Posts tagged: New Product

The iWatch

iWatch mock up photo by Brett Jordan Via www.adr-studio.it/site/?p=269 is licensed under CC BY-SA 2.0

 

 

The iWatch! Could it finally be on it’s way onto our super deserving wrists? Well, we think so. We’re almost as sure as we can really ever really be with an Apple product release, especially a completely new product release. Here’s a bunch of stuff we think we know about the iWatch.

 

Way, way back in 2008, Apple co-founder  Steve Wozniak confirmed to the Telegraph that “Apple’s future could lie in an ‘iWatch’.”

 

Then, in the midst of a thousand iWatch rumors, Apple trademarked ‘iWatch’ in Japan, Mexico, Russia and a number of other countries.

 

Tim Cook has said this about wearable tech:

 

“I think the wrist is interesting. I’m wearing this (Nike Fuelband) on my wrist…it’s somewhat natural. But as I said before, I think for something to work here, you first have to convince people it’s so incredible that they want to wear it.”

 

So we know it’s coming, and we know it’s going to be incredible, which is pretty exciting.

 

The iWatch is rumored to be out this year. Definitely, probably, this year. We think it will be if not announced, at least hinted at during the WWDC in June, and if not, definitely revealed  in the Fall, and released later in the year or early 2015.

 

The idea is that the iWatch will feature a small number of already established products combined into one, similar to the original iPhone when it came out.

 

It is said to be standalone with the option to be used in combination with your iPhone. It will most likely include watch, (duh) as well as fitness, health and phone functionality. Siri is a possibility, as is FaceTime capabilities, and maps, if not full iOS 8 functionality.

 

Fitness and health tech accessories were one of the big new industry product sectors at this year’s CES conference in Vegas. Many believe that it’s where the future of wearable tech lies.

 

Apple have recently made a bucketload of new roles rumored to be centered on the creation of the iWatch. Some of these are a little vague, others are quite telling. These include:

 

Sleep analysis experts who hold “several patents for integrating mobile devices with fitness equipment”

 

Biometric scientists.

 

Ben Shaffer (previously innovation leader at Nike) and Jay Blahnik, a health and fitness instructor who consulted on the Fuelband for Nike.

 

Sleep research expert Roy J.E.M Raymann, a scientist from Philips Research last month.  Raymann’s experience includes extensive research into non-pharmacological methods of altering sleep quality and in wearable sensors and miniaturization of sensors related to tracking sleep and alertness activity.

 

Nancy Dougherty was hired as a hardware engineer in late 2013. Previously she worked with technology-based medical products with Proteus Digital Health. Her work there included a health metric-reading wearable patch and ingestible, Bluetooth-connected smart pills for monitoring dosages and scheduling. Most recently, Dougherty worked as a hardware lead for Sano Intelligence, whose tagline reads ‘the API for the bloodstream,’ working on a wearable sensor system.

 

Apple recently advertised for an Exercise Physiologist to oversee cardiovascular fitness and energy expenditure tests at its main headquarters campus.

 

The ad read: Design and run user studies related to cardiovascular fitness & energy expenditure, including calories burned, metabolic rate, aerobic fitness level measurement/tracking and other key physiological measurements.

 

Michael O’Reilly, M.D. was recently added to the Apple team. Previously he was the  Chief Medical Officer of pulse oximetry (measuring the amount of oxygen in the blood)  for Masimo.

 

In the fashion line, Former Yves Saint Laurent CEO Paul Deneve, below, was hired last year to work under Tim Cook on a “special project”, and Angela Ahrendts, CEO of Burberry, joined Apple in a newly created position last year, as a senior vice president and member of their executive team.

 

Pretty promising stuff, right? So what else do we know?

 

A supply chain source indicated to Cantor Fitzgerald analyst Brian White in early October that it may also serve to integrate with home automation systems, allowing users to control heating and cooling, lights, and audio/video systems right from their wrists.

 

The design will come from the delightful brain of one Jony Ive (and his no doubt delightful team).

 

It is expected to have a 1.5-inch display, it will more than likely have a battery life longer than one day (Hi Galaxy gear!) and no one is brave enough yet to guess at a price.

