Items tagged with NASDAQ: AAPL
Some combinations go well together like peanut butter and jelly or HotHardware.com and tech news and reviews. There seems to be no future however, for the unification of iOS and macOS. Apple CEO Tim Cook recently remarked that Apple customers do not want iOS and macOS to merge. In an interview with The Sydney Morning Herald, Tim Cook argued that a merger between iOS and macOS would be more convenient, but would lead to a decline in the overall quality. He remarked, “We don't believe in sort of watering down one for the other. Both [the Mac and iPad] are incredible. One of the reasons that both of them are incredible is because we pushed them to do what they do well. And if you begin to...
Read more...
How many hours a day do you spend on your smartphone or other devices? Former Apple engineer Tony Fadell, also referred to as the “Father of the iPod”, believes that society spends too much time on their devices. He recently contended in an op-ed for Wired that Apple has a responsibility to curb iPhone “addiction”. Fadell compared device use to food nutrition guides and programs. He remarked, “When it comes to digital ‘nourishment’, we don’t know what a ‘vegetable’, a ‘protein’ or a ‘fat’ is. What is ‘overweight’ or ‘underweight’? What does a healthy, moderate digital life look like? I...
Read more...
It turns out that the Apple “halo effect” has its limitations. Apple has purportedly lowered its sales forecast and reduced the orders of the HomePod, a premium voice-activated speaker similar to Amazon’s Echo family of speakers. Various Apple store workers have reported that inventory is piling up and that they typically sell less than ten HomePods a day in individual stores. It initially appeared that Apple’s HomePod would shake up the voice-activated speaker market. The device was available for pre-order this past January and managed at the time to capture one-third of the smart speaker market. Those numbers took a turn for the worse by the time the device hit...
Read more...
Now is your chance to pounce if you have been itching to get your hands on one of the most popular games of 2018. Epic Games’ Fortnite is available for free on iOS -- for everyone. Epic Games initially released an invite-only beta test to prevent its servers from being overwhelmed. Invites were sent to players as the servers were able to increasingly handle more action. Players were able to invite up to three friends to join their squad while others were able to join a waitlist. Fortnite managed to surge to number one in the iOS App Store despite its limited availability during this beta period. Fortnite is almost identical to the Battle Royale mode that is available for PC...
Read more...
Apple is all about the profit margin when it comes to its devices, and the iPhone X is no exception. The high-end smartphone hasn't sold as strongly as Apple wanted according to some reports, with some citing the high cost of entry. Shipment estimates for Q1 2018 were allegedly slashed in late December as demand during the crucial holiday shopping season for the iPhone X was soft. A new report is making the rounds concerning the iPhone X from KGI Securities analyst Ming-Chi Kuo, who just so happens to be one of the most accurate analysts out there with regards to all things Apple. According to Kuo, Apple will discontinue the first-gen iPhone X when the second-generation version of the device...
Read more...
Apple's flagship store in Chicago has a unique design aesthetic, much like the company's mobile devices (big Apple logos don't hurt). Despite the building's interesting, MacBook-inspired looks, though, the winter weather conditions in the area have exposed a problem. Customers of the store are now greeted by large signs warning them to be on the look-out for falling ice around the building's perimeter. People that live in warmer climates might look at these signs and feel that there's some real danger, but Chicagoans? Not so much. Winter is brutal in the windy city, so these signs are not atypical. However, the design of this Apple Store has made the entire perimeter -- including the walkways...
Read more...
A handful of Apple engineers fell from Cupertino's tree and into Google's hands earlier this year, and apparently 2017 wasn't about to end without another notable move taking place. Talented engineers commonly move around the industry, so many employer changes are uneventful, but when the person involved in a move is a top chip designer at a major player like Apple, things become a little more interesting. The man in Google's crosshair this go-around is experienced chip designer John Bruno, whose tenure at Apple lasted five-and-a-half years. Before that, Bruno spent over eight years at AMD, working on northbridges and their IGPs in his earlier days, and then moving on to deliver the Comal platform...
Read more...
