Cult of Mac

Best List: Nomad Rugged Strap for Apple Watch

Nomad, maker of minimalist, practical accessories for Apple Watch and iPhone, now offers a strap that is not only designed for active wearers, but is really good-looking as well. And, at 40 bucks, it’s a super-sporty and stylish alternative to the higher-priced Nike Sport Bands by Apple.

With the intention of creating a silicone strap designed to “withstand the stresses of all forms of sport and exercise,” Nomad has succeeded — the Rugged Strap is a strong, lightweight, sweat- and water-resistant band that is also-super comfortable on the wrist. The best part is that it will take you from a hard workout to a night out, and will look great in both situations.

Read on to learn more about this band, which is perfect for year-round sports junkies. And check it out in our Watch Store.

Fitbit wants Google’s help to turn its fitness trackers into health monitors. The wearables maker will use Google’s cloud solutions to tie directly to users’ electronic medical records.

The real goal, of course, is to help Fitbit be more competitive with arch-rival Apple Watch.

Analysts have been extremely pessimistic about the iPhone X, with almost daily predictions that Apple’s top-of-the-line model was a flop. And they were all dead wrong. Tim Cook just said the iPhone X has been Apple’s best-selling model for every week since it launched, and that sales of all the company’s phones grew last quarter.

How did the analysts get it so wrong? Here’s what probably happened.

Apple blew analysts’ expectations out of the water this afternoon with its historic Q2 2018 earnings report that saw the company post the most revenue ever in the March quarter.

Tim Cook and Apple CFO Luca Maestri were absolutely giddy during today’s call with investors. Everyone expected the iPhone X to be a bust, but even Apple was surprised by its success as it still dominates the iPhone sales charts. New products are on the horizon too as Apple’s executives teased new goodies coming down its pipeline:

These were the biggest takeaways from the call:

Apple is set to reveal its second quarterly earnings report of 2018 this afternoon. If you’ve been listening to the analysts the last few months, you know that iPhone sales might take a dip.

Lagging iPhone X demand could cause Apple to bring in slightly less revenue than this quarter last year, unless Apple’s services or “other products” sectors picked up the slack. We’ll know for sure once Tim Cook and Apple CFO Luca Maestri run through all the numbers with investors today at 2 p.m. Pacific.

As usual, Cult of Mac will be live-blogging the action with all the analysis and snark we can muster.

Come join the fun:

There’s a lot of good news in Apple’s second earnings report of 2018 that should keep investors happy going into the next quarter.

Revenue during Q2 2018 hit an all-time high for a March quarter at $61.1 billion, thanks in large part to 52.2 million iPhones sold. Apple CEO Tim Cook says iPhone X sales are still killing it, too.

If you need an ultra-affordable smartphone that features everything you need, why not build it yourself? The Kite kit lets you create your own Android-powered smartphone from scratch, just as you want it — and it won’t break the bank.

It’s just one of the awesome ideas in this week’s Crowdfund Roundup. We’ve also got the world’s smartest wearable, an awesome mechanical gaming keyboard with a twist, and more!

This post is brought to you by Dashlane.

With all of the news about data insecurity at Facebook, you might be thinking twice about using the social network to log in to other apps. Sure, using the Facebook Login feature makes it simple to create an account or log in to apps and websites.

Unfortunately, it also adds to the data dossier Facebook is compiling about you and your friends.

A small company that makes dual cameras for cellphones claims Apple is infringing on several of its patents. The Israeli startup says it showed Apple prototypes for a miniature telephone lens, and Apple used them to create its own.

According to Corephotonics, the iPhone X, iPhone 8 Plus, and iPhone 7 Plus all use technology for which it holds patents.

Developers received a big batch of updates this morning as Apple dropped the third set of betas of its upcoming software updates for iOS, macOS, tvOS and watchOS.

iOS 11.4 beta 3 was made available to developers today, bringing a host of bug fixes and performance improvements to the iPhone and iPad. The new update adds a number of features that were missing from iOS 11.3 while also adding some crucial new goodies.

They say the best camera is the one you have with you. And when isn’t the iPhone with you? iPhone photography has created a whole new generation of amateur photographers. While you may be looking for the next great app to help produce some stunning photos, did you know you can easily recreate a long exposure style image right within the camera app?

Check out our latest Quick Tips video below to see how.

Mobile photographers using the iPhone X can now shoot wider and closer, thanks to a new olloclip lens system.

