The iPad mini already seems to be a huge hit with buyers, with Apple’s diminutive little tablet already selling out at the 5th Avenue Apple Store. You know, the one in New York City, a town ravaged by Hurricane Sandy that it is still half-flooded and half without power? Even a natural disaster can’t seem to keep people away.
Apple’s cracking down on apps that have no other purpose but offering emoji — that cute emoticon character set popular with some text messengers — and are kicking developer’s apps out of the App Store if they do nothing else. The reason? iOS 6 already does emoji.
Here are the two things you need to know about the iPad mini. The form factor’s perfect, it’s beautifully designed, you will love holding it… but the screen’s awful and the performance is lacking, especially in graphics. Even at the price, it’s a deeply disappointing product that most people should think twice about buying right now.
If your Facebook app is crashing after the iOS 6.0.1 update, you’re not alone: it’s crashing for loads of other users too.
The problem, however, isn’t necessarily iOS 6.0.1. Some Twitter users are reporting that the app is crashing on them, even without upgrading to iOS 6.0.1. Deleting the app and reinstalling it or rebooting your device doesn’t seem to fix the issue.
In short, the problem seems to be something on Facebook’s end that can be fixed without issuing an app update. Just be patient, and in the meantime, log-in to Facebook using Mobile Safari.
Starting November 2nd, Apple fans will finally be able to buy themselves an iPad mini, Apple’s diminutive new 7.9-inch tablet with an A5 chip, a 1024 x 768 display, a 5MP camera and that comes in the usual flavors of between 16 and 64 gigabytes and in white or black.
So which iPad mini is right for you?
We’ll make it easy for you. Across the board, for almost everyone, the cheapest iPad mini — the $329 Wi-Fi only model in black — is the one most worth considering. There are some exceptions worth considering though. Here’s why.
In addition to pushing iOS 6.0.1 to users earlier today, Apple has just pushed the first beta of iOS 6.1 for the iPhone 3GS, iPhone 4, iPhone 4S, iPhone 5, iPad 2, third- and fourth-gen iPads, and fourth- and fifth-gen iPod touch to registered developers. Curiously, however, it does not yet seem to be available for the iPad mini.
Source: developer.apple.com
Apple has just released iOS 6.0.1 for all compatible devices (including the new fourth-generation iPad and iPad mini). Right now, you can get it using the direct download links below, or OTA using Software Update on your iOS device (if you have an iPhone 5, you will have to update your Software Update first by going to General > Software Update, which will install a new Software Update app to your homescreen).
The change log isn’t online yet, but will eventually be here. Improvements include numerous bug fixes, including an issue that prevents the iPhone 5 from updating itself over-the-air, a bug where horizontal lines are shown on the keyboard, sporadic issues with camera flashes, improvements with Wi-Fi reliability for iPhone 5 and 2012 iPod touch, and more.
The changelog and direct download links can be found below:
Although Hurricane Sandy passed through the Northeastern United States on Monday, the aftermath is still being felt three days later. Not only is New York City still flooded and thousands still without power and electricity in many states, but FedEx and UPS are still experiencing disruptions to their delivery services.
What does this mean? If you live in Connecticut, Delaware, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, North Carolina, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, Vermont, Virginia, Washington, D.C., or West VirginiaJersey, there’s a chance your iPad mini preorder won’t get delivered to you tomorrow. And if you live in New York or New Jersey? It’s pretty much a certainty you won’t get it.
This is odd: when you receive your iPad mini, a stated software requirement listed on the box is that you will have a PC with iTunes 11 installed.
The only problem? While iTunes 11 was originally slated for an October release, it’s now been pushed back to November.
It’s not a big deal: if you plug in an iPad mini into the latest version of iTunes, it works just fine, albeit without an iPad mini icon. To me, that implies that we’ll probably see a small update to iTunes drop later today.
Source: iGen
One of iOS’s most limiting aspects is its icon-driven interface. iOS’s default interface, the homescreen, it simply a grid of equally sized icons, and while these icons are pretty, they all look pretty much the same. Worse, they are dumb: they can’t do anything cleverer than pin a badge to themselves to convey information.
