Mark is an award-winning journalist who worked at 9to5Mac for over six years. He covers Apple and other topics related to the consumer technology industry.
Among the many changes in iOS 4.2 for iPad, Apple has apparently reduced the amount of power that the iPad’s 30-pin connector can emit from 100mA to 20mA. The good part about this is that your iPad’s battery will probably last longer but the downside is that Apple’s iPad Camera Connection Kit is crippled for many people. The Apple iPad Camera Connection Kit includes two adapters: 1 USB connector and 1 SD card reader.
The core issue is that connected devices that require power of more than 20mA will no longer work. That means that many USB keyboards (Apple’s included) as well as USB flash drives will no longer work with the iPad. When the user connects a device that is not self-powered and requires more than 20mA of power from the iPad they get the following alert: “The connected USB device requires too much power.”
This problem not only pertains to camera-related devices but also is an issue for microphones. USB microphones were compatible with the iPad running iOS 3.2.2 but now some of them apparently use more than 20mA of the iPad’s power. Although many users are unhappy that they cannot use many of their USB flash drives, USB keyboards, or USB microphones anymore, users are even angrier that many of their USB cameras no longer work with the iPad.
The Apple iPad Camera Connection Kit’s USB adapter was built so users with USB cameras could plug their cameras in via USB on the go. Now they cannot anymore as most USB cameras require too much power from the iPad. This issue is unpleasant for photographers relying on the iPad to import and upload their photos on the fly. It is unknown whether or not this is simply a bug in iOS 4.2 but we do hope that it is and that Apple will fix it in an upcoming software update. To summarize, the iPad Camera Connection Kit no longer works with non-self powered devices.
Back in 2009, we reported that Apple was working on a Radio app for the iPhone. Today Patently Applereports that Apple has patented a Radio.app. As you can see in the image above, the iPhone mockup on the right is displaying your traditional radio app with presets and song info. The image on the left is where things get interesting. The iPhone on the left is displaying a map with your location along with all the nearby radio towers.
This patented radio feature would be very helpful for people driving around and looking for the best possible radio signals. The radio signal strength is symbolized by the half circles above the radio towers, similarly to the AirPort signal strength indicators on Apple’s iOS devices and Macs. If Apple’s patent actually comes to life this will be extremely useful for people constantly searching for strong radio strength. Then again most of what Apple patents never sees the light of day — or Apple’s labs for that matter.
Many iPad keyboard cases have hit the market in recent weeks and we finally got our hands on ZAGG’s ZAGGMate iPad keyboard case for review… and it’s awesome. The ZAGGMate is an iPad keyboard accessory at heart but doubles as a case. The case aspect of the ZAGGMate is not fantastic but the keyboard part may just be the best third-party implementation we’ve seen. Check out our review after the break:
SBRotator, a new jailbreak-only tweak, was just released and it brings landscape homescreens to the iPhone in addition to a feature that makes all apps work in landscape. The tweak is fully customizable so you can arrange your homescreen apps any way you like, and it is fully compatible with Apple’s latest iOS devices. The tweak is available on the Cydia store and check out the video above to see it in action. Full feature list after the break courtesy of iSpazio:
Radio Shack has announced that starting tomorrow through December 11th they will be selling all iPhone models at a $50 discount. Radio Shack carries the 16 GB and 32 GB iPhone 4 as well as the 8 GB $99 iPhone 3GS. The discounted prices are:
Radio Shack will also be giving users $75 of credit for an iPhone 3G and $125 in credit for an iPhone 3GS in their “Trade and Save” program. The device needs to be in working condition and cannot be jailbroken, unlocked, etc. These are fantastic deals for anyone in the market for a new iPhone and is looking to save some money.
According to the LA Times the iPhone now accounts for just under a quarter of all business smart phones with 23% of the market. This compares to BlackBerry’s 51% of the market. Business phones, in this report, are considered phones deployed by companies that are at least partially paid for by the company.
Notably, this 23% does not include people who own the iPhone as a personal device and use it as a business phone as well. Steve Jobs noted at Apple’s October financial call that iPhone sales passed BlackBerry sales by 2 million for the quarter with 14 million iPhone sales and 12 million BlackBerry sales.
Apple has informed Mac Developers that demo, trial, and beta versions of software will not be permitted on the upcoming Mac App Store. Apple will only be accepting fully functional, retail versions of applications. Unlike with the iOS App Store, Apple is encouraging developers who wish to provide demos, trials, and betas to post them as files on their own personal websites.
Your website is the best place to provide demos, trial versions, or betas of your software for customers to explore. The apps you submit to be reviewed for the Mac App Store should be fully functional, retail versions of your apps.
