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Apple has started hiring for two new chip engineering jobs in Israel, notes AppleInsider. The company is looking for two "SoC Backend Physical Design Engineers," to be based in the Haifa and Herzliya Pituah regions of the country. People hired for the jobs will be required to handle "physical implementation of a complete SoC [system-on-chip] from net list to tape-out," including aspects like clock and power distribution, and power and noise analysis. The openings join five others in Israel, all involving engineering. Most of these are situated in Herzliya Pituah.... |
Researchers at the MIT Media Lab have created a Minority Report-style glove and iPad input system for three-dimensional virtual object manipulation called T(ether). The system lets the team use motion tracking on gloves to create and alter virtual items with the iPads used as a point-of-view window to see what the users are manipulating. A demonstration video shows the system having multiple users simultaneously affecting the compter-generated world, both with and without the glove.... |
At Apple's online store today save on a variety of refurbished Macs like the refurb. Mac mini with a 2.3GHz Intel dual-core i5 processor, 2GB of RAM and a 500GB hard drive, now $519 after a $80 price cut. Or for $699 is the refurb. Mac mini with a 2.5GHz Intel dual-core i5 processor, 4GB of RAM and a 500GB hard drive.... |
Today in the MacNN forums one Fresh-Faced Recruit was setting up a small network and ran into some problems with the network when a new computer is added, read more here. Also today one Forum Regular had some questions about webpage icons, join in here.... |
An anticipated untethered jailbreak for iOS 5.1.1 devices has been released by hacker pod2g and the Chronic Dev Team. Called Greenpois0n Absinthe 2.0, the software is notable not only for supporting the latest version of Apple's iOS firmware, but also reportedly almost all A4 and A5 devices, including the iPhone 4S and the third-generation iPad. Traditionally, support for A5 hardware has been difficult due to changes made by Apple that closed an earlier exploit. The one exception to support in Absinthe 2.0 is the revised iPad 2 equipped with a 32nm chipset.... |
Today's deals from DealNN include price breaks on MacBook Airs, power supplies, and more. Apple.com has recently lowered the cost of the refurbished 1.86GHz MacBook Air, sporting a 13.3-inch LED-backlit widescreen display, 2GB of RAM, 128GB of Flash storage, and an Intel Core 2 Duo processor. Currently featured at DealNN, this model has now dropped $300 in price and can be purchased for only $899.... |
UK furniture retailer DFS is offering the Trophy Cuddler Audio Sofa that has built-in speakers and a dock for Apple's iPhone and iPod touch. The sofa has two speakers and a subwoofer, though their power ratings aren't being listed. Other than docking iOS devices, there is also a USB port and 3.5mm auxiliary input for other audio sources.... |
Apple has quietly revealed that it is launching the third-generation iPad in Guam and the Philippines on May 29th. Rather than making an official announcement, Apple has disclosed the news through its Asian iPad page, which has been updated to show the new locations. Other launch details have yet to be published, but Filipinos will have the advantage of ordering from Apple's online store.... |
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Windows Phone fans currently face a limited selection of new devices, however a few companies, including Samsung, continue to release new offerings powered by Microsoft's mobile OS. Electronista checked out Samsung's Focus 2 earlier this month at CTIA's spring conference for a quick hands-on preview, however our full review takes a closer look at the latest budget-priced Windows Phone off ...... |
A report from Chinaís Sina Tech has tipped that Apple will integrate Baidu as a search engine in iOS for the Chinese iPhone. Baidu is the leading search engine in China with a massive 83.6 percent share of the market. The pairing is seen as mutually beneficial with Baidu gaining exposure on the smartphone platform with the most active on Chinaís mobile web, while its inclusion will be an additional selling point for the iPhone in China.... |
Diablo III will get its first patch next week, according to Activision-Blizzard community manager 'Nethaera'. The incoming client-side patch will fix a number of bugs, including one that breaks the game, as well as a number of alterations to class skills to balance gameplay. Security concerns and the real-money auction house were also discussed in the forum post.... |
Apple has made another subtle change to its iOS App Store, dropping the "Game of the Week" and "Staff Favorites" sections on the main page in favor of "Editor's Choice" and "Free App of the Week." The new designation has kicked off naming Chillingo's new Air Mail game and Autodesk's SketchBook Ink drawing app for the iPad, and Facebook Camera and Extreme Skater getting the nod on the iPhone. Cut the Rope: Experiments is the free app for both.... |
