Items tagged with (NASDAQ:AAPL)
Apple is looking to make lemonade out of the lemons that it has been dealt due to the coronavirus. Like many other tech conferences past (and future), Apple is not willing to take any chances when it comes so the spreading the coronavirus with a mass grouping of people from all over the world huddled together in close quarters. Also, California regulations regarding the coronavirus would have nixed the conference anyway. As a result, the company's Worldwide Developer Conference (WWDC) will be online-only this year. Apple made the announcement via its website this morning. Rather than lament the loss of the on-stage keynote with thousands in attendance, or the individual breakout sessions,...
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Slowly but surely, Apple is moving on from using keyboards with a flawed butterfly mechanism, and outfitting new products with scissor switches like the ones it used on MacBook Pro models prior to the 2015 redesign. As such, it's expected that a couple of upcoming products—a new MacBook Pro and MacBook Air—will implement a so-called "Magic Keyboard" as well. Apple analyst Ming-Chi Kuo outlined his predictions in a research note to investors. According to his note, Apple will release new MacBook Pro and MacBook Air models in the second quarter of 2020, both with Magic Keyboards, which is how Apple dubs the return to scissor switches (it has a better ring to it, we suppose). His prediction...
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Each time a new version of watchOS for the Apple Watch turns up, people get excited about the upcoming new features. Further details have surfaced for the Apple wearable that come from hints in leaked iOS 14 code. The leaked code gives information on new watch faces, sleep tracking, and parental control features for the Apple Watch that are expected to land later this fall. One of the fundamental changes for the wearable comes in watch faces. WatchOS 7 has three key differences in the watch face arena, with the most interesting being shareable watch faces. This will allow users to share their custom watch faces with other users. Each watch face is treated like an individual file in watchOS 7....
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Health has always been a focus of the Apple Watch and other wearables, and at minimum you can typically expect there to be a built-in heart rate monitor on today's smartwatches and fitness bands. FitBit went the extra mile, though, and rolled out a software update that added blood oxygen tracking on some of its devices. Now it looks like Apple is working on the same thing. In case you are wondering, a normal blood oxygen level is between 75 and 100 millimeters of mercury (mm Hg). There are various symptoms of a low blood oxygen level, such as shortness of breath, dizziness, headaches, chest pain, rapid heartbeats, high blood pressure, and so forth. According to the Mayo Clinic, values under 60mm...
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Manufacturing in China has been in turmoil with the country hard hit by the coronavirus over the last several months. Apple has warned retail employees that there are shortages of iPhone replacement devices, indicating the slowdown in China is impacting its supply chain. Recently support staff in stores were told that replacement iPhones for heavily damaged devices would be in short supply for up to the next four weeks. Word of the shortage comes from Apple Store employees who report they were advised in a memo that they can offer to mail replacement iPhones to customers and provide loaner devices to help ease delays. Some Apple store workers are also reporting that there is a shortage of individual...
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We could be seeing a barrage of products from Apple that utilize mini LED technology. In a note to investors, Apple analyst Ming-Chi Kuo predicted Apple will release half a dozen mini LED products throughout this year and next, including a 27-inch iMac Pro, 14.1-inch MacBook Pro, 16-inch MacBook Pro, 12.9-inch iPad Pro, 10.2-inch iPad Pro, and a 7.9-inch iPad mini. That would be quite the refresh if it comes to pass. It could also lead to some tantalizing deals on current generation products as vendors look to clear out store shelves (physical and virtual) to make room for the new stuff. It's already been happening to some extent—the 32GB iPad is listed at $279 on Amazon (down from $329),...
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Apple got off to a rocky start with sales its HomePod smart speaker, which integrates the Siri digital voice assistant. We can't blame consumers for staying away from the HomePod initially, as Apple debuted the smart speaker at a lofty $349, when Amazon sells scores of Echo devices for under $100. Around this time last year, Apple finally responded to complaints by giving the HomePod a permanent price cut to $299. However, electronics retailer Best Buy is going one step further with a compelling discount on the HomePod. Best Buy is currently selling the HomePod for a "low" $199, which represents a $100 discount off its regular asking price, and matches its limited-time Black Friday...