 

What about competition? There are already a few smart watches, coming from the likes of Samsung with the Galaxy Gear  (1& 2), the Pebble, the Sony smart watch 2 and now Google who has confirmed to the Financial Times after filing a patent that they are indeed manufacturing a smart watch, possibly for release this year.

 

Apple will be looking to blow them all out of the water, obviously. This means that it has to be innovative in the same way that shocked the world with the original iPhone, and that all the components such as battery life, synchronization with other tech, wearability and functionality will have to be perfect.

 

 

So, no pressure, Apple. Also: hurry up, cos we really, really want one.

 

 

 

 

iWatch mock up photo by Brett Jordan Via www.adr-studio.it/site/?p=269 is licensed under CC BY-SA 2.0

There’s another Steve Jobs biopic coming out

 

 

 

Seen the first Steve Jobs movie? Ready for another one?

 

Um… sure?

 

 

Sure! But don’t worry too much, this one hasn’t even started filming yet so it’s quite a ways off, but you should probably be ready for people to start talking about it.

 

This new one promises to be different from the last one with famed wordsmith Aaron Sorkin ( West Wing and The Social Network) having just submitted the completed the script.

 

The script is based on Walter Isaacson’s biography and Sony is in charge of this one, hence it is purported to have a significantly larger budget then the Ashton Kutcher starring ‘Jobs’.

Sorkin has already revealed to the press in 2012 that he planned on having the movie take place across 3 30-minute scenes, all focusing on important Apple product releases. It is not known if that is still the case.

 

We liked Jobs, but being fans of Alan Sorkin’s script structure and sympathetic yet flawed characters, we’re quietly excited about this one.

 

 

 

Images courtesy of Hollywoodreporter & Twicsy.

The Ultimate iPhone 5S & iPhone 5C Rundown (Full Specs)

 

 

So, today’s the day, huh?

 

NEW APPLE PRODUCTS OH MY GOD SKRILLEX NEEDS TO BE PLAYING THE SOUNDTRACK TO THIS BLOG POST.

 

I’m sorry, we’re a little bit excited over here.

 

So, hey, WHATSUP.

 

At 10am pacific time Apple held a special media event at their town hall auditorium in Cupertino, California.

 

Everyone was VERY excited,  even though the select few members of the press who were super special enough to be invited didn’t really show their excitement very well. Here are some of them lined up like they’re waiting for a bus, instead of shiny new iPhones!! Silly super special people!

 

 

BUT! Then they went inside…. 

 

Inside, Tim cook, Craig Federighi, a few special guests, and ( sadly, only) videos of Jony Ive were awaiting.

 

AND…

 

We got ourselves a shiny-ass brand spanking new iPhone 5S AND a pretty bubbly multicolored sparkly iPhone 5C!

 

SUPER RAD

 

Now, this is the part where we say a lot of words about hardware and software specs and you skim through and judge whether you’re going to want one, or whether you’re gonna want to complain about it not being up to par with expectations and in line with what other smart phone giants are doing with their tech.

 

Here’s our opinion on that, first up. We… we want one. Of both. We don’t know how to justify that, but we do.

 

There was a few surprises, which is always great considering the multitude of leaks that appeared in the weeks leading up to this event. We got a few things that we were expecting, and a few other things that Apple kept up their sleeves like the crafty tech magicians that they are.

 

Tim Cook started things off, as he usually does, and he did so by talking about the iTunes Music Festival, which you can read about here.

 

He moved on to speak about how Apple retail is expanding, and how next month, Apple is forecasting that they will sell their 700 millionth iOS device. Millionth. Wowsers.

 

Craig Federighi got up and spoke about iOS 7, how awesome it is, and how with it you might miss your phone calls because of the new techno ringtones? He’d probably like our Skrillex blog soundtrack!

 

Tim then let everyone know that on any new iOS device sold, the following apps will be available to download for free- Keynote, Numbers, Pages, iMovie and iPhoto. SCORE!

 

Then they got down to business. You know the business. The iPhone business.  Two new designs.

