iOS devices refer to any of Apple’s hardware that runs the iOS mobile operating system which include iPhones, iPads, and iPods. Historically, Apple releases a new iOS version once a year, the current version is iOS 10. Here is the complete list of iOS 10 compatible devices.
Google today made its QuickOffice suite for both iOS and Android free to use with a Google Account. QuickOffice is a cross-platform document editor that can manage and edit Microsoft Office documents. The app is downloadable for free on both iTunes and Google play for no charge. Better yet, Google says that those who login to the updated app by September 26th will receive a 10GB storage boost in Google Drive for the next two years.
Apple launched iOS 7 yesterday, and while adoption rates are soaring, some users are less-than-thrilled with the new look and feel of their phones. Typically Apple doesn’t allow iOS to be downgraded to previous versions, but at the time of this writing disgruntled users are still able to go back to the leather and green felt they know and love.
Just how do you accomplish this? Keep reading for a full walkthrough.
If you are a a developer and want to cross platform your game play, Amazon today announced that it had made its (not a copy of GameCenter) GameCircle available to iOS developers.
Amazon GameCircle and Whispersync for Games is live on iOS and Android! You can store game data in the AWS Cloud so players don’t lose their game progress, high scores, or achievements when switching between devices. We know programming for multiple platforms is standard practice for many developers—iOS support has been a frequent feature request—so we’re excited to make GameCircle available on a whole new class of devices. GameCircle and Whispersync are free for you and your players. Plus, when you integrate GameCircle achievements, you automatically get access to Achievement Reports as well. These reports help you get a better understanding of how players interact with your game so you can make sure they’re having a great experience.
While the iPhone 5c will begin selling in stores tomorrow starting at $99 on contract through most retailers, we’ve just learned that Target will be matching the $79 offer that Walmart recently announced for preorders of the iPhone 5c. It will also throw in an extra 5% off for those with a Target REDcard.
Target will begin selling the iPhone 5s in its stores tomorrow as well (as will Apple and many other retail stores), but it doesn’t seem to be matching the $189 offer Walmart announced for that device.
Preorders for the $79 iPhone 5c are available starting today through Target Mobile centers. Like Walmart, it will still be charging the full $199 for the 32GB model of the 5c. Expand Expanding Close
Yesterday, Apple released iOS 7 for the iPhone, iPad, and iPod touch. The major update, which includes 200 new features and a completely new interface aesthetic, not only effects Apple’s operating system, but it has a profound connection to the hundreds of thousands of apps available on the App Store. Since yesterday, we’ve been posting in-depth looks at the new operating system, how-to posts, and reviews & previews of new applications that fit the design of iOS 7:
In the UK, the iPhone 5s has just gone on sale. Shipping estimates stand at 7-10 days. At the time of writing, all models are expected to be delivered in the first week of October.
The iPhone 5s has just gone on sale in Australia. However, as has been noted several times, supply of the 5s is extremely constrained. As a result, Apple is already quoting 7-10 day shipping estimates for the device. The prolonged availability applies to all models and all colors. 5s cases are similarly low in supply, to a similar extent, quoting 3-5 day shipping times.
Supply issues seem to apply to all countries. In the UK, O2 has announced that they will have no 5s’ in stock, but will order it for when it becomes available. Via CZ on Twitter, for the Apple Store in Hong Kong, the 5s has already lapsed into October for shipping.
@markgurman if you check HK apple online store. 5s available to ship in October
With Australia, alongside other countries in Asia included in the initial September 20 iPhone launch, the first to get their hands on the iPhone 5s and iPhone 5c, a repair company in the country has just posted the first teardown of the two new iPhones. The iExperts Team out of Australia has taken apart both devices, revealing new components but not yet giving us a look at what we expect will be a Samsung made A7 chip.
The first thing noticed in the teardown was a new connector for the TouchID fingerprint sensor assembly. Lining up with leaks leading up to the launch of the iPhones, it also found a 5.92Whr battery in the 5s (up from 5.45Whr in the iPhone 5), and a 5.73Whr battery in the iPhone 5c. Internal layouts for the two new iPhones also seem to line up with part leaks we seen in recent months. Interestingly, the site notes that the batteries are stamped with “Apple Japan.”
Many of the teardown shots below also include an iPhone 5 next to the 5s and 5c for comparison.
iExperts notes that Apple has fixed an issue from previous generation devices by adding an extra coating to switches “that should help hold them together to prevent the failures prevalent in the other models.”
