After kicking off the “phablet” trend in 2011, the Galaxy Note series has become the bigger and better smartphone in Samsung’s lineup every year — and usually the best phablet on the market. But with this year’s Note 5, a lot has changed.

Samsung has snubbed a number of popular features to take a gamble on the new design language it first introduced with the Galaxy S6 earlier this year. It makes the Note 5 far prettier than its predecessors, but does it make for a better handset overall?

You bet your S Pen it does!

People who have been waiting to pick up their iPhone 6s or 6s Plus without a SIM card can start planning out their weekend — because Apple has just started offering unlocked, carrier-free, SIM-free versions of its next-gen iPhones direct from the Apple Store.

Elon Musk has hit out at Apple’s rumored electric car project, saying that it’s filling its ranks with second rank people — who Tesla has already tried out and then gotten rid of.

“They have hired people we’ve fired,” Musk told German newspaper Handelsblatt. “We always jokingly call Apple the ‘Tesla Graveyard.’ If you don’t make it at Tesla, you go work at Apple. I’m not kidding.”

If you’re confused about the so-called ‘Chipgate’ controversy swirling around the Internet today, we’re here to help.

It just wouldn’t be an iPhone launch without something going awry, and the latest outcry concerns the relative performances of the iPhone 6s and 6s Plus’ A9 processors, especially their effects on the phones’ battery lives. And if that all sounds a bit technical and boring, it is. But it’s not too hard to understand.

The app that Chipgate made famous is returning to the App Store after a brief hiatus.

Developer Lirum Labs has told Cult of Mac that its diagnostic tool, that can tell people which A9 processor their iPhone 6s contains, is back by popular demand.

Heading to social media to vent about Chipgate, some iPhone 6s owners are upset to discover that not all A9 chips are created equal.

Worse, some feel duped by Apple, which used two vendors to supply different versions of the chips in “identical” phones. Others worry about reports of inferior battery life — and some are thinking seriously about returning their new iPhones. Still others are playing the latest Apple controversy for laughs.

The Chipgate controversy upsetting iPhone 6s owners over the past 48 hours is completely overblown, Apple said this afternoon, claiming battery life on iPhone 6s units varies only slightly.

iPhone 6s and iPhone 6s Plus owners have discovered that devices with a TSMC A9 chip get considerably better battery performance than ones sporting an A9 made by Samsung, based on GeekBench 3 scores and some real-world testing. However, Apple says that “manufactured lab tests” that continuously run a heavy workload don’t represent the iPhone 6s’ true capabilities.

Here’s Apple’s full statement on Chipgate:

Steve Wozniak lashes out at his Apple co-founder Steve Jobs, asking the Apple CEO what he actually does, in a just-released scene from the upcoming Steve Jobs biopic.

While the pair remained close friends until Jobs’ death in 2011, the scene shows the two meeting before the unveiling of the NeXT Computer. After confronting Jobs about his roll in creating computers, Woz warns Steve that he’s about to get killed for releasing the NeXT, which was marketed toward schools and students — but came with an ungodly $6,500 price tag.

Watch the heated exchange below:

Seriously, people, we have families to feed. Kittens to adopt. We need your ad impressions.

The new iOS content blockers, as well as traditional ad-blocking browser plugins, threaten the wallets of every ad-supported website, including Cult of Mac. Luckily, it’s easy to whitelist us (and any other sites you want to support). It’s incredibly easy to restore order to the online universe, whether you’re using an iPhone or a Mac.

AT&T finally activated Wi-Fi calling on its network, allowing iPhone users to seamlessly switch to their local wireless network to place calls when their LTE signal is weak.

Apple added WiFi Calling in iOS 8, but you probably haven’t had a chance to use it yet because the only carrier in the U.S. to support it has been T-Mobile. Now that the nation’s second-largest carrier is getting on board, more iPhone users than ever can take advantage of the feature to place calls anywhere in the United States, free of charge.

Here’s how to turn it on:

The cloud is a pleasant yet mysterious name for that place our pictures, videos, emails and other digital bits of life go to be stored. With our vibrant lives taking up all the storage on our devices, we are slowly warming to cloud-based services that promise to keep our stuff safe and accessible.

A company called MiMedia has designed a cloud service it hopes allays reluctance with a clean user interface, quick uploading and easy, private sharing. Best of all, it can immediately free up storage space on your phone.

iPhone 6s units with a TSMC A9 processor score two hours’ better battery life over those with Samsung chips in GeekBench test scores, but real-world gains of the “good” chip might be much less significant.

Several YouTubers have put the iPhone 6s TSMC and Samsung A9 chips to the test in real-world scenarios to get to the truth of Chipgate — and what they discovered was quite surprising.

OS X El Capitan has arrived, and it’s a free for most Mac users, making the decision to upgrade super-simple. Once you have it installed, there are some awesome new features you have to try out. See them all in action in our video tour below.