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When Apple introduced the first iPhone way back in 2007, it was a device that was very much married to a PC or Mac. You needed a computer to activate the device, perform OS updates, install music, transfer contacts, etc. However, over the years, the iPhone has grown so independent that it doesn't need a computer for much of anything at all. Well, unless you need to restore the firmware of your device in the case of a system failure, or if you want to rid yourself of beta software and get back on a "production" iOS track. Fortunately, the code sleuths over at 9to5Mac have uncovered evidence that Apple is working on over-the-air (OTA) mechanism for restoring iOS/iPadOS software/device...
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This may come as a surprise to some people (and not to others), but the iPhone XR was the best selling smartphone in all of 2019, and by a big margin, according to data corralled by Omdia. The tracking firm says Apple shipped 46.3 million iPhone XR models last year, beating the best selling Android phone, Samsung's Galaxy A10, by 16 million units. These figures are not coming directly from Apple, which no longer offers up iPhone sales data. However, Omdia is not as obscure as the name might seem at first glance. It was recently established following the merger of the research division of Informa Tech and the acquired IHS Markit technology research portfolio. IHS Markit is a stalwart in the market...
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The Arm-powered Mac – it’s an elusive hardware beast that has been rumored for around 4 years or so, with new reports resurfacing roughly every six months. It seems inevitable that Apple will ditch Intel as a processor supplier as it strives to bring more hardware design in-house, but it’s always been a question of “When?” Apple analyst Ming Chi Kuo is now the latest to throw his hat in the ring with a prediction on initial availability for an Arm-powered Mac. According to Kuo, the first breakthrough device will land during the second half of 2021, which is more than a year away. The motivation for Apple moving away from Intel processors is obvious...
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It seems as though Apple is getting ready to launch a set of over-the-ear headphones under its AirPods label, with a premium price tag attached. It is not entirely clear what is going on, only that a product database listing at Target points to a new AirPods (X Generation) item, priced at $399. If that is the case, it would be Apple's most expensive AirPods yet. Tech analyst and YouTuber Jon Prosser spotted the database entry, and promptly posted his finding to Twitter. Multiple Target employees have started reaching out to me about this 🤔 Showing up in their systems and on UPC scanners is this mysterious “Apple AirPods (X Generation)” listing, priced at $399. 👀 Potentially Apple’s...
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U.S. lawmakers have been on a mission to kill end-to-end encryption as we known it. And we're not just talking about killing encryption (or at least providing backdoors) on devices like iPhones or the Google Pixel 4, but also online software platforms from Facebook and Google. The bill is entitled "The Eliminating Abuse and Rampant Neglect of Interactive Technologies Act of 2019,” which of course has to work out to some hip catchphrase, which in this case is the "EARN IT Act". Sponsors of the bill include Senators Lindsay Graham (R) and Richard Blumenthal (D). At its heart, the senators claim that the legislation is aimed at stopping child sexual abuse and the exploitation of...
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The number of preinstalled apps on iPhone devices has steadily risen over the years—it started out at 16 on the original iPhone, and has skyrocketed to 38 on the latest models. Users have never been able to change certain default apps, like Safari and Mail, but after all these years, Apple may finally allow users to choose third-party alternatives. If this comes to pass, Safari and Mail would likely be the most affected, as they are the two most widely used apps on iPhone and iPad devices. As things stand, when a user clicks on a link, iOS devices automatically fire up the built-in Safari web browser. Users can download other browsers, like Chrome and Firefox, but are not able to set them...
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Late last year, Apple performed a major update to its flagship MacBook Pro family with the release of a new 16-inch model. The company kept the same Intel Coffee Lake processors, but included a number of key updates including a replacement for the failure-prone and unloved butterfly keyboard. Apple's 13-inch MacBook Pro family is also due for an update, and the company is expected to launch it sometime this year. According to this latest 3DMark benchmark result unearthed by @_rogame, Intel is switching to Ice Lake processors for the 13-inch model, replacing the current Coffee Lake options. Time Spy i5-8279U 4C/8T 2.4GHz base 4.1GHz boost + Iris Plus 655 with 128MB eDRAM 28W (2019...
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TSMC has been critical to AMD’s resurgence as a dominant force in the processor market, and the company has also been beneficial in ensuring that Apple has a steady flow of A12 and A13 SoCs on hand for its hot-selling iPhone and iPad product lines. As TSMC is looking to grapple with the demands of these high-profile customers while shifting to smaller process nodes, it needs to invest in its fabs. Luckily for the company, its board this week approved approximately $6.7 billion to expand it facilities used to produce chips. The capital appropriations have been narrowed down to these five areas according to TSMC: Fab construction and installation of fab facility systems Installation...