The US Transportation Security Administration (TSA) may purchase up to $3 million in Apple hardware over the next three years. Up to a thousand Macintosh and a thousand iOS mobile devices purchases are planned. The Apple equipment has been declared to be "critical to meet a variety of operational, programmatic, and mission-specific requirements" by the TSA.... |
Following last year's Microsoft partnership with Nokia, Bing Maps is the latest product to see a benefit. Starting today, users in 24 countries will be able to view active traffic data in Bing Maps as a result of Nokia services integration. United States traffic coverage will include side street traffic as well as freeway information. Behind the scenes, Nokia's geocoding services are now being used to offer improved turn-by-turn directions.... |
Apple earlier today filed an 8-K form with the Securities and Exchange Commission, indicating that the board of directors has decided to give restricted stock holders the same $2.65-per-share dividend they expect to give public shareholders. CEO Tim Cook has requested he not be awarded the dividend, however, costing him an estimated $75 million dollars over the next decade.... |
An Apple fan dissatisfied with the attention the company has paid to its Mac Pro line of recent has taken to Facebook, posting a fan page petitioning the computer maker to refresh its line of professional-level desktops, or at least to let Mac Pro fans know what is going on with the line. The page has subsequently taken off, with more than 4,100 Likes and a number of shares from users around the world.... |
Apple Senior VP of Industrial Design Jonathan Ive is now officially Sir Jonathan Ive, having been knighted by Princess Anne on behalf of Queen Elizabeth II yesterday. The honor, first bestowed on Ive through an announcement at the end of last year, makes the 45-year-old designer a Knight Commander of the British Empire, a step up from the Commander honor he was given in 2005 for services to design and to enterprise.... |
Research firm IDC has published its latest smartphone market-share report, finding Android and iOS to be responsible for eight out of 10 smartphones shipped in the first quarter of 2012. Android captured 59 percent of all sales, while iOS took 23 percent of the 152 million smartphones shipped in the first quarter. Linux phones maintained the same small share held for four quarters. Symbian and Blackberry shipments continued to drop precipitously.... |
Apple on Thursday released a minor maintenance update for its photo-editing software, Aperture. Version 3.2.4 is said to improve stability when operating in Mac OS X Snow Leopard. The update also resolves an issue that sometimes prevented the Viewer from correctly updating after a photo had been modified in an external editor.... |
Facebook has launched its own camera app for the iPhone (free, App Store), complementing the social network's existing iOS utilities. Following on the heels of the company's recent Instagram buyout, Facebook Camera provides a photo editor that can be used to crop shots or apply various filters.... |
Pascal Cagni, Apple vice president for Europe, the Middle East, and Africa, is stepping down from the position, reports French newspaper Le Figaro. Cagni, who has been with Apple since 2000, is said to have tendered his resignation yesterday. Cagni steps down in the midst of a successful stretch, as Gartner recently reported that Apple's European sales were up 20 percent year-over-year by the end of 2011.... |
Apple has reportedly established a licensing agreement with patent holder SimpleAir, putting an end to the patent infringement battle that began late in 2009. SimpleAir had filed its original lawsuit in the federal district court for the Eastern District of Texas, a venue frequented by plaintiffs in intellectual-property lawsuits, however the settlement was said to have been reached shortly before the formal proceedings commenced.... |
Just two months after being introduced, the third-generation 2012 iPad has managed to catch up to the market share of the first-generation iPad in the US, market analysis firm Localytics reports. The new model now accounts for over 20 percent of all US-based iPads, just over the percentage of active first-generation iPads. The iPad 2, released in 2011 and still available new for $100 less than its original price, leads the pack.... |
Just two months after Foxconn bought a 10 percent stake in Sharp, the two companies have announced a collaboration on a plant in Chengdu, China that will be used to build iPhone displays and potentially displays for other products. Foxconn will build the plant, and Sharp will assist by supplying technology, which may be used to further expand its ability to produce displays using its IGZO formulation, along with possible poly-silicon LCD screens.... |
