★★★★☆
The Zagg Pro Stylus 2 is ready to help you take handwritten notes on an iPad and sketch out your ideas, too. Or you can use it on your iPhone — don’t try that with Apple Pencil.
It wirelessly charges on the edge of an Apple tablet, and that’s just one of the tricks it can do.
I tested the Pro Stylus 2 with my iPad Pro and iPhone 15 and came away pleased.
Apple’s CEO made the clearest statement yet about his company’s plans for generative AI. Tim Cook said Thursday that “we have work going on.” And he made additional comments, too.
The executive also promised that Apple’s efforts on artificial intelligence are being carried out responsibly.
Apple stock price dropped over 3% after it announced the results of its most recent financial quarter. But there’s good news mixed with the bad, and that shouldn’t be ignored. CEO Tim Cook and other executives stayed upbeat in a call with investors on Thursday, talking up strong iPhone sales, why Tim loves Apple silicon and more.
Here are the reasons for optimism we found in Apple’s quarterly financial results and call.
The question on whether the iPhone 15 is off to a strong start has been answered. Apple just revealed that iOS handsets brought in more revenue in its most recent financial quarter than ever before.
“Today Apple is pleased to report a September quarter revenue record for iPhone and an all-time revenue record in Services,” said Tim Cook, Apple’s CEO.
A crazy good deal on the new AirPods Pro 2 with USB-C case lets you save $60 off the retail price. And this despite the wireless earbuds being on the market for just over a month.
Apple’s new top-of-the-line wireless earbuds take advantage of all the latest new bells and whistles in iOS 17. Plus, they bring additional new features besides the port change, including additional dust resistance and the promise of high-res audio when paired with Apple Vision Pro.
When Apple reports the results of its most recent financial quarter later on Thursday, look for Mac and iPad to be a drag on the company’s revenue. Still, analysts are upbeat about the company’s earnings.
Investors will also be watching closely, especially considering AAPL shares are down 9% since the company last reported financial results in August.
In The Family Plan, Mark Wahlberg plays a father with a small secret: he used to be an assassin. His past comes back to haunt him — and his family — in a film that debuts on Apple TV+ in mid December.
With that premise, it could be a gripping drama, but the flick will be an action-comedy instead.
Preorder some heavily loaded configurations of the newly announced M3 MacBook Pro models and you’ll be waiting until later in November to receive them. But Apple still has plenty of other configurations ready to go on launch day.
The same is true for the new M3-powered iMac — load it up and the result is a somewhat longer wait.
Disney Dreamlight Valley Arcade Edition, Football Manager 2024 Touch, Sonic Dream Team and Puzzle & Dragons Story are among the eight games on the way to Apple Arcade in November and December. They’ll join the 200+ already on the service.
In addition, more than 50 of the already available games will get content updates.
With the latest iPhones dropping the Lightning port in favor of USB-C, there was speculation (and hope) that Apple would release new versions of the Magic Mouse, Trackpad and Keyboard that also reject the Lightning port. Nope.
So charging these wireless devices still requires a Lightning cable.
Apple broke with tradition and unveiled the M3, M3 Pro and M3 Max processors all at once on Monday, rather than stringing the releases out. The performance cores in the new chips are up to 30% faster than M1, and the efficiency cores are up to 50% faster.
“Apple silicon has completely redefined the Mac experience. Every aspect of its architecture is designed for performance and power efficiency,” said Johny Srouji, Apple’s SVP of Hardware Technologies. “With 3-nanometer technology, a next-generation GPU architecture, a higher-performance CPU, faster Neural Engine, and support for even more unified memory, M3, M3 Pro, and M3 Max are the most advanced chips ever built for a personal computer.”
The Apple TV+ documentary The Enfield Poltergeist goes in-depth on “the most famous poltergeist haunting in history.” The events inspired The Conjuring 2 and are creepy Halloween fun, though unlikely to convince anyone that ghosts are real.
I suspended my disbelief for a few hours and enjoyed the show for what it is.
iPhone 15 Pro and Pro Max owners can start playing the console-quality version of Resident Evil Village. The survival horror game hit the App Store just in time for Halloween.
It can also be played on iPads with high-end processors.
UPDATE: The “Scary Fast” event has come and gone, and it brought the fresh MacBook Pro models and the iMac — all powered with a new M3 processor — that leaks predicted. Check out Cult of Mac‘s full coverage for more details.
Apple fans are getting a treat this Halloween: an event that’ll bring the M3 processor and a range of new Macs to run it.
Here’s everything we’re expecting at Monday’s event, including an iMac and MacBooks, with some accessories thrown in.
Halloween is almost here, making this a great weekend to play some spooky games. Apple Arcade has a nice selection of these to help you enjoy the creepy season.
Here are the best options in Apple’s gaming service to find ghosts, ghouls and goblins.
The most-recent iOS update increases the battery life of several older iPhone models, according to tests on a range of devices. And it’s a jump for almost every model tested over the first iOS 17 version.
But there’s still room for improvement.
NexDock and the infiniteX2P app are designed to turn an iPhone 15 into a laptop. Connect Apple’s latest to the touchscreen/keyboard/mouse and run the app to start multitasking on a 13-inch display.
The USB-C port in the iPhone 15 makes this combination possible.
Apple seeded the first beta of iOS 17.2 to developers on Thursday. The major new feature seems to be the AI-enhanced Journal app that Apple previously promised. macOS 14.2 beta 1, iPadOS 17.2 beta 1, watchOS 10.2 beta 1 and tvOS 17.2 beta 1 are also available to devs.
These come just a day after the previous versions of all these operating system went out to the public.
Apple sells millions of AirTags because people want to track the location of their stuff. But the tracker does only part of the job — it only warns the user when their iPhone moves too far away from the tag. Making it also set off an alarm when the tag moves away while the user is sitting still would be a welcome improvement.
This could be done with a changes to the Find My application. No new hardware is required.
★★★★☆
Apple dropped its leather iPhone cases, but the Mujjo Full Leather Wallet Case with MagSafe is a brilliant alternative. It protects your valuable handset while also providing an easy way to carry credit cards and drivers license. Plus, it looks gorgeous while doing so.
I carried my iPhone 15 Plus this case on holiday, to restaurants … everywhere I went for weeks. Here’s why I love this case for my iPhone 15 Plus, despite a notable drawback.
NBA 2K24 Arcade Edition, the latest addition to the long-running esports games franchise, launched a bit earlier than expected. The feature-packed basketball game is now on Apple Arcade for iPhone, iPad, Mac and Apple TV.
This is the definitive basketball game for Apple devices, and each new version adds even more features.
Apple introduced macOS Sonoma 14.1 on Wednesday, so it’s out of beta testing and ready for Macs going back about five years. The update includes a few modest enhancements and bug fixes.
Here’s what’s new.
The cost of watching Apple TV+ series and movies just went up 40%. A monthly subscription is now $9.99.
The price for Apple Arcade, Apple News+ and Apple One also increased. But the Apple Music cost remains the same.
Apple invited the world to a product-launch event on October 30. And the invitation strongly suggests that new Macs will be on the agenda.
It’s not surprising — leaks coming out of Cupertino already said the event will bring updated MacBooks and an iMac.
Add Amazon to the list of tech giants throwing their weight behind passkeys. With the new system, customers can shop online or in Amazon’s apps without passwords. Passkeys are considered safer and easier.
Apple, Google and others have already started their own move away from passwords.