What’s most interesting about these fake iPhones is that they were made from real iPhone parts. The assumption is that the companies that made supplies for Apple would make additional parts and sell them to third parties who would somehow assemble a Frankenstein of iPhone and non-iPhone parts together and sell them at double the cost.
The cost to make one fake iPhone, which used some genuine parts, was around 2,000 yuan ($313). It was sold on unauthorized markets and on the Internet for around 4,000 yuan, only a few hundred yuan cheaper than the real iPhone, the newspaper said.
The fake iPhones had the same functions as the genuine ones but had a shorter battery life, it quoted the police as saying.
It would be interesting and surprising if they got iOS working on these. I’m guessing a flavor of Android with a iOS-like skin was used. Apple would have a big problem on their hands if iOS was being pirated.
Just like Verizon, T-Mobile has chosen to side with Samsung in its fight against Apple reportsFoss Patents. T-Mobile’s reason, in response to a preliminary injunction proposed by Apple, is that they don’t want key 4G devices to be banned for the holiday season. And since it doesn’t look like T-Mobile is getting the iPhone anytime soon, Samsung’s 4G phones could be a big part of their sales. Check out T-Mobile’s response below:
This probably isn’t real, but we’re posting it for discussion. Found on a Chinese forum, source is unknown but we gave it to someone who is running it by some higher ups for clarification. Video of iPhone 5 prototype with double GPU rainbows below:
Well known iOS accessory maker Griffin Technology just announced the TechSafe Case for iPad 2, a protective polycarbonate case equipped with a 4-digit combination-lock and cable system for tethering the device to an anchor point.
“The TechSafe Case is the ideal solution to protect your iPad 2 while on the go,” said Matt Brown, Director of Category Management at Griffin Technology. “It takes only a few seconds to lock down your iPad, and it removes any opportunity for theft.”
Much like the Kensington SecureBack Security Cases we told you about a couple weeks back, the TechSafe Case is of course best suited for schools, offices, and other public settings where potential theft or damage is a concern. The design is a little more subtle than the SecureBack case, and at first glance seems like it would be more secure.
The case also has the typical foldout stands, one for “typing and tapping”, and the other for viewing content in landscape orientation. You also have easy access to the 30-pin connector, volume rocker, and power and home buttons. Griffin will even store your 4-digit code on their website in case you forget it.
The iPad application Take One – Movie Clapper is a great solution for anyone into film or making movies that wants a cheap and simple way to keep track takes, which assists in keeping filmed video and audio in synchronization. The major difference between Take One and its competitors is price and ease of use. Take One costs $2.99, compared to its $9.99 and $24.99 competitors – but offers an easy-to-use solution and all the necessary features one would expect from a Movie Clapper.
As Apple’s October 4th event approaches, two of Apple’s announcements have been revealed in Apple’s internal inventory system. The first is a new iPod touch. Three new iPod touch models have appeared in the system with the codename N81A. N81 is the codename for the fourth-generation black iPod touch, so the A likely represents the string of the three new white models. A device that we first revealed proof of plans for with a white fourth generation iPod touch front-plate. Since there are only three new iPod touch models – at this time – it’s likely that the black models won’t be updated. This also likely means the storage capacities will stay at their current 8GB, 32GB, and 64GB capacities.
Even more interesting are the two new iPhone SKUs that have showed up in the system. The catch is that these two SKUs are actually marked as tweaked iPhone 4s. The new device’s codename is N90A and this represents very minor changes from the iPhone 4 – which is the N90. In fact, this may be an iPhone 4 – an 8GB version as previously rumored. It is very possible that the two SKUs mean black and white models, but that is unconfirmed. We don’t think Apple’s next-generation iPhone – coming next week- would be labeled as an N90A – as it includes major internal hardware upgrades that would typically constitute a new codename. Additionally, the iPhone codename of N94 has appeared in the iOS SDK on numerous occasions.
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jUtmOApIslE]
Kinda neat. The voiceover quotes French writer François-Marie Arouet Voltaire.
