Apple

According to analyst Ming-Chi Kuo, the Apple Watch Series 6 will mark a switch to flexible circuit boards made of liquid crystal polymer. These new circuit boards should make the Series 6 noticeable faster than the Series 5 and may breath new life into the stagnant wearable brand.

Apple release iOS 13.2.2 this week, bringing a fix to the RAM management bug introduced in iOS 13.2. There are a few other bug fixes and patches. Considering Apple's terrible track record with iOS 13, it may be prudent to wait a few days to update your iPhone or iPad.

Apple continues to dominate the smartwatch market; 47.9% of smartwatches sold in Q3 2019 were from Apple. The company enjoyed a 51% year-over-year growth from Q3 2018, bumping sales to 6.8 million units during the past quarter. Samsung and Fitbit trailed behind Apple with 1.9 and 1.6 million units sold, respectively, in Q3 2019.

Six more games are now available for mobile devices through the Apple Arcade service. The monthly subscription service is fast approaching its goal of offering over 100 high-quality games for $5/month.

Pokémon GO remains one of the world's most popular augmented-reality (AR) mobile games. However, it has a persistent discrepancy as a title in this ecosystem, which is a lack of Pokéstops, particularly in more isolated regions. Therefore, its maker Niantic is about to launch a more global method of taking user suggestions for additional such item-sources in the future.

Apple continues to dominate the smartwatch market, but is its latest iteration the best device of its kind? Part fashion accessory, part lifestyle smartwatch, but not a professional fitness tracker. We expected better battery life from a device that costs a minimum of US$399 too.

Apple heralds its latest AirPods as a "Pro" product that offers amazing audio quality and immersive Active Noise Cancellation (ANC), but do they live up to the hype? Our time with them would suggest otherwise, although they will likely impress those who already own a set of AirPods. Audiophiles will probably be less enamoured by the US$250 wireless earbuds, though.

Artistic concept renders for the Apple iPhone 12 have offered fans an idea of what the Cupertino company could be planning for the next generation of its popular smartphone range. The notch is still present but slightly more modest, and the rear of the device sports a quad-camera setup. The conceptual iPhone 12 also features straighter edges than its most recent predecessors.

Apple released the first developer beta for iOS 13.3 yesterday. While the update seems to fix the RAM management issues discovered in iOS 13.2, it offers little else. In fact, a new bug in the iOS 13.3 beta disallows the use of Beats Solo Pro headphones; an iPhone running iOS 13.3 Beta 1 will not recognize the headphones at all.

While recent leaks suggest that Apple will soon introduce the 16-inch MacBook Pro, they also point towards the device not living up to the hype. Current evidence indicates that the new MacBook Pro will neither sport a major redesign nor a higher screen-to-body ratio than the current 15-inch MacBook Pro. Sadly, the reality is likely to be far more mundane.

Although the launch date of the next Dragon Age game is not set in stone yet, BioWare has recently published a teaser on Twitter that labels December 4 as "Dragon 4ge Day" so at least some kind of Dragon Age 4-related official announcement is definitely in the pipeline. Sadly, this highly-anticipated title might launch in 2022.

A recent claim made by a MacRumors contributor states that macOS 10.15.1 Catalina contains a string of code referencing the new AMD Radeon RX 5500M. This statement has kicked off rumors that the long-speculated 16-inch MacBook Pro will feature the latest mobile GPU from AMD.

Microsoft looks set finally break from its Internet Explorer past with a brand-new stylized e-shaped wave logo. The new look is undoubtedly fresh while just hinting enough at its past for those with a sense of nostalgia, but it is certainly on point for its debut using the Chromium web engine.

Aukey has unveiled its new Omni-Power series of accessories. The company claims that it integrates various state-of-the-art charging technologies, including a graphene skin, GaN and USB Power Delivery. This line includes new adapters, car chargers and power banks.

Canalys and Strategy Analytics have just released their findings for the worldwide smartphone market's third-quarter performance for this year (3Q2019). The 2 groups have reported slightly different sets of statistics. However, they generally agree on who the top OEMs are, and their performance compared to the previous year.

Orbita, a company that makes a personal assistant-like AI platform focused on healthcare, has published the results of a study that shows this is what the US adults recruited to it want from their voice-controlled searches. It apparently concludes that 7.5% of this group has used services such as Alexa for this purpose, whereas over 50% would like to.

