Tired of talking to Siri? In iOS 11, you can tap out your requests silently. Photo: Cult of Mac
Using Siri in public places can be a drag. Either it’s too noisy for Apple’s AI assistant to understand your query, or it’s too quiet and it’s embarrassing (or even risky) to ask Siri for help.
Luckily, iOS 11 brings a Siri upgrade that changes all that: The new Type to Siri feature lets you silently send all your questions and commands. This feature comes disabled by default, but enabling it shouldn’t take more than a few seconds.
With Instaread, you can cut down on needlessly lengthy reads and get straight to the heart of bestselling books. Photo: Cult of Mac Deals
It’s a lot easier to create a reading list than it is to make progress on one. For many people, the time and energy to get through a book is harder and harder to find. Luckily, you don’t always need to read every word of a book to catch its meaning.
Instaread has rolled this principle into a popular app. It provides summaries of more than 500 New York Times Bestseller books, condensing them into digestible overviews with key takeaways that can be consumed in just minutes, by reading or listening. And for the last time, you can get a lifetime subscription to Instaread for $49.99 at Cult of Mac Deals.
Apple distributors in a coastal province in China have been arrested for allegedly trying to sell iPhone user data, according to reports.
Police in Zhejiang rounded up 22, accusing the distributors of searching an internal Apple database for Apple IDS and phone numbers. Prices for the data were cheap, ranging from a U.S. dollar equivalent of $1.50 to $26.
New 21.5-inch iMac features removable RAM and CPU. Photo: iFixit
Apple’s new 4K 21.5-inch iMac is slightly more repairable than its predecessor, a new teardown by iFixit reveals. But there’s one big surprise buried in the computer’s guts: Both the CPU and the RAM can be swapped out when it’s time to upgrade.
While it’s still not an easily repairable computer, that’s still a change of direction for a company whose products regularly get dinged for lack of upgradeability.
June 8, 2009: Apple promotes its 13-inch MacBook to join the MacBook Pro family, adding a speed bump, new FireWire 800 port, the first SD card slot on a MacBook, improved LED-backlit screen, and backlit keyboard across all models.
Coming the year after Apple radically upgraded its MacBooks with a new aluminum unibody design, the update is more about evolution than revolution. But it still makes for a pretty darn great laptop!
Two years after its launch, ResearchKit just got a big update. Photo: Apple
Apple has updated ResearchKit, adding a number of useful functions aimed at improving medical researchers’ ability to use iPhones around the world as mobile health gathering devices.
ResearchKit 1.5 includes three new “active tasks” researchers can incorporate into their studies, along with the added ability to display rich video content to users within apps.
Ad includes words of wisdom from Carl Sagan. Photo: Apple
Apple has debuted a great new ad from its “Shot on iPhone” campaign, showing off some stunning videos of the world shot by everyday users. The ad is titled simply “Earth.”
It comes days after Apple reconfirmed its commitment to environmental causes after President Trump’s withdrawal from the Paris climate accord. Check it out below.
You can already save big on the new iPad Pros! Photos: Apple
It’s been less than 48 hours since we heard all the exciting news from Tim Cook & Co. during the big WWDC 2017 keynote, and we’re already seeing the first deals on preorders of the new 10.5-inch iPad Pro.
Not to be outdone, Apple itself is providing some impressive discounts on refurbished MacBooks and iMacs. You’ll find those surprising discounts and more in this week’s best Apple deals.
When Apple unveiled the new iMac Pro at WWDC this week, not only was it the most powerful Mac ever made, it was also one of the most pricey ever.
At $5,000 for the baseline model, the iMac Pro is aimed at the most professional of Pro users, but according to a new price analysis on competing super-powered PC, the iMac Pro might actually be a killer deal.
New watch faces as part of Apple Watch OS 4. Photo: Apple
In watchOS 4, you can use an image from your Photos library on your iPhone as a custom Apple Watch face. It’s an easy way to add a touch of personalization to your wearable.
Despite removing its annual Design Awards show from the WWDC 2017 schedule last month, Apple still handed out awards for the best apps of the year at its developer conference and games were the biggest winners.
New features in iOS 11 make the iPad a multitasking beast. Photo: Ste Smith/Cult of Mac
iOS 11 brings brilliant new features and enough design tweaks to make everything feel fresh. The first developer beta landed this week, and we’re loving what we see – especially when it comes to the great new options for iPad users.
Apple's WWDC 2017 Platforms State of the Union session gets boiled down to its bare essentials in these sketchnotes. Photo: Andy McNally/Cult of Mac
The WWDC 2017 Platforms State of the Union, during which Apple laid out what’s new for developers, brimmed with updates. The session at Apple’s annual developer conference focused on fundamentals of and refinements to iOS 11, Swift and Xcode, delivering vital details for coders.
