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Through Tech Warehouse, JPMorgan Chase and Good360 are providing non-profit organizations and schools with refurbished computers that are equipped with basic peripherals and OS software, allowing them to enhance their tech capabilities…. and their local communities.

Apple released a range of updates to the its Mac applications last week along with the release of Mountain Lion on Wednesday. Most of those updates were to integrate new Mountain Lion technologies and provide general compatibility with the new OS.

Among them were updates for  Apple Remote Desktop, Apple’s extremely powerful and flexible remote management solution for Mac systems. In addition to offering support for Mountain Lion, the update also added a couple new features focused around some of Apple’s latest hardware, but no major changes. In fact, one has to wonder why this amazing Mac IT solution has gotten so few updates over the past few years.

If Crocodile Dundee had been a digital artist instead of a hardened Aussie hunter, and if you had pulled your iPad stylus out in the middle of a heated argument somewhere in NYC, then he would have said this:

“Call that a stylus? That’s not a stylus… This is a stylus.”

And then pulled out the JaJa, an iPad stylus that is not only pressure-sensitive (with 1024 levels), but manages to communicate its intent to your iPad without a cable, Wi-Fi, Bluetooth or any other radio protocol. How the hell do it work?

Once a staple of any vacation, the postcard has since faded into obscurity due to the advent of technology and instant sharing. One company meshing the best of both worlds, Touchnote Ltd., has a popular app on both Android and iOS that allows users to turn photos into personalized postcards and have them sent for around a $1.49 per postcard. In celebration of the 2012 Olympic Games, both Touchnote and Samsung want users to have the luxury of sharing their amazing moments via a postcard without having to visit a local London gift shop. That’s why Samsung is sponsoring a promo that will allow users to send free Touchnote postcards up until August 31st.

A couple of rumors hit the web today claiming that the iPhone 5 will supposedly be revealed in just 6 weeks. We’ve seen a lot of iPhone 5 parts leak out from manufacturers over the past couple weeks as well, so it sounds like the rumored September 21st release  date might be true.

So if the if the iPhone 5 really is going to be announced on September 12, what new hardware features do you want it to come with? 2GB of RAM? 128GB storage? NFC? New dock connector? 3D Display? Also, what’s Apple going to name this bad boy? “The new iPhone,” or something else entirely? We want to hear what you want out of the next iPhone you buy, so come over to the forums and let us hear about it.

CLICK HERE TO TELL US WHAT NEW  FEATURES YOU WANT IN THE IPHONE 5 AT OUR FORUMS.

Image: InventHelp

We just heard that Apple plans to announce the next iPhone, iPod lineup, and iPad mini at an event on September 12th, and now more rumors have surfaced regarding Apple’s iPhone and iPad roadmap, including the iPad 4 and some new cases.

While Apple is expected to ship the iPad mini by November, it’s currently unclear if the smaller tablet will ship at the same time as the iPhone 5 or not. The next major version of the current iPad is rumored to be a more of an evolutionary upgrade to the third-gen iPad, and Apple is expected to implement the same smaller dock connector that will be in the new iPhone.

In 2012, there’s nothing that lends prestige, luxury and credibility to a shopping space like an Apple Store. From that perspective, it’s the Tiffany’s or Sak’s of the 21st Century.

In fact, it looks as if the Apple Store was considered to be such a prestigious draw that the Metropolitan Transportation Authority bent over backwards to make sure it could get Apple to lease a space in the famous Grand Central Terminal… at the expense of other applicants.

In addition to launching Mountain Lion Server last week, Apple rather quietly released a Mountain Lion Server version of Workgroup Manager – the traditional Mac management tool included in previous releases of OS X Server. The move was unexpected after Apple released the Advanced Administration guide for Mountain Lion Server, which implied that administrators would need to begin an almost-immediate shift to Mountain Lion Server’s Profile Manager.

The move is good news for many organizations that have an existing investment in OS X Server and Mac clients. Although Mountain Lion Server’s Profile Manager is arguably a more modern and enterprise-friendly solution, it only supports Macs running Lion and Mountain Lion. Any schools or businesses with clients still on Leopard or Snow Leopard would be out of luck if Profile Manager were the only available option.

If you carry a stylus for your iPad, it’s fair to say you like writing (or at least doodling). And – by extension – it’s likely that you also carry a pen. Now one of our favorite styluses – – the metal-mesh-tipped TruGlide from Linktec – has been turned into the Duo, a single stick with a different writing technology at each end.

The patent war between Apple and Samsung is just starting to heat up, with both tech giants scheduled to appear in U.S. court today. Apple accused Samsung of copying the iPhone and iPad back in April 2011, and Samsung countersued with similar accusations. In the months leading up to the trial, there have been treasure troves of previously hidden information uncovered, including hundreds of early iPhone and iPad prototype designs.

One design in particular, aptly named “Jony,” sparked an accusation from Samsung saying that Apple borrowed from Sony’s designs to create the first iPhone. To combat Samsung’s claim, Apple has since produced an early (and possibly first) prototype design of the iPhone from circa 2005.

The Samsung vs. Apple legal brouhaha has been a pretty tedious story to cover up until now, but over the last week, those of who with a professional interest in paying attention to the bickering were finally rewarded when Apple started coughing up images of their early iPhone prototypes in the court filings.

On Saturday, though, in preparation for the start of today’s trial, Apple released a new filing with dozens of sketches, prototypes and 3D models of early iPhone prototypes. We’ve seen some of them before, but a lot of them are new, and one thing that is abundantly clear is that back in 2006, Apple has already thought out every possible shape an iPhone could be.

We’ve put together a gallery below of all of Apple’s iPhone prototypes, culling the images from a longer slideshow from All Things D. Check it out: not only will you see iPhones that never made it in there, you’ll see the iPhone 3G, the iPhone 4 and even a longer iPhone that could be the iPhone 5!

