An analyst believes that as soon as this year, Apple will rip the Intel right out of the MacBook Air and transfuse an ARM-based chip in its place, maybe even some successor to the iPad 2’s A5 SoC. But that’s just stupid. Isn’t it?
Ably beating Apple for a change, Google has just joined Amazon in unveiling their cloud-based music service at this year’s Google I/O conference… but it’s still hard to believe that Cupertino won’t be able to clobber Google Music once iTunes joins the cloud, especially given the new service’s reliance upon Adobe Flash.
There was a time when proudly declaring yourself a Mac gamer would earn you laughs at best, and a smear of sputum streaking down your face at worst. These days, though, the Mac’s a great place to be, thanks to Steam for Mac and the Mac App Store, and it’s just gotten a little better: IGN’s Direct2Drive has just launched their own Mac games section.
See that green line? That’s Blackberry-maker Research in Motion, tanking hard and giving up the position of biggest U.S. Smartphone platform to Android. Meanwhile, guess which Cupertino-based company has regularly commanded a 25% share of all U.S. smartphones for over a year?
I think of Steve Jobs as more of an expert businessman, management genius and incubator of innovation and ingenuity than an engineer, but 900 engineering undergraduates in the UK surveyed by General Electric are ready to claim him as one of their own: the Apple CEO has ranked third in a list of Engineering Heroes behind Isambard Kingdom Brunel (creator of the first major British railway) and James Dyson (who makes the world’s best vacuum cleaners bathroom hand dryers).
Jobs beat out Bill Gates, who came in at the number four spot. He also ranked higher than Nikola Tesla, Isaac Newton, Albert Einstein, Charles Rolls, Henry Royce and Thomas Edison.
While Apple is unlikely to release a 4G iPad until 2012 or even 2013, due to their issues with the power hungriness of current LTE modems chipsets, never underestimate Cupertino’s competitors — or their desperation to beat the iPad — to adopt an underdeveloped new technology before its time.
Meet, then, the HTC Puccini, a 10-inch LTE tablet set to debut in June. Not much is known about it, although it’s likely to be a Honeycomb tablet and support HTC’s Scribe capacitive stylus.
Otherwise, the most interesting aspect about the Puccini is that it is one of the first devices that will support AT&T’s forthcoming “true 4G” LTE network. That’s interesting not because of the Puccini, but because of what it means for Apple. When AT&T’s LTE network debuts, Apple will finally be able to support the two largest mobile providers in the country in their 4G pursuits using the same chipset.
We’ve seen our fair share of sleeves and cases in the past meant to graft new functionality onto an existing iDevice, the most obvious example being the Peel 520, which transformed any iPod Touch into a 2G iPhone 4.
It was only a matter of time, then, before we could expect accessory makers to make a go of transforming the iPhone 4 into the iPhone 4G. Now they’d made a go of it, but sadly, it’s South Korea only right now… but expect it in the United States soon.
The Sun, that last bastion of journalistic excellence, reports that Queen Elizabeth II has shuttled off one of her liveried manservants to the Regent Street Apple Store to buy her an iPad 2. Explanation, please!
Although Apple’s own Game Center once threatened to topple it from its perch as iOS’s most popular gaming social network, OpenFeint is still going strong, largely thanks to an open, cross-platform approach that allows iOS and Android devices to play with one another on equal social footing.
But that’s not to say that OpenFeint hasn’t had its missteps. Last month, a security researcher discovered that OpenFeint commonly linked iOS devices’ unique device identifiers (or UDIDs) to the phone owner’s Facebook profile. The result? A list of names for 75 million registered OpenFeint users, linked to their iOS devices and Facebook accounts.
OpenFeint has since closed the security hole in their system, but as security researcher Aldo Cortesi tells Wired, if a network as big as OpenFeint managed to link UDIDs with specific user accounts across games as popular as TinyWings, Pocket God, Robot Unicorn Attack and Fruit Ninja, there are probably a lot more apps out there flying under the App Store Approval Team’s radar. And those app developers could, even now, be selling your information to advertisers.
Ben Hopkins is the developer of the forthcoming iOS platformer, 1-Bit Ninja, and while ostensibly the aesthetic he’s going for is that of the Game & Watch titles of his youth, the effect is much closer to early Gameboy titles. For my money, that’s a good thing, and has made 1-Bit Ninja a title to watch out for, even if its Fez-like 3D effect — in which the game world is rotated by a multitouch gesture to reveal its depth — appears to be a cool but ultimately pointless gimmick.