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Tax season is upon us, and one thing nobody wants to deal with is getting audited. In a sense, however, that is what some major tech corporations have to deal with, as the Federal Trade Commission announced it is looking into hundreds of prior acquisitions made by Alphabet (including Google), Amazon, Apple, Facebook, and Microsoft. The FTC is essentially asking major tech companies to open their books and make sure that everything is on the up and up. It also wants to "deepen its understanding" of how large technology handle acquisitions, including they get reported to federal antitrust agencies, and whether some of the smaller mergers fall under the radar of potentially being anti-competitive....
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Microsoft launched its Project xCloud game streaming for Android devices back in October, but at the time it left out those running iOS (i.e. iPhones and iPads). Apple is notorious for placing a lot of restrictions on app developers for acceptance into its App Store walled garden, so Microsoft had to navigate those landmines before launching on the platform. Today, Microsoft is ready to make available a beta version of Project xCloud for iOS users, and it’s doing so through Apple’s TestFlight service. Given that Project xCloud is still in beta; that it is only available right now through TestFlight; and that this is Apple that we’re dealing with, there are some key...
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If you are in the market of set of Apple's AirPods Pro earbuds, you're looking at spending $249, a premium price for sure. The non-Pro models run $159 with charging case, or $199 with a wireless charging case. A cheaper version might be around the corner, ago, according to the latest unconfirmed chatter. It's said Apple is working on an AirPods Pro Lite variant. Depending on where pricing lands, and what features get stripped for a cheaper price tag, an AirPods Pro Lite SKU could have mass appeal. No information on potential pricing is available, however, so we are left to guess where the new earbuds could end up. The rumor comes from a Digitimes report that is mainly focused on Apple shifting...
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After winning an Oscar for Best Adapted Screenplay for his film "Jojo Rabbit," Taika Waititi threw some comedic shade at Apple's laptop keyboards, saying "they are impossible to write on" and makes him want to go back to using PCs. Incidentally, the film director, writer, and actor was not referring to the troubled history of Apple's keyboards. "Apple needs to fix those keyboards, "They are impossible to write on—they’ve gotten worse. It makes me want to go back to PCs. Because PC keyboards, the bounce-back for your fingers is way better. Hands up who still uses a PC? You know what I’m talking about. It’s a way better keyboard. Those Apple keyboards are horrendous," Waititi...
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Could Apple be ready to break free of Intel exclusivity for its Macs? It's certainly seems possible thanks to references that were found in Apple’s latest macOS 10.15.4 beta. As you know, all modern Macs for well over a decade have used Intel Core processors. For example, the latest 16-inch MacBook Pros use 9th generation Coffee Lake processors. But the references found in the macOS 10.15.4 beta suggest that Apple may be at least be looking to add AMD as a second supplier of processors for its computers. In addition to familiar codenames like Navi -- the 16-inch MacBook Pro makes uses of Radeon Pro GPUs with Navi architecture -- there are also references to Picasso,...
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Most people would probably agree that having standards is a good thing. If anyone needs proof of this, just look at USB. The connector is one of the best innovations to ever happen to PCs, and is found on billions of keyboards, mice, digital cameras, flash drives, and practically everything else. So why is Apple protesting the European Parliament's push for a standard charger? Parliament's stance is that "a standard for a common charger must be adopted urgently," and it has called on the European Commission to implement "beef-ed rules on common chargers" no later than July of this year. "According to estimates, around 50 million metric tons of e-waste are generated globally per year, with an...
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A jury has awarded $1.1 billion in damages to the California Institute of Technology (CalTech) after finding Apple and Broadcom guilty of infringing on its Wi-Fi patents. Apple bears the brunt of the penalty, as it has been ordered to pay $837.8 million in damages, while Broadcom is now legally compelled to fork over $270.2 billion (barring an appeal). Coming off a $91.8 billion quarter, it's best ever, Apple will be just fine after writing a check (if it comes to that). After paying the bills, Apple was left a massive $22.2 billion profit in the three-month period ended December 29. Meanwhile, Broadcom is coming of a quarter in which it earned $5.78 billion in revenue for a profit of $874 million....
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