Application and file sharing app Bump (free) has been updated to allow for photo transfers between a phone and a computer. Users of the app can go to the Bump website on a computer, then after selecting photos to share, can bump the phone into the spacebar to send the images to the browser. Images could then be saved to the computer or shared through social networks with a short link.... |
Apple CEO Tim Cook is on the cover of this week's Fortune Magazine with a story by Inside Apple author Adam Lashinsky profiling the intensely private CEO and noting some of the changes -- some subtle, some not -- introduced by Cook early in his tenure as head of the world's most valuable company. Lashinsky's story posits that in some ways, Apple is becoming a more "traditional" company under Cook.... |
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In a pair of related developments, Microsoft has retreated from earlier claims that its phone OS was more popular in China than iOS just as new figures for the first quarter of 2011 show that Apple has nearly tripled its sales of iPhones in the country and raised its share from eight to 19 percent, mostly due to the launch of the iPhone 4S, which was launched with two of China's major carriers in January to great demand and some crowd issues.... |
In a surprise, an Apple patent application for an optical stylus has turned up on the USPTO website. Steve Jobs had derided the stylus as an input method for the iPhone and the iPad once famously saying that ëIf you need a stylus, youíve already failed.í However, Jobs was well known for throwing the opposition a curve ball from time to time speaking out against an idea, only to have been developing a concept behind the scenes. One example was when he said that consumers liked having a separate iPod while also carrying their phone, only to reveal the ultimate convergence device in the iPhone a... |
Update: Axis was temporarily pulled by Yahoo due to a security vulnerability, but has already been updated.Yahoo has released Axis, which it is calling a 'visual search' application. It has been released as a full mobile browser for iOS and as a cross-platform desktop browser extension that uses page snapshots in live search results instead of text. The iOS app, while having the same tabbed browsing and bookmarking found in Safari, has a user interface focussing on image-heavy search, with cross-device synching possible between iPhone, iPad and the desktop browser extension.... |
High-level talks between Apple and Samsung regarding patent infringements have reportedly failed, according to the Korea Times. Apple CEO Tim Cook met with Samsung CEO Choi Gee-sung along with Samsungís head of mobile, Shin Jong-kyun. Although Tim Cook has stated that he prefers to settle when he can, two days of talks yielded nothing that will avert the case proceeding to trial as scheduled.... |
Windows Phone fans currently face a limited selection of new devices, however a few companies, including Samsung, continue to release new offerings powered by Microsoft's mobile OS. Electronista checked out Samsung's Focus 2 earlier this month at CTIA's spring conference for a quick hands-on preview, however our full review takes a closer look at the latest budget-priced Windows Phone off ...... |
Apple has released two new televisions commercials featuring the iPhone 4S, its Siri voice capability and a celebrity in need of company. Like the first two ads in the series, a famous actor (in this case thespian and director John Malkovich) is inside a white house alone, making conversation with Siri. Unlike the previous commercials, Malkovich never leaves his chair, and gets two distinct ads -- one of which reveals the meaning of life.... |
Windows Phone fans currently face a limited selection of new devices, however a few companies, including Samsung, continue to release new offerings powered by Microsoft's mobile OS. Electronista checked out Samsung's Focus 2 earlier this month at CTIA's spring conference for a quick hands-on preview, however our full review takes a closer look at the latest budget-priced Windows Phone ...... |
North Carolina's Utility Commission in Raleigh has approved Apple's application to build a 4.8-megawatt fuel cell for the company's Maiden data center, the largest privately-owned such fuel cell in the country. The cell will consist of 24 energy servers provided by Bloom Energy, and will use conventional natural gas off the grid to power itself. Apple will offset the natural gas by buying or producing and equal amount of biogas locally.... |
Electronics technician Ken Shirriff has completed a teardown in minute detail of the Apple iPhone charger, revealing higher-quality manufacturing techniques and parts along with more attention to detail than is normally seen in smartphone chargers. The $29 charger and cable combo costs more to make than a typical AC USB charger, but remains a highly-profitable unit despite the extra care taken. Shirriff also did a teardown on a cheaper "clone" iPhone charger, and strongly recommends that under no circumstances should they be used, calling them "tiny, cheap, and dangerous."... |
