Apple appears to be doing its part to revive the U.S. economy. Taiwan-based chipmaker Samsung reportedly will hired 300 new technicians in its Austin, Tex. plant to fill a growing number of orders for the iPad 2. Meanwhile, the Cupertino, Calif. tech giant is paying a little-known company three to four times the going price for LCD screens destined for the new tablet.

Samsung Austin Semiconductor plans to hire 300 more engineers, with most of the plant’s chip production reportedly going to Apple. The new workers follow more than 600 hired in 2010, brining the plant’s total payroll to around 1,700. Although rumor suggested Apple may have used its own A5 chip in the iPad 2, closer x-ray examination found Samsung still powering the next-generation device. Apple is expected to spend $7.8 billion with Samsung this year, purchasing processors, flash memory and LCDs.

Apple has released the next beta version of Mac OS X Lion. The new release dubbed Developer Preview 2 build number 11A419 is available to registered Mac OS X developers through the Mac App Store. Developers wishing to acquire this release must visit developer.apple.com and request a redemption code.

In addition to the above Apple has also made Mac OS X Lion Server Developer Preview 2 with the same 11A419 build number available. Both releases are accompanied by Xcode 4.1 Preview 2 which is the pre-release version of Apple’s Mac OS X development suite.

Contrary to rumors none of these releases have been labeled as Gold Masters. Instead according to developers the builds still have a number of issues that are outstanding and unresolved.

The release of Mac OS X 10.6.7 isn’t even two weeks old and Apple has issued a supplemental update that patches the latest OS release. The patch fixes problems encountered by late 2010 13-inch MacBook Air users who upon launching iTunes experienced crashes that left their computers completely frozen and unresponsive.

I even experienced it myself before the problem mysteriously disappeared after forcing the machine to restart by powering it off and then on again. Since then I haven’t had a problem, but for some the problem persists. Luckily Apple has a fix.

According to Apple:

This update addresses an issue that makes the system unresponsive when using iTunes. It is recommended for all 13″ MacBook Air (Late 2010) users running Mac OS X v10.6.7.

You can grab this update via Software Update on your Mac or download it directly via this support page.

With April 1st just around the corner, it’s time to start planning your attacks on friends, colleagues, and even loved ones to ensure they’re suitably mocked, embarrassed, and shamed on April Fools’ Day. We want to make sure that no one gets off lightly this year, so to help you formulate your plan, we’ve put together a list of the best tech-related pranks and practical jokes for your disposal.

They’re all quick and easy to perform with minimal effort, and ensure your April Fools’ Day victims don’t get away from a little light-hearted pranking.

The Annoy-a-Tron from ThinkGeek

The Annoy-a-tron is essentially a high-tech fart machine, but with a little more taste. It’s $12.99 from ThinkGeek and features 6 annoying sounds that go off at random to irritate anyone within earshot. Turn it on, hide it under a co-worker’s desk, and observe them as they try to work out where the sound of a cricket is coming from. It’s a tiny device that’s easy to conceal, and if your target does manage to find it, they won’t have a clue what it is.

Check out the rest of our pranks after the break!

So you just got your iPad, and have loaded it up apps. Now what? It may seem like a hassle to hunt around for the apps you want and to page through all of those home screens. Well, there is an easier way. In this video, you’ll find out the best way to arrange your apps on your iPad.

We start out another day of dealing with an offer on a 2.4GHz Core 2 Duo Mac mini. The desktop unit is $599. Also in the spotlight is a deal on a Harman Kardon speaker system for the iPod – just $169.95. Finally, Monkey Island returns as a free item from MacUpdate.com.

Along the way, we’ll also check into more cases for your iPod, as well as charger cases for the iPhone 4. As always, details on these and many other item can be found at CoM’s “Daily Deals” page right after the jump.

Roqbo, a jukebox app with the inevitable social media component that debuted at SXWX, is now animating one San Francisco bar.

