With every waking moment before Apple’s big Sept. 9 reveal, competing tech companies are trying to to steal the spotlight. Samsung, one of Apple’s biggest rivals, revealed its latest creations Wednesday in Berlin. Will two new smartphones, a smartwatch and a virtual reality system be enough to overshadow Apple’s upcoming news?

In today’s video we take a look at Samsung’s latest products and see exactly what the company is cooking up to challenge the iPhone 6 and the iWatch. Check out Samsung’s new Android phone with a curved display (the Galaxy Note Edge), a redesigned phablet (the Galaxy Note 4), a wild virtual-reality phone accessory called the Gear VR and more in this quick roundup.

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Ming-Chi Kuo of KGI Securities has a big research report out today with his late-minute predictions for Apple’s September 9th media event.

It’s a doozy of a note, mainly because it lays out not only juicy iPhone 6 and iWatch details, but the revelation that Apple is expected to introduce the second-gen iPad Air at the event as well.

Kuo, who nailed most of the details surrounding the iPhone 5s/5c launch last year, is saying that both 4.7 and 5.5-inch iPhone 6 models will be announced. On top of that, both will have a 128GB storage option. He also makes some interesting predictions regarding Apple’s sapphire plans and iWatch specs.

In his latest column for The New York Times, Nick Bilton drops an interesting tidbit about Jony Ive and the iWatch.

The mythical wearable, which is expected to finally see the light of day at next week’s Apple event, is something Ive has been bragging about around Apple HQ. He thinks it will be so good that even Swiss watchmakers won’t know what hit them.

With all the excited chatter about the iPhone 6 and the iWatch, the iPad is starting to look like a relic from the past — and the sales back this up.

Across the board, tablet sales have flatlined. On the back of another lower-than-expected tablet quarter, research firm IDC recently slashed its 2014 forecast for worldwide tablet shipments from 260.9 million units all the way back to 233.1 million. With Apple’s leading position in the market, even Tim Cook has had to admit that this has represents a bit of what he calls a “speed bump”.

The iPad took a crack at disrupting classrooms, cash registers, hospitals and airplane cockpits, but sales nonetheless slumped 10 percent from the same quarter last year. Simply put, Apple’s once white-hot tablet brand has cooled off. Relegated to a second-tier product, it just doesn’t seem as exciting any more.

“I own an iPhone, a Mac and an iPad, and out of these I use the iPad the least,” says Michael Grothaus, a former Apple employee, and the entrepreneur behind SITU, an iPad-enabled set of smart kitchen scales. “It occupies a bit of a no man’s land. As much as I love Apple products, recently I’ve been looking around at other tablets on the market to see what’s out there.”

Here’s what the top developers we talked to said might make the iPad a game changer again.

If you love learning about the technical intricacies of your favorite gadgets, chances are you’ve heard of the website AnandTech.

The founder of the 17-year-old site, Anand Lal Shimpi, has been a highly regarded tech reviewer for years. Over the weekend, he announced his retirement from the world of journalism with no explanation.

Now it has been revealed why he quit: to work for Apple.

After years of reports saying that NFC is coming to the iPhone for mobile payments, it looks like it will finally be a reality on September 9th.

Part leaks have indicated that Apple’s next-gen iPhone hardware will indeed be equipped with NFC to make transactions for physical goods at brick and mortar stores. Now Apple has struck a partnership with American Express, Visa and MasterCard to support mobile payments in the iPhone 6, according to new reports.

Depending on who and when you ask, the iPhone 6 may or may not ship with a futuristic new Sapphire Glass display. Widely rumored to be nigh-invulnerable, Sapphire Glass is widely believed to be the technology that will make shattered iPhones a thing of the past. But will it really?

Seeking answers, the repair experts over at uBreakiFix have taken a piece of Gorilla Glass and a piece of Sapphire Glass through a series of torture tests to see which resists damage better. And the truth is that Sapphire isn’t actually as good as Gorilla Glass in one key scenario.

Every nerd loves a good Apple rumor, and late night show host Jimmy Kimmel is no exception. Jimmy has a history of pranking street walkers with fake Apple products with some hilarious results, but in his latest sketch tackling rumors of a 12.9-inch iPad, Jimmy takes to the streets again to show just how ridiculous you’re going to look when Apple’s gigantic tablet is released next year.

Check out the short skit below:

The iPhone 6’s NFC chip has been spotted for the first time, according to images of an supposedly leaked iPhone 6 logic board that’s been fully assembled with Apple’s next-generation A8 processor, NFC chip, and another chip from Avago Technologies.

Previous leaks have shown the iPhone 6’s bare logic board, but the images from Feld & Volk give us our first look at some of the new chips. The new 2Ghz dual-core A8 chip is expected supposed to be much faster and smaller than the A7 in the iPhone 5s.

Here’s a shot of the NXP’s tiny NFC chip that could also make an appearance on the iWatch:

The official unveiling of the iPhone 6 has finally been announced for September 9th, and while the iWatch has been rumored to make a surprise appearance at the event, “informed sources” out of China report that Apple’s 5.5-inch iPhone 6 won’t be seen at the Flint Center for performing arts.

Chinese tech blog IT168 Mobile reports that Apple’s upcoming event will launch two new iPhones, but we will only see a 4.7-inch iPhone 6, plus a new 8GB iPhone 5s to presumably to replace the iPhone 5c.