Apple's latest top-end iPhone may cost a cool $1,000 USD, but that hasn't stopped it from flying off of the shelves and into the hands of those who couldn't imagine not having the best possible iPhone available. Whether you like its design, its speed, or leading-edge technologies (like face recognition), the iPhone X has myriad features that comprise what is an otherwise very alluring smartphone, despite its cost. It seems that not everything is heavenly about Apple's new iPhone X, however. There are usually a few caveats with every new device that in fact may not affect you personally, and if they don't, consider yourself lucky. However, if this latest iPhone X issue could certainly be...
Read more...
If you already find yourself glued to Apple's Siri assistant, then you may be glad to learn that it's only going to become an even bigger part of your life going forward. That is, as long as assumptions are correct with regards to the latest shuffling around of executive responsibilities at Apple. Since 2012, Apple's Senior VP of software and services Eddy Cue has been overlooking Siri. Cue has a long history with Apple, and much success to gloat about. He's played an important role in securing streaming deals with content companies, and if that's not enough of a job in itself, he also oversees iCloud. In a subtle change made to the biography pages at Apple's website, we learn that the company's...
Read more...
Yesterday, a video hit YouTube that could have been alarming to any Apple users anyone running an iPhone 7 or 7+, or even some iPhone 6 models. With a $500 device in hand, simple iPhone passcodes could be defeated quickly and easily, with the help of a brute force password-hacking tool. Many passcodes are just 4 digits long, so it doesn't even take that long to find a match. This kind of device is the same used by law enforcement, and ultimately, its use should be limited. However, from the looks of the video below, it does appear to be available online and it's pretty simple to use. Generally speaking, multiple incorrect password entries should lock you out a device, but a bug in iOS 10 allowed...
Read more...
It seems like more now than ever, the chance that you'll run into a situation where law enforcement wants to see what's on your phone isn't outside the realm of possibility. The problem in many jurisdictions is that law enforcement is allowed to force you to unlock your phone, something easily taken care of with a finger print. Well, while law enforcement may be able to get you to unlock your smartphone with your finger, problems will likely arise if you have a password-locked phone. Since a password is personal information that doesn't have to be handed over on a whim, law enforcement wouldn't be legally allowed to access your phone. iOS 11 is a game-changer for Touch ID. Press power button...
Read more...
The term "fake news" has been floating around a lot over the past year, largely fueled by events surrounding the 2016 U.S. Presidential Election. Following Donald Trump's November victory, the world at large began to wonder if heavily biased or outright made-up new stories were causing real ill effects in the general populous. Even entire companies have been mulling the theory, including Facebook, which has been actively battling the issue in France, where a springtime election is fast approaching. The latest person to chime in on the issue is none other than Apple CEO Tim Cook. He goes so far as to say that fake news is "killing people's minds", which isn't hard notion to sympathize with. Some...
Read more...
We'd contend that one of the best feelings in the entire world is that of nostalgia. Most of us love to time-travel in our minds back to a time that filled us with joy, whether it was caused by a place we visited, or something as simple as a video game we played. Well, where the Amiga is concerned, nostalgia is the name of the game (not literally), so it's of almost no surprise to learn that a brand-new documentary revolving around the platform has soared up the charts. Viva Amiga: The Story Of A Beautiful Machine is an hour-long documentary that takes a look at the Amiga computer from its inception, when it was an idea to move beyond the standard fare PCs with their monochrome displays, breaking...
Read more...
Apple's AirPods launched to some seriously mixed reaction when they were unveiled a couple of months ago, but it's seemed that since then, some have warmed up to the idea of having a cordless experience when listening to music. Many who've adopted AirPods early generally have good things to say about them - at least those who've managed to not lose half of the pair yet (yes, it's happened)! When AirPods launched, their niche-ness led some to wonder if we'd ever see a second iteration. Well, based on a newly-granted patent, there's almost no doubt that we will in fact see a follow-up. An obvious concern with earbuds like these is that they have the capability of falling out during exercise, which...
Read more...
Are you tired of wrenching your phone from the deep recesses of your purse or pocket and waiting 20 seconds to a minute for Pokémon GO to load? Do you hate having your phone app open just to hatch a silly Pidgey? Apple has your back, because Pokémon GO is now available on Apple Watch. According to Niantic, “Apple Watch is particularly well suited to Pokémon GO as it seamlessly combines game play and imagination with getting exercise and exploring the real world...And hey, what great timing—you can get a head start on that New Year’s fitness resolution by having some fun now!” Apple Watch Pokémon trainers can receive notifications about nearby Pokémon and PokéStops, be pinged when their eggs...