CTO Ketu Patel got the brainwave for it because walking over to select the right tunes on the jukebox at the bowling alley in his small California town was ruining his game mojo.

Instead of waddling around with change for the jukebox, you can buy credits or earn them by interacting with the app – confirm your email address, rate songs on the bar’s playlist, or post your picks to Facebook or Twitter and you get more DJ credits.

Roqbot runs on any internet connected computer, iPod Touch, or Roku hooked up to the locale’s speaker system and owners can choose what music plays when from 20 catalogues or create their own playlist. The app is free to download for users and available for iPhone and Android.

The app currently is getting the most traction at San Francisco SOMA watering hole Bar Basic, where the six top spinners there have been playing stuff like Lil Wayne “A Milli” and Far East Movement “Girls on the Dance Floor.”

Anyone up for a Cult of Mac meetup and DJ-off there?

Via Urban Daddy

Those of you of a certain age might remember the Game Boy Camera, an ingenious add-on for the original Nintendo Game Boy that snapped tiny 128×112 pictures.

It was briefly one of the most exciting ideas in handheld consoles – suddenly the Game Boy wasn’t just for games, it was for other fun stuff too!

Better still, if you had the money to spare, you could buy a Game Boy Printer and print out your pixellated works of art to give to friends.

All that’s ancient history, which is precisely what makes it the ideal starting point for an iOS app.

It’s called 8 Bit Pocket Camera, and it’s lots of fun and, at just a dollar, excellent value.

Word that Apple may not release the iPhone 5 as early as expected prompted some observers to talk of a “delay.” Naturally, Wall Street’s sensitive rumor tripwire went into action, the result the start of analysts downgrading estimates for the iPhone.

Piper Jeffries’ Peter Misek Wednesday morning shaved four percent from his fiscal year 2011 revenue projection, telling investors he expects the Cupertino, Calif. company to rake in $103 billion, rather than his previously estimated $106.9 billion. The fiscal year ends September. More dramatic is the analyst’s double-digit refiguring of iPhone shipments.

A thief fleeing with an iPhone pushed a woman to her death down a flight of metro stairs in Chicago.

At rush hour on Monday, a man snatched an iPhone from a woman who was using it at Fullerton station platform in the Lincoln Park neighborhood.

As he ran off, the man knocked over Sally Katona-King, 68, on her way home from her church receptionist’s job.

Katona-King died yesterday after tumbling down the station stairs. Hospital officials believe that she suffered a cerebral hemorrhage.

“It’s a worldwide problem where iPhones are being taken, resold to fences, which are then resold for a higher price,” detective Cmdr. Gary Yamashiroya said. “It’s something that police departments across the country are trying to find solutions to.”

Police have not located the perp, though they hope video surveillance footage will help lead them to him.

Via Chicago Daily News

For months we’ve been reporting that iPad sales are eroding demand for traditional PCs, such as netbooks. Little wonder then top executives have begun sniping at Apple as inflexible and only for consumers with oodles of cash. The most vocal sour grapes come from the sales and marketing heads at HP and Dell.

“I can say that it really feels like they’re [Apple] holding you hostage sometimes,” said Stephen DeWitt, senior vice president of HP’s Americas Solution Partners, talking in an interview about the difference between how the PC maker and the Cupertino, Calif. tech giant work.

Now here’s a relationship that’s off to a good start. 9to5Mac reports on a couple of lovely geeks – or a couple of geeks in love – who just got engaged with the assistance of an iPad 2 and Apple’s custom engraving. Lucky groom-to-be Jordan wrote to tell them the story:

I stayed up all night to order my iPad with the inscription “Will You Marry Me?” Received mine this Monday, Took my then-girlfriend, Jessica, up to the National Redwood Forrest in Northern CA. After having to cross a river on a downed Redwood and dealing with the intermettant rain I found the largest tree in the world I kneeled down and gave it my best!

Whether it was something I said or “Apple’s Magic” in action she gushed and said YES, now give me my iPad!!

