Apple is not a company that is afraid to introduce a product that will cannibalize other Apple products. No one buys iPod Classics anymore, they buy an iPod Touch or iPhone. The MacBook Air cannibalized sales of regular MacBooks. And many assumed the iPad mini would cannibalize sales of the iPad, but that assumption is false.
Some analysts believed the iPad mini would cannibalize sales of the iPad by a rate of 10 to 20 percent. A new survey by Cowen and Co. shows that while the iPad mini has been selling well, it hasn’t been cannibalized its bigger sibling, but it is killing PC sales.
Although the iPad mini is well-reviewed, a constant complaint that has been leveled against Apple’s smallest tablet is that the display isn’t Retina. In fact, in my review of the iPad mini, I could barely see past the terrible fuziness of the on-screen text, and considered it an otherwise perfect device’s Achilles’ Heel.
Summarized, the argument is this: A Retina iPad mini would be too expensive for Apple to make right now, and it would come with other tradeoffs, like a significantly reduced battery life and a much thicker and heavier form factor.
I was curious if this was actually true, so I decided to try an experiment: I’d build an imaginary Retina iPad mini out of technology that Apple already has access to, add up how much it would cost, and then see what the design tradeoffs would be.
What I found out was that Apple could indeed have shipped an iPad mini with Retina this generation without significantly changing the form or battery life of the device, but it would have cost $379. Here’s why.
While Apple Stores across the U.S. continue to enjoy a lot of success, Apple is looking to expand their retail operations overseas in countries such as China, Turkey and now Brazil.
According to a new press release, Apple has informed the Brazilian press that they plan to open their first Apple Store in Rio de Janerio next year. If the Rio de Janeiro store is successful, Apple is likely to follow it up with more retail locations in Brazil, which is also where Foxconn has built new factories to assemble iPads.
If Apple accepts its $84,000 fine, it could pave the way for other parties to sue.
Apple has appealed an $84,000 fine from a Chinese court that alleged it had profited from sales of a pirated encyclopedia that was sold through its App Store. The Cupertino company refuses to accept responsibility for the infringement and argues that it was nothing more than a store operator.
This "Foxbot" could soon be building Apple's latest gadgets.
Apple gadgets you buy in the future may have been assembled by machines as Apple’s biggest manufacturing partner, Foxconn, begins replacing its workers with robots. The move is expected to improve efficiency in Foxconn’s Chinese plants, as well as combat rising labor costs.
Fact: I carry my iPad almost naked (the iPad is naked — not me thank God).
Fact: I often want to prop the thing up in portrait mode to use with a Bluetooth keyboard
Fact: Penguins and polar bears would never meet in the wild.
Fact: Most portrait-capable iPad stands are just too unwieldy to live in a bag permanently.
Considering these amazing facts, it should come as no surprise that I’m about to tell you about a stand which will in fact hold the iPad in pretty much any orientation. What’s more, it does it whilst looking like a love egg that has sprouted a long, long pair of huggy arms. Let’s be honest — it’s pretty creepy-looking.
To say Samsung and Apple have a strained relationship would be quite the understatement. A once symbiotic partnership has turned into an all out war over claims of patent infringement and design copying. Their global legal battles have disgusted enough judges and consumers to spawn serious debate over the current status of our patent system and a call for reform.
Lightning chargers! Get your Lightning chargers here! Scosche has finally announced a set of basic home and car chargers for the current crop of iDevices, and you can actually buy the things.
Camera+ now offers a horizontal level and live exposure on iPhone.
Tap Tap Tap has updated its hugely popular Camera+ app for iPhone today, introducing a stack of great new features and lots of improvements. It claims to have “made the impossible possible” by introducing a front-facing flash, in addition to a horizontal level, live exposure, and more.
It used to be so simple: you grabbed your gadget, and you plugged it into the nearest available USB hole. Then, a few minutes or hours later, your device was fully charged.
Now we have retina iPads with laptop-sized batteries, 5W, 10W and 12W chargers, and even differently-rated USB ports in our Macs. It’s so confusing.
Let’s make this problem disappear by throwing some money at it. $49 worth of cash-money, to be precise. And that $49 will get you the… DoubleUp!
Apple's latest EFI update for the Retina MacBook Pro should be avoided if possible.
If you haven’t already installed Apple’s latest EFI firmware for your 15-inch Retina MacBook Pro, you may want to avoid it for a little while. Users on the Apple Support Communities forum are reporting that the update causes reduced frame rates and processor slowdowns when using graphically-intensive applications.
Every time Apple introduces a new product they love to compare it to a common object that shows just how magically small it is. The MacBook Air fits inside an envelope. The iPod Classic is the size of a deck of cards. The iPad mini is thinner than a pencil. And the 4th generation iPad with Retina display is thinner than a penny! Wait, what?
A typo on Apple’s website says that the depth of the iPad is .37mm, which would make it about as thick as four sheets of paper copy. For sake of comparison a penny has a depth of 1.57mm, so the new iPad is hella skinny. Obviously the image should show .37 inches thick, not millimeters. We’re just surprised this little mistake has slipped through Apple’s perfectionist fingers without much notice.