Claiming that the Department of Justice is completely wrong in its approach and interpretation of the circumstances and public remarks of its entry into the e-book market, Apple has filed a formal response to the lawsuit that accuses it and major book publishers of conspiring to fix prices on e-books and undermine Amazon's ability to discount them. The response echoes Apple's few public statements on the matter, saying it fostered competition where Amazon would have destroyed it.... |
Patrick Spence, 14-year veteran of Research in Motion (RIM) and its head of global sales, has departed the company. Spence "will be taking on a leadership position in a different industry," according to RIM spokeswoman Rebecca Freiburger. No comment has been made if the move is in response to the announcement of RIM's new Chief Operating Officer and Chief Marketing Officer three weeks ago.... |
Apple is by far the largest buyer of all kinds of microprocessors, buying 50 percent more RAM, processor and other chips than any other company, with its appetite having tripled since 2009 due to the success of its iOS devices (and to a lesser extent its growing Mac business). At an industry conference, IHS iSuppli researcher Dale Ford said that the company will buy $27 billion worth of chips, up from $9B in 2009.... |
Microsoft is planning on releasing two new native iOS apps using a Metro-style interface by the end of October, an AppleInsider source claims. The first is the Outlook Web App for Exchange 2012 users, also reportedly known as the "OWA Mobile Client for iOS." The app will require both iOS 5 and an Exchange 2012 mailbox, though some offline functions will be supported. Versions for Windows Phone 7.5 and Android 4.0 are planned, but Microsoft documentation is said to list their features as "to be determined," while the iOS app is expected to provide the "best" mobile support.... |
Microsoft is preparing to release tablet versions of its Office suite for both Apple's iOS and Google's Android platforms, a source familiar with the software has told BGR. The company had been previously rumored to be bringing its Office suite to the iPad, and the new details, if true, will see the productivity suite arriving on tablets in November.... |
Apple could be hoping to bring iOS' Dictation feature to OS X, a code string in the current preview of Mountain Lion suggests. Within the preview's build of Safari, a resource file mentions using a Command-Command hotkey to "Start Dictation." While the option isn't yet functional, it could be by the time Mountain Lion ships, or alternately in a later Safari update.... |
New details have emerged about two upcoming Apple Stores. The first of these is another Parisian outlet, which Apple has announced will launch Friday morning at 9 AM in the city's Quatre Temps mall. The shopping center sits along the north extension of the Champs Élysées. Apple already has several Apple Stores in the Paris area, but just a handful scattered throughout the rest of France.... |
Google has released a major update of its Search app for iOS, v2.0.0. The iPhone side of the title has been overhauled, gaining "major" speed improvements and a redesigned interface. This includes auto fullscreen, which hides controls when scrolling down, and reveals them again when scrolling up. A special fullscreen mode is used during image search.... |
Apple and Samsung have failed to reach any kind of settlement after court-ordered talks on Monday and Tuesday, according to the Korea Times. A Samsung official tells the publication that the companies could find "no clear agreement" on their patent dispute. The talks were extremely high-level, involving Apple CEO Tim Cook, and Samsung CEO Choi Gee-sung.... |
It's not too late to win a FREE MacBook Pro! Expercom is celebrating their fifteen-year anniversary by giving away one 13.3-inch MacBook Pro. This MacBook Pro includes features like a 2.4GHz Intel dual-core i5 processor, 4GB of RAM, a 500GB hard drive, and comes pre-installed with OS X Lion, read on to find out how you can win.... |
KurbKarma, an app that allows users to share parking spot availability in the San Francisco area, has been updated in the App Store. Users are rewarded with KarmaKredits whenever a spot they publish is taken by another user. These points can then be used to "buy" access to nearby available parking spots. During a parking exchange users are connected directly to the publisher allowing for the exchange of a more precise location without having to reveal a phone number.... |
Siri, the voice command system on the iPhone 4S, is being blocked on IBM's internal networks, the company's CIO has revealed. Jeanette Horan mentioned the fact in an interview with MIT's Technology Review this week. The core issue involves the way Siri translates speech; rather than performing the task on a phone, it uploads recordings to Apple servers, where the speech is deciphered before results are sent back. Accompanying this is user data, such as the names of people in Contacts, since the information is needed to interpret some requests.... |
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