Leander Kahney - page 3

Editor’s note: We originally published this illustrated history of the iPod to celebrate the device’s 10th anniversary on Oct. 22, 2011 (and updated it a decade later). We republished it on May 10, 2022, when Apple finally pulled the plug on the iPod.

The iPod grew out of Steve Jobs’ digital hub strategy. Life was going digital. People were plugging all kinds of devices into their computers: digital cameras, camcorders, MP3 players.

The computer was the central device, the “digital hub,” that could be used to edit photos and movies or manage a large music library. Jobs tasked Apple’s programmers with making software for editing photos, movies and managing digital music. While they were doing this, they discovered that all the early MP3 players were horrible. Jobs asked his top hardware guy, Jon Rubinstein, to see if Apple could do better.

Apple CEO Tim Cook doesn’t often wear colorful Apple watch bands, but he made an exception during Apple’s Peek Performance event on Tuesday.

Cook emceed the event wearing an eye-catching yellow Sport band. Paired with his blue sweater, Cook seemed to be making a subtle gesture of support for the embattled country (yellow and blue are the colors of the Ukrainian national flag).

Between air raids and missile strikes, Julia Petryk works in her bathtub in Ukraine. It’s the safest place in her Kyiv apartment.

“The last interview I gave for media was in the bathtub,” she told Cult of Mac in an email. It’s “the safest place in the apartment during bombardment.”

I have two original iPhones in my possession. One sits in a junk drawer, untouched and unloved for many years.

The other has been carefully disassembled and the parts arranged in a handsome black frame that hangs on my office wall. Made by Grid Studio, the Grid 1 is my own personal iPhone teardown in a box.

If you’re looking for a holiday gift for an Apple fan, consider The Cult of Mac, 2nd Edition. This great-looking coffee table book about the Apple community is on sale right now for just $9.99 — a whopping 71% off.

Co-written by David Pierini and yours truly, the gorgeously designed, full-color book details many aspects of the Apple fan universe.

Apple’s stock is tanking in after-hours trading, despite the company’s announcement of yet another record-breaking quarter. The problem? Wall Street expected it to make way more.

The new AirPods 3 are marvelous little earbuds. They sound fantastic, are dead easy to set up and use, and the wireless charging case is a godsend.

Compared to their predecessors, Apple greatly improved just about everything — and they are well worth their $179 price tag.

At Apple’s “Unleashed” event Monday, the company unveiled a pair of new “pro” Apple Silicon chips: the M1 Pro and M1 Max processors.

The two new chips were described by Apple executives as “breakthrough” and “groundbreaking.” The M1 Max “is by far the most powerful chip we’ve ever built,” said Johny Srouji, Apple’s senior vice president of hardware technologies, during the “Unleashed” presentation.

At first glance, they appear to be a pair of wicked-fast but battery-sipping beasts that blow Intel out of the water.

For this week’s giveaway, we teamed up with Speck to offer Cult of Mac readers the chance to win an iPhone 13 and a bundle of three nifty MagSafe-compatible cases.

Speck is a long-standing case manufacturer for Apple devices, going all the way back to the original iPod. These days, the company makes tough, handsome cases for a range of smartphones, tablets, laptops and watches. Speck will send one lucky reader an iPhone 13 in Starlight, plus a bundle of three MagSafe-compatible cases from its new Presidio line.

If you want to win an iPhone 13, you better enter right now. The giveaway ends Tuesday night!

Ten years after Steve Jobs’ death on this day in 2011, Apple is thriving when many predicted it wouldn’t.

Go back and look at articles published in the wake of his death, and it’s all gloom, gloom, gloom. But a decade on, the company is worth more than $2 trillion, revenues have nearly tripled, the stock is up more than 1,000%, and there’s no end in sight.

Apple’s success has many fathers of course, but one big one is that Jobs’ personality has been deeply embedded into the company and how it does things. It’s called “the routinization of charisma,” and it helps explains why Apple continues to prosper.

Is there such a thing as the fabled Goldilocks phone? You know, a phone that is just right? Not too big. Not too small. Great camera and screen. Amazing battery life.

Well, the new iPhone 13 Pro is that “just right” phone.

Of all the things Apple revealed Tuesday, to me the most impressive was the iPhone 13’s new Cinematic mode. The depth-of-field effect creates amazing focus transitions between subjects.

Apple basically built an AI cinematographer into the iPhone 13.

If, like me, you hate the fiddly Apple TV Siri Remote like the pox, Function 101’s Button Remote for Apple TV might be your perfect choice.

It’s a traditional infrared remote control with 18 buttons, hence the name.

Thanks to its familiar design, it’s perhaps the easiest way to use your Apple TV. It works with most TVs and home theater components out of the box, and it costs just $29.95.

Unfortunately this is the last issue of Cult of Mac Magazine.

We launched Cult of Mac Magazine back in September 2013 and have published 411 weekly issues since then. Yes, 411 issues!

Highlights include a cover made especially for us by Susan Kare, the designer of the original Mac’s icons, and a string of great-looking magazine covers by Ste Smith, a former staffer.

But declining readership, competition from news apps and difficulty getting advertising has led us to retire the publication. It’s been a great run, but it’s time to shut up shop.

