The anticipated fifth-generation full-size iPad will employ the same thin touch sensor Apple first introduced last year in the iPad mini, according to a new report.
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An alleged delay in production of fingerprint sensors could severely restrict how many "iPhone 5S" units Apple is capable of building this quarter, a new rumor claims.
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Political pressure on electronics makers to do more to combat smartphone theft is intensifying.

Shutterstock / Innershadows Photography

San Francisco’s District Attorney George Gascón and New York Attorney General Eric Schneiderman have been spearheading a campaign to convince phone makers to build technology into their devices that prevent stolen smartphones from ever being reactivated in an effort to discourage theft.

Now London Mayor Boris Johnson is joining the “Secure Our Smartphones” initiative.

“Residents and visitors to our city need better protection from the menace of smartphone theft,” Johnson said in a statement last week. “We need the industry to take this issue seriously and come up with a technical solution that can squash the illegal smartphone market that is fuelling this crime.”

Gascón and Schneiderman have also garnered support from prosecutors and elected officials in Connecticut, Delaware,...

If you are looking for one of the lightest 11-inch notebooks on the market with one of the best displays in the segment, then you might want to take a look at the Sony Vaio Pro 11 with its 11.6-inch Triluminos display. In addition to running the latest Intel 'Haswell' Core-series processors, which help to extend battery life, you will also a good helping of Sony's trademark product style on sho ......
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In a fascinating post from Kelly Jacklin, the long time Apple software engineer details how he helped create the default text alert sound on the iPhone -- now known as the "Tri-tone" alert.

The history of the the pleasant chime we've all come to know and love stretches all the way back to 1998, nearly 10 years before the iPhone ever hit store shelves.

Back in 1998, Jeff Robbin, Bill Kincaid and Dave Heller began working on an MP3 player for the Mac called SoundJam MP. If the name sounds vaguely familiar, it's because Apple famously acquired SoundJam MP in 2000 and quickly repurposed it into the first version of iTunes.

But in 1999, before an Apple acquisition was on the horizon, Jeff Robbin asked Jacklin if he could come up with a sound to alert a...

As the success stories keep piling up, so do the number of projects filling up crowdfunding websites with, among other things, neat hardware- and software-related products. Some projects, like Pebble, gain thousands of supporters as well as millions of dollars in funding (and end up at Best Buy’s retail stores). Other projects flop and don’t reach their necessary funding amount.

Rather than make you sift through all of these projects, we’re rounding up the best or most notable projects from around the web and delivering them to you in a simple roundup.

If there’s a project that you’ve backed – or even a project that you founded – be sure to leave a link below so it can be considered for...

Oslo, Norway in Apple Maps (No 3D available)

Apple is being blocked from capturing 3D, aerial footage of Norway capital Oslo for its iOS and Mac Maps applications, according to Norway-based newspaper Aftenposten. As part of removing Google Maps from iOS, Apple, last year with iOS 6, launched its in-house Maps app with 3D “Flyover” data being a premier feature. Flyover allows users to see a 3D representation of many cities across the globe.

According to today’s report, Norway’s...

Fitness bands and smart watches are all the rage right now – even Apple is expected to release the iWatch some time in the future. A new competitor is entering the market, but the science, technology and brand behind it are anything but new.

Salutron, founded in 1994, has been engineering and manufacturing heart rate monitoring solutions that you’ve probably interacted with many times – they own 70-80% of the market for the heart rate monitoring circuitry. If you’ve used gym equipment that allows you to see how fast your heart is beating, there’s a good chance Salutron was behind it. They also develop technology alongside NASA, which in itself proves their engineering-focused company culture.

LifeTrak, a brand of Salutron, builds sports watches and other accessories. We’ll be taking a look at their...

iPhone 5S/5C physical mockups

Apple’s next two iPhone models will be named iPhone 5S and iPhone 5C, according to a report from Japan-based Macotakara. With repeated reports and rumors of the next-generation iPhone retaining the same design as the iPhone 5, the “iPhone 5S” name has long been claimed and regarded as the name of the new flagship iPhone. Apple’s iPhone 4S and iPhone 3GS retained the designs of the iPhone 4 and iPhone 3G, respectively.