We don’t learn much more from the teardown, which is likely still in progress as the site analyzes new internal components, but we’ll be learning a lot more as others pry into their new iPhones in the hours ahead. The teardown also gives us a good look at Apple’s new home button/fingerprint assembly: Expand Expanding Close
In iOS 7, Apple has made it easier for parents to find great age-appropriate, kid-friendly educational apps by gathering them all in one location. It’s currently being featured on the Featured page. Also you can find it by pressing on the blue word Categories in the upper left hand corner of the screen and then scroll down until you see Kids or click here. (ages 5 & under, ages 6-8 and ages 9-11).
By pressing on the Kids category the apps are split up based off the kids age. They have sections for ages 5 & under, ages 6-8 and ages 9-11.
There are even categories that cover key learning concepts like creating, shapes, colors, discovering the world, reading, music, and interactive books. To see them all, just swipe right to left on the boxes to view them all.
So parents, the next time you give your device to your children, you can now have them play with apps that are truly developed with them in mind and that are educational!
30 percent of iOS users upgraded to iOS 7 in the first 16 hours, according to data from tracking company Mixpanel. As we fanboys love to do, compare with the Carrier-controlled Android ecosystem where you have to go back to last year’s Android 4.1 to find numbers close to that:
Earlier this week, we noted that Apple has begun allowing users on older versions of iOS to download older versions of their previously purchased apps. This feature exists because some iOS users are running hardware that no longer supports newer versions of App Store applications. At launch, this feature was auto-activated for all developers, and these developers were not able to manage what users on older hardware could download. Now, Apple has informed developers that they could manage the availability of their legacy software:
KGI analyst Mingchi Kuo has released his estimates for iPhone sales over the launch weekend. The forecast is set at between 6 – 8 million units, accounting for both the 5c and the 5s. Apple opted not to report preorder sales figures for the 5c, leading some to speculate that demand for the device is weak. Kuo’s guidance does not seem to reflect this as an issue, however.
In 2012, the iPhone 5 shipped 5 million units across its launch weekend. If Apple hit the upper limit of Kuo’s forecast, 8 million units, that would result in sales growth of about 60%.
However, Kuo warns that supply is likely going to be a limiting factor in the near term. Kuo expects the available supply to skew heavily in the 5c’s favour, with only about a third of total supply in the launch period being 5s units. For the holiday quarter, Kuo says supply constraints will loosen to enable Apple to report record shipments of 55 million iPhones in fiscal Q4.
Alongside the launch of iOS 7, Apple has raised the limit for an application file size that could be downloaded over a cellular network via the App Store. The new limit is 100MB, and that is double the previous limit of 50MB (via MacRumors). Back in 2008, the App Store launched with a 10MB cap, but as iOS devices gained new features such as 3G, LTE, and Retina Displays, Apple has been raising the limits. It seems likely that the limit was raised due to the influx of new app designs that Apple is expecting to be rolled out in the coming weeks.
With Apple utilizing a new laser cut sapphire crystal in its redesigned home button that now includes a capacitive fingerprint touch sensor on the iPhone 5s, it’s not that surprising that rumors of a sapphire home button on future iPads are starting to pop up. We’re certainly not taking this one as fact, as it comes to us from the not-so-reliable DigiTimes, but a new report from the publication says new models of Apple’s full-sized iPad and iPad mini will also utilize the hard sapphire crystal material. The rumor apparently comes from “Taiwan-based sapphire makers.”
The report adds that Apple could also be looking to utilize the material for entire touch screen covers for new iPhones coming in 2014, but that price could be a factor, as sapphire crystal is reportedly still around 5 times more expensive than alternative materials.
In it’s latest promotional video for the new iPhone 5s home button and TouchID feature (below), Apple says the Sapphire crystal button protects the the new touch sensor and also “acts as a lens to precisely focus it on your finger.”
Ahead of iOS 7’s release later today, Apple has published iOS 7 user guides on the iBookstore. At the moment, guides are only available for the iPad and iPod touch but a book targeted at the iPhone will likely follow. As is to be expected, both books are offered as a free download.
In essence, they are ebook versions of Apple’s downloadable PDF manuals, featuring setup, troubleshooting and other instructions for the device and the OS. Apple has offered user guides on the iBookstore ever since its inception in 2010, starting with the original iPad.
French site NWE has a photo of what it believes to be a Space Gray casing for the iPad Mini expected to be announced next month – on 15th October, according to another French site.
NWE has a decent track-record in leaked parts, and it seems likely that Apple would adopt the same colors for the new iPads as for the iPhone 5s. If you were wondering what the iPad Mini might look like in Apple’s new champagne color, Martin Hajek has created some renders. I’m not taken with the look myself – let us know your thoughts in the comments.