1-Bit Ninja is due out later this month.
Like Mike Schramm over at TUAW, I love this photo of an iPhone that has been “aged to perfection”. In fact, it looks very similarly to the way my first iPhone looked a few years in.
No doubt Steve Jobs’ heart would stop if he saw one of his products looking this way, but in truth, that’s one of my issues with Apple’s products: they have never been designed to age gracefully, but instead, seemingly to exist in a vacuum of asceticism.
It’s something I have always liked about the first iPhone that it can handle scratches better than the models that followed it, as long as the display is protected. It’s hard to imagine that a workman’s iPhone 4 will look nearly as good despite its blemishes four years down the line.
According to Semiaccurate, Apple is working on a plan to migrate all of their MacBooks over to ultra-efficient ARM processors by 2013. But does that really make sense?
Due to a deficiency of wrist-flipping motor skills that all too often see me smashing myself in the face with a plastic pie tin instead of gracefully floating it to my girlfriend down the beach, I much prefer my frisbees to be the tall-tale-spinning, alien-smashing Twilight Zone type than the throwing kind… but for Whammo’s officially sanctioned iOS app, Frisbee Forever I’ll make an exception.
With over 100 levels and 100 frisbees to collect, Frisbee Forever might be one of the biggest free games on the iOS Store, and the early reviews are surprisingly good. You can download it here for free for any iPhone, iPod Touch or iPad capable of running iOS 4.0.
Contradicting reports that the white iPhone 4 was delayed by almost a year because of problems with light leaking onto the camera sensor, Apple’s Phil Schillar commented during the handset’s eventual release that the delay was necessary to give the handset some much needed “extra UV protection.”
Once he said that, everyone guessed the real issue: yellowing over time, a la some of the earlier and uglier white MacBooks. Now here’s the proof. Nick Bilton over at the New York Times managed to get an original white iPhone 4 from a guy who knew a guy at the factory that made it. Paying $1000 bucks for his prize, he went about comparing models.
The results? The obvious ones, sure, especially regarding the camera and the proximity sensor, but while the new iPhone is pristine white, the year-old one is already looking like it was pulled out of someone’s ashtray. It’s already dirty and yellow.
If Apple’s releasing the white iPhone at this point, they’re doubtlessly reasonably certain that the new model isn’t going to be subject to the same problems. Still, as Wired’s own dirty and yellowing blogger Charlie Sorrel notes, how did this happen in the first place? It’s not like Apple’s never made a white gadget before.
In a daring move that might result in a legal tussle and a cat-and-mouse game between Apple and Europe’s largest and most popular music streaming service, Spotify is adding iPod Sync Support to its music service… and you don’t need to go through iTunes to do it.
Compatible with the iPod Classic, iPod Nano, iPod Shuffle, iPhone, iPod Touch and iPod, the new download service will allow users to sync MP3 content from Spotify Playlists to any iPod without using iTunes,
It’s an interesting move that brings Spotify’s library to dumb iPods, but will Apple kick? My guess is yes, but legally: I don’t see Apple updating the iPod Classic’s software just to deal with Spotify.
That said, it’s pretty clear this is a proactive move on Spotify’s part to shore up their defenses for an iTunes onslaught. When Apple announces its new iCloud service, Spotify and Apple are going to start trading blows head-to-head.
When the iPad 2 debuted back in March, half of all the people waiting in line outside of the 5th Avenue Store were Asian scalpers looking to ship the iPad 2 overseas to China and Hong Kong.
Hysterically, the same thing is happening again now that the white iPhone 4is here… but it’s happening in China, where as many as 95% of all people camped outside of the Beijing Apple Store are scalpers.. And they are brazenly reselling the white iPhone 4 to real prospective buyers right outside of the store… at a 200-500 yuan (or between $33 and $77) markup per device.
The end result is that scalpers are controlling almost 100% of the white iPhone 4 supply in China, and selling them for a profit accordingly. Not all the profit is generated merely by reselling the iPhone either: another way money is made is by opening up the iPhone 4, replacing the battery with an inferior one, and then selling the real iPhone battery to knock-off manufacturers. Tricky!