 

 

The iPhone 5C

 

 

It’s pretty, guys. It’s really pretty. The 5C is made from one single hard-coated polycarbonate  surface with no seams, part lines or joins which has a reinforced steel structure on the inside. ( Polycarbonate is basically a plastic shell instead of aluminum).

 

It’s replacing the iPhone 5, however the 8Gb 4S will stay in the lineup as their low end model, offered for free on contract.

 

As expected, the 5C comes in a range of bright poppy rainbow bright colors that will no doubt attract many young rainbow bright individuals.Green, Yellow, Blue, White and a quite salmony looking red.

 

 

The phone has a 4 inch retina display, integrated touch, 8 megapixel camera, and is powered by the same chip as in the iPhone 5.

 

The 5C still has both rear and front facing cameras, so selfie takers can breathe a sigh of relief! The cameras are both still 5 megapixel and the back camera has a flash, so you don’t have to prepare yourself for any loss of quality.

 

It will also have slightly larger battery capacity and  a new HD Facetime camera.

 

This colorful sparkle pony will be offered in 16Gb  for $99 and 32Gb for $199 on a two year contract, with cases costing $29 each.

 

The cases-

 

 

So. It’s basically the iPhone 5, except slightly better, but more platsicky and colorful. We really like the idea of the seamless shell, and really wanna see if it lives up to our idea on how nice it would feel in the hand.

 

Jony Ive ( via video) said it perfectly- ” The iPhone 5C is beautifully, unapologetically plastic… It’s simpler, more essential, more capable and more colorful.”

 

 

 

The iPhone 5S

 

It’s really shiny looking. Also, according to Apple, “The most forward-thinking phone we’ve ever created.”

 

The 5S will come in three colors- Gold, Space Gray and Silver, and yes, although not called champagne, the gold is refined and ridiculously shiny and wanted.

 

 

The iPhone 5S has an A7 chip, and is the first smartphone ever to have one. The A7 is a modern instruction set, with 2x general purpose registers, 2x floating point registers, over 1 billion transistors and 100 square mm die size.  It has twice as many transistors for roughly the same size as the A6. It will have Xcode support, and it’s backwards-compatible. 32 and 64-bit.

 

 

This stuff? It means that this phone is hella fast, and hella powerful. The CPU performance is 40 times faster than the original iPhone, and half of that increase comes with the A7 chip. The graphics performance is 56 times the original iPhone. The phone will be significantly and noticeably faster and better at doing everyday operations.

 

 

 

The way they choose to show this? The announcement and demo of Infinity Blade 3, by Epic Games co-founder Donald Mustard. You can run 5 times faster on the 5S than on the iPhone 5, for example, and there is four times the detail on characters, such as this guy:

 

 

 

Infinity Blade 3  will be available alongside the iPhone 5s.

 

The iPhone 5S will also come with a chip called the M7 chip which measures motion continuously – it acts as an accelerometer, gyroscope, and as a compass support. It will also have a CoreMotion API  which will be able to identify your movement, if you’re running or driving, etc. Nike is coming out with an app called Nike + Move which will use these features to keep track of your activities.

 

Battery time is AWESOME! Just looky here:

 

 

The camera on the new iPhone is where a lot of the surprising and most welcome improvements (in our opinion) were made. The new camera has a 5 element Apple designed lens with f/2.2 aperture and 15% larger active sensor area.  It looks like this:

 

 

iOS 7 will automatically set white balance, exposure level and will pick the sharpest from a series of photos.

 

The duel LED flash is there, they’re calling it True Tone. It will allow of better low light photography and  will combine the two lights to get the right color balance for the room.

 

 

There is digital auto stabilization, and, something we love- burst mode.  If you hold the shutter down, the camera will take ten photos per second until you lift your finger off the button. It will also analyze all the burst shots and present which one it thinks is the best, whilst still storing the others.

 

SLO-MO!  Slo-mo  is supported you guys! That’s HD, 120 frames per second slo-mo we’re talking. That is so cool! You can even select which parts of your video you want in normal speed, and which parts in slo-mo. There’s going to be so many slo-mo you-tube videos this winter…. Cue snowballs to the face!