Compare that to the way Android or Windows Phone handles the homescreen. In Android, you can pin intelligent widgets along with apps to the homescreen; in Windows Phone, the tiles operate not just as app icons, but as smart widgets that can convey to the user changes that are happening within the app, even when it’s not as open.
iOS users have been clammoring for Apple to figure out a way to make the iOS homescreen smarter for quite a long time, and this concept video describes one possible interpretation, which mixes up the iOS homescreen with Android’s widgets and Windows Phone’s Live Tiles.
The iPad mini is slated for release on Friday, and reactions are mixed: some see it as the device that finally takes the iPad line to iPhone-like mainstream popularity, while others see it as a shrunken down iPad 2 that can’t really compete with the competition in either specs or price.
So which will it be? To help predict, it might help to go back to the first “mini” sized iDevice Apple released: the iPod mini. Before that, there was just the iPod, shipping 1.5 million in a year. In 2004? The iPod mini helped increase the number of iPods sold by five times as many.
Over the course of the last five years, there have been a lot of movies with the gimmick that they have been shot on the iPhone, but few have pulled it off as well as this incredibly scary little short film made by Clement Deneux for the 2011 Disposable Film Festival, a film festival dedicated to short films shot on smartphones and either pocketable cameras.
It’s called Les Ongles, or The Nails, and it would be a discredit to describe the plot in much detail, except to say it’s a found-footage-style short that takes place during a party in Paris in which one guest is compelled to quit a nasty habit. You’re going to want to watch this.
If you preordered an iPad mini directly from Apple.com, you have probably noticed that you have yet to receive a shipping confirmation from Apple… and it’s getting close to the wire.
Considering the fact that Apple is guaranteeing a Friday, November 2nd delivery for initial preorders, and that Apple usually ships out new products directly from the factories in China, that might have you concerned.
There’s no reason to panic. Your iPad mini has, in all likelihood, already shipped, and is right now sitting in a delivery center in the United States, just waiting for Apple to give the okay to have it delivered to your door.
Here’s how to check on your iPad mini, even if Apple hasn’t sent you a shipping reference yet.
Every launch of a new Apple product, some lucky S.O.B. slips through Apple’s steadfast delivery net and gets their new gadget early.
This time, that S.O.B. is a customer in France who ordered his white iPad mini from French reseller Darty, and received his shipment today.
When it comes to Bluetooth speakers, there’s one company’s product against which all others are measured: Jawbone’s iconic Jambox.
There’s a reason for that. Jawbone entered a pretty much empty market segment with a new product that they polished to hell. The Jambox doesn’t sound like sonic nirvana, but it sounds pretty good, and the rest of the details — from the way it feels in the hand, to the way it’s boxed, to the Nintendo-like bleeps and bloops it makes when you pair it or skip a track — are just polished to hell.
Just like with Apple products, though, that polish comes at a premium: the MSRP of the Jambox is $199.99, which is a lot of money for most people. Enter the CUBEDGE EDGE.sound, a new Bluetooth speaker that attempts to do everything that the Jambox does for an MSRP of $50 less.
Skeuomorphism, or the tendency to deliberately make something new look like something old and familiar. Some people love it, some people hate it and think it’s tacky.
No matter how you feel, his love for skeuomorphism is one of many reasons that former iOS chief Scott Forstall was fired yesterday. Replacing him is Apple’s Senior VP of Design, Jonathan Ive, who will lead a new Human Interface Group in Apple… and whom reportedly loathes skeuomorphism with every fiber of his being.
All that fake leather stitching, those hideous textures, those bizarre font choices in iOS’s stock apps? If Ive gets his way — and we think he will — they’re all about to change.
Here are the eight skeuomorphic apps in iOS 6 we hope Jony Ive is going to change in iOS 7, along with some third-party apps we hope he takes inspiration from.
It’s rare that you can point to an accessory and say “Jony Ive” designed that, but with the Harman Kardon Soundsticks, that’s literally true.
Back in July 2000, Apple partnered with Harman Kardon to release an officially blessed subwoofer and speaker combo to perfectly accentuate the translucent iMac G3. One of the benefits of that partnership to Harman Kardon was that Jonathan Ive undertook the design of the product. The result — the iSub 2000 Subwoofer and SoundSticks — are a classic example of vintage Ive design, all bubble shaped and translucent.
