News tagged ‘test’
Foxconn Gearing Up to Start Production of Sapphire Displays
According to the latest report from China Economic Weekly, Foxconn, one of Apple's largest suppliers, is currently gearing up to start the production of sapphire for next generations of company's mobile devices. Asian tech giant has reportedly got the final approval for building a large sapphire display manufacturing facility in Zhengzhou, China. The plant will be situated close to the facility, where the iPhone 6 units are currently assembled.
Samsung to Become Apple's Main Components Supplier
According to the latest reports from supply chain insiders, Apple has recently decided to make Samsung one of its major hardware suppliers. I'm now talking not only about the chips for next generations of iPhones and iPads. As noted by BusinessKorea, the guys from Cupertino plan to use Samsung as a primary components manufacturer for the long-anticipated Apple Watch as well. This indicates that Apple will soon once again become extremely dependent on its market rival from South Korea.
World Tablet Sales to See Decrease This Year - Analysts
According to the latest report from a research firm called International Data Corporation (IDC), world's tablet market is expected to see a noticeable decline this year. In particular, the experts claim the year-over-year growth will be equal to only 7.2%, down from 52.5% in the last year. In general, world's tablet sales in 2014 will account for 235.7 units shipped.
Release of New iPhones Caused Noticeable Increase in App Downloads
According to the results of the latest research conducted by a marketing firm called Fiksu, the release of both iPhone 6 and iPhone 6 Plus caused a substantial increase in app downloads in October. As noted in the latest report prepared by company's analysts, the number of downloads managed to reach an enormous figure of 7.8 million per day among the top 200 free iOS apps. I must admit, it is a truly impressive result for Apple's virtual marketplace.
Apple Looks for Virtual Reality Software Specialist
As you probably know, Apple is one of those companies that show interest in the development of virtual reality technologies. Over the past few years, the guys from Cupertino have filed a number of patents related to all kinds of virtual reality gear. Apple is an inventor of the 3-D viewing headset similar to the Oculus Rift, moreover, it possesses other technical documentation required for creation of virtual reality devices. But why haven't we seen any gadget from Apple so far? Let's find out.
Apple to Support (Product) RED Initiative This Year
According to the latest announcement made by Apple, the company will support the (Product) RED initiative this year. The guys from Cupertino promised to send a part of money they get from sales on Friday, November 28th and Monday, December 1st to the Global Fund to fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria. Moreover, they have already updated the App Store with a new (RED) category of apps. This category features 25 apps connected with the charity initiative. The money from selling these apps will be sent directly to the aforementioned fund.
Apple to Sell 71.5 Million iPhones in Holiday Quarter - Analyst
According to the latest report from Ming-Chi Kuo of KGI Securities, Apple will sell as many as 71.5 million iPhone 6 and iPhone 6 Plus units during the holiday quarter. The analyst believes that the 4.7-inch device will account for about 60% of sales. The larger 5.5-inch iPhone won't be as popular as the smaller one as the suppliers won't manage to catch up with the demand causing serious supply constraints.
Top 10 Stories of the Week
It is Sunday today, so you're probably waiting for our traditional roundup of the most interesting posts of the past seven days. Let's take a look at them right now.
Microsoft Releases New Cortana vs. Siri Ad
Microsoft has recently released another anti-Apple ad. This time it's a short clip featuring an iPhone 6 with Siri virtual assistant and a handset with Windows Phone 8.1 and Cortana on board. As you might have guessed, the guys from Redmond mock Apple's creation claiming their product is more efficient, functional and user-friendly.
Anyway, let's get back to the main topic. Today, Microsoft advertises Cortana's ability to create contextual reminders and traffic alerts based on the latest traffic data. Take a look at the video below and you'll understand what I mean.
Apple's A8 Chip Supports 4K Video Playback?
According to the latest reports from people familiar with the matter, the A8 chip found inside of Apple's latest iPhone 6 and iPhone 6 Plus is capable of playing 4K video. And that is rather strange, I must admit, as the aforementioned devices have a display resolution of "only" 1334 x 750 and 1920 x 1080 pixels respectively. The support of ultra high-definition video has been discovered by developers who created a popular Mac app called WALTR.
iOS 8.1.1 Slightly Improves Performance of iPhone 4S and iPad 2
As you probably know, after the release of iOS 8 back in September, many iPhone 4S users began reporting various performance issues. On Monday, Apple released iOS 8.1.1, which, according to the release notes, was expected to improve performance on older devices, namely, the iPhone 4S and the iPad 2. As noted by the researchers from Ars Technica, the latest version of Apple's mobile operating system does improve the stability and performance of the older handsets and tablets, however, only slightly. Moreover, average users are very unlikely to notice these improvements as nearly all the build-in apps still work slower than that of iOS 7.
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Apple Releases Glitchy OS X Yosemite 10.10.2 Beta to Developers
Apple has recently seeded the first beta of OS X Yosemite 10.10.2 to developers for testing. The release of this version of Apple's operating system for Macs comes just three days after the official public release of OS X 10.10.1 that contained stability and performance improvements as well as some bug fixes.
What is important about the latest beta is that it contains bugs, which cause constant crashes of Google Chrome browser as well as Retina iMac graphics issues. That is why I suggest that you shouldn't upgrade to this version, especially if you plan to install it on your main computer.
Apple to Integrate Beats Music in iOS?
iOS 8.1.1 Successfully Jailbroken [Video]
Good news for all the users of jailbroken iOS-devices, who don't want to lose their jailbreak after upgrading to iOS 8.1.1. iH8Sn0w and XanderKitteh have recently successfully jailbroken iOS 8.1.1 and posted the video of the process to YouTube. In a short video you may see an iPad running Cydia with untethered jailbreak.
38mm and 42mm Apple Watch to Get Different Screen Resolutions?
Immediately after the developers got access to iOS 8.2 with WatchKit SDK, they managed to find out what screen resolution the upcoming Apple Watch will get. Though the guys from Cupertino announced their long-anticipated wearable device in September, they somehow forgot to tell us about such an important parameter.