 

Finally, when you shoot panoramic shots, the camera can adjust the exposure automatically as you go along. Thank god, cos the sun just is not a team player when we shoot panoramic.

 

 

Ok, now for security- yeah, it’s the fingerprint sensor. Or, as it’s now known- the Touch ID.

 

 

The new iPhone has a crystal inlaid fingerprint scanner in place of the home button that can read multiple fingerprints. There is a stainless steel detection ring around the home button, so that the sensor can detect your finger without you having to press the button.

 

This is the finger they showed- just in case you forgot what one looked like. Sorry if you did. That’s… awkward.

 

 

The sensor is 170 microns thin, 500 ppi resolution, scans sub-epidermal skin layers and has 360-degree readability.

 

It basically takes a picture of your fingerprint in order to analyze it, all fingerprints are encrypted, and they will never be stored on Apple servers or backed up to the cloud. Awesome.

 

The fingerprint scanner will come in handy for security and shopping – the examples they give are not having to enter a passcode for your iPhone ( or worry about how you’re too lazy to set up a passcode) and having your fingerprint replace the ever irritating iTunes password.

 

Pricing is the same as the iPhone 5, 16Gb – $199, 32Gb – $299, 64Gb – $399 with a two year contract. Cases for the 5S are $49 each.

 

Here’s a picture of Tim Cook talking. It made us feel more involved.

 

 

 

Now we’re down to the nitty gritty end. iOS 7 will be available to download for free on September 18th.

 

The iPhone 5C will be available for pre-order starting midnight the 13th of September, with full release in stores on the 20th of September. The iPhone 5S will not be available for pre-order, but will be available online and in-store on September the 20th.

 

By December, the new iPhones will be available in more than 100 countries.

 

The Apple store has been down since 6am this morning in preparation for the iPhone announcements-but will be back online right now if you want to check out the goods

 

Overall, we’re really pleased with these releases. They show consistency, reliability, and significant hardware and software upgrades, alongside iOS 7.

 

Without having physically held or played with today’s releases (yet!), we can’t be for realsies sure, but it sounds like having ( at least) one of these phones will definitely improve how we use our mobile technology, and increase out affection for said technology.

 

We… we really like them. We also believe that it is serious time, guys, to start thinking about upgrading and how you’re going to go ahead and do that. Which phone is best for your needs, and how are you going to get that shiny newness into your hot little hands?

 

We want the champagne 5S, 64Gb, because we like shiny, sophisticated, fast, powerful, and awesome tech that makes everyone’s life better.

 

Just like we do.  Right?  But, also, it has the super sweet camera stuff. And the Touch ID. And the fast and powerful stuff.

 

Whichever one you choose, if you are considering selling a stinky old iPhone in order to get the CASHMONEY to upgrade or buy new these shiny new iPhones, you should click on this blue link right here, which will tell you all you need to know about preparing your old phone for moving on to it’s new forever home.

 

You can also click on this blue link right here to see how much CASHMONEY we can give you for your stinky old iPhone! Super fast, super easy, super large CASHMONEY!!

 

 

And that’s a wrap! We hope this brightened your day!

 

 

 

 

Images courtesy of Macrumors, The Verge, and Engadget. Special thanks to the super awesome Brad Molen over at Engadget for providing pretty much the best live blog we’ve ever read. Serious.

 

iTunes Radio release another thing to get excited about this September!

 

 

 

September is IT guys.

 

Not only do we have the HUGE Apple September 10th announcement believed to be announcing the new iPhones ( 5S and 5C ), there is also the unveiling of Samsung’s smart watch Galaxy Gear, IFA – the huge techie consumer electronics trade show in Berlin 6th – 11th September, the Apple iTunes free concert series, the final Breaking Bad ever on Sept 9th (gulp), the return of Sons Of Anarchy and Southpark, America’s cup, TechCrunch Disrupt, and just, just so much more.

 

So much more like what iPhone Antidote?

 

Well, for one thing, the release of Apple’s iTunes Radio! Yay!

