Here it is: the iPad mini, shown in the flesh and fully constructed in this new video by E-Trade supply.
Disingenuously, the video is called a “Power-On” test but I’m pretty sure that this unit isn’t actually functional, since it looks to me like that boot-up logo at the end is simply superimposed.
Either way, though, this is a really good comparison video, and gives a great feel for what the iPad mini will actually feel like in your hand… where it will be very, very soon.
Apple has just lost one of its magic patent bullets thanks to a non-final Office action by the USPTO. Patent No, 7,469,381 (used against Samsung in California) has been declared invalid after evidence supporting prior art (as well as being obvious) was brought about during a reexamination request.
This news is not only great for Samsung, but many other manufacturers who are currently caught up in Apple’s legal charades.
Earlier this year, Apple CEO Tim Cook famously said that Cupertino was going to “double down on secrecy” this year. It hasn’t worked. Apple — once a company known for the surprise “one more thing” — had every single detail of the iPhone 5 leaked to the public before the actual event. Can Apple ever get its secrecy back?
Probably not. A new report talking to a number of Apple employees under the condition of anonymity suggests that while Apple HQ is as secretive of new products as ever, Cupertino can do nothing about leaks that come out of the Asian supply chain.
Safari 6 came out just before Mountain Lion did, and it’s bundled with Apple’s latest operating system. For many Mac users, Safari is the end of the line when it comes to web browsing, as well as a super fast modern, accessible web browser for the rest of us.
We took a look at several new features of this latest iteration of Safari, including security tips and tricks, as well as how to use Reading Lists and sync tabs from your Mac to your iOS devices, and vice versa.
The iPad mini will be announced next October 23rd, but when’s it actually going on sale? Common sense and looking at what Apple has done in the past would dictate November 2nd, which is what previous internet rumor suggested. Now we’re hearing confirmation of that date from loftier sources.
The first thing you notice about the 2012 fifth-generation iPod touch is how beautifully it’s made. Crazy thin, ridiculously light, yet sturdy as a slab of slate.
The fit and finish are extraordinary. There are no seams, screws, gaps, cracks or openings. It’s literally seamless. The buttons look like they’re part of the iPod’s case, not nubbins that poke through. Who makes stuff this good? Oh yeah, Apple.
Other reviews have complained about the price (it starts at $300) and some reviewers seem unimpressed by the touch. Who is it for, they wonder? Especially if you already have an iPhone.
Well, it’s for the kids. It’s a kids’ computer. Their first computer, if you like. It’s a relatively cheap, highly portable, extremely capable little handheld computer for children. It plays games, music and movies; surfs the net; communicates via text and Facebook; and hosts a bazillion apps for entertainment or homework. It also displays e-books, though let’s be honest: reading is the last thing it’ll be used for.
But $300 is a lot of money to spend on a kid. Is it worth it?
As a publicly traded company, Apple submits its financial reports every quarter to let their investors know how well the company is doing. However, Apple is under no obligation to share specific financial results about each of the individual products it sells, data that it is still trying to protect via the court in the Apple v Samsung case in Northern California.
However, rabid interest in the specifics continues unabated. In a survey reported today, CNN Money asked 61 Apple analysts, 31 from Wall Street and 30 independent analysts, what their estimates were for specific device sales in the quarter that just ended on September 29, 2012. Turns out, the analysts estimates were all over the place when it came to predicting the number of iPads sold.
There are few jailbreak hackers in the world regarded as highly as Nicholas Allegra, also known as “comex.” In the earlier days of iOS, Allegra released JailbreakMe, the first and only web-based jailbreak of its kind. He has worked on numerous jailbreaks throughout the years, but recently he’s been working off the radar.
Allegra has been in hiding for the last year because of Apple. The 20-year-old Brown student’s expertise in iOS security was noticed by the all-seeing eye of Cupertino last August, and for the past year Allegra has been working as an intern at Apple, presumably helping patch the vulnerabilities he so adeptly reverse engineered. As of today, Allegra no longer works at Apple, and there’s no telling what he’ll do next.
US District Court Judge Lucy Koh today denied Apple’s request to have several documents sealed from public view in its fight to recoup more damages from Samsung than were even awarded by the jury several weeks ago. The documents include “product-specific unit sales, revenue, profit, profit margin, and cost data” that it also wants to use in its argument for a higher award from the court.
Judge Koh basically said that Apple can’t have it both ways. Her decision says to the Cupertino-based company that it can’t use documents in its arguments that it then in turn wants to keep secret. It just doesn’t work that way.
