iPad - page 186

The Opus hotel in Vancouver made a somewhat shocking announcement last week. The hotel was ripping the landline phones out of its rooms and replacing them with iPhones. While that seems extravagant, it’s actually a rather brilliant plan.

The hotel, which already offers guests an iPad that can act as a concierge service, points out that offering guests, particularly international guests, an iPhone adds a lot of value. In addition to the value for customers, Apple’s free iOS management tools could make implementing such a program simple and relatively inexpensive – beyond the cost of the iPhones themselves anyway.

Although a new iPhone didn’t show its face during Apple’s WWDC keynote back in June, the Cupertino company did release a number of new products, including refreshed MacBook Airs, MacBook Pros, and Mac Pros; a new “next generation” MacBook Pro, and more. But according to one analyst, the Cupertino company’s fall event will be even bigger, with a new iPhone, a new iPad, and a new Apple TV all on their way.

Apple has been handed yet another blow in a U.K. courtroom after the High Court of England & Wales sided with Samsung today and decided that the Korean company’s Galaxy Tab series does not infringe Apple’s designs. The judge said Samsung’s products are recognizably different to Apple’s, and are therefore free to remain on sale in the U.K.

There’s no denying that the iPad is far to big to be a telephone, but there are times when it would be nice to make calls on the device. For example, I’ve previously used Skype to make a call on mine while my iPhone was being updated. But a new smartphone app called ‘TU Go’, on its way from U.K. carrier O2, will allow you to use a device connected to your iPhone — such as an iPad — to make and receive calls from your existing phone number.

It’s been rumored for many months that Apple will release a smaller ‘iPad Mini’ to compete with cheaper Android tablets and devices like the Kindle Fire.

After Bloomberg and The Wall Street Journal reported that Apple is indeed working on a smaller version of its popular iPad tablet, a fresh report from Japanese blog Macotakara reveals some more alleged details about the forthcoming device.

The #BoycottApple hashtag was trending hard on Google+ last week.

No, I’m not talking about the boycott-Apple-to-save-Chinese-workers, the boycott-Apple-because-they-discriminate-against-Iranians or even the boycott-Apple-because-they-support-gay-marriage movements.

I’m talking about the boycott-Apple-because-they’re-using-the-courts-to-compete-against-Android-devices movement.

Specifically, the call to boycott is based on anger over Apple’s successful attempt to ban both the Samsung Galaxy Nexus phone and the Galaxy 10.1 tablet. An appeals court temporarily lifted the ban on the phone yesterday, but upheld the tablet ban.

Here’s why the call for a boycott is misguided and futile. 

Kicking off this week’s must-have games roundup is a fantastic first-person shooter from the creators of Shadowgun, in which you must take down hoards of bloodthirsty zombies before they take control of planet Earth. We also have a wonderfully unique astronaut simulator called Astronaut Spacewalk, plus lots more.

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Despite all the talk about Android, Windows, and other tablets being iPad killers and expected to steal both consumer and business market share from Apple, not one has managed to make a real dent in the iPad’s dominance – particularly in the business space.

There are, of course, plenty of factors that I could point to and say “this is why the iPad is still number one” – IT folks know how to secure and manage iPads, there’s a single form factor, there’s a great selection of apps. I could go on, but one of the biggest reasons Apple that retains the market share that it does has nothing to do with specs, brand loyalty, app choices, or integration with existing enterprise systems.

As this absurd  and rather sleazy ad for a Toshiba Windows tablet makes obvious, virtually all Android, BlackBerry, and Windows device commercials don’t tell me anything about what a device can actually do for me.

Well, here’s a good idea that’s been a long time coming: AT&T is about to launch a new service that will make it easy for you to report and block your iPhone or iPad’s service if it has been stolen.

Led by the iPad, tablet sales are now expected to overtake laptop sales within four years. Given how disruptive the iPad has already been to many industries, it’s almost impossible to read reports like that without wondering which industries the iPad will topple or transform over the next five to ten years.

A new Morgan Stanley report identifies some of the likely winners and losers in an iPad and tablet dominated world. The industries expected to succeed include a couple of surprises – at first glance.

Although we’ve been deeply skeptical over the speculation surrounding another new 10-inch iPad this year, there is a possibility Apple could be gearing up to make some modifications to its existing device. The Cupertino company has been quick to dismiss the new iPad’s heat issues, but the latest report from DigiTimes claims it is looking to remove one of its two backlight modules in an effort to decrease its operating temperature.

One interesting challenge that’s emerging for companies out of the bring your own device (BYOD) and iPad-at-work trends is deciding who’s responsible for setting and enforcing policies when it comes to employee-owned devices. The immediate assumption is that it should be the IT department, but what group within IT? Security, network management, and user support teams can all make a claim that it should be them.

There’s even the question of whether or not IT is even the right department to take ownership of the situation. Some HR executives are claiming that this is an employee policy issue and therefore their responsibility. Some finance chiefs are claiming that they should own mobile devices if there’s going to be any expense sharing with employees or a stipend that helps users purchase devices for work.

In a growing number of organizations, there’s talk about creating a new position or a dedicated team to handle everything mobile – iPhones, iPads, Android handsets, in-house and public app stores, and anything else related to iOS, mobile, or BYOD. In other words, a mobility chief, or iOS Czar. 

Earlier this year, we reported on the plans by NetZero and FreedomPop to offer free 4G mobile broadband in the U.S. over ClearWire’s WiMax network. Both companies planned to operate on a freemium basis where users get a limited amount of data each month and can buy more if they choose.

This week, a company in the U.K. called Samba joined the free broadband bandwagon with a model that’s ad-based and freemium in nature, making it somewhat similar to NetZero’s original business model from the good old days of dial-up service. 