The instruction we find in books is like fire. We fetch it from our neighbors, kindle it at home, communicate it to others, and it becomes property of all.
And then, Amazon adds its own cheesy part: From Kindle, the Fire is born. Talk about pun intended.
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_u7F_56WhHk]
Amazon has just unveiled at a press conference in New York its inaugural seven-inch tablet and a new family of Kindle e-readers that now include the $99 Kindle Touch and the low-priced regular Kindle which retails for just $99. Seth Weintraub is on the scene and the latest information includes the news that Amazon will be rolling out its own brand new browser for the Fire tablet, named Silk.
The company set up a new blog for the Silk team and their first blog post explains that Silk is “an all-new web browser powered by Amazon Web Services (AWS) and available exclusively on the just announced Kindle Fire”. It appears Silk is using WebKit rendering engine and leveraging Google’s SPDY on the network protocol layer. According to a promo clip included above, a “split browser” architecture (kinda similar to Opera’s Turbo mode) taps the Amazon cloud which caches files (limitless caching) and does the heavy-lifting, depending on workload. It’s a smart approach which offload page rendering to Amazon Web Services, resulting in faster page load times. And here’s what’s so smart about it, according to the Silk team:
While the new Kindle Fire tablet failed to impress folks who were hoping for an iPad killer, the $79 regular Kindle has gotten us excited because this thing is now within grasp of an average consumer and if history is an indication, sales should grow at an exponential rate. Conveniently, Amazon has a new television commercial to push the $79 Kindle into mainstream. Clearly they want you to view the device as the perfect holiday gift. The new inexpensive Kindle is available today. Its touch-based counterpart named the Kindle Touch is arriving in time for Thanksgiving, priced at $99/$149 for Wi-Fi/3G variant.
A study today from independent ad network InMobi gives us insight into the number of smartphone users currently planning on buying the new iPhone 5. The report claims 41% of current mobile users in the U.S., Canada, and Mexico plan on making the upgrade, this in comparison to Nielson’slatest numbers which as of August put Apple at 28% of the U.S. market.
We know the introduction of a new iPhone next week will eventually begin to sway the numbers in Apple’s favor. InMobi’s study shows 50% of the 41% of users planning on making the upgrade will do so in the first six months following launch.
The report does provide numbers if Apple were to only introduce an iPhone 4S upgrade (akin to the 3GS). In this scenario, the study finds only 15% of mobile users plan on making the switch.
Of those interested in making the jump to an iPhone 5, the study found 52% of BlackBerry users, 51% of current iPhone users, and 27% of Android users, plan on upgrading. When it comes to an incremental iPhone 4S upgrade, 28% of BlackBerry owners still intend on making the purchase. Expand Expanding Close
In addition to the new Kindle Fire tablet, Amazon has also re-shuffled their Kindle offering at a New York event this morning. Our Seth Wientraub is on the scene and has the latest info. Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos has just unveiled a brand new e-reader with a touchscreen. The device is aptly named the Kindle Touch and costs just $99 for the Wi-Fi-only version or $149 if you want to use it over 3G cellular networks. There is no physical keyboard on the Kindle Touch as it uses the all-touch approach and relies on typing on the virtual keyboard instead which pops up when needed.
They are shipping it November 21, right before Thanksgiving, and taking pre-orders today. Perhaps more important than that is the news that the regular Kindle now costs just eighty bucks. Yeah, you read that right. Plus, they are shipping the $79 Kindle today.
Just as Amazon’s media event begins in New York, serving as a launchpad for their inaugural tablet, Bloomberg spoils the announcement by publishing key pieces of information about the device. It will be called the Kindle Fire, as rumored, and will cost just $199, which is a pretty big deal.