Congrats to the happy couple, and good work Jordan! Another reason to order your iPad online and avoid standing in line.

[via 9to5Mac.com]

There’s been a lot of press lately about Time Warner Cable’s foray into portability by offering its subscribers access to their programming via their iPads.

With iPhones and other devices replacing watches as personal timepieces for most people, analog craftsmen of yore are looking for other ways to ply their trades. Juxtaposing timekeeping technology across the centuries, luxury watchmaker De Bethune has introduced a new iPhone case that incorporates their DB 1024 pocket watch mechanism directly into the back panel of an alligator leather sleeve. It’s rather… unique. For those who can’t decide whether you prefer analog or digital, now you won’t have to make the choice.

I’m not sure the watch would provide good impact protection during a fall, however – for itself or the iPhone’s rear glass. Would that require another case to protect the first one?

[via Born Rich] [Gentleman’s Gadgets]

Everybody’s favorite jumping-as-high-as-possible iOS game, Doodle Jump, has just been updated with something cool: two player mode.

You can now challenge other Doodle Jumpers via Game Center, using your iDevice’s wifi connection. In two-player mode there’s a finish line, first player to reach it is the winner.

To spice things up, power-ups are shared between the two players. He who jumps higher, faster, gets to use them first.

“What a shame there’s no Doodle Jump for iPad,” you might whisper sadly. Whisper not: makers Lima Sky say Doodle Jump for iPad is on its way to us right now.

Signs are everywhere that Apple’s iDevices are gaining business cred. Apperian, a development firm making software that allows business to create and manage their own apps, just won $9.5 million in venture capital funding, according to a press release.

Apperian’s star iOS product is a cloud-based platform called EASE they claim is the first to allow large-scale creation and management of apps in a business environment — pretty key if you’ve got, say, 150 salespeople all needing access to the same sales app and whining for support every 15 minutes.

That Apperian managed to net the funding means that investors think EASE will increasingly allow iPads and iPhone’s to elbow their way into the enterprise world — traditionally the domain of RIM and the Blackberry. Apperian is also working on an Android-based version of EASE.

Daily coupon upstarts like Groupon and Living Social have become so massively popular that it’s gotta be increasingly difficult for older and more fogey-ish coupon flingers like Valpak to keep up.

So what Valpak has done is team up with the Junaio augmented reality app to provide an AR channel for Valpak deals in the area. Which is cool, because since Junaio is location based, rather than flip through Valpak’s iPhone app (yeah, they have an iPhone app now too) any potential coupon would just pop up on the screen when standing right outside the store.

Unfortunately, Valpak still seems to have retained its stodgy image; a pity, because the deals are actually pretty good. The Junaio channel’s a start though.

We start the day with three hardware deals. First is a number of MacBook Air laptops from the Apple Store, starting at $849 for a 1.4GHz 64GB SSD unit. Next is a MacBook Pro powered by a 2.53GHz Core i5 processor. The Expercom bundle also includes three years of AppleCare – all for $2,387. Finally, we’ve offered many iPod touch devices, but this is the first in memory that includes the Insignia GPS navigation system with 4.3-inch screen.

Along the way, we’ll also check out cases for your iPad, docks for your iPhone and LED Cinema Displays for your Mac. As usual, details on these and many other items can be found at CoM’s “Daily Deals” page right after the jump.

First, Amazon beat Apple and Google to the punch, announcing a cloud-based music locker. Now the Internet retailer says owners of its Kindle e-reader – which competes against the iPad – can avoid the New York Times’ newly-erected Paywall.

Subscribers to the Kindle version of the NYT will get free access to the newspaper’s online articles, avoiding paying a subscription requirement that went into effect Tuesday. Web users are able to read up to 20 articles each month free, afterwards paying either $15, $25 or $35 every four weeks.

It’s true: sometimes Macs do crash. More often than not, though, crashes will be limited to a single application, rather than the entire system.