However, because of Apple’s surprise naming scheme for the third-generation...

Apple told developers Saturday morning that all services at the company's Developer Connection were back online. Apple pulled those services three weeks ago after a security breach, and slowly brought those services back online. With Saturday's letter to developers, all services have been restored.

Apple is set to unveil the next iPhone on September 10th, according to a report by AllThingsD. The website is known to have very accurate sources, so people can feel safe in marking their calendars now.

AllThingsD doesn't offer any additional information on the specs of the new iPhone--and if we'll see a lower cost iPhone as well. However, the site also claims Apple "is also expected to formally launch the next version of Mac OS X, known as Mavericks, in the coming weeks," but not at the September 10th event.

AllThingsD: Apple to unveil next iPhone on September 10th originally appeared on TUAW - The Unofficial Apple Weblog on Sat, 10 Aug 2013 20:05:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of...

Apple is set to unveil its next iPhone next month at an Apple Event reported to be held September 10, 2013.
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According to a report by AllThingsD, Apple will debut its latest iPhone lineup during a special event on September 10th, just a month from today. The report doesn’t specify as to which models will be announced at the event, but if rumors are to be believed, we may see the highly anticipated iPhone 5S as well as a new, low-cost iPhone 5C.

There’s been much speculation as to when exactly Apple will unveil its latest lineup as the company has been unusually quiet about new products over the last year. Many are also wondering whether or not Apple will break its traditional iPhone lineup (introducing a new iPhone and shuffling older models down to lower price...

9to5mac

After dealing with various outages for more than three weeks, Apple finally announced any developer services still down at its Developer Center are running again. And for users' trouble, Apple is extending every membership by one month.

The downtime came after an "intruder" accessed the development site's servers on July 18. Apple acknowledged the issue on July 21 and at the time could not "rule out the possibility that some developers’ names, mailing addresses, and/or e-mail addresses may have been accessed." That notice led...

Apple said Saturday that it has restored the last of the developer services that had been out of commission following a hacking incident last month.

The company, which has been gradually bringing back various services, said on Saturday it will extend all developer memberships by one month.

“We are pleased to let you know that all our developer program services are now online,” Apple said in an e-mail to developers. “Your patience during this time was sincerely appreciated.”

It apologized to developers who...

The developer portal went down July 18 due to a security breach, and after some time released a statement regarding the security situation. In an interesting turn, the person responsible went public, and 25 year-old Ibrahim Balic explained that he had not only posted a bug, but then use the exploit, which apparently prompted Apple to close everything down until a fix was applied.

Since then Apple has been putting services back online a few at a time. As TechCrunch reports, it started "...with certificates, identifiers and profiles, as...

Num pad with secure passcode

While many of us know about and use the simple four digit passcode or more complex alphanumeric passcode to secure the data on our iOS devices, I recently discovered an interesting option built right into the system that I find to be more secure than a simple passcode and more convenient than an alphanumeric passcode.

As mentioned in a recent episode of the Mac Power Users podcast, you can make your passcode more complex without complicating it by using more than 4 digits without involving letters and still using the num pad.

While a simple passcode is a 4 digit number, turning off simple passcode and setting up a complex passcode using on numbers allows you...

Roku has added a new feature to its iOS app that will make the streaming service more attractive to users trying to pick between it and an Apple TV. Version 2.3 updates the Play on Roku service, giving users the ability to stream videos directly from an iOS device to their television.

Play on Roku debuted last September and allowed users to stream pictures and music from their tablet and smartphone to their TV set, but was sorely lacking video support. The move brings Roku closer in line with the functionality of Apple TV, though there are a few important differences.

The Roku service still doesn't allow users to stream TV shows or movies they've synced with their iOS devices or allow third-party video apps to be streamed to the box. Roku's new iOS features work on Roku 3, Roku 2, Roku HD, and Roku Streaming Stick. You can find the app update in the...