The latest update, labeled 2.9.1705.31, is now available with multiple enhancements to the Vivaldi Menu, the ability to set global default preferences for requests based on sound, geolocation, camera, microphone, motion sensors, Bluetooth devices, and pop-ups, as well as multiple tweaks and fixes.

The Your Phone app in Windows 10 has acted to effectively mimic iPhone syncing on Mac, but for Android devices. It has also allowed users with these devices to mirror their phone screens on PCs via Bluetooth Low Energy (BLE). However, this has come to an end in the latest Insiders' build.

A new image of the next 16-inch MacBook Pro has been spotted in macOS 10.15.1 revealing a new approach to the Touch Bar. The device is also expected to drop Apple’s disastrous butterfly keyboard mechanism for a more traditional scissor switch approach. Other design changes are minimal.

Super Mario Kart is off to a phenomenal start. The mobile racing game hit 123.9 million downloads in its first month on the market, making it the most downloaded Nintendo smartphone game in its first month. However, total revenue pales in comparison to Fire Emblem Heroes, possibly because of Mario Kart Tour's controversial subscription system.

Sony has joined the ranks of Samsung in offering the Apple TV app on its smart TVs. Users who own some of the newer models have noted that the latest firmware update introduces the Apple TV app to the collection of preinstalled apps.

Do not install iOS 13.2. If you have a HomePod and have installed iOS 13.2, DO NOT RESET YOUR HOMEPOD. Multiple users are reporting that iOS 13.2, released yesterday, bricked their HomePod smart speakers. Apple has since pulled the update.

The Rich Communications Service (RCS) standard has been touted as the ultimate messaging platform for some time. Unfortunately, its implementation and adoption worldwide could be described as sluggish at best. Therefore, Verizon, Sprint, AT&T and T-Mobile have collaborated on the Cross Carrier Messaging Initiative (CCMI), which aims to bring it to their customers by 2020.

A report from noted market analyst Ming-Chi Kuo has detailed when Apple could set the long-awaited iPhone SE 2 into production. Apparently, the diminutive smartphone will start being mass manufactured in January 2020, with March set as the potential launch period. Rumored hardware specifications for the iPhone SE 2 include the presence of a fast A13 Bionic chip.

Apple launched iOS 13.2 and iPadOS 13.2 today. The update brings 60 new emoji, the ability to opt-out of sharing Siri interactions with Apple, and Apple's Deep Fusion image processing technology for the iPhone 11 family of smartphones. However, given prior iOS 13 updates, it may be wise to wait on this one.

Apple unveiled its new AirPods Pro wireless earbuds earlier today. The buds feature a new design and active noise cancellation. However, the $249 price tag is significantly higher ($90) than the current AirPods'. AirPods Pro will be available for purchase starting October 30th.

Apple's AirPods are currently projected to gain a Pro version soon, thanks to a recent slew of leaks and rumors. The latest of these may indicate that they will finally launch in colors besides white for a change. Furthermore, it is even vaguely possible that they will match those of the iPhone 11 Pros.

The consumer-grade security development group Nok Nok Labs has unveiled its new SDK. It asserts that it is the first such app software capable of conferring FIDO-based authentication on smartwatches. This, then, may help users depend more on their wearable for more functions typically carried out on a phone.

A recent study by the analyst group Asurion has concluded that being brought along to celebrate Halloween is one of the biggest potential nightmares a smartphone can go through. The risks of damage and other adversity these devices may face go up by as much as 42% on the date in question. The study indicates this is linked to phone use at night during these festivities.

Wandera, a security research firm, has found malware in 17 apps on the Apple App Store. The apps use a clicker trojan module to generate fraudulent web traffic in the background, likely to pump up ad revenue for specific websites. The apps passed through Apple's stringent review process because they connected to a remote server to execute the fraudulent activity rather than having malware embedded directly in their code.

iPhone owners could be due a hefty slice of compensation following a Court of Appeal judgment against Google. The complainant, Google You Owe Us, is seeking up to £3.2 billion (~US$4.1 billion) to compensate over 4 million iPhone owners for the misuse of their data. There are a few caveats to be eligible for making a claim, though.

