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Apple Watch goes on sale in India

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It can be tricky to explain Apple Watch's subtle allure.
And just in time for Diwali, too!
Photo: Jim Merithew/Cult of Mac

The Apple Watch is continuing its international rollout by going on sale in India — shortly before the country’s Diwali festival, and just one month after the Indian debut of the iPhone 6s and 6s Plus.

Apple’s first wearable device — which has so far shipped close to 7 million units around the world — starts at Rs 30,900 ($469) for the 38mm Apple Watch Sport, and goes up to Rs 14.2 lakh ($21,500) for the top-priced Apple Watch Edition.

How to master the Apple TV remote’s new buttons

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Wonky Menu button? Try this weird trick.
Wonky Menu button? Try this weird trick.
Photo: Rob LeFebvre/Cult of Mac

Like all well-designed products from the Apple mothership, the new Apple TV’s remote, also known as the Siri remote, looks simple but contains a surprising amount of depth.

Sure, you might know that one press on the Menu button will take you back one screen, but what about all the other secret moves (like how to restart your Apple TV with the buttons)?

Luckily, we’re here to help you discover all the secrets of the Siri remote. Today, let’s look at the buttons and their hidden features.

YouTube is now showing virtual reality video

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youtube-is-now-showing-virtual-reality-video-image-cultofandroidcomwp-contentuploads201511YouTube-VR-gif
You can now enjoy YouTube videos like never before. Photo: Google
You can now enjoy YouTube videos like never before. Photo: Google

It’s time to dust off that virtual reality headset that you’ve hardly used since the day it arrived, because the biggest video platform on the planet now supports VR video. Google CEO Sundar Pichai today announced that YouTube has begun offering its first VR video, which can be enjoyed with Google Cardboard.

Facebook now lets you share tunes from Apple Music

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Your Facebook feed is about to get a lot more musical.
Your Facebook feed is about to get a lot more musical.
Photo: Facebook

Facebook is dipping its toes into the music biz this week with a brand new feature that makes it easier than ever to share your favorite tunes with all your social network friends.

The new Music Stories feature rolls out to iPhone users today and allows you to share 30-second song samples from Apple Music and Spotify by simply copy and pasting a link into your status update.

Here’s a preview of how it works:

Chronos disc will turn your dumb watch into a smartwatch

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The Chronos disc can bring smartwatch powers to any watch.
The Chronos disc can bring smartwatch powers to any watch.
Photo: Chronos

You have your reasons for not owning a smartwatch, one of which is you happen to like the timepiece presently on your wrist. What if you could make your primitive wristwatch a little smart?

Chronos is like slapping a brain on the back of your favorite timepiece. It is an ulna-thin disc with 36 hours of battery life that brings curated notifications and health tracking to a watch of any age.

Apple is already ordering chips for iPhone 7

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iPhone 6s teardown
Pegatron will team up with an Indonesian manufacturer..
Photo: iFixit

The iPhone 6s and 6s Plus have barely been out for a month, but Apple engineers are hard at work finishing the iPhone 7, and they’re already placing orders for new chips.

Apple has placed LCD driver orders with Synaptics for the iPhone 7 and iPhone 7 Plus, indicating that the touch and display driver (TDDI) single-chip solutions its been developing in-house aren’t quite ready for prime time.

Bring the beat in and take it anywhere with this banging Bluetooth speaker [Deals]

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The UE BOOM Bluetooth Speaker brings room-filling, 360-degree sound in a device that's compact and built to last.
The UE BOOM Bluetooth Speaker brings room-filling, 360-degree sound in a device that's compact and built to last.
Photo: Cult of Mac Deals

Now that we can basically all the music in the world anywhere we go, it’s up to us to make sure we’re hearing it at its best. Headphones are great, but when it’s time to share the noise you’ll want to pick up a UE BOOM Bluetooth Speaker. The critically acclaimed speaker will get any room moving with rich, balanced sound, and right now you can get one for just $149.99.

Apple Music ad goes backstage on Kenny Chesney’s tour

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Who knew Kenny Chesney is an Apple fanboy?
Who knew Kenny Chesney is an Apple fanboy?
Photo: Apple

Apple Music has gone country in the streaming service’s latest ad that debuted last night during ABC’s broadcast of the Country Music Awards. The new ad gives viewers a backstage peek at Kenny Chesney’s ‘No Shoes Nation’ tour as the country singer uses Apple Music to create playlists, and discover new tunes

Along with waxing philosophical about the ‘human element’ Apple Music offers, the one-minute ad also features the Apple Watch that’s worn by Chesney to track his workouts as he slams medicine balls into the ground while aspiring to become a bull rider.