Vietnamese website Tinhte, which has a solid track record of getting its hands on pre-release Apple products and accurate mock ups,today posted what it claims are mock ups of two next-generation iPhones. One is the full-fledged “iPhone 5S” upgrade, while the other claims to show the much rumored low-cost “iPhone 5C” that we’ve been hearing a lot about recently. It’s worth noting that Tinhte says the source of the images,...

Apple sent out emails to developers early Saturday saying all Developer Center services are back online, and that the company is extending a month membership to all teams to make up for the prolonged downtime.
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Would you believe that after releasing two totally obnoxious, over-the-top Amateur Surgeon games, Adult Swim's newly released Amateur Surgeon 3 is a tasteful, realistic look at the medical practice? No? Ok, good -- because it's really, really not -- but that's not necessarily a bad thing.

Amateur Surgeon 3 lets you poke around inside the bodies of a whole cast of characters and creatures, each with their own medical ailment. Using the touchscreen, you'll need to cut out organs, yank broken bits of glass and other objects from within bodies and of course sew up wounds and clean up your work at the end.

But this is an Adult Swim game, so there's absolutely nothing realistic about this experience whatsoever. You often cut up your patients with a pizza cutter, cauterize wounds by burning them with a Bic lighter and can use special "tag team" powers -- like bringing your dog into the operation so he can lick the...

iOS 7 will give iPhones and iPads a rather drastic makeover when it launches publicly later this year. While we already know that the next version of OS X, Mavericks, doesn't offer the same visual refresh, that didn't stop designer Stu Crew from doing Apple's work for it. The new OS X concept, which Crew has named "Ivericks," employs the same simplistic, modern design principles as iOS 7 to create a rather appealing product.

Gone are the beveled windows and faux 3D buttons and in their place are narrow lines and a minimalist aesthetic that seems very much like it could have come straight from Cupertino. My own personal favorite touch is the completely revamped calculator, which takes obvious cues from the calculator app in iOS 7, and still looks gorgeous. Take a look at the full set of concept renders on Crew's blog.

[via...

Apple today released printer driver updates for two different manufacturers' products, with all of the updates available for Snow Leopard (OS X 10.6) and Lion (10.7), while a few also include updates for Mountain Lion (10.8). Brands include Epson, and a number of labels owned by Ricoh, including NRG, InfoPrint, Lanier, Infotec, Savin and Gestetner. The updates will appear in Software Update as relevant for users' existing printers, and when users connect new printers to their network or computer. New models have been added alongside updates for older models with unspecified changes....
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Summer is almost gone, but there's still time to get in a same vacation. Vern Seward points out 3 iOS tour guides to help. Rock Creek Park Walking Tours, New York Beyond Sight, Palace at Versailles, all free for your iPhone and iPad.

Apple has scored another victory in its battle against Samsung copying of the company's non-essential patents. The U.S. International Trade Commission (ITC) ruled on Friday that a variety of Samsung devices violated two Apple patents, and issued a sales ban for those products, the only remedy the ITC has at its disposal.

As per Google's announcement in July regarding its plan to release textbooks to Google Play Books, listings are now available via an update to the iOS app.The textbooks are currently available to purchase outright, though some titles will be offering a six month lower-cost "rental" option. Free samples of textbooks are provided. Presently only available to US customers, the Google Play Books app is available for Android, iOS, and on the web....
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Amazon is reportedly developing an Amazon-branded TV console that would run on Android and use apps found on the Amazon Appstore for Android. The device will supposedly have its own dedicated game controller and be available by Black Friday for the holiday shopping season. Bryan Chaffin offers his thoughts on the subject.

It's time to save some of that hard-earned cash with our Daily Deals, featuring exclusive TUAW Deals, a handy list from Dealnews and our own hand-picked iOS and OS X selections.

TUAW Deals

ColorSchemer Studio 2 [On sale for $29, down from $50]

ColorSchemer Studio 2 is the professional color-matching application for your Mac.

Use ColorSchemer Studio to identify color harmonies for web (RGB) or print (CMYK), create palettes from photos, search over a million existing color schemes, mix colors, create gradient blends, and many other time saving features.