Read more...
What happens if you break your Apple AirPods? It looks like you will have to just buy another pair. A teardown of the Bluetooth earbuds revealed that the AirPods are almost impossible to repair, difficult to recycle, and are held together mostly by glue. The iFixit team had a heck of time getting the AirPods to open up. In order to get to the insides of the AirPods’ heads, they used a heated knife and a pick opener. They attempted to then go through the bottom of the stem of AirPods to no avail. They finally resorted to a scalpel and pliers in order to fully open the stem. The charging station was even more difficult to open. The team had to essentially destroy the charging station in order to...
Read more...
Over the past few years, it has seemed like the advancement of smartphone tech has slowed, with some wondering whether or not it is actually worth upgrading from one flagship model to the next. We saw the same thing on the desktop: over time, CPUs were "good enough", so some people stopped fussing over needing the latest and greatest. Well, that concept of being stuck in limbo is one even Apple can't escape. Its beloved iPhone continues to get better and better with each iteration, but again, we're at a time when it's becoming ever-harder for companies like Apple to "wow" us. So what's that mean for future iPhones? We might see some changes we weren't quite expecting.Apple's current top-end iPhone,...
Read more...
Children of the 80’s and 90’s, rejoice! Super Mario Run is finally available on the iPhone and iPad. Hopefully your allowance is a little higher than it was in the glory days, because the game comes with hefty price tag (for a mobile game at least) of $10 USD to unlock the full version. According to Mario creator Shigeru Miyamoto, “The longer you continue to make a series, the more complex the gameplay becomes, and the harder it becomes for new players to be able to get into the series.” He views Super Mario Run as an opportunity to “make a game that the broadest audience of people could play” and introduce the game’s characters and properties to a newer audience. Super Mario Run is a side-scrolling,...
Read more...
Hot on the heels of Samsung's Galaxy Note 7 exploding in certain cases came a number of stories of other smartphones following suit. The biggest of those is with Apple's iPhone, and in particular, the two-year-old iPhone 6. At least eight cases in China arose from consumer iPhones that caught fire, and as you'd expect, Apple took the complaints very seriously (especially given the timing). After its research, the Cupertino company established that the phones only caught fire due to external physical damage, not a fault of the product itself. The company's official statement reads, "The units we've analyzed so far have clearly shown that external physical damage happened to them which led to the...
Read more...
It's no secret that Apple places a high value on customer security and privacy, and the company goes to great lengths to make sure that it's a market-leader in both regards. However, even the most careful companies can be exposed to crippling security vulnerabilities. If software contains a previously unidentified bug or exploit, it just sits there waiting for some enterprising user to spot it. And that's just what happened with Apple's Activation Lock. When an iPhone or iPad is lost, the user has the ability to enable "Find My iPhone", which can immediately locks the device, requiring correct credentials to regain access. This is useful in case a device gets stolen or is simply found by...
Read more...
Apple Reportedly Throttling iPhone 7 Models With Qualcomm Modems To Match Versions With Intel Modems
This week, a report ousted Apple's decision to throttle the Qualcomm modem found in most of its iPhone 7 and iPhone 7 Plus models to match the performance of the Intel modem found in other versions. Now, according to sources close to the matter, it's absolutely the case but is there a real issue? The issue involves Apple's need to dual-source the iPhone 7's modem block with either a Qualcomm X12 LTE modem or an Intel XMM 7360 chip. As a company that sells millions upon millions of smartphones, Apple needs to plan every launch and production roll-out very strategically and supply chain consistency is critical, hence the need for multiple sources of key components. Further, even...
Read more...
2016 is going to be remembered for a number of fortunate and unfortunate things, with one topic that falls into the latter category being the debacle of U.S. law enforcement vs. Apple. The FBI and other US federal agencies have made it no secret that they would like to be able to gain access to any smartphone if the need arises - something that anyone who cares even remotely about their privacy shouldn't be okay with. In the months that followed, the FBI somehow managed to break into an iPhone 5C without any help from Apple. And while it's not clear if the agency is able to pull that off on more recent iPhones, it looks like the FBI is not willing to divulge how it cracked the device to any other...
Read more...
