Apple just brought Intel’s latest eighth- and ninth-generation chips to the MacBook Pro, making it the company’s fastest-ever laptop.

The newest 8-core models deliver up to twice the performance of a quad-core MacBook Pro, and up to 40 percent more than a 6-core model. They also promise powerful graphics, a T2 Security Chip, super-fast SSDs and “all-day” battery life.

Find out what’s going on in this week’s free issue of Cult of Mac Magazine for iOS.

Or read on to get the rest of the week’s best Apple news, reviews and how-tos in your browser.

This Memorial Day, hopefully you’ll be taking an extra day to relax, reflect and recharge. Something else you can do is take advantage of some great deals on gear, tools, and training. We’ve got discounts as high as 96% on things like VPNs, Excel training, and more. Read on for more details:

May 25, 2010: Apple opens an investigation into a string of suicides at Foxconn, its Chinese manufacturing partner.

After reports of a ninth death at a Foxconn factory, Apple says it is “independently evaluating” Foxconn’s response. Cupertino vows to take a long, hard look at the facilities that manufacture its products. It’s a tough challenge for Apple to deal with — and Steve Jobs’ controversial comments don’t exactly help.

Apple’s annual Worldwide Developers Conference is just over a week away and it’s shaping up to be one of the most software-packed events in the company’s history.

New software for the iPhone, iPad, Mac and more will be shown off for the first time when Tim Cook takes the stage on June 3rd. Most of the event will be focused solely on Apple’s biggest software updates of the year, but there’s a chance we could see some new hardware too.

Apple taught Elvin Hu new languages.

Born in China, Hu refined his English by watching Apple keynote events. He also came to understand the visual language of Apple’s product photography.

The latter inspired Hu, a design student at The Cooper Union in New York City, to create a series of product shots showing broken and well-worn Apple gadgets in hands that share similar gouges and scratches.

Apple unexpectedly introduced iOS 12.3.1 this afternoon. It comes just a few weeks after the last update, and apparently only takes care of three bugs, two of which relate to spam in Messages.

There’s a glimmer of hope that Apple will once again make a truly budget handset. Information leaking out of this company’s supply chain indicates that there could be an iPhone SE 2 introduced in 2020.

WWDC 2019 and the grand unveiling of iOS 13 is just over a week away and based on the rumors, it could be one of the biggest iPhone and iPad upgrades ever.

Designer Alvaro Pabesio published a beautiful new concept that showcases what some of the most popular requested features could look like. Dark Mode, an updated Files, a redesigned volume indicator, iMessage profiles and more are on full display, plus some tweaks that Alvaro dreamed up himself.

Take a look:

While Apple seems to be phasing out fingerprint scanners in favor of facial recognition, sources in the Asian iPhone supply chain reportedly claim that Touch ID will actually be back next year, and better than ever.

The 2020 iPhone will also supposedly be the first with 5G as well as a 3D rear-facing sensor.

Best Buy is now offering one of the biggest discounts we’ve seen on the 2018 iPad Pro, with $200 off select models for a limited time. You can get an 11-inch unit with 64GB of storage and Wi-Fi connectivity for just $674.99

And it’s just one of the awesome offers in today’s Deals & Steals roundup.

There’s also a whopping $250 off the newest MacBook Air, $100 off the latest 9.7-inch iPad, and $50 off Apple Watch Series 4. Plus, you can now save $250 on a brand new iPhone X.