Relive the session’s highlights with these sketchnotes, which should give Apple developers and Apple users alike much to be excited about.
Isn't it time you swapped that dusty old Mac for a new one? Photo: Ste Smith/Cult of Mac
Apple’s most affordable 13-inch MacBook Pro has been discontinued.
The 2015 model has held onto its place on the Apple online store as a more affordable alternative to more recent MacBook Pros, but you’ll have to buy one of the company’s latest notebooks if you want to stick with a 13-inch display.
Micro-LED displays could make Apple Watch super-thin. Photo: Apple
Apple is planning to cut down on its reliance of Samsung displays with future models of the Apple Watch by adopting microLED screens. According to a new report out of Asia, the switch could come as soon as next year.
Mann was tickled by macOS's new name. Photo: Jonathan Mann
When Apple revealed the name of its next macOS update this week, Jonathan Mann — like a lot of Apple watchers — found himself somewhat amused by the “High Sierra” moniker.
If you don’t know Mann by name, you may well be familiar with his work. A YouTube musician and Apple fan, he has composed more than 40 songs about his favorite tech company over the years — including one that once made Steve Jobs dance.
Check out his appropriately smoky macOS High Sierra song below.
That line, the best camera is the one that’s always with you, gets associated with the iPhone. SANDMARC says its newest product is the camera accessory you will always want with your iPhone.
It’s vying for that place with a claim of adding “cinematic drama” to your iPhone photos with a set of clip-on polarizer and neutral density filters that will improve dynamic range, reduce glare and reflections, enhance color and add motion blur.
The best gesture in iOS 11 isn't just for iPad. Photo: Apple
Apple brought drag and drop to the iPad with iOS 11, making it easier than ever to transfer content between multiple apps. It turns out the feature will also be available on the iPhone — but it won’t be anywhere near as good.
iOS 11 brings plenty of powerful new features. Photo: Apple
Rather than completely overhauling the Home screen in iOS 11, Apple settled for a few neat tweaks that will make using your iPhone easier. One of the coolest new features makes the previously clunky process of organizing your Home screen a lot less annoying.
Rather than painstakingly dragging individual app icons across the pages of your Home screen, iOS 11 lets you move multiple icons simultaneously with this hidden trick.
This popular app offers a range of tools that makes it much more versatile than iTunes for iOS management. Photo: Cult of Mac Deals
For all the use we get out of our iDevices, iTunes doesn’t offer much choice in how we manage their data. Whether it’s hidden files eating up storage, or the complex dance required to move a single song from one place to another, it can be more hassle than convenience. There’s just has to be a better way. And of course, there is.
iMazing 2 is a popular app that offers a spread of tools for moving and managing every category of iOS data. No wonder this app calls itself the Swiss Army Knife of iPhone, iPad, and iPod management. Easily browse and manage backups, extract and print text messages, drag and drop songs from one device to another, all without jailbreaking or other trickery. And right now is your last chance to get iMazing 2 for just $24.99 at Cult of Mac Deals.
Prepare to remortgage your home to afford these! Photo: Heritage Auctions
Do you hate going outside without anything on your feet? Happen to have a spare $30,000 sloshing around? Then you could be the lucky owner of an incredibly rare pair of authentic 1990s Apple sneakers, going up for auction this weekend.
Part of a Beverly Hills auction titled “The Future is Now” by Heritage Auctions, the shoes will be sold off on June 11, alongside an assortment of “sneakers, surfboards, skateboard decks and street art.”
When it comes to original programming, this isn't exactly Netflix's House of Cards. Photo: Apple
With its new reality show Planet of the Apps, Apple didn’t try to reinvent the wheel. It slapped a new body on a well-worn vehicle — wannabe entrepreneurs pitching their precious ideas to a panel of questionable celebrity experts — and drove straight to “Meh-ville.”
iOS 11 can prevent apps like Uber and Waze from using your location at all times.
Apple has added a new location option in the update that will rollout to everyone this fall, which only allows certain apps to access location data while they are open and active.
32-bit apps won't launch on iOS 11. Here's how to get a list of the ones on your device. Photo: Cult of Mac
iOS 11 won’t run any 32-bit apps. Most of the time, that won’t make any difference — most apps you use every day were updated to be 64-bit a long time ago. But we all have a few of those old apps laying around that haven’t been updated in years. Perhaps they’re still useful for you, or maybe Apple kicked the app out of the App Store and there’s no modern alternative?
Under iOS 11, those apps will no longer work. You may as well just delete them. And to help, there’s a spot in the Setting app where you can see a list of all those incompatible apps.