News tagged ‘Mac’

On Monday Apple revealed that over 100 million downloads were made via its Mac App Store in less than one year of availability.

"In just three years the App Store changed how people get mobile apps, and now the Mac App Store is changing the traditional PC software industry," said Philip Schiller, Apple’s senior vice president of Worldwide Marketing. "With more than 100 million downloads in less than a year, the Mac App Store is the largest and fastest growing PC software store in the world."

There are now more than 500,000 applications in App Stores for iOS and the Mac that were downloaded more than 18 billion times. More than one billion applications are downloaded per month there. Noteworthy, Apple Stores helped developers achieved success with their applications. Here some comments from the developers whose applications are now available in the Mac App Store.

"The Mac App Store has unparalleled reach and has completely transformed our distribution and development cycle," said Saulius Dailide of the Pixelmator Team. "Offering Pixelmator 2.0 exclusively on the Mac App Store allows us to streamline updates to our image editing software and stay ahead of the competition."

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Many Apple fans are interested in discovering hints of Apple's future iOS devices in various configuration files in each beta and public version of iOS. Such references provide essentially no information on the new devices themselves. Most of them simply appear in the form of "iPhone4,1" that meant the iPhone 4S as one example, but they are carefully watched as hints of what devices Apple is likely to be testing with the software at the moment and perhaps how many variations of an upcoming device there might be.

But today Apple has tried to obscure that information having released 5.1 beta 2 with numerous fake references within configuration files. For example, USBDeviceConfiguration.plist has listed about two dozen different device variants.

As discovered by 9to5Mac's Mark Gurman, that list has now ballooned to well over 100 such entries as Apple has seeded it with dozens of new fake references to such future products as "iPad10,1", "iPhone11,3", "iPod11,1", and "AppleTV8,3".

Apple has made more difficult to identify new product, though the change does not shut out examination of the evidence entirely, as unaltered listings are still visible in other locations.

UPDATE: ultrasn0w for iOS 5.0.1 released.

This tutorial is for those users of locked iPhone 3GS and iPhone 4, who updated to iOS 5.0.1 and realized that ultrasn0w unlock doesn't work there.

Indeed DevTeam have not updated software unlock utility ultrasn0w to work with the latest iOS 5.0.1. There are two workarounds, that will make ultrasn0w work on 5.0.1.

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According to Japanese blog Macotakara, Apple held a MFI Conference for iPod / iPhone / iPad for accessory manufacturers in Shenzen, China this past week.  During the conference Apple reported that the company was going to introduce a new chip for MFI program ("MFI" means Apple's Made iPod / iPhone / iPad certification program) in order to encourage manufactures to produce more iOS-compatible accessories. The rumored chip will provide access to devices running iOS via AirPlay, Bluetooth and Wi-Fi. The current program for iOS devices is limited to physical dock accessories.

TouchArcade has confirmed these rumors by its recent article telling us about iOS gaming accessories. TouchArcade explains that the reason why all the current gaming accessories rely on Bluetooth keyboard emulation is due to the restrictions Apple has placed over bluetooth connections and with the new chip such restrictions seems to be loosed opening the way to analog control sticks for iOS devices.

Moreover, Apple has recently revealed that the company would be adding support for AirPlay over Bluetooth. It is unclear what advantages this will offer.

Wedge Partners analyst Brian Blair suggests that Apple may bring some functionality of its rumored television set to the iMac with a revision in the first half of next year.

Blair envisions the company pushing the largest screen sizes of the iMac toward the TV market by integrating Apple TV and iCloud features into a slimmer all-in-one PC with TV capabilities.

“We think this makes sense because while we typically think about the newest TV’s hanging on the wall in large form factors, Apple could effectively start with what they already have on the manufacturing line and slowly push their offering from 27 inches and scale up from there to 32 inches and then move on to the 42, 50 and 55 inch market,” he writes. “In short, we believe the initial Apple TV is their iMac computer that can function as a TV, over the iCloud platform.”

Apple previous offered its "Front Row" software for OS X debuted on the iMac in 2005. The software provided users with an easy access to content while interacting with their Mac via the remote control previously included with most Macs.

The pioneer of cloud gaming OnLive has announced the release of its playable app for tablets and mobile devices. Now top-tier, console-class games that was previously limited only to computers and consoles are available for playing through the free OnLive app on more than half a million mobile devices over mobile networks and Wi-Fi in the UK and US.

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UBS (Investment Firm) analyst Maynard Um now believes Apple will sell as many as 30 million iPhones in the December quarter, up from a previous estimate of 28 million. The firm changed its expectations for the iPhone sales because of AT&T's announcement that it expects its best smartphone quarter ever thanks to the iPhone 4S.

The firm didn’t change its predictions for the iPad. It still expects that Apple will sell 12 million units in the fourth quarter of 2012 and may achieve 13 million iPads because of seasonal boost during the holidays. UBS numbers are quite conservative due to its belief that "there might be a slight shift in consumer preference to the company's Macbook computers." Um said customers may not be able to buy multiple Apple products simultaneously and could instead elect to purchase larger ticket items with more functionality.

In light of the expected iPhone upside, UBS raised its revenue estimates to $38.5 billion, up from $37.2 billion. The firm now expects earnings per share to reach $9.90, compared to a previous projection of $9.47. For fiscal 2012, Um sees Apple bringing in $142.7 billion in revenue and $35.83 EPS.

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Citing an Asian supplier who is allegedly crafting components for Apple's next iPad, Japanese blog Macotakara claims that Apple's third-generation iPad will be slightly thicker than the iPad 2 for an "unknown reason." That means that third-party cases that cover the back side of the device won’t fit to the iPad 3, but Apple’s Smart Covers will remain compatible with the next-generation Apple’s tablet.