 

Apple has managed to get a bunch of brand partners including McDonald’s, Nissan, Pepsi, and Procter & Gamble, who will all get exclusive ads on the Radio product through the end of 2013.

 

The internet radio service, similar to Spotify and Pandora, will offer a way to listen to the radio which intuitively personalizes the tracks and artists you listen to, introduced you to new artists based on the style of music you listen to, as well as giving you the ability to create your own playlists from their selection and your own music from iTunes.

 

The system is free with ads, but has a super competitive premium ad-free option, if you subscribe to iTunes Match, at just $24.99 a year.

 

For the free service, listeners can look forward to walking out of the room grumpily every 15 minutes for an audio ad, and once an hour if you’re listening on a platform where you can exposed you to video ads. You will also get an ad if you skip songs six times in a row, if this stays the same as it currently is in the iOS 7 Beta testing.

 

The iTunes Radio service is part of iOS 7 and will be released with it. We don’t know the exact date… but we’re thinking it’s pretty likely that it will be released on or very close to September 10th!

 

We think we might rename September YAYtember!

 

 

 

 

Image courtesy of iTunes.

 

 

 

Samsung’s New TV – Watch two things at once ( and no, we don’t mean with split screen)

 

 

We gotta say, Samsung have impressed us with this one.

 

You guys know the feeling, where you’re sitting with your beloved significant other, and love sitting next to them, and being near them, and being able to touch them, but really really hate the crap they have playing on TV cos it’s their turn to pick?

 

We do.  …Sorry iPhone Antidote’s significant other.

 

But! Can I hear a hell yes? Cos here’s the fix!

 

Samsung have now released a new television in the US, one which was announced back in January 2012. This magical and most welcome entry to the television market is a $9000, 55-inch, curved, OLED multi-view T.V.

 

Hi, KN55S9C! You’re a little expensive!

 

If you do have the cash, it may just be worth it. The multi-view function is not created using split screen or picture in picture, but is instead enabled by Samsung 3D glasses that come equipped with little headphones. This allows two parties to see two different programs on the same curved screen. This also means that the TV has 3D capabilities, and additionally is a Smart TV, with internet connectivity. Pretty sweet.

 

 

The fact that it’s OLED ( Organic Light Emitting Diode ), means that the television is thinner and lighter with the abilty to produce a higher contrast ratio than LCD sets. The curved screen is said to work better with the curves of your eyeballs. huh. Also makes it very, very hard to mount on a wall, according to consumer reports.
You can order one now here, and it comes with free shipping until August 31st!

 

 

Image courtesy of Gizmag.

iWatch trademark update

 

So, we now have news that Apple has applied to trademark the name ‘iWatch’ in more countries across the world.

 

All of the applications were filed on June 3rd but have only become public in the last few days.

 

As well as Russia and Japan, Apple has filed to trademark ‘iWatch’ under both software and hardware categories in Jamaica, Taiwan, Turkey, and Mexico.

 

Momentum is building! Aghhhh!

 

 

Image courtesy of Forbes.

The iWatch

 

Good news for those of us waiting for a brand spanking ( ooh) new Apple product!

 

Yesterday, Apple’s application to trademark the term ‘iWatch’ in Japan was made public.

 

iWatch is, of course, the rumored name for the first wearable Apple device and the potentially out of this world Smart Watch. The trademark was applied for on June 3rd this year and is actually the second time that Apple has applied to trademark the name, the first being in Russia in February.

 

Momentum (and the rumor mill) for this product is building rapidly. Yesterday’s reports come after Bloomberg posted in March this year that according to their sources there were 100 engineers working on the planned smart watch, and after Tim Cook said in May that the wearable device market is one just waiting for innovation. And who better to do it than Apple?

 

Unlike other Smart Watches currently available (see the wonderful Pebble Watch), the much speculated iWatch will most likely be a stand alone device, with biometric potential that could turn the way we use technology on it’s head.
Suckily, experts agree that we probably won’t see the iWatch until the 3rd or 4th quarter of 2014.

 

C’mon Tim Cook! We want wearable device innovation, and we want it now! Or soon! Please?

 

Image courtesy of  Forbes.