Watch the new ad below:

Jetpack daredevils take flight alongside Airbus A380

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A Jetman Dubai pilot soars to catch up with an Emirates A380 commercial jet.
A Jetman Dubai pilot soars to catch up with an Emirates A380 commercial jet.
Photo: Jetman Dubai

We were all supposed to have personal jetpacks by now. But keeping them in the air for any length of time has made them impractical, so to get our futuristic fix we have to settle for Buzz Lightyear or James Bond from the 1965 movie Thunderball.

But check out jetpack pilots Yves Rossy and Vince Reffet, of the Jetman Dubai team, who recently conducted a fantastic formation flight over the Palm Jumeirah in Dubai with an Emirates A380 commercial jet.

Xiaomi’s first smartphone with 3D Touch hits a snag

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3D Touch in action on iPhone 6s. Photo: Killian Bell/Cult of Android
3D Touch in action on iPhone 6s. Photo: Killian Bell/Cult of Android

Xiaomi’s efforts to follow Apple into adopting pressure-sensitive smartphone displays has hit a roadblock, with the Chinese company struggling to source suitable components at a reasonable price. This almost certainly means that Xiaomi fans will have to wait longer for its first handset with 3D Touch.

Think same? HTC’s new One A9 ad is another Apple ripoff

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HTC's new flagships certainly looks familiar.
Photo: HTC
HTC's new flagships certainly looks familiar. Photo: HTC
HTC’s new flagships certainly looks familiar. Photo: HTC

Before he made The Martian, Ridley Scott directed the most iconic Apple ad in history with the classic 1984 Macintosh commercial.

So what better way to set yourself apart from Apple as a rival smartphone maker than to… completely rip off ideas Apple was circulating thirty-odd years ago? Yeah, we don’t get it either.

Check out HTC’s new One A9 ad below to make your own mind up.

Apple patents ‘panic mode’ tweak for Touch ID

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touchid
Touch ID could get even more useful.
Photo: Apple

Thanks to innovations like Apple Pay, Touch ID has become increasingly useful as of late. But Apple’s got another idea it’s been toying with also — in the form of a “panic mode,” which can be entered by unlocking your iPhone with a certain finger.

Apple has already shipped almost 7 million Apple Watches

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apple-watch
On course to smash first-year Apple records.
Photo: Apple Watch

I wish I could have a failure like the Apple Watch!

Despite naysayers claiming the Apple Watch hasn’t taken off as Apple hoped, a new set of figures suggests that Apple has shipped close to 7 million Apple Watches since its launch — a figure which outstrips all other vendors’ combined smartwatch shipments in the past five financial quarters.

Apple plans to build massive campus in San Jose

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Apple employees can make thousands selling their login info.
Apple employees can make thousands selling their login info.
Photo: Apple

Apple has been busy scooping up real estate in North San Jose throughout 2015 and now we finally know what they might be doing with all that acreage.

A new Apple campus is reportedly in development, and according to a report from the Silicon Valley Business Journal, it could be a lot bigger than the current spaceship campus that’s scheduled for completion next year.

Catalyst’s new waterproof case will keep your iPhone 6s dry

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A waterproof case for the iPhone 6s and 6s Plus can protect it in water up to 16 inches deep.
A waterproof case for the iPhone 6s and 6s Plus can protect it in water up to 16 inches deep.
Photo: Catalyst

If you upgraded to an iPhone 6s, chances are the case on your old 6 fits just fine. But if the old case is waterproof, don’t go dropping that 6s in a puddle.

The iPhone 6s is taller, wider and thicker by 1/100th of an inch in either direction, hardly noticeable in hand but enough to compromise the protection on a waterproof case.

Catalyst, an accessories company favored by Apple users unafraid of a little water on their devices, has rolled out a new waterproof case for the iPhone 6s and 6s Plus.

