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The best Apple Watch apps you probably haven’t heard of

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Time to download some apps. Photo: Apple

There are already more than 3,000 apps for the Apple Watch, which makes it difficult to find all of the hidden gems. How do you find the best Apple Watch apps?

Luckily, there are plenty of third-party Watch apps that deserve attention, whether they tell you when it’s going to rain or help you get stuff done. Apple is promoting Watch apps heavily in the App Store, and while the big players (Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, etc.) are obvious downloads, we’ve been on the lookout for some of the other apps for the Apple Watch you might not know about.

Here are some of the best Apple Watch apps to trick out your wrist.

How powerful is the Apple Watch’s S1 processor?

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The S1 processor inside the Apple Watch is equivalent to an A5. Photo: Apple
The S1 processor inside the Apple Watch is equivalent to an A5. Photo: Apple

If you’re wondering roughly how powerful the Apple Watch’s S1 SoC processor is compared to other ARM chips, the answer appears to be that it’s roughly equivalent to an A5 chip, as seen on the iPhone 4S, iPad 2, first iPad mini, and the Apple TV, at least as far as graphics chutzpah is concerned.

Awesome iOS Easter egg discovered after two years, hiding in plain sight

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Say Apple into Voice Memos and you get its logo. Photo: Mike Rundle
Say "Apple" into Voice Memos and you get its logo. Photo: Mike Rundle

Apple is known for placing its fair share of Easter eggs into iOS and OS X, but this is the coolest one we’ve seen in a while.

You know the new Voice Memos icon Apple introduced in iOS 7 Beta 2? It turns out the icon is designed after the waveform representation of someone saying “Apple.”

Three new ads remind us that Apple Watch is here

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Apple Watch
The Watch is here! Photo: Apple

Apple Watches started arriving with customers today, and to mark the occasion Apple has launched three new ads, showing how its long-awaited wearable device can improve your life.

Titled “Us,” “Up,” and “Rise,” the ads stress the Apple Watch’s various functions in a way that doesn’t just appeal to those people who already own a smartwatch, but also makes a strong case for why everyone should have one.

Apple Watch teardown reveals tiny device’s biggest secrets

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The Apple Watch next to a classic mechanical watch. Photo: iFixit

The folks at iFixit wasted no time gutting their new Apple timepiece.

Their Apple Watch teardown confirms that the device comes with a hidden diagnostic port. They’ve also exposed the watch’s Taptic Engine, located the tiny battery, and found some gold highlights on the Apple Watch Sport.

Check it out:

Parody videos take a swipe at Apple Watch

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A starry-eyed Jony Ive raves about the Apple Watch in a new parody video. Photo: Gizmodo
A starry-eyed Jony Ive raves about the Apple Watch in a new parody video. Photo: Gizmodo

One magical piece of wearable technology, two radically different parody videos.

The first takes a jab at the seemingly never-ending supply of superlatives Jony Ive uses to describe the Apple Watch. The other reminds us just how precious watches are to people determined to pass them along as keepsakes at all costs. See them both below.

First wave of Apple Watch buyers show off their new favorite things

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Soon, this sight won't be so strange. Photo: Ryan Ozawa/Flickr CC
Soon, this sight won't be so strange. Photo: Ryan Ozawa/Flickr CC

Can you hear that giant “Squeeeeee!”? That’s the sound of Apple fans in Asia and Australian taking delivery of the very first Apple Watches.

In time zones where it’s already April 24, the wearable now adorns the wrists of delighted buyers who put in their orders immediately after Apple Watch went on sale earlier this month. These earliest of Apple Watch adopters were only too happy to show off their purchases on Twitter, Instagram and other services.

These kids can’t handle the awesomeness of new Star Wars trailer

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Literally blown away. Photo: America's Funniest Home Videos
Literally blown away. Photo: America's Funniest Home Videos

Looks like you don’t need to be a long-time Star Wars fan to totally geek out over The Force Awakens trailer that appeared online last week, as these cuties so ably prove.

Even super young babies get it: this is the coolest, most exciting trailer ever in their young lives: it’s time to completely freak out.

Check out how these little ones react to the best Star Wars thing in recent years in their own America’s Funniest Home Videos YouTube post.

Apple Watch is launching with over 3,000 apps

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Soooo many Apple Watch apps. Photo: Cult of Mac
Soooo many Apple Watch apps. Photo: Cult of Mac

The Apple Watch App Store is now live and it’s packed with way more apps than we expected.

Even if you don’t have an Apple Watch yet, you can start exploring the new Apple Watch App Store in the companion iPhone app. The App Store began to roll out this morning, and Apple says it will include over 3,000 apps for users to install when orders deliver tomorrow.

iPhone captures Downton Abbey cast’s awesome lightsaber battle

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Indubitably. Capes are cool. Photo: Rob-James Collier
Indubitably. Capes are cool. Photo: Rob-James Collier

Rob-James Collier, who plays the evil butler on Downton Abbey, Thomas Barrow, is running the London marathon to raise money for a local Multiple Sclerosis charity.