If you’re interested in throwing your bucks down on one of those fancy new 4G modems from Verizon you better check that the computer you’re rocking is a PC. According to All Things DVerizon’s new 4G modem sticks will only work with Windows PCs. Specifically your PC will need to be running Windows XP, Vista, or 7. According to a Verizon Wireless representative Mac drivers for the 4G modems will be available “in the near future.”
Although NBC was rumored to be included in Apple’s new $0.99 TV show initiative, they ended up dropping out and to this day you cannot rent NBC TV shows on iTunes. Now it appears that Apple and NBC may have reached an agreement and $0.99 NBC TV show rentals will be coming to iTunes. The information comes from a screenshot we’ve discovered by digging around the iTunes website. As you can see in the image above, the TV show listing for The Office has $0.99 rental buttons next to the usual $2.99 buy buttons.
In a blog post today Nokia Siemens claims that Apple’s latest smart phone operating system supports a technology called Network Controlled Fast Dormancy. This new technology brings the iPhone and its’ network together to create the most ideal performance. This means the iPhone’s software can work with the cellular towers to find ones with the least amount of congestion. In the end this technology allows the iPhone to run more efficiently and last longer throughout the day.
Nokia Siemens’ networks are one of the first to support this technology and it is interesting to note that they made the discovery through their own in-house testing. This technology being in iOS 4.2 does not appear to be a result of a collaboration between Nokia Siemens and Apple. In terms of actual battery life stats on this new technology their tests in the Middle East showed a battery life increase from 6 to 11 hours on an unnamed smartphone.
Apple today finally let the iPad loose in Taiwan and it starts at NT $16,500. The iPad is not available at Taiwan’s online Apple Store but it is available at Taiwan’s fine Apple-certified retailers. It also hits the ground today on Samsung’s home turf of South Korea.
Moving from Asia to Europe, the iPad will launch in the Nordic nations tomorrow: Denmark, Sweden, Norway, and Finland. As of this writing the iPad has hit Denmark’s online Apple Store but is yet to hit the others. It also hits Portugal, Hungary, Poland and Czech Republic too. Be sure to send in your iPad launch expieriences to tips@9to5mac.com or the comments below.
Back in late October we reported that PhotoFast began producing 256GB SSD upgrade kits for Apple’s latest MacBook Air lineup. PhotoFast’s third-party SSD upgrade for the new MacBook Airs read and write at 250MB/s while Apple’s included SSD runs at between 150MB/s and 160MB/s. Now, according to a source close to the company, Apple contacted PhotoFast last week and had them stop all production of their new MacBook Air SSD upgrades.
PhotoFast is complying with Apple’s request for them to stop production of the product and one of the leading reasons for this is because PhotoFast is in Apple’s MFi program. This means they are licensed by Apple to create accessories for Apple products (they don’t want to lose the license). There is still a chance that production will resume by PhotoFast is holding back until they get the thumbs up from Apple. This is not the first time Apple has asked a company to cease sale of products. Two recent high profile incidents have involved the Meizu iPhone lookalike and the HyperMac Apple notebook chargers.
Oliver Sanche (center), the man in charge of all things related to data centers for Apple, passed away last Thursday from a heart attack. Sanche was heading Apple’s soon-launching North Carolina data center and it is sad that he’ll be missing the opening. Sanche joined Apple from eBay in late 2009 where he used to lead data center projects as well. At the time this was said about Sanche:
“There is no other person I can think of who could better prepare Apple for Greening the Data Center. Olivier is one of the few data center managers who uses a Mac, and he craves the moment he can drop the blackberry and switch to the iPhone.”
According to a purported Apple employee, Apple is expanding its European presence with a significant increase in new job opportunities in the coming months. Specifically, this employee claims that Apple will be hiring 500+ new staffers for their Cork, Ireland corporate headquarters. Multiple job listings have showed up for the Cork, Ireland center in Apple’s jobs database as well as several more in a local jobs database.
The job listings vary from internships to finance positions to iOS engineers who are bi- and tri-lingual. Apple is expanding its Cupertino HQ and it looks like a few more office spaces will be required in Europe as well.
When hidden AirPlay APIs and AirPlay enhancements from Cydia came to life just days ago we knew the party was just getting started. A 9to5mac reader managed to stream live TV from his iPad to his Apple TV via a modified version of AirPlay (video above). Cool stuff and we’re sure this is just the beginning.
In other news the same upcoming web browser for the Apple TV we showed you recently has a new walkthrough video (below) this time demonstrating HTML 5 video playing functionality on the second-generation Apple TV.