5 secret remote tricks to supercharge your Apple TV

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tvOS changes the default scrubbing behavior of your Siri Remote, and we couldn't be more glad.
tvOS changes the default scrubbing behavior of your Siri Remote, and we couldn't be more glad.
Photo: Rob LeFebvre/Cult of Mac

Your Apple TV remote is an amazing little device that lets you manage your big TV exerience. There are quite a few little settings you may have missed, though, when you started up your new Apple TV.

You can adjust and tweak your way through the Apple TV settings to make the most of your time with the remote, including monitoring its battery, adjusting accessibility options, and — yes — even figuring out what Siri commands you can use.

Here are five of them, just for you.

Talented cartoonist turns iTunes Terms & Conditions into comic book art

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R. Sikoryak does Steve Jobs and the iTunes Terms and Conditions.
R. Sikoryak does Steve Jobs and the iTunes Terms and Conditions.
Photo: Robert Sikoryak

We’ve all seen those horrendously long Terms and Conditions documents with every bit of Apple software we download, including the iTunes Terms and Conditions.

But what if you could see them in an illustrated version? We all might read them in that case.

These illustrated panels, each drawn in a different comic book style after famous other cartoonists, put Steve Jobs front and center of the otherwise dry, dusty legal disclaimers from Apple.

Totally worth a look, right?

Pick up your Pebble Time now to save $50

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Pebble Time is cheaper than ever in the U.S. Photo: Pebble
Pebble Time is cheaper than ever in the U.S. Photo: Pebble

Pebble Time just got its first price cut since making its official debut on Kickstarter back in February, and it’s one worth taking advantage of. For a limited period, customers in the U.S. can save $50 — that’s 25 percent — on the black, white, and red models.

Andy Warhol’s classic Macintosh ad can be yours for $600,000

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Apple (from Ads).
Apple (from Ads).
Photo: Andy Warhol

Old Apple computers are no stranger to Sotheby’s, but next week a different piece of Apple history is hitting the auction block, only this high-priced collectors item was created by Andy Warhol instead of Steve Jobs.

Warhol’s acrylic and silkscreen ink on canvas painting of the classic Apple logo is going up for auction and could fetch as much as $600,000 according to early estimates. The painting is part of Warhol’s ‘Ads’ suite of creations which were created in 1985, just one year after the Macintosh launched.

The painting wasn’t created using a Macintosh, but Sotheby’s includes this interesting anecdote of how Warhol first met Steve Jobs when the Apple CEO came over to John Lennon’s house to setup a Macintosh for his son:

China’s secret shops can upgrade your 16GB iPhone to 128GB

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In China, a 16GB iPhone 6 can be upgraded to 128GB for $100 or less.
In China, a 16GB iPhone 6 can be upgraded to 128GB for $100 or less.
Photo: Imgur

China’s legendary black markets have goods and services for every need, from organs to counterfeit designer handbags. For cashed-strapped Apple fans in this communist country, there’s also a thriving market around iPhone upgrades.

For as little as $100 U.S. dollars, the 16GB iPhone can get upgraded to 126GB. That’s a big deal to Chinese consumers, who have trouble affording the 16GB iPhone 6 at just over $700, let alone any models with more capacity.

This headset turns your smartphone into a virtual reality gateway [Deals]

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Homido's VR Headset converts your smartphone into the processor and screen for fully immersive virtual reality experiences.
Homido's VR Headset converts your smartphone into the processor and screen for fully immersive virtual reality experiences.
Photo: Cult of Mac Deals

The age of virtual reality is here, and you’re probably closer to taking part in this exciting new form of interaction and storytelling than you think. If you’ve got a smart phone, you’ve got most of what you need to drop into virtual reality today — the only other thing you’ll need is something like the Homido VR Headset. Simply slide your smartphone into the headset’s receiver and you’re on your way to another reality, all for $69.95 at Cult of Mac Deals.

Tony Fadell says Steve Jobs was considering an Apple Car in 2008

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Photo: Web Summit/Flickr CC
An Apple Car was one of Steve Jobs' big dreams.
Photo: Photo: Web Summit/Flickr CC

Steve Jobs was considering building an Apple Car as far back as 2008, the year after successfully launching the iPhone, according to a new interview with Nest CEO and iPod co-creator Tony Fadell.

Speaking with Bloomberg TV’s Emily Chang, Fadell says that he and Jobs enjoyed “a couple of walks” (Jobs’ favored way of taking meetings), talking about a possible Apple vehicle.