The screen of the iPad 3 will have the same 9.7-inch screen size as the iPad 2, but Apple is rumored to implement the Retina Display technology into the next-generation iPad. One reason for a thicker frame on the iPad 3 could be the components necessary to include a high-resolution Retina Display.

In order to include a Retina Display, Apple may adopt entirely new display technology. One report in November suggested Apple would use IGZO displays from Sharp to reach a 330 dots-per-inch screen resolution. But that report claimed the IGZO display would also allow for a future iPad to be thinner, not thicker. Other reports, however, claimed that Apple would utilize a dual-LED light bar system to illuminate the Retina Display of a third-generation iPad. Apple's apparent difficulties with the higher resolution displays and new LED backlight designs were said to have already affected the launch schedule of the next iPad.

The Retina Display technology was firstly introduced by Apple with the 2010 iPhone 4. Apple boasts that an individual pixel on such screen is so small that cannot be distinguished by the human eye.

Intel intends to launch its mobile Ivy Bridge processors in April and May of next year. The report posted yesterday ttracts special attention to the fact that the Ivy Bridge platform, both mobile and desktop, will provide support up to three independent displays. Noteworthy, one of those displays will be an internal one.

While we're talking about graphics, as with the desktop Ivy Bridge processors, the mobile processors also support up to three independent displays, although one of these will be the built in display in the notebook, but hopefully we'll see notebooks with a DisplayPort connector as standard come next year.

The current Sandy Bridge platform supports only two independent displays. For example, the 13-inch MacBook Pro can only drive two external displays by turning off its internal display. More powerful MacBook Pro models can currently drive two external displays in addition to the internal one. But Ivy Bridge opens door to a direct support of three displays. Users of the MacBook Air will be able to connect to two external displays.

There are many official codenames for operation systems. For example, Mac OS 10.7 is Lion, Android 4.0 is Ice Cream Sandwich. But we have never heard of iOS codenames. TiPB reports that developer Steve Troughton-Smith has revealed what Apple's codenames are for each iOS version. Here they are:

• 1.0: Alpine (1.0.0 – 1.0.2: Heavenly)
• 1.1: Little Bear (1.1.1: Snowbird, 1.1.2: Oktoberfest)
• 2.0: Big Bear
• 2.1: Sugarbowl
• 2.2: Timberline
• 3.0: Kirkwood
• 3.1: Northstar
• 3.2: Wildcat (iPad only)
• 4.0: Apex
• 4.1: Baker
• 4.2: Jasper (4.2.5 – 4.2.10: Phoenix)
• 4.3: Durango
• 5.0: Telluride
• 5.1: Hoodoo

This month Apple is continuing its global rollout of its new iPhone model and while the company has not issued any statements about its future launch schedule, retailers and carrier partners in some countries have announced availability of the device for December 16th. This round of rollout will include two of the most populous countries: Russian and Brazil.

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During the last several days, there have been many reports on the findings of Trevor Eckhart revealing that logging software is present on many BlackBerry, Nokia and Android phones. The software called "IQRD"  was developed by the company Carrier IQ. The PCWorld summarized the video showing the scope of logging.

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More news on new devices found in iOS 5.1 beta. This time it's Apple TV 3rd generation.

Usually every product has a codename identifier. For example iPhone3,1 is iPhone 4 and AppleTV2,1 is Apple TV 2G. We have seen AppleTV3,1 codename in iOS 5 a while ago. 9to5mac reports that as a product in development moves closer to the release, it is assigned another codename. For example N94 (iPhone 4S) or K48 (original iPad). The 3rd generation Apple TV has reached that stage. New name J33 was found in iOS 5.1, that corresponds to new Apple TV 3,1.

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Analyst Chris Whitmore with Deutsche Bank and his team of analysts checked more than 200 stores on Black Friday to assess demand for Apple products, including the iPhone, iPad and Mac lineup and found out that Apple's Black Friday sales were more than successful.

75 percent of Apple’s retail stores sold out of the iPhone 4S on Black Friday while on Saturday just 30 percent of Apple's stores remained sold out of the iPhone 4S. At AT&T stores, Whitmore found that about 50 percent were sold out over the weekend.

Gene Munster with Piper Jaffray also polled Apple's retail stores on Black Friday, and discovered that iPad sales per hour were 68 percent higher than they were a year ago that means an average of 14.8 iPads per hour, comparing with the 8.8 iPads sold per hour year-over-year. Mac sales were 10.1 units per hour, up 23 percent from Black Friday 2010.

Whitmore also found strong iPad and Mac sales, noting that the 11.6-inch MacBook Air was the most popular option in the MacBook Air lineup on Black Friday. As for the iPad, he revealed that the most popular version was the 32GB model.

Digitimes reports that Apple plans to update its MacBook Air line in the first quarter of 2012. The company is expected to launch a new 15-inch model alongside refreshed 11.6-inch and 13.3-inch models with Intel's Ivy Bridge processors that will bring significant graphics improvements and new OpenCL support.

Apple reportedly is set to launch its new MacBook Air series notebooks with panel sizes of 11.6-inch, 13.3-inch and 15-inch in the first quarter of 2012 and will directly compete against ultrabooks from PC brand vendors, according to sources from the upstream supply chain.

The sources noted that related upstream players have already started pilot production of the MacBook Air models and will add a 15-inch model into the product line to expand its reach in the ultra-thin notebook market.

Apple is likely to provide discounts on the current MacBook Air models ahead of the debut of the new models.

First rumors about new ultra-thin 15-inch notebook from Apple appeared in July. Digitimes also reported that component production for the notebook had begun with an eye toward a second quarter 2012 launch.