You know how some ideas sound really good conceptually but end up not panning out in reality? Color was such an idea. The iPhone app received a ton of hype originally with its $41 million in venture capital funding. The premise was to create a location-based, crowd-sourced photo stream from people’s smartphone cameras that was shared publicly for everyone to see. After that idea failed, Color tried to reinvent itself into a photo sharing service by partnering with Facebook. Now the app is positioned as an internet broadcasting tool.
With recent rumors that Color Labs was considering closing its doors, a surprising report today claims that Apple is in the process of acquiring the startup.
To vastly simplify matters, every LCD screen is made up of a bunch of pixels connected to each other with a mesh of tiny little wires. These pixels don’t actually emit light themselves, but simply regulate the color of the light being displayed in that pixel. Behind this mesh is a lamp, and before a pixel can light up on your screen, the light from this lamp needs to shine through this mesh of wires. Because this mesh is so densely packed, though, the lamp needs to shine very, very brightly to get through… and the brighter an LED light shines, the more power it soaks up.
This is why the new iPad needs such a massive battery. The Retina display has over 3 million pixels in in a tiny area, which means the mesh behind the display is even thicker and more densely packed. To compensate, Apple needs to use a very bright light to shine through this extremely dense mesh, which results in worse battery performance over all.
What if there was a way to make the mesh of wires behind every pixel a lot less dense? That’s the idea behind Sharp’s IGZO technology, and the reason why we’ve been excited about it finally coming to Apple products since at least the beginning of the year. Now it looks possible that, with the iPad mini, we could finally get our wish, as Sharp is now announcing that their IGZO tech comes in 7-inch varieties… and they are releasing a tablet to prove it.
I wasn’t expecting to laugh at a confessional song about how good one man was at Apple’s iWork and iLife suites, and how it ended up resulting in the loss of his cherished cat, Winslow. But laugh I did. Long and hard. Happy hump day, everyone.
Via: Reddit
Apple rarely buys other companies, so when the Cupertino giant makes an acquisition, it’s worth noting. CNET is reporting that Apple has recently purchased Particle, a small creative consulting company based in San Francisco that specializes in HTML5 development. Particle is a relatively small firm, but it has done some big projects for companies like Google, Sony and even Apple.
What does the acquisition mean? While the reason behind the deal remains unknown, Apple likely wants the web talent from Particle.
When Apple sends out invitations for their media events, they often include little hints as to what people can expect to be announced. The iPhone 5 event nvitation had the shadow of a gigantic five emerging from underneath the date, and the iPad 3 invitation showed off the clarity of the tablet’s still-unannounced Retina display.
In comparison, today’s invite for the October 23rd event doesn’t seem to have many clues as to what Apple is announcing. The design of the invitation doesn’t seem to mean much. However, the writers of Apple’s invitation have tipped their hat a little bit in the wording of the invitation: “We’ve got a little more to show you.”
What does it mean? Well, everything Apple is expected to announce next week is either a smaller version of an existing product (thinner iMacs, a 13-inch Retina MacBook Pro tear) or ‘mini’ (the iPad mini, a new Mac mini). It’s not a lot to go on, but it’s definitely a purposeful choice and a nod to the products we’ll see next week.
Apple’s iMac line hasn’t been updated since May 3rd, 2011. On average, that makes an update almost a year overdue. So you know a big update is coming, and rumor has it that when it comes, the new iMac will jettison the the optical drive to achieve a vastly thinner, teardrop form factor.
We were curious what that would look like, so we asked our designer Dan Draper to mock-up what a revised iMac with a thinner design would look like while largely retaining the iMac’s iconic portrait. The answer is familiar, and yet entirely new… the best iMac yet.
The new iMac is believed to be announced next week at Apple’s October 23rd event. Check out the full concept after the jump, and let us know what you think in the comments.
Last week I argued that Apple’s ingredients for an ‘iTV’ experience could be simpler than you think. Quoting Barclays analyst Ben Reitzes, I suggested that the iPad could be the remote control hub for Apple’s desired TV interface. Imagine swiping through your favorite channel icons on the iPad and having them play live on your living room flatscreen. A TV guide menu designed by Jony Ive would be a dream come true. There’s so much untapped potential.
Cult of Mac reader and user interface designer Adrian Maciburko sent me some great concept designs of how iTV could work with the iPad. Check them out and let everyone know what you think!
Apple has tapped Amazon executive William Stasior to run Siri, the Cupertino company’s digital assistant. Stasior has been responsible for running Amazon’s A9 search/advertising unit, and his impressive CV has attracted Apple’s eye.