The American Customer Satisfaction Index saw Apple take the top spot in the personal computers category for the 10th year running, with its score of 87 a full eight points higher than the industry average. Apple, which scored one point higher than last year, has topped the ranking since 2004.
The ACSI includes tablets in its ‘PC’ category, so the scores reflect both Mac and iPad. Factors feeding into the scores include customer expectations pre-sale, perceived quality, perceived value, customer complaint incidents and customer loyalty.
The iPhone took the top slot in the JD Power customer satisfaction survey for the ninth consecutive time back in March, and both iPhone and iPad even managed to beat Samsung on its home turf of South Korea.
If you use Chrome on your iPhone or iPad, and you’re not running the latest version, you may want to update it. Google has started inviting selected users to enable the data-compression feature it first launched on Android back in March.
For an average web page, over 60% of the transferred bytes are images. The proxy optimizes and transcodes all images to the WebP format, which requires fewer bytes than other popular formats, such as JPEG and PNG. The proxy also performs intelligent compression and minification of HTML, JavaScript and CSS resources, which removes unnecessary whitespace, comments, and other metadata which are not essential to render the page. These optimizations, combined with mandatory gzip compression for all resources, can result in substantial bandwidth savings.
Or, in less technical terms, Chrome strips out everything not needed to display webpages properly, so you get the same experience but with up to 50% less data usage. For those who do a lot of browsing on 3G/4G, that can make a big difference to your monthly data bill.
So far, only a relatively small number of users appear to have been invited to participate, but that number is likely to grow over the next few weeks.
Morgan Stanley is estimating that iPhone sales for Q3 (Apple’s fiscal Q4) will hit 34.5M, 28 percent higher than the 26.9M sold in the same quarter last year, reports Fortune.
Apple had only just begun taking iPhone 5C pre-orders Sunday when Morgan Stanley’s AlphaWise Smartphone Tracker closed the books on Q3 2013, but the survey had already registered a bump in buyer interest in the company’s line of smartphones … Expand Expanding Close
On the eve of iOS 7’s release, as iPhone and iPad users eagerly prepare their devices to receive the latest software, tech publications across the web have began releasing their reviews of the totally redesigned operating system from Cupertino.
iOS 7 is a complete overhaul of the system, throwing out just about every visual element from previous iterations and building on a new system of whitespace, transparency, and motion. The beta release was met with mixed reviews from users ranging from utter delight to sheer horror. After six betas over the past three months, Apple has made more than a few changes to the original design; but is it enough to win over critics? Keep reading to find out in our iOS 7 review round-up.
Apple announced last week that Burberry would be capturing its London fashion show that took place yesterday entirely with its new iPhone 5s, and today Burberry has posted the full video of the event. There’s no mention whether or not the full 15 minute long video above has been retouched after being shot on the iPhone, but Apple and Burberry say the entire show, including photos and video, was “shot exclusively on iPhone 5s.”
We’ve seen a few shots leak throughout the week already, but Pocket-Lint has an inside look at how Burberry’s photographers shot the show using 14 different iPhones and an interview with Burberry’s creative director Christopher Bailey: Expand Expanding Close
Apple has announced that iOS 7 will be available tomorrow, September 18th. Before installing the update, it is recommended that you have a backup of your data. This how-to is going to walk you through backing up your iOS 6 device and transitioning it over to iOS 7:
At the time of writing, only the 16 GB ‘space grey’ SKU’s remain available for reservation. All other models have sold out and are “currently unavailable” according to the online store. Sina reported on the phenomenon, noting that the gold model, in particular, was in high demand… Expand Expanding Close
Touch ID is far, far more important than most people have realised – the core message behind a Quora post by the CEO of a card payment service. We can expect to learn far more “in the next few months, and that’s likely to eventually include both Touch ID Macs and use of the fingerprint system for mobile payments.
In the torrent of the billions of words already written about Touch ID very, very few people have really understood just how revolutionary this really is. Apple not only has developed one of the most accurate mass produced biometric security devices, they have also solved critical problems with how the data from this device will be encrypted, stored and secured.
Brian Roemmele, CEO of 1st American Card Service, said that Apple’s attempt to solve the problem of how to develop a truly secure access system goes all the way back to a patent application in 2008, but it was only through the A7 chip – specifically created by ARM with mobile payment security in mind – that the company finally had a gold-standard solution. And its applications will go far beyond iPhone unlock and iTunes purchases … Expand Expanding Close