If you aren’t Apple, it’s rare to be handed an Ive design every day, and so Harman Kardon has wisely kept the shape and look of the SoundSticks line pretty much the same for the last twelve years, only improving the technology inside as they can.
The new SoundSticks Wireless system is a further refinement of the classic year 2000 design. There’s one big difference, though: the SoundSticks now do Bluetooth.
Despite apparently record sales of the 7-inch Kindle Fire the day after Apple debuted the iPad mini, Amazon is taking to the low-road in order to direct shoppers on its website away from Cupertino’s new mini-sized tablet.
How? They’ve posted a comparison chart to the front page of Amazon.com showing how the Kindle Fire HD and iPad mini stack up, spec-for-spec.
We’re surprised it has taken this long. When the iPad mini initially became available for preorder on Friday morning, it took just twenty minutes for the white iPad mini + Wi-Fi to sell out, but the other models (especially the black) continued to be available for November 2nd delivery.
Apple doesn’t keep new products in stop indefinitely, though. As of this morning, the iPad mini doesn’t ship for another two weeks if you preorder it today. Still, it’s amazing it took this long for Apple to sell out of the much anticipated new product: either Apple made plenty of them ahead of time, or demand for the mini isn’t yet quite what it is for the iPhone or iPad.
Source: Apple Store
They’re here! iPad mini preorders have just gone live. We used the Apple Store app to get our order in, but the Apple.com store is now up as well. Go get your order in, because iPad mini supply isn’t going to last, then come into the comments and tell us which one you got. Me? I followed my own advice and picked up a 16GB iPad mini with Wi-Fi for $329, but I already have a 64GB third-gen iPad with Wi-Fi + LTE. What about you.
After over a year of rumor and speculation, we’re less than a day away fr0m the iPad mini finally going up for preorder. Starting at 12:01AM Pacific Time, the iPad mini (Wi-Fi version only) will be available for preorder on Apple’s official site, with units delivering on November 2nd.
It’s always hard to tell with a new product, but if history is anything to go by — the iPhone 5 preorders sold out within hours, and stock is still short — the iPad mini is going to be crazy in-demand. If Apple starts preorders in the middle of the night, it’s because they’re anticipating a madhouse… such a madhouse that if they held it in the middle of the day, their servers would crash under the pressure.
Hence this guide. We’re going to walk you through the best ways to make absolutely sure you get your iPad mini preordered right at the stroke of midnight and in your hands next Friday when it officially launches in the minimum amount of time, so you can go right back to sleep.
Wondering which iPad mini to buy? Check out our guide to finding the one that is right for you.
We love DODOCase here at Cult of Mac. They are the finest of a surprising number of purveyors who makes cases that turn your iDevice into a simulacrum of the Moleskine, and now they’re doing the same by selling three new products for the iPad mini.
There’s the classic DODOCase, which starts at $59.95, the DODOCase Hardcover, which starts at $35,94, and the BookBack, which affixes the back of your iPad mini with a Moleskine-like leather and costs just $19.95.
All of Dodocase’s products for the iPad mini are available to buy now. Stay tuned for a Cult of Mac review.
Source: DODOCase
I seldom let my geekiness get in the way of my nerdiness, but even I’m slavering over this Eye of Sauron iPhone 5 case designed by Shapeways user joabaldiwn, “in which the Apple logo becomes the evil eye of Sauron, in the tower of Barad-Dûr, by the fiery pits of Cupertino… I mean, Mordor.”
Sir Jonathan Ive, Apple’s Senior Vice President of Design, is much like Apple’s products: at best, he only comes in two colors. Even though he has been used in promotional videos for eight new Apple products in just the past three years, he has only ever worn two shirts through all of them.
Luckily, he’s Lon Chaney-like in regards to the number of expressions he can put on his face. Unfortunately, not all of them are what we would call strictly dignified.
Along with AT&T yesterday, Sprint tosay has announced their third quarter 2012 results, and activated 1.5 million iPhones during that period, 40% of whom are new customers… essentially the same number of new iPhones per quarter Sprint has maintained for the entire year of 2012 to date.
It wasn’t all sunny, though. The company reported a net loss of $767 million for the third quarter against $7.3 billion in revenues.
Source: Sprint