Save 42% off ColorSchemer Studio 2 at TUAW Deals. Requires Mac OS X 10.5 or higher, or Windows 2000/XP/Vista/7. License...

[strong]Updated with Samsung statement on ruling[/strong] The US International Trade Commission (ITC) ruled today that assorted Samsung mobile products do in fact infringe on two of four Apple-held patents in a complaint going back to 2011. The panel has issued an import embargo on some of Samsung's older mobile products, preventing it from selling and distributing the infringing devices. Today's ruling begins the 60-day Presidential review process of the ITC ruling....
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The first of the many Apple legal rulings and requests expected today came out poorly for the company. Judge Denise Cote refused a request by Apple for a temporary suspension of her ruling last month stating that Apple had conspired with publishers to raise e-book prices and violated antitrust laws.

Just yesterday, the e-book publishers the company allegedly conspired with came to Apple's defense, asking the increasingly hostile Department of Justice to do away with a proposal to "remedy" the allegedly "illegal" activities Apple engaged in.

As our sister site Engadget notes, "It appears that Apple is fighting a losing battle. We're sure that there are still...

President Barack Obama held a closed-door (private) meeting on Thursday with Apple CEO Tim Cook, Google VP Vint Cerf, AT&T CEO Randall Stephenson, and civil liberties leaders, The topic at hand is the government's much criticized surveillance program(s) that have caught many top American technology firms in a growing wave of foreign criticism. Bryan Chaffin explains.

The industry consortium dedicated to sustaining the quality, integrity and dissemination of Serial ATA (SATA) technology, the Serial ATA International Organization (SATA-IO) today announced the ratification of its revision 3.2 specification. The latest specification includes SATA Express, a new specification that enables the coexistence of SATA and PCIe storage devices, as well as enhancements in power management, new SATA form-factors, and optimizations for solid state hybrid drives....
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Legal observers have noted that Samsung appears to have gotten the worst of questioning in Friday's hearings with Apple at the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit, which could mean that the Cupertino company may be able to get the better of its rival in the coming months.
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Kid in Story Book Maker by Locomotive Labs is an iPad app for children and adults to use together to create a story. More than just a plain-text page turner, Kid in Story Book Maker allows you to insert the image of the child into the story and to record voice-over narration for each page. It's your own personal story book maker that can be used for creative storytelling or more focused instruction by educators and speech language pathologists (SLPs).

The central purpose of Kid in Story Book Maker is the ability to create a personalized story. The developers have created tutorial videos to walk you through the steps, and the process is relatively easy. Templates make it simple for you to get started, but at this time there are not many choices. The developers at Locomotive Labs invite users to share their original stories, so hopefully the Kid in Story template library will...

Image by CNET

According to several reports fresh off the wire, the International Trade Commission has just ruled in favour of Apple in the company’s long-running attempt to get the courts to implement a sales ban on certain infringing Samsung devices. The case stems back to a countersuit that Apple filed in 2011 following a lawsuit launched by Samsung that claimed several Apple device’s infringed its patents. Fosspatents reports:

Today the United States International Trade Commission (USITC, or just ITC) handed down its final ruling on Apple’s July 2011 complaint against Samsung. An import ban has been ordered and will take effect at the end of the 60-day Presidential review period.

The ITC found that Samsung does indeed infringe on the two patents asserted in the original case, including one often referred to as the “Steve Jobs” patent that...

The U.S. International Trade Commission ruled on Friday that certain Samsung products do infringe on two Apple patents and should be barred from being sold here.

However, the trade court also ruled in Samsung’s favor with regard to four other patents at issue and said that no violations occurred.

“The Commission has determined that the appropriate remedy is a limited exclusion order prohibiting Samsung from importing certain electronic digital media devices that infringe one or more of claims 1, 4-6, 10, and 17-20 of the ’949 patent and claims 1-4 and 8 of the ’501 patent,” the commission said.

The order doesn’t list all the products involved, but it appears to include a wide range of Samsung phones and tablets.

Even the media players and phones that were barred can continue to be sold during a Presidential Review period. The White House rarely intervenes in...