The new iMacs are here, and they are fantastic, but one thing that’s worth making a note of is that the new 27-inch iMacs have dual Thunderbolt ports… which means that you can now attach two external displays to your top-end desktop.
Buy a pair of Apple’s official 27-inch LED Cinematic Displays and you’ve got 81 inches of desktop to play with. That’s a huge perk, given that the previous solution to driving multiple displays on your Mac either resulted in lag (though wireless solutions) or didn’t support 3D (through USB adapters).
The iMac line just got a heck of a lot more appealing not just to video professionals, but to gamers. And here I am rocking a 27-inch iMac with only one Mini DisplayPort like some sort of sucker.
App Store ratings are a valuable commodity, with each additional star worth a substantial amount in sales. No surprise, then, that less scrupulous developers like to try to game the system, but because of the way Apple links reviews to individual iTunes accounts, there’s not a lot of ways to really cheat the system easily… especially if the app is a paid app.
One way app devs can sometimes game the system, though, is by distributing promo codes, allowing their employees to download the app and rate it. No longer though: Apple has just eliminate the ability for anyone to review an app if they downloaded it through a promotional code.
It’s actually a bit ironic. Ostensibly, promotional codes are to encourage jokers like me to review apps. I can understand Apple’s reasoning here, but it does seem a bit rich that app reviewers issued promotional codes can review an app on their own websites, but not on iTunes.
We all know iOS 5 will inevitably be revealed at June’s WWDC, but the internal testing of iOS 5 is already in full sway, according to 9to5Mac… with the most conspicuous device absent being the iPhone 3GS (although not the iPod Touch 3G).
Even if iOS 5 does debut at WWDC, it’s likely to not be out for another few weeks, giving developers time to update their apps. What are the features you’d most like to see in iOS 5? Let us know in the comments.
According to the lads over at Boy Genius Report, iOS 4.3.3 — which is the update that will famously fix the problem of iPhone location tracking — is coming soon, and they’ve got their hands on it.
What’s new?
• The update will no longer back up the location database to iTunes.
• The size of the location database will be reduced.
• The location database will be deleted entirely when Location Services are turned off.
• Battery life improvements.
• iPod bug fixes.
iOS 4.3.3 should be out in the next two weeks, and Apple will likely also close that pesky jailbreak hole revealed by iOS 4.3.1.
[via Redmond Pie]
Although I’m a loyal Chrome man on the desktop, I tend not to care much for competing browsers on iOS… not because they don’t often do functionality better than Mobile Safari, because let’s face it, they often do. However, Mobile Safari’s privilege of being the default browser on iOS means there’s a lot of functionality you just can’t really do with an alternative browser.
It’s a pity, because if not for that, Terra for iPad would get a sensational recommendation: not only does it have an attractively minimal interface that supports tabbed browsing (as well as nifty full-screen functionality that quickly whisks the tabs out of the way when you want to be immersed), but also a very intuitive library of multitouch gestures. Best of all, it’s free. Give it a shot.
Yes, Virginia, Apple did indeedpurchase the iCloud.com domain from Swedish cloud computing company Xcerion. But when it launches, don’t expect it to just be a locker for your streaming music. It’ll also encompass all of the functionality currently provided by MobileMe, and more…
If you’re willing to trust a company by the name of CompuExpert with your Mac peripheral needs, the Wow-Keys dock is a pretty nifty idea: an iPhone dock embedded right into a working keyboard. Just by loading up the Wow-Keys app, you can use the docked iPhone as a num pad or function keys to your desktop Mac, while keeping your media files synced and your iPhone fully charged.
The only drawback? Sort of expensive at $99.99, sort of ugly with that Windows key and sort of unavailable for sale until May 24th.
[via Redmond Pie]
Epic Games, in co-operation with Chair Entertainment, brought us Infinity Blade, one of the most graphically impressive, no-compromise game on the App Store. Infinity Blade costs $9.99, and not only is it worth every penny, but for the price, it’s graphically equal to many games on modern consoles like the PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360…. and Epic sees app games as possibly killing off consoles once and for all.
Lest it be construed that they were afraid to go head-to-head with Apple on domestic shores, Samsung has just filed suit against Cupetino in United States federal court, claiming that Apple is infringing upon ten of their patents concerning “fundamental innovations that increase mobile device reliability, efficiency and quality, and improve user interface in mobile handsets and other products.”