While he might have been able to raise the goal amount of £10,000 on his own cache in the popular British period drama alone, he chose to film a few members of the cast on set playing with lightsabers.

How can you not want to watch Downton Wars?

Jimmy Fallon’s iPhone game wants to give a bear a good night’s sleep

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Jimmy Fallon brings fun and feathers to his game Tedzy, which launched on iTunes Thursday. Photo: Sparklehorse/YouTube
Jimmy Fallon brings fun and feathers to his game Tedzy, which launched on iTunes Thursday. Photo: Sparklehorse/YouTube

Jimmy Fallon is known for inventing silly games to play with his guests on “The Tonight Show.” It’s part of the hot host’s comedic repertoire that keeps his show atop of the late-night ratings.

Now Fallon is trying his hand at developing games for the iPhone.

Fallon formed Sparklehorse, a game production company that debuted Thursday on the iTunes store with the game Tedzy, a colorful teddy bear on a quest for feathers to stuff his pillow and get a good night’s sleep.

Master your Apple Watch before it arrives

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Do your homework now so you'll be a master of Apple Watch right out of the gate. Photo: Apple
Do your homework now so you'll be a master of Apple Watch on Day 1. Photo: Apple

Once your Apple Watch arrives, you’re going to slap it on your wrist ASAP. But then what?

There’s a fairly steep learning curve for the Apple Watch, since Apple came up with innovations like Force Touch and the Digital Crown to make wrist computing more manageable. Luckily, there’s an easy way you can avoid being baffled by your shiny new Apple Watch — and it won’t take more than a half-hour of your precious time.

Get the Earjax ‘Lyrics’ headphones for 65% off and with free shipping [Deals]

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You don’t need to spend hundreds of dollars on a pair of headphones to get professional sound quality.

Enjoy studio quality sound at an affordable price with a pair of Earjax ‘Lyrics’ Noise-Isolating Headphones. For a limited time, Cult of Mac Deals is offering these solid headphones at 65% off the regular price, with free US shipping.

Apple Watch app lets you call for help during a seizure

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Greg Pabst, who has epilepsy, developed an iOS app for people with seizure disorders to send out emergency alerts. Photo: SeizAlarm
Greg Pabst, who has epilepsy, developed an iOS app for people with seizure disorders to send out emergency alerts. Photo: SeizAlarm

Greg Pabst and his neurologist were trying to get a handle on his adult onset epilepsy when the doctor’s mention of the newly announced Apple Watch gave Pabst an ah-hah moment.

The doctor was discussing tools for Pabst to chart his seizures and send alerts to emergency contacts.

“Then he said, ‘It’s only a matter of time before somebody does that for the Apple Watch,’ ” Pabst, 38, recalled. “Then I thought maybe it should be me.”

Pabst, of Orlando, Fla., and a developer friend quickly went to work creating SeizAlarm, which appeared in the iTunes store for the iPhone last week and is available for the watch, the pre-orders for which begin arriving Friday.

Apple patent hints at the amazing future of Force Touch

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Apple Watch-style Force Touch is coming to both iPhone models this September.
Apple Watch's Force Touch tech could be about to get a whole lot better. Photo: Apple
Photo: Apple

The Force Touch technology seen in the Apple Watch and new MacBook is pretty great and all, but imagine being able to go further than the relatively simple haptic feedback Apple currently offers — by having your future Mac trackpad actually simulate different textures when you run your hand over it.

That’s the aim of a new patent application published today, which describes a new diamond-layered touch surface capable of using a variety of vibrations and temperatures to recreate a range of textures.

10 super-adorable Apple Watch app icons

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Embrace simplicity, they said. Photo: Apple
Embrace simplicity, they said. Photo: Apple

Crafting a tiny icon for an Apple Watch app is a huge design challenge. Coming up with one that’s truly adorable – even at 80 pixels by 80 pixels – requires something like a graphic design miracle.

Lucky for anyone strapping an Apple Watch on their wrists this Friday, some designers have been working wonders. Behold the cutest Apple Watch app icons in the world!

Apple rejects iOS apps that support the Pebble watch

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Investors and consumers alike are skipping Pebble
Investors and consumers alike are skipping Pebble
Photo: Pebble

Apple has begun rejecting iOS apps that support Pebble, the immensely popular and more affordable alternative to Apple Watch.

One developer received an email to say that their app, SeaNav US, was no longer welcome in the App Store because it mentions the Pebble — a third-party mobile platform — in its description.

These smart-ish watches paved the way for the Apple Watch

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It's bulky looking but Casio's SATELLITE NAVI had GPS to help wearers find their way around. Photo: Svet Satova
It's bulky-looking but Casio's SATELLITE NAVI had GPS to help wearers find their way around. Photo: Svet Satova

The Apple Watch and everything it will do is not a new idea. Watches for years have been able to store data, give us directions, offer a means to communicate at a distance and, yes, show us our heartbeat.

 It’s just that you couldn’t get all of those functions wearing just one watch. For each function, there was a separate wrist gadget.

So on the eve of the Apple Watch launch, consider the technologically advanced timepieces that paved the way to this momentous day. You might be even more impressed with the power of your new device.