If you thought that all apps that turn photos into “paintings” and “drawings” were total gimmicky junk, you’d be dead right. Applying a “find edges” filter and desaturating the result into grayscale doesn’t make a picture look like you drew it. It looks like you’re a dummy for even using it.

But things have changed: Glaze is an iPad app which actually makes faux paintings that look good.

Apple has just announced that OS X Mountain Lion is the most successful launch of Mac OS X ever, with over three million copies sold in four days.

“Just a year after the incredibly successful introduction of Lion, customers have downloaded Mountain Lion over three million times in just four days, making it our most successful release ever,” said Philip Schiller, Apple’s senior vice president of Worldwide Marketing.

Last year, Apple sold over 1 million copies of OS X Lion in the first day of release. It looks like Apple managed to not just match that rate, but exceed it with Mountain Lion.

Apple’s press release is after the jump. Have you updated to Mountain Lion yet?

September 21, 2012 is looking increasingly likely as the release date for the next-gen iPhone and upcoming iPad mini, as a new report from a trusted site pegs the date.

Over the weekend, The New York Times reported that Apple was in talks to invest a significant amount of cash into Twitter. The multi-million dollar investment would raise Twitter’s company valuation to a healthy $10 billion.

But that doesn’t really sound like something Apple would do, does it? If you thought that when you first read this rumor, then you had the right hunch. Apple and Twitter have talked, but not recently. Beyond the current Twitter integration in iOS and OS X, the two companies are merely friends.

We thought about simply updating our original post on this story, but a separate article to debunk the former seemed more appropriate in this case.

Rumors surrounding Apple’s next-gen iPhone are started to pick up steam leading up to the device’s rumored release this fall. We know that the sixth iPhone will probably have a 4-inch display, slimmer design, smaller dock connector, and launch before November.

Leaked snapshots of purported next-gen iPhone parts have surfaced in recent months, but nothing as complete and authentic-looking as a series of images published over the weekend.

Kicking off this week’s must-have apps roundup is a stunning new weather app called Solar, which boasts a simple, intuitive user interface and a no frills approach that doesn’t suffocate you with information you’re not interested in. There’s also a great new drawing and animation app from Disney that you and your kids will love; a great new photography app that adds bokeh light effects to your photos; and updates to Google Earth and Yelp.

After making its debut on consoles, The Walking Dead series is now available on iOS, and it’s kicking off this week’s must-have games roundup. We also have two classic titles in the form of Fur Fighters and Spy vs Spy, a retro-style 2D platformer, and the official game of the new Total Recall movie.

The Walking Dead is the definitive zombie tale of the past few years, moving quickly from indie hit black-and-white comic book to even bigger hit television series, and then as a Mac and PC game on Steam. If you haven’t played it there, you owe it to yourself to check it out on your iPhone or iPad – it’s really that good. Heck,if you have played it on Steam, you might want to check it out on iOS.

Ping never had a chance, but a recent report may show the way to Apple’s eventual success in the social media space. According to a report in The New York Times, “people briefed on the matter” say that Apple has been talking with the social media startup about making a strategic investment.

The numbers bandied about include an Apple investment stake of hundreds of millions of dollars, which might in turn increase Twitter’s high valuation of around $8.4 billion to a nicer-looking $10 billion.

In a not-so surprise move today, Apple filed a proposal with the US District Court that is handling Monday’s trial between it and rival Samsung over possible patent infringements. The surprise move today is the fact that Samsung agrees with Apple.

Both companies have to submit documents as exhibits in the wide-ranging trial, scheduled for Monday, and each company would like to keep it’s sensitive business data private. The two tech industry leaders today came up with a proposal that, if accepted, will have them jointly submitting documents they would like redacted from the public.

Tonight during the Olympics, Apple aired several new Mac focused ads. The spots are drastically different than the kind of style Apple has been using in its TV ads for products like Siri and the iPad.

One features a man on a plane receiving assistance from a Genius with iMovie on his Mac, and another features a conversation between the same Genius and a customer who has just been tricked into buying “basically a Mac.” The third ad shows a scene in which a frantic dad explores iPhoto with a Genius.

One of the new features in OS X Mountain Lion is called Power Nap. Touted as a tool that get things done while your Mac is sleeping, Power Nap enables a Mac running Mountain Lion to download email, sync with iCloud, check for system updates, etc. while in sleep mode. There is a big caveat, however. Power Nap will only run on Macs with an internal solid-state hard drive (SSD).

During the developer beta phase of Mountain Lion and continuing into its public release stage, it was noticed that certain compatible Macs didn’t have Power Nap installed by default on the final release of Mountain Lion. Apple has since issued a firmware update to bring Power Nap to the MacBook Air, and now a new update today has been issued for the new MacBook Pro with Retina display.

Have you ever noticed that the Shuffle option on iTunes or on your iPod isn’t truly random? For example, if you have a playlist with ten tracks and start off by playing, say, the second track, iTunes will always shuffle to the exact same next track, everytime.

Doesn’t seem much like “Shuffling,” does it? It is, though: Apple’s just thinking about Shuffling a different way than you are.

Our Mountain Lion Megasode is here, and on this minty-new CultCast, we’ll tell you what we like, what we love, and which hidden features we’ve discovered in Apple’s new big kitty.

Plus, should you upgrade or do a clean install of Mountain Lion? We ponder that very question, then tell you when a clean install makes more sense and how to do it the right way on this all-new megasode.

Subscribe to The CultCast now on iTunes, or easily stream new episodes right on your iPhone or iPad with Apple’s newly updated and freshly debugged Podcasts App.

Show notes up next!