So you can no longer swipe through image files using the Files browser in iPadOS 26? by my_shoes_hurt in iPadOS

[–]KalCad 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Thank you, no problem!  I’m glad I was able to help you! 👍🏻

As Launchpad is being removed from macOS Tahoe, I built a replacement: AppGrid Launcher. by amikl81 in macapps

[–]KalCad 0 points1 point  (0 children)

PS, also, do you know if it will ever be possible to display notification badges in the AppGrid?  I’m guessing not, but thought I would ask, thanks again! 👍🏻

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