Siri co-founders Dag Kittlaus and Adam Cheyer were hired by Apple when Siri was purchased back in 2010. Since then, both Kittlaus and Cheyer have left Apple with a Siri-sized hole for someone to fill. Stasior looks like the man for the job.
You mess with the bull, you’re going to get the horns. Google discovered this when they launched Android, their own competitor to iOS, a move which ultimately resulted in Apple jettisoning the search giant’s products almost entirely from iOS 6. Now Samsung is finding out the same thing: not only has it been found guilty of infringing Apple’s intellectual property and been told to pony up a $1 billion fine, but now Apple is now taking away their portion of Samsung’s multi-billion dollar manufacturing business.
As you know, the upcoming media event for Apple’s smaller, thinner, and less expensive tablet, the as-yet-named iPad Air iPad mini, is being widely reported as happening on October 23,2012.
While the invites haven’t gone out yet, we’re seeing a rumor that the event will focus on iBooks, which makes a ton of sense considering that a smaller iPad is in the same market category as a device like the Amazon Kindle Fire, which is kind of like a souped-up eReader, with media consumption its main purpose, at least from Amazon’s perspective.
While this seems like a plausible rumor, I’m not ready to fully embrace it yet.
I bet you weren’t aware of the real reason why Batman couldn’t save Rachael in The Dark Knight or why Katniss had a bit of trouble finding the Cornucopia in Hunger Games? What if I told you it was all Apple’s fault? Well it is! Don’t believe me? We’ve uncovered the deleted scenes to prove it.
Enjoy!
When Apple first unveiled the 15-inch Retina MacBook Pro back in July of this year, they used two images to specifically highlight the incredible resolution of the new display. The first was a shot of a herd of zebras running through the grass captured by photographer Steve Bloom. And the second? A photograph of an eye in full Ziggy Stardust make-up, taken by Swiss photographe Sabine Liewald.
The only problem with that latter photograph? According to the photographer, Apple never properly licensed it to be used in Retina MacBook Pro marketing materials. And she’s now suing over it.
I was craving a pumpkin spice lattee from Starbucks the other day. I didn’t have time to go get one myself, but one of my friends was going later in the day. He offered to pick one up for me. Yay!
Starbucks recently added support for Apple’s Passbook service in iOS 6, and I hadn’t yet been able to try paying for Starbucks with Passbook. I had already added my Starbucks Rewards Gold card to Passbook on my iPhone 5, and I like using my Gold card to pay whenever I can because it earns me points towards free drinks. So I had three choices: pay my friend back in cash, give him my Starbucks card from my wallet, or let him use my Passbook. I went with the third option, and it was as easy as taking a screenshot.
The just-released seventh generation iPod nano has just started being seen in stores and shipping from online pre-orders, but it already has a software update waiting for it. If you get a new iPod nano and plug it into iTunes to set it up and sync, you’ll likely see a new update that you’ll need to apply before you can use it.
Apple and Samsung are in the midst of what is perhaps the most heated patent lawsuit in history, but that doesn’t mean the two companies won’t still steal from each other’s camps. One of Samsung’s most prominent chip designers has joined Apple, the Korean company’s sworn enemy. “Veteran” processor guru Jim Mergard could help Apple create proprietary chips for the Mac, reports The Wall Street Journal.
Mergard’s expertise could mean that Apple will eventually switch from Intel on the Mac to its own processors, like its in-house “A” chip series for iOS devices.
In the real world, as related in Walter Isaacson’s biography, the name of Apple Computers came when Steve Jobs was one one of his fruitarian diets, and was inspired to name his company after coming back from a mysterious commune in Oregon called “the Apple Orchard” because it sounded “fun, spirited and not intimidating.”
In an alternate dimension filled with psychadelic bio-horror, though, what if Steve Jobs named his company Apple because he bit into an Apple and cut his mouth on a microchip inside, after which he began to be haunted by squiggling, biomechanical creatures with lurid, prehensile appendages strung together from silicon and copper wire.
The latter is the origin of Apple Computers as conveyed in Ryan Patrick’s new music video for Miike Snow’s “Pretender,” and while it may seem all a bit surreal, behind the best surrealism is another way of looking at the truth. Our friend Mark Wilson says over at FastCo. Design that maybe the best way to summarize Jobs’s life story is “as a gifted wild child who earnestly searched life for meaning and found computers.” Weird as it is, that’s what the video to “Pretender” is about too.
Via: Fast Co. Design