As the Epic Games v. Apple trial winds down, Apple CEO Tim Cook took to the witness stand Friday to deliver a big fat nothingburger.

Trial watchers were hoping Cook would deliver dramatic and explosive testimony, but he mostly dodged, demurred or couldn’t remember.

Wow, that was the speediest, most jam-packed Apple event in recent memory.

It was so quick-moving, we all got whiplash. There was barely time to catch your breath between announcements: Here’s a new purple iPhone. Fuggedaboutit, here’s a new Apple TV, and new AirTags. Oh, and hers’s new iMacs — and iPads!!

In an hour, Tim Cook and Co. managed to introduce a raft of products with dozens of new features and technologies while dazzling us with some pretty jaw-dropping promo videos.

Once again, the prerecorded format worked well. The promo videos in Tuesday’s “Spring Loaded” event looked super. They hit us with a great mix of head-spinning effects and angles, humor and product placement.

Here are some thoughts and initial reactions to some of the major announcements:

In a surprise move, Apple just introduced a brand-new color for the iPhone 12 and iPhone 12 mini — purple.

The new color spiced up Apple’s “Spring Loaded” special event Tuesday. It’s an unusual move for Apple, which rarely introduces new colors or finishes mid-cycle.

In spite of a devastating pandemic, a moribund economy, widespread unemployment, factory and store closures, and a workforce toiling from home, Apple in 2020 had one of its best years ever.

The company released a raft of new products, saw its stock soar, enjoyed a record valuation, made record amounts of money, experimented with virtual product launches and events, released great advertising, and mostly skated through government antitrust hearings.

The company even killed off a hated product feature, to widespread plaudits from fans.

I just opened more than 650 tabs in Safari on a new M1 MacBook Air. I would have opened more, but I got bored.

Meanwhile, in the background, the machine is downloading Photoshop and the Microsoft 360 suite, and I can see in Activity Monitor that it’s processing thousands of iCloud photos while also indexing the hard drive.

Despite this, the machine is as fleet as a greyhound. I started working on a Photoshop project while checking email, keeping an eye on TweetDeck and, of course, clicking around all those open Safari tabs. The MacBook Air is just humming. I’ve never seen anything like it.

Apple has been doing some remarkable things with audio lately. The sound coming out of a new MacBook or iPad Pro is nothing short of amazing, given the tiny speakers they have. AirPods sound spectacular. And then there’s the original HomePods, which punch way above their weight and are some of the best speakers out there.

But what about the new HomePod minis, which cost $99 and pack the potential to give Apple a much-needed boost in the smart speaker game? Do they sound any good?

Buying a compact smartphone used to mean making some big sacrifices. You either had to settle for an older model, or you had to opt for an Android handset (ugh!). That’s no longer the case, thanks to iPhone 12 mini.

iPhone 12 mini makes no compromises. It’s not a watered-down version of the larger iPhone 12; it is an iPhone 12 that’s squeezed into a smaller body. It has a gorgeous Super Retina XDR display, a blazing-fast A14 Bionic processor, great cameras, 5G and Face ID.

What’s missing? Absolutely nothing! If you want a small smartphone that has it all, iPhone 12 mini is the only option.

The biggest and best version of iPhone 12 has finally landed. The iPhone 12 Pro Max takes everything that makes this year’s iPhone lineup so terrific and combines it with an even bigger screen and a better camera. Apple calls it “the photographer’s iPhone,” but really, it’s the best smartphone going for anyone who likes super-sized displays.

iPhone 12 Pro Max is Apple’s biggest smartphone to date, with a Super Retina XDR display that measures at 6.7 inches diagonally. It’s also the fastest handset on the market, thanks to an incredibly speedy A14 Bionic processor that’s coupled with 5G connectivity (where available).

However, the Pro Max is just one of four iPhone 12 options available this year —- and it’s the most expensive of the bunch. Is it worth it?

Apple Silicon was widely expected to be fast, but perhaps the biggest surprise of the new M1 chip is the insane battery life it enables.

During Tuesday’s “One More Thing” keynote, Apple touted some truly eye-popping battery life numbers. While we expected improved battery life from the new MacBooks, the numbers Apple released surpassed expectations.

Apple just unveiled a new M1 Mac that no one was expecting (but should have) — the Mac mini.

Featuring the Apple M1 chip, the new Mac mini boasts 3x faster CPU performance and up to 6x faster graphics, compared to the previous generation mini, Apple said during Tuesday’s “One More Thing” keynote.

Almost all the reviews of the Apple Watch Series 6 say the same thing: Yeah, it’s great, but it’s an incremental upgrade, and if you already have a Series 5, skip the upgrade.

That’s sage advice, I guess, especially in the middle of a crushing pandemic that’s ruined the economy, left millions unemployed, and has lots of people thinking carefully about their expenses.

But I say stuff it!

If you have the money, run out and buy the latest Apple Watch. It’s frickin’ amazing! It blows my mind that you can have a mini-iPhone strapped to your wrist that can make phone calls, pay for groceries, give directions, monitor your blood and heart, and so, so much more. It’s a technological marvel, my favorite gadget — and it could possibly save my life.