Launched Tuesday, the newly designed edge mount aligns with both front and rear cameras on Apple’s flagship handset. It enables iPhone X photographers to quickly swap out any of the six olloclip lenses.

Unless you’re living under a rock, you’re probably aware of Fortnite, the biggest game on iOS (and just about every other platform) right now.

Well, a great game is about get even greater thanks to the rollout of the 4.0 version of the iOS game, a.k.a. Fortnite Season 4. Check out the trailer below.

A Florida teenager reportedly had her life saved by her trusty Apple Watch after it alerted her to a dangerously high resting heart rate.

18-year-old Deanna Recktenwald was at church when her Apple Watch displayed a warning, noting that her heart rate had hit 190 beats per minute and that she should seek medical attention.

If you want to be seen and safe on the road when you’re cycling, you need a Lumos Helmet. The world’s first smart bike helmet offers more than just protection, with built-in lights, brake and turn signals. And now it’s even better, thanks to Apple Watch.

Lumos today launched its new watchOS app, which lets you control your helmet’s lighting using simple gestures. The company also confirmed that the Lumos Helmet will soon become the first bike helmet to be sold in Apple stores throughout the United States and Europe.

Like the Force, Wi-Fi signals surround us, penetrate us, and bind our devices together. They’re also similar in that both are prone to dark spots. With the Force, it takes nine movies and 40 years to work out. With Wi-Fi, all you need is NetSpot.

Qualcomm has made several concessions which could help speed up the end of its dispute with Apple and regulators in general.

Saving Apple cash? That’s one way to end a conflict!

Apple is rumored to be interested in purchasing media company Condé Nast, home to magazines including Vogue, Vanity Fair, Wired, The New Yorker, GQ and more.

However, company CEO Bob Sauerberg says that company is, “not for sale.”

Apple is supposedly working on a way to let developers create apps which work on iPhones, iPads, and Macs — but don’t expect to see it any time soon.

When news of the plan was first leaked in December, it was suggested that the feature may be announced at this year’s WWDC event. However, according to Apple watcher John Gruber, while Apple may still be working on a project like this, it is more likely to arrive with MacOS 10.15 and iOS 13 in 2019.

Microsoft has good news for users of Mac, iPad, and iPhone: there are improvements in Office 365 for all of you.

Word for Mac now uses neural machine translation to convert text between 11 different languages. This AI system is intended to produce more accurate results.

You’ve had a couple of cold ones, then head to your car. Suddenly, your iPhone starts shrieking out an alert. It’s telling you that you’re too impaired to get behind the wheel. 

This is the goal of AlcoGait, which uses a smarthone’s built-in sensors to monitor the way the user is walking.  AI is used to detect if the person’s gait indicates they’re not up to driving.

A couple of new renders and a video from a reliable source show what might be the next-generation iPhone SE. The device shown looks a lot like the earlier version, but updated with some of Apple’s newest tech.

Most notably, the Home button is gone, being replaced by a screen cutout with Face ID sensors.

Sometime, probably quite soon, your Mac will stop running 32-bit apps. All new Macs have 64-bit processors, and Apple wants to phase out older 32-bit apps in order to “enable faster system performance” for your Mac as a whole. What this means is that, in an as-yet-unspecified future version on macOS, 32-bit apps will stop running altogether.

If you’re running macOS High Sierra 10.13.4, then you may already have seen a warning pop up onto the screen when you launch older apps. Today we’ll see how to view a list of all the 32-bit apps on your Mac, so you can either harass the developer to update them, look for a better-supported alternative, or just delete them.

In today’s edition of Deals & Steals, we’ve discovered a great deal on a new iMac and much more, as part of Best Buy’s 24 hour Flash Sale. You can also get your hands on the HomePod for a nice discount!

Elsewhere, save big on a bonanza of PC gaming parts and a mounted phone charger.

Note: On some of these deals, Cult of Mac might earn a small commission through an affiliate link. However, we pick our daily Deals & Steals strictly on their potential value to our readers.

Most of these deals are good for a limited time only, so act fast before the prices change!

Deals & Steals: Save on Apple accessories

A job post shows Apple is hiring an engineer to lead a team designing 5G modems.  This may be mean that the company is going to stop outsourcing these wireless chips.

Apple currently sources its LTE modems from Qualcomm, but there have been reports that it’s working with Intel on next-generation modems. Maybe the iPhone maker decided to kick Intel to the curb too.