The tablet is powered by a dual-core processor, has a seven-inch color display which responds to touch (just two fingers at once, though) and a “fresh and easy user interface” running on a forked Android version. You can read e-books on it, listen to music, watch movies and play games available for download through the Amazon Appstore for Android. Meanwhile, our own Seth Weintraub is on the scene in New York at Amazon’s press conference and here’s what he was able to glean from Amazon’s announcement…
A biggie: The device will come with a 60-day free trial of Amazon Prime (a $79 a year value) membership and pre-registered with your Amazon account, so you can literally use it right out of the box. Bad news: It has no cameras – not even a microphone. Heck, it even lacks 3G access so looks like the Fire will be a Wi-Fi affair only. The Kindle Fire is available at Amazon’s newly published Fire page and over at amazon.com/kindlefire. November 15 can’t come soon enough.
As for competition, check out this side-by-side specs comparison of Amazon’s Fire, Apple’s iPad 2 and Barnes & Noble’s Nook Color, courtesy ofThe Verge.
That, plus this bit from the Bloomberg article:
Chief Executive Officer Jeff Bezos is betting he can leverage Amazon’s dominance in e-commerce to pose a real challenge to Apple’s iPad, after tablets from rivals such as Hewlett-Packard Co. and Research In Motion Ltd. have fallen short. Sales of Amazon’s electronic books, movies and music on the device may help make up for the narrower profit margins that are likely to result from the low price, said Brian Blair, an analyst at Wedge Partners Corp. in New York.
The analyst observes what all of us have known for a long time, that the Seattle-based online retailer has the most compelling ecosystem to take on Apple’s iTunes juggernaut. His quote plus three more Fire shots after the break.
The wizards over at iFixit tore down the new 27-inch Apple Thunderbolt Display which has two Thunderbolt ports that let you hook up the display to a Thunderbolt-equipped Mac and have the display’s USB, FireWire and Gigabit Ethernet ports at disposal, all via a single $49 Thunderbolt cable. iFixit “were struck” by the Thunderbolt Display’s ease of disassembly. Inside, they found a lot of chips that support a plethora of ports on the back.
The display is the same model number LM270WQ1 by LG Display as found in the iMac Intel 27″ from October of 2009. A thing of note: The display rocks a 49 Watt 2-speaker sound system, including a miniature subwoofer, while a Flextronics power supply provides 250 watts of maximum continuous power. As for the panel, it’s basically the same as in Dell’s competing 27-incher (UltraSharp U2711), sans LED backlights and matte coating.
Unlike the Dell display’s 6 ms response time, Apple’s display has twice as much. There is also “a large, brushless fan to keep the colossal Thunderbolt Display cool and quiet”. Apple also engineered a solution that prevents the Thunderbolt cable from being detached from the logic board’s Thunderbolt socket, as seen in the below image. “Interestingly enough, the Thunderbolt cable that routes into the display also plugs into a standard Thunderbolt socket on the logic board”, iFixit explains. The most impressive aspect of the display has got to be the logic board full of chips. More information after the break.
Microsoft just announced a cross-licensing agreement with Samsung. Akin to their patent deals with other Android backers, this one will have Samsung pay per-device royalties for mobile phones and tablets running Android. Microsoft has in total eight cross-licensing agreements with Android backers Acer, General Dynamics Itronix, Onkyo, Velocity Micro, ViewSonic, Wistron, HTC and Samsung.
Microsoft explained in a blog post that the agreement “gives both companies greater patent coverage relating to each other’s technologies, and opens the door to a deeper partnership in the development of new phones for the Windows Phone platform”.
Did the software maker just say that Samsung will focus more on Windows Phone in the future? Per press release, Microsoft and Samsung “agreed to cooperate in the development and marketing of Windows Phone”. Could be just what Microsoft needs given their struggle to keep Nokia afloat. Patent expert Florian Mueller characterized the announcement on his FOSS Patents blog as “the most important Android-related intellectual property deal in its own right”, adding:
If Samsung truly believed that Google’s acquisition of Motorola Mobility was going to be helpful to the Android ecosystem at large, it would have waited until that deal is closed before concluding the license agreement with Microsoft. But Samsung probably knows it can’t rely on Google. It decided to address Android’s intellectual property issues on its own.
