Apple Inc. - page 123

The MacBook Air has ushered in a new era of powerful netbooks that function more like prosumer computers. In our review of Apple’s latest 2011 MacBook Air, it’s obvious that the Air now packs a punch and accompanying price tag that most notebooks of similar size haven’t been able to dream of for years.

The PC market is looking to level the playing field between the Air and its competition, with Intel announcing a new platform called the “Ultrabook.” The Ultrabook is the PC industry’s proposed MacBook Air killer, but these upcoming notebooks will also have an ultra-price tag that’s higher than the Air’s. Apple’s entry-level MacBook Air retails for $999.

Just a few days after rumors started springing up that Apple intended on buying streaming video service (and Netflix competitor) Hulu comes an even odder rumors, courtesy of BGR: Apple is in talks to buy Barnes & Noble out from under them. What?

Reader Pascal Beausoleil pointed us to a cool (and, we think, new) easter egg in OS X Lion.

If you go to System Preferences > Users you can change your OS X default user icon to a vinyl record… but what are the track titles on that record? If you like Steve Jobs’ keynotes and his unique, shouted catchphrases, you’ll absolutely love this…

We’re all aware of how popular Apple’s tablet is. It spawns endless lines outside of Apple stores for days after its launch, and it no other tablet is anywhere close to being as successful. Apple’s iPad is so popular in fact, that one in six Hong Kong citizens own the device.

If you’ve ever played the classic NES fighter, Mike Tyson’s Punch-Out, you can probably sympathize with Nintendo right now: an absolutely huge juggernaut of an enemy has filled their screen, capable of knocking them out with a one-two punch… a blow that is only tipped by a sly wink a millisecond before.

That enemy’s Apple, and it is fighting with two weighted gloves with the iPhone and iPad, accordingly. Now Nintendo’s so punch-drunk that they are dramatically lowering the price of their latest console, the Nintendo 3DS, less than six months after it debuted.

Apple’s patents can often be an exciting glimpse into the super secret things that are being worked on at the Cupertino camp, however, this one gives no indication of the features that may arrive in future Apple devices. Instead, it covers the tool that Apple already uses to cut its logo into a number of its products.

Who controls the U.S. smartphone market? It’s a tie between Apple and Android with RIM and others trailing far behind according to new research.

For years, Apple has been affiliated with a little online shopping portal called CVN.org, otherwise known as the Christian Value Network. The site raises money for various religious groups by taking a small slice of product purchases at over 600 participating companies, including Apple and iTunes.

Sounds innocuous, right? Except that several of those religious groups are described as “active hate groups” that regularly engage in “anti-gay, anti-women” activities. And after a petition that garnered 22,000 signatures, Apple has yanked their support from the CVN and pulled iTunes from the network.

Yet another report indicates Apple’s iPad beats the pack of Android tablets until at least 2015. More polished and less expensive alternatives could cut Cupertino’s comfortable marketshare by more than a third, new research finds.

If you love e-reading and the Kindle app for the iPad, you may have noticed the familiar “Kindle Store” button missing. Its absence is causing an uproar online and prompting questions whether Apple is unintentionally pushing consumers to buy iBook alternatives.

Apple recently announced that they’d sold just over 15 billion apps in just three years, which got ZDNet’s Eric Lai doing some number crunching, and it turns out that the App Store has just passed a big milestone: Apple’s now selling apps faster than McDonald’s can sell hamburgers.

Not all patent defenses against Apple are created equally, HTC has learned. A trade court told the Android handset maker its shiny bundle of $300 million S3 patents aren’t infringed by Apple’s iPhone or iPad, and just partially by Mac OS X.

Rumor has it that Apple is already working on a new method of charging our iPhones for 2012, and many believe the company may introduce wireless magnetic charging using technology developed by WiTricity. But according to a report from DigiTimes, future iOS devices may absorb all the energy they need from the sun.

Apple’s latest line of Mac mini compact desktops offer some pretty impressive specifications. What with those latest Intel Core i5 and i7 processors and the opportunity to grab a solid-state drive with a custom build, you can get a super speedy mini if you have the money.

One thing you can’t get for your new machine, no matter have much money you have, is 16GB of RAM… at least not from Apple.

The Geniuses at your local Apple Store are trained to be some of the most confident and unflappable retail employees in the biz, but how far can you push it? Can you order a pizza in an Apple Store? Can you take your wife on a date to one? Can you get your iPhone repaired dressed as Darth Vader? Can you bring your pet goat into the store?

Can we talk? That’s the message coming from executives at Android-handset maker to Apple. HTC’s finance chief wants to “sit down” with the Cupertino, Calif. tech giant flush from a patent win that could be costly for companies touting Google’s mobile operating system.

See anything interesting in the image above, plucked right from Apple’s own website? Say, the iPod Touch with the 3G icon in the top left? Did Apple just out a web-connected iPod Touch coming in September?

Ah, the marketing sleight-of-hand, it’s something to behold. On one hand, Android sales are thundering past the iPhone. Yet, on the other hand, buyers are finding Android isn’t as easy-to-use as iPhone, resulting in returns of 30-40 percent.

Although not the smallest, Apple’s planned store in New York City’s Grand Central Terminal could be the tech giant’s cheapest Big Apple location. The backdrop of countless movies, the cavernous Grand Central turns out to be less expensive than your average Manhattan store front.

The latest patent to surface from the Cupertino camp shows Apple has been working on a physical keyboard that does away with physical keys. That’s right — a keyboard, much like the one you might have in front of you now, but without keys. Instead, you’ll use piezoelectrics, haptic feedback and acoustic pulse recognition to type.

The staggering success of Apple’s iPad has inevitably spawned a myriad of wannabe devices from a large number of electronics manufacturers. While many of these tablets are yet to really compete with Apple’s tablet, the Cupertino company is still preparing itself for a worthy adversary by “adjusting the cost structure” of the iPad 3.

Amazon’s Kindle app for iOS was updated yesterday in order to comply with Apple’s latest in-app purchase terms and secure its place in the App Store. In addition to removing the link to its external Kindle store, however, did you notice that the update introduced more than 100 magazine and newspaper subscriptions to iOS?

Two fingers are enough for many tasks – a Boy Scout’s salute or a Peace Sign – but it may not be enough for tablet users. Unless you are Amazon looking for ways to undercut the iPad price by offering cheap touchscreen displays. The Internet retailer’s foray into tablets starts with a device limited to just two fingers — enough to give a one-fingered sign of displeasure.

Apple has just seemingly banned its first big name app for not playing along with Apple’s revised In-App Purchase rules, as Google’s official Google Books app, which contained a prominent web link to an outside e-store, has disappeared from the App Store. If it has happened to Google, will Amazon’s Kindle app be the next app to disappear?

Research in Motion is axing 2,000 employees, or 10.5 percent of its workers. RIM also rearranged its management, the Canadian company announced. Now that the iPad is trouncing RIM’s PlayBook gamble, how long can the beleaguered company keep its head above water?