Not all iPhones 6s units are created equal, and yours just might have a weaker processor thanks to Samsung. Chipgate rocked the Internet with the revelation that Apple used two different suppliers for the A9 chips in its latest iPhones and one processor looks like a serious under-performer.

Even though Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company’s 14-nanometer A9 chips are bigger than Samsung’s 12-nanometer A9 chips, if you have an iPhone 6s with a TSMC chip, you might get an extra two hours of battery life on your device.

There’s no way to tell if you’re getting stuck with a Samsung A9 processor when you purchase your iPhone 6s in stores or online, but you can find out whether you got saddled with a crappier processor with some help from a couple of apps.

Here’s how to find the maker of the A9 processor in your iPhone 6s or 6s Plus:

As iPhone 6s owners freak out over whether their new smartphones might be saddled with a performance-deficient chip, an app that makes it easy to identify the type of chip inside the new smartphones mysteriously vanishes from the App Store.

It’s enough to get “Chipgate” conspiracy theorists churning, but the reality is a little less dark than all that.

Python is one of the most widely used programming languages out there, a clear but powerful and perfect for projects big and small. It’s a perfect addition to anyone’s resume, but like any new language it takes practice and guidance to master. This bundle of 6 lessons is like a full-immersion language course for Python, covering everything from general web development to data analysis to games, a wealth of skills and knowledge that can be yours for $29, more than 80% off the normal price.

Sony’s new Xperia Z5 has the best smartphone camera available, according to the experts at DxOMark — but that could be about to change.

In a number of real-world tests, the Xperia Z5’s 23-megapixel shooter is outperformed by the 12-megapixel camera inside the iPhone 6s Plus.

I just leveled up while I was driving to pick my kid up from school. I set up a digital battle using my iPhone while sitting in my driveway, hit “Go,” and then just put my iPhone down on my dashboard while I drove to get him.

I’ve been calling these types of games “auto-battlers” for their central feature: letting you skip tedious, grinding gameplay that tends to be a feature of traditional role-playing games. I don’t have time to micromanage my iPhone; chances are neither do most people, which explains the rise of casual gaming over the past five years or so.

Here are three fun mobile games that let you experience more depth than a typical Flappy Bird clone, but still don’t require too much input to enjoy.

Wireless iPhone charging is a feature Apple fans have dreamed of for years, and it could finally be on the way — with an interesting twist that takes advantage of Apple’s unique technology.

Best List: Bullseye guitar effects pedals by GMF

These tiny guitar effects pedals from GMF Music will fit on any pedalboard or stage setup thanks to their unique, top-loading design. Sure, they’re small, but boy do they pack a powerful punch.

All four Bullseye pedals feature a fully shielded steel case (to minimize that hum you’ll hear at most live shows) crammed with some serious circuitry that makes it super-easy to dial in the perfect guitar sound.

Michael Dell is most familiar to long-time Apple fans as the man who told a crowd in the late-1990s that, if he was running the company, “I’d shut it down and give the money back to the shareholders.”

With Aaron Sorkin and Danny Boyle’s Steve Jobs movie currently making waves, Conan yesterday unveiled his hilarious trailer for what a Michael Dell biopic might look like.

If you ever wanted to see a Hollywood version of the Dell story — complete with inspirational lines like “Don’t think different; think same” — this is probably the closest you’re ever going to get. Check it out below.

Apple today announced the launch of special “Enhanced Editions” of all seven Harry Potter books, exclusively on iBooks.

Featuring interactive animations, elaborate artwork, custom covers, exclusive annotations by J.K. Rowling, and, of course, the original text, the books can be downloaded individually for iPhone, iPad and iPod touch.

It’s no secret that the iPhone 6s packs a pretty darn great camera, but how does it compare to a professional DSLR like the Nikon D750?

A recent 4K video shootout compares the two and, wouldn’t you know it, finds that Apple’s next-gen handset pretty much owns the Nikon in terms of filming beautiful, crisply detailed footage.

Check out the video below.

Jimmy Iovine used his appearance at the Vanity Fair New Establishment Summit in San Francisco to take swipes at Spotify and, in particular, to underline his hatred of free music streaming.

“Free is a real issue,” he said. “This whole thing about freemium, maybe at one time we needed it. But now it’s a shell game … These companies [offering a free music tier] are building an audience on the back of the artist.”

Not content with selling a whopping 13 million iPhone 6s handsets in their first weekend on sale, Apple is also smashing records with iOS 9 adoption.

According to Apple’s latest developer figures, just three weeks after its public debut, 57 percent of users with compatible mobile devices are already running iOS 9. Meanwhile, 33 percent are still using the last-generation iOS 8, while just 1 in 10 users is stuck on an earlier version.