Samsung has circa 28,000 patents in the United States and more than 100,000 patents around the world. Curiously, Microsoft hasn’t targeted Apple’s iOS with its patents so far which leads us to believe that Oracle, Microsoft and Apple may be working together to derail Android or at least make it a pricey proposition for handset makers. Be that as it may, it is going to be interesting seeing how this Microsoft-Samsung patent protection affects the nine Apple vs. Samsung lawsuits in twenty countries around the world…
Apple, iPhone and iPod dominated the 2009 CoolBrands index, but this year the British luxury car maker Aston Martin topped the charts, reportedThe Telegraph. The votes came from the British public and a panel of influential opinion formers. True, coolness is subjective and personal, but it doesn’t hurt being described as cool (and Apple often is). Apple has been described in the CoolBrands results (PDF download) as “sleek, stylish design combined with powerful, groundbreaking technology make Apple’s unique products iconic must-haves around the world”.
As for Aston Martin:
Aston Martin combines three key elements – power, beauty and soul. Its sleek, polished and sexy cars ensure the brand continues to dominate the list of the nation’s coolest brands, as judged by experts and consumers alike.
For the first time, Apple, iPhone and iPod have been treated as one (no iPad?). Apple came in second, followed by…
UPDATE [Thursday, September 29, 2011 at 5:35am ET]: Based on numerous reports and tips from our readers, iTunes music as well as movie rentals and purchases are now available in these twelve European Union countries: Bulgaria, Cyprus, Czech Republic, Estonia, Hungary, Latvia, Lithuania, Malta, Poland, Romania, Slovakia and Slovenia.
Additionally, iBookstore is also live in 25 new EU countries (was only available in the U.S., UK, France, Germany, Australia and Canada before): Austria, Belgium, Bulgaria, Cyprus, Czech Republic, Denmark, Estonia, Finland, Greece, Hungary, Ireland, Italy, Latvia, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Malta, Netherlands, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Romania, Slovakia, Slovenia, Sweden and Switzerland.
Licensing complications and the fragmented European Union market have proved thus far too tough a nut to crack for Apple’s iTunes Store which lacks the presence in twelve of the 27 EU member countries. If Polish newspaper Rzeczpospolitais to be believed, things could change “soon” as Apple allegedly gears up to launch the iTunes Music Store in ten new countries in the European Union. This comes from “a person associated with the music industry”. Apple is “technically ready to take off” and another source hinted at an October launch.
The EU member states allegedly getting Apple’s music store include Poland, the Czech Republic and Hungary which have a combined population of 60 million. As for the other seven EU member states getting iTunes, it’s anyone’s guess, but it’s worth mentioning that the UE markets where iTunes does not operate include Bulgaria, Cyprus, Czech Republic, Estonia, Hungary, Latvia, Lithuania, Malta, Poland, Romania, Slovakia and Slovenia.
Perhaps Apple will announce the iTunes Music Store expansion at its iPhone-related event next Tuesday. Meanwhile, reader Juri tipped us that iTunes movie rentals have just gone online in Finland, as you can see in the below screenshot. The Finnish iTunes store has no specific category for movie rentals yet, but it is possible to use the search feature to find and rent flicks for €3.99 (€4.99 for HD rentals, €13.99 per SD purchase).
It also looks like Apple is prepping to launch its movie store in Scandinavia and another reader, Frederik, says movie rentals and purchases hit the iTunes Denmark store. OneMoreThing.nlalso spotted movies in the Dutch and Belgian iTunes Stores. Currently there are about 270 titles from 20th Century Fox, Universal and Buena Vista. Most movies are available for purchase or rent. No sign of TV shows yet. With that in mind, it’s easy to speculate that Apple TV may be showing up in those countries soon.
Just as Amazon’s media event begins in New York, serving as a launchpad for their inaugural tablet, Bloomberg spoils the announcement by 