Much of the discussion about the iPhone and iPad in business focuses on larger enterprise companies and organizations. While the devices are clearly have a lot to offer in the big business arena, the iPhone and iPad are also excellent tools for smaller companies. The versatility of iOS devices, the iPad in particular, lets small business owners perform many crucial tasks like tracking expenses, generating invoices, and planning new projects quickly and easily from a single device.

The App Store is full of apps that can help launch, manage, and grow a business of any size. Many business apps useful to small business are fairly well-known. Square’s mobile payment system (and PayPal’s competing solutions) get a fair amount of coverage in mainstream and tech media stories, for example. There are, however, many great apps for small business users in the App Store that don’t get that kind of publicity.

If you’re a small business owner (or employee), here are ten amazing apps that you may not know about which can help you run your business more easily and efficiently.

I love having my photos on my iPad, but I hate using iPhoto to get them there. To be honest, I just hate iPhoto, along with its more complicated and even more sluggish cousin, Aperture. I use Lightroom, and up until last week I was exporting photos from there into iPhoto just to sync them. Not only was this a headache, but it was a waste of space.

Now, you can tell iTunes to sync any folder of photos to the iPad, but with a little bit of effort things can be made much more elegant. By setting up Lightroom correctly, we can have any changes to our photos mirrored to the iPad at the touch of a button, and the whole process is near-automatic.

If you’re reluctant to spend $99 on an Apple TV just to enjoy your iOS games on your HDTV over AirPlay, check out this Kickstarter project for the GameDock by Cascadia Games, the team behind Cavorite for iOS. It plugs into your TV via a HDMI connection and allows you to “play classic games the way they were meant to be played,” in full 1080p. It even has two USB ports on the front so that you can hook up a pair of retro gamepads.

Increased productivity is one of the most common rallying cries when people, myself included, talk about the consumerization trend in business technology and the related growth of personally owned mobile devices like the iPhone and iPad in the workplace. Increased productivity and the comfort of choosing and using the best apps or devices for the job is one big advantage that these trends have to offer, but it isn’t the only one.

The ability to collaborate is being unleashed by these trends in businesses around the world. That, perhaps, points a finger to why the iPad, cloud services like Box and Dropbox, and social networks have gained so much popularity in so many offices. They allow people to interact and collaborate in ways that traditional business collaboration tools do not.

In its first year, the Mac sold just 372,000 units. PC clones were reaching two million units, or six times the amount of sales of the Mac. And things got worse from there, climbing to a vertiginous 60x by 2004.

Now, though, according to everybody’s favorite Apple analyst and Christopher Walken soundalike Horace Dediu, the gap has dropped to just 2:1 – if you count iOS in with OS X.

Following yesterday’s report from Bloomberg that revealed Apple plans to release the long-awaited iPad mini this September, a new report from The Wall Street Journal has this morning added even further credence to those claims.

According to “people familiar with the matter,” Apple’s suppliers are preparing for mass production of a new iPad with a display smaller than 8 inches, which is expected to begin in September.

Just five days after submitting its complain to the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO), Apple has been granted ownership of the iPad3.com domain name. The address was reportedly transferred to Kilpatrick Townsend & Stockton, a legal firm that has represented Apple in the past, within the last 24 hours.

Adding more fuel to the ‘iPad Mini’ fire, a new report from Bloomberg says that Apple is planning to launch a cheaper 7-inch iPad in October. The device will feature a non-Retina 1024×768 display. In theory, the third-gen iPad would still serve as Apple’s premium tablet with a Retina display and faster internals, and the 7-inch iPad would be priced around $200 to compete with tablets like the Kindle Fire and Google Nexus 7.

“The Mac is still growing, and I think it could still grow, but I strongly believe that the tablet market will surpass the unit sales of the PC market.”

Apple CEO Tim Cook said that at a Goldman Sachs conference several months ago. Cook has been one the industry’s most vocal proponent of tablets as the future of modern computing, and recent statistics support his argument. According to new data, traditional notebook computers will take a backseat to tablets in four years. By 2016, tablet shipments are estimated to surpass notebook shipments.

There’s no question that the iPad is incredibly popular and revolutionary. As the device continues to become part of our daily lives, we’re beginning to see the iPad take hold in schools, workplaces, and our homes. What’s the most common task performed on an iPad(or other tablet)?

According to research firm Gartner, the most frequent task is checking email.

In a new report, Gartner used survey data from consumers in the U.S., U.K. and Australia that was recorded in a diary-style format at the end of last year. Email was the most common task performed on a tablet but a more interesting observation from Gartner is that people are largely using tablets as a way to replace tasks that previously involved printed and paper in one form or another.

The report stopped well short of saying we’re going to become a paperless society in the near future, but it did identify some interesting trends.

The brand-spanking new Google Nexus 7 is arguably the biggest non-Apple tablet announcement since Amazon debuted the Kindle Fire. With a starting price of $200, the Nexus 7 isn’t really intended to be an iPad killer, although Google wouldn’t mind cutting out a piece of Apple’s pie.

The guys at iFixit recently tore down the Google Nexus 7, and their findings revealed that a one millimeter difference in thickness makes Google’s tablet infinitely more repairable than Apple’s iPad.

With GarageBand for the iPad, Apple has brought an inexpensive, very powerful music recording studio right to your favorite mobile device. This fantastic $5 app lets anyone with an iPad create, record and enjoy making music, even if they have little experience with recording software or musical instruments.

With a killer beat in place, it’s time to add the second (mostly unsung) hero of modern music: the bass. Whether your tastes run to big, fat and bottom-heavy or quick, snappy and distorted, GarageBand has you covered. With GarageBand for iPad, you can create bass tracks that sound incredibly good with very little knowledge or expertise.

Let’s take a look at the simplest way to do that: Smart Bass.