Apple has just posted their Black Friday deals for the United States and it looks like everything must go! iMacs, MacBook Pros, and MacBook Airs are $101 off, iPod nanos are $11 off and new iPod touches are discounted by $21. And the product that most people will be digging, the iPad, is $41 off starting at $459 for the 16 GB WiFi model.
Last night we received confirmation that Apple would in fact be updating their iBooks application to support better organization and printing and emailing of PDF’s. Well today we received screenshots of the new iBooks for iPad and iPhone/iPod touch displaying the ‘Collections’ function. iPhone version after the break:
AirPrint is currently Mac only and works exclusively with a few HP printers. For Mac users without one of those fancy AirPrint-compatibile printers there’s a fantastic Mac application called Printopia but what about Windows? For Windows husers who want AirPrint to work with their computer there is a new tool called ‘AirPrint Activator.’
The tool works on both 32-bit and 64-bit Windows machines and all setup requires is three easy steps. The steps are in German but here’s our English version via (translated)Macerkopf:
Just download the one-click tool, install and activate AirPrint for Windows 32bit or 64bit. Then you have to have the printer in System Preferences (printer properties) to share. Already, all printer under Windows 32-bit or Windows 64-bit for IOS 4.2.1 and AirPrint available. Please note Step 3: AirPrint.exe must be enabled in Windows Firewall.
Oh, and you want to download it? Here. Let us know in the comments how it goes for you.
Update: We’ve received screenshots of the new iBooks update with ‘Collections.’ Check them out and read the details below:
Just yesterday we reported that Steve Jobs informed a customer that better iBooks management would be ‘coming’ and today we got our hands on the details. First of all folders are indeed coming to iBooks for iOS and are similar to the folders on the iOS 4 homescreen. Users will be able to create their own ‘Collections’ which they can call whatever they like.
There will be two default collections: Book and PDF’s. If you look in your iBooks app right now you will notice that these two collections already exist. The new ‘collections’ feature lets you create your own lists that hold books and PDF’s. You can even move the collections and the items in them around.
From looking at these Apple documents it appears that collections will be a button you tap on the iBooks toolbar that brings up a list of all your collections but it also appears there will be ‘collections’ actually sitting on your bookshelf.
Also, you will now be able to take PDF’s you have stored in iBooks and e-mail them off to whomever you would like. Printing PDF’s via AirPrint will also come in this update which should be handy for many users. Apple will also be very clear to say that the printing and e-mailing of actual books is not happening.
No word on when iBooks will be getting these new features but they should be coming very soon. Apple’s document regarding the new features is after the break:
NoMute, a jailbreak only application, switches the controversial mute switch from iPad 4.2 into its former (and more useful) orientation lock. The plugin is free and you can get it from the BigBoss repository on Cydia.
According to Yahoo Richard Branson, Virgin Atlantic, Virgin Mobile etc., will be launching an iPad-only newspaper/magazine next week called “Project.” Project will include sections pertaining to entertainment, travel, business, design, and international culture. Branson’s announcement comes only days after News Corp.’s news about their tablet-only newspaper The Daily. Branson will be holding a press conference soon to announce full details.
When Steve Jobs announced AirPrint back on that day in early September excitement rang as iOS users finally got the ability to print from their device. Then as a few weeks passed and we learned that this was not the case. AirPrint only works on a few select HP printers which leaves most of us in the dark for one of the slickest features in iOS 4.2. Well, that is where Printopia comes in.
Printopia is by far the best piece of software you can get right now for your Mac if you have an AirPrint-capable iOS device. In short, Printopia allows any iOS user with an AirPrint-capable device to print. Installation is a snap. Simply download the software (which does not mess with your file system!), click and install, and you’re done. Expand Expanding Close
Billboardreports that Apple has informed them that 2 million individual Beatles songs have been sold since their recent iTunes launch. Additionally, 450,000 whole albums were downloaded by customers on iTunes. Here Comes the Sun, which has been the top ranking Beatles song on iTunes as long as we can remember, is the most sold individual track and Abbey Road is the best selling album.
Surely Apple’s full-blown hype and advertising campaign for The Beatles on iTunes is helping out and from the looks of things, The Beatles numbers are still rising with more and more tracks reaching the top 200 iTunes rankings.
Apple today announced that they will in fact be having a Black Friday sale this Friday, November 26th. Apple won’t be announcing what is on sale or the sale pricing until Friday but you can drool over the latest Apple gear until then.
Come back to the Apple Online Store this Friday for a special one-day-only shopping event. You’ll find dozens of great iPad, iPhone, iPod and Mac gifts for everyone on your list. Mark your calendars now. And until then, get started by browsing the Apple Online Store for great ideas.
By the way, we’ll be posting Apple related deals all day on Black Friday and through to Cyber Monday both on the home page and in the Toys section.