You’ll know an app has crashed because it simply stops doing anything. Clicking on controls has no effect, scrolling gets you nowhere; the app simply doesn’t respond to your usual commands. So what do you do next?

First, don’t panic. OS X is designed to keep crashes under control. Even if an application has crashed, in most cases you’ll still be able to carry on just fine with work you’re doing in other applications. All you have to worry about is the one that’s crashed, and any unsaved work you had inside it.

The lines for the iPad 2 have been long and dragged on for weeks the launch. Many have lamented that they haven’t been able to get one, despite the wait .

Cult of Mac founder Leander Kahney was interviewed by NPR on the iPad 2 shortage and how he went about getting his hands on one just hours after launch.

Just days after Finnish cell phone giant Nokia was rebuffed by the U.S. International Trade Commission, the Finnish company is back with another patent-infringement complaint against Apple. Tuesday Nokia filed suit charging the Cupertino, Calif.’s devices – including the iPad, iPhone and iPad – violated seven patents.

Although not offering specific patents, Nokia claims they cover technology used for multi-tasking, data synchronization, call quality, positioning and Bluetooth. “Our latest ITC filing means we now have 46 Nokia patents in suit against Apple, many filed more than 10 years before Apple made its first iPhone,” charges Nokia’s Paul Melin, vice president of intellectual property.

Over at his official Twitter account, iPhone hacker Comex is airing some heady suspicions about Apple’s latest strategy in the cat-and-mouse jailbreak game. The talented hacker behind the Spirit and JailbreakMe 2.0 exploits is suggesting that Apple might have a spy within the iPhone Dev Team itself, allowing Cupertino to close exploits in their iOS software before the Dev Team can release a working jailbreak with them.

Yesterday, Apple opened up registrations for 2011’s WWDC, and within ten hours had already sold out of tickets. The more interesting rumor from yesterday, though, was that Apple would refrain from unveiling the iPhone 5 at this year’s WWDC, instead focusing entirely on software. That would mean that instead of the iPhone 5 shipping in June, as it has historically done, the iPhone 5’s launch would be pushed back until later in the year.

After the initial shock, the rumor sounds extremely likely. The report came from Jim Dalrymple over at The Loop, whose sources are solid. Moreover, the early year launch of the Verizon iPhone and Apple’s continued delay in shipping the white iPhone 4 (while repeatedly promising it’s still coming) all imply that Apple’s not planning the iPhone 5 in June, but will push it until later in the year, to debut before the holiday shopping season.

Over at Slashgear, Chris Davies brings up one interesting point: a late 2011 debut might give Apple more flexibility in making the iPhone 5 4G compatible. Qualcomm’s next LTE chipsets are due out at that point, and will allegedly boast improved power efficiency… the very issue that led Apple to leave LTE support out of the Verizon iPhone earlier this year.

If Apple does delay the iPhone 5 until later in the year, it’s all the more likely we’ll see a sizable update boasting 4G capability. For Verizon users, that means LTE; unfortunately, on AT&T, their HSPA+ “4G” smartphones are actually throttled to be slower than their regular 3G phones. If the iPhone does go 4G later this year, the Verizon iPhone 5 is going to be the clear winner: AT&T’s 4G network is a disgrace, and it doesn’t look like it’s going to get substantially better anytime soon.

Google’s Android operating system is expected to lead a growing smartphone market, increasing its No. 1 position to just under 50 percent by 2015, according to one analysis released Tuesday. Apple is in third-place, its iOS commanding just 15.7 percent of smartphones. Potentially more troubling, the IDC report shows Apple’s growth by 2015 relatively flat, falling to 15.3 percent in four years.

As the smartphone market takes 49.2 percent of the mobile handset market, Nokia’s Symbian will suffer. The cell phone giant’s smartphone market share will fall from this year’s fourth-place 20.9 percent, to 0.2 percent by 2015, according to the researchers.