If you’re into iPhoneography, chances are you’ve heard of Olloclip. The company sells one of the best lens kits there is for the iPhone. Apple gives you the ability to digitally zoom in the Camera app, but Olloclip takes photography to the next level with fisheye, wide angle, and macro lenses.
Olloclip is now offering its 3-in-1 lens kit for the iPhone 5.
If you don’t know by now, Mujjo makes the sexiest sleeves around for Apple products. If you just bought or plan on picking up Apple’s new 13-inch MacBook Pro with Retina display, then Mujjo has you covered. The Dutch company has announced its new sleeve for the 13-inch Retina MacBook.
When Apple released the iPhone 5 three months ago, jailbreak hackers were sent back to the grindstone. Like a new version of iOS, new Apple hardware almost always kills the current jailbreak. It’s a ruthless game of cat and mouse.
Has the iPhone 5 been jailbroken? Sort of. A picture of what looked like a jailbroken iPhone 5 spread like wildfire several months ago, but that’s only part of the story. An iPhone 5 jailbreak is being worked on, and good progress is being made. For jailbreakers, now is the time to have hope.
Today a free version of popular photography iPhone app “Over” launched in the App Store called “Overgram.” With Overgram, it’s easy to add beautiful typography to pictures taken on your iPhone. As the name implies, you can easily share your creations on social networks like Instagram.
Check out Overgram, and if you like it, the full version of Over is on sale in the App Store for a limited time. Your Instagram feed will never be the same.
The last few weeks have been a bit rocky for Apple and its new CEO Tim Cook, but that hasn’t stopped it from enjoying record breaking successes thanks to the iPhone 5 and iPad.
Every year the people at Fierce Wireless rank the top 25 most powerful people in the U.S. wireless industry, and for their rankings this year Tim Cook managed to grab the number one spot.
The iPad mini is the cheapest tablet Apple’s ever made. At $329 we think it’s an alright deal even though it needs a Retina display. But if you’re put off by the cheap price tag and demand something a bit more extravagant, you can always dip your iPad mini in 24kt gold.
Gold & Co. have plated the iPad mini in both gold and rose gold and will probably sell a limited number of the blinged out iPad minis to any dufus who wants their iPad mini to scream “1%.”
Apple’s new Maps app leaves a lot to be desired, and while there are some decent alternatives out there, the only worthy replacement for Apple Maps is either Google Maps or Nokia’s Maps. Neither company has an iOS app ready to go just yet, but Nokia is planning to change all that.
In a few weeks Nokia plans to release a maps app for iOS called Here. The app will be free for iPhone, iPad and iPod Touch owners, and Nokia is hoping that it will persuade some iOS users to try out their smartphones as well.
These clip-on headphones probably sound truly awful, but the paperclip that lets you secure them to your clothes or bag is genius, and probably worth the price-tag alone. Then again, they probably won’t be much worse than Apple’s old pre-EarPod earbuds, either, and we all got by with those for years.
Last week we reported that Apple was planning to ship initial iPad mini with LTE pre-orders on November 16th, and it looks like units are finally ready to leave home base and make their way to your doorstep.
Customers who have pre-order the iPad mini with LTE are now reporting that Apple has sent them confirmation that their iPad mini has shipped and is en route to its destination.
I used to be a diehard Moleskine fan. I still love them, but I realized that I was spending too much time worrying about what to write in those precious pages that I never actually wrote much. So I switched to completely disposable (and easily scannable) index cards and I never looked back.
Well, apart from the time I found an index card written to me by my future self which said “Look behind you… NOW!” But that just turned out to be a drunken prank I played on myself.
So I have little time these days for Moleskine, Field Notes or any other fancy book that gets in the way of my scrawlings. But that’s not to say that this Field Notes Archival Wooden Box isn’t tempting.
3-D printing: It’s just like knitting, right, only more high-tech? No? OK, fine. At least I tried.
But you know what really is high-tech and just like knitting? These iPhone cases, which are 3-D printed in the shape of knitting. Try to spoil that one for me, you grumpy old sourpuss you. Just try…
The Jawbone UP wristband first launched back in 2011, and it became quite a popular product. Everyone wanted to get their hands on the fitness- and sleep-tracking iPhone accessory, which came with plenty of promise. Unfortunately, it launched with all kinds of problems, too — including water leaks and inflexible components that broke too easily — and Jawbone was forced to pull it.
The company’s now giving the device a second shot. Today it announced the second-generation Jawbone UP, which is now shipping for $129.99.
Despite losing some of the tablet marketshare to Android tablets this year, the iPad and iPhone are still the two most popular non-PC devices to watch video on. A new study on video monetization conducted by FreeWheel found that Apple iOS devices make up more than 60% of all non-PC/Mac video viewing.
Even though Android tablets and smartphones have seen major gains, they’re still a work in progress and their users don’t consume media as heavily as iOS users.