The Pixel 4 phones have caught a lot of flak for being unable to record 4K video at 60 fps. According to a discovery, however, it would seem that the devices were originally able to do that but the feature ended up not making it to release software.

TSMC started sampling the A14 Bionic SoCs earlier than usual, as a recent Chinese report claims Apple already received the first engineering samples in late September. Apparently, there is also a downside to making the jump from 7 nm to 5 nm: the net die per wafer ratio gets reduced and 2020 iPhone prices could end up being even higher than the current gen.

A new study into user attitudes towards wearables found that health tracking is the most popular use of this electronics category. 36% of those polled reported concerns that these functions may not live up to reality, however. 10% of the respondents also said they worried about data security on these devices.

Multiple users are reporting a failure of the Ultra WideBand U1 chip in their iPhone 11, iPhone 11 Pro, or iPhone 11 Pro Max after updating to iOS 13.1.3. While restoring an affected iPhone's firmware has solved the problem for some, others have received replacement devices.

According to a Bloomberg report, Apple is planning on releasing its rumored AR glasses sometime in 2020. The glasses, while still in development, may eventually become a replacement product of the iPhone. However, a lot of work remains to be done, including the development of a "killer application."

Icons of what could be the 16-inch MacBook Pro 2019 have been found in the beta code for macOS Catalina. Those hoping for a complete exterior redesign of the MBP might be disappointed by the images though, as the laptop featuring on the icons looks very similar to the 15-inch MacBook Pro. But some differences between the supposed iterations have been spotted.

Just 26 days after its release, Apple has reported that 50% of all iPhones are running iOS 13. Compared to the abysmal history of Android OEMs' software updates, the high adoption rates for the newer versions iOS continue to be a strong feature of the iPhone brand.

Apple’s wholly-owned subsidiary Beats has launched an all-new Beats Solo Pro range. Effectively the Beats Solo 4, the all-new design also brings improved audio performance as well as active noise cancelling to the Solo line for the first time.

Are you in the market for a new iPhone, but do not like the size of the iPhone 11 series? Well, rumor has it that Apple is planning to bring an iPhone SE 2 to market in Q1 next year, and an A13 Bionic at that. However, the iPhone SE successor may not be as small as some people have perhaps hoped.

Apple's Arcade game subscription service welcomed 5 new titles to iOS and tvOS and 2 new titles to macOS this week. The new games bring the total number of games available in Apple Arcade to 80 for iOS and tvOS and 61 for macOS, steadily fulfilling Apple's promise of 100 games available in the service.

A source familiar with the matter claims that Apple is developing an in-house 5G modem for release in 2022, according to a report from Fast Company earlier today. The source says that a 2022 release date is "really pushing it," but it is likely that Apple plans to design and manufacture its own custom 5G modem.

Call of Duty Mobile recently claimed the award for most downloads in the first week after launch for any mobile game in history, surpassing 100 million unique installs after its first week. Sensor Tower estimates peg total downloads at 102.2 million as of October 8th. Total revenue or the free to play title is estimated at just over US $17.7 million.

Apple now sells the Microsoft Xbox Wireless Controller through its online store. The move is likely due to Apple's recent push into the gaming market. Considering the latest OS updates for all Apple devices (e.g., iOS 13, iPadOS, and macOS Catalina) include native support for the Xbox Wireless Controller and Sony's DualShock 4 controller, it makes sense for Apple to offer the controller directly to its user base.

New research has found that nearly 50% of all US households with broadband subscribe to 2 or more subscription-based services in 2019, whereas this figure was 33% in 2017 and only 20% in 2014. The apparent demand has driven the number of individual services to match in the country. It has grown by 1.4 times since 2014.

Computational photography - or imaging that depends at least as much on software as on hardware - was worth US$7.9 billion as a market in 2018. However, the latest analysis indicates that this valuation will grow to $29 billion over the next 5 years. This market is led by companies such as Qualcomm, NVIDIA, Alphabet and Apple.

Apple has initiated a recall for certain iPhones of the 6S series, saying that it has found that the relevant units may become unable to start under certain circumstances. The Cupertino-based OEM will not disclose which aspects of the phones causes these potential failures, but has announced that it will rectify it if those who own these device send them for servicing.