A New York district court judge on Friday denied Apple's request to suspend a ruling that found the company guilty of e-book price fixing while it seeks an appeal.
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Photo: appadvice.com

According to the Associated Press, Apple’s request to suspend Judge Cote’s decision regarding the e-books antitrust case has been denied.

A judge on Friday refused a request by Apple to temporarily suspend her ruling that it violated antitrust laws by conspiring with publishers to raise electronic book prices in 2010.

Judge Denise Cote, ruling from the bench in Manhattan federal court, declined to withdraw the effect of last month’s ruling while Cupertino, Calif.-based Apple Inc. appeals.

The future doesn’t look so bright for the iBookstores’ agency model, as it looks like the agreements with publishers will be ending very soon if things don’t turn around for Apple.

Today is a busy day for Apple’s...

Apple's board of directors is allegedly upset with CEO Tim Cook over a lack of innovative products in recent times, according to sources cited by Fox Business News' Charlie Gasparino. Cook is reportedly safe in his position for now, but the board members are thought to be worried that Apple isn't keeping up with the momentum established under former CEO Steve Jobs. As a result, the board is allegedly putting pressure on Cook....
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The latest edition of iLounge Weekly, our weekly newsletter covering all things iLounge, will be arriving in subscribers’ inboxes early next week. iLounge Weekly is a summary of the week’s best news, reviews, and feature articles we’ve published, and it also features giveaways and accessory discount offers from various companies.…

Former Apple advertising consultant Ken Segall at the University of Arizona in March, 2013.

Ken Segall, author of Insanely Simple and former Apple advertising consultant, today posted a blog entry detailing his views on the evolving definition of “pro” at Apple. In it, Mr. Segall claims that Apple is working to rework the pro industry and grow a “larger audience of high-end consumers who can suddenly understand, enjoy and benefit” from the apps and hardware.

An even more interesting tidbit is what he reveals about Steve Jobs’ plans for the company’s pro products:

Could it possibly be? Would Apple ever even think about saying goodbye to the pro market?

I hope you’re sitting down for this, but Steve Jobs did in fact once consider that very option.

This was back in the days when iMac had established itself as a global bestseller. During one of the agency’s...

It's the TUAW Daily Update, your source for Apple news in a convenient audio format. You'll get all the top Apple stories of the day in three to five minutes for a quick review of what's happening in the Apple world.

You can listen to today's Apple stories by clicking the inline player (requires Flash) or the non-Flash link below. To subscribe to the podcast for daily listening through iTunes, click here.

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Daily Update for August 9, 2013 originally appeared on TUAW - The Unofficial Apple Weblog on Fri, 09 Aug 2013 15:15:00 EST. Please see our...

RHA, the Glasgow-based makers of high-quality earphones and over-ear headphones, has added two new, premium earphone models to their in-ear line-up, the MA600i and MA750i (pictured above).

TUAW's reviewed RHA's MA150 and MA450 earphones and the SA950i on-ear headphones in the past, and the results were very impressive, especially considering the price points. The two new models RHA has announced promise even better sound quality, design and value for money.

The MA600i (US$85.95) are constructed from "...

Twenty years after its birth and untimely end, Michael Cohen picks up his MessagePad 2000 for a trip down memory lane. Join us for a look at Apple’s — and TidBITS’s — past.

Read the full article at TidBITS, the oldest continuously published technology publication on the Internet. To get a full-text RSS feed, help support our work and become a TidBITS member! Members also enjoy an ad-free version of our Web site, email delivery of individual articles, the ability to make long comments with live links, and discounts on Take Control orders and other Apple-related products.

Photo courtesy The Laughing Squid

Behold! Rumor has it that Tim Cook wants to revamp Apple's retail stores and the above is a sneak peek at what we have in store.

What you're really looking at, though, is a pretty spot on replica of an Apple retail store constructed completely with Legos. The occasion? The release party for the book Arduino and Lego Projects, which The Laughing Squid's Scott Beale dropped by.

I can only wonder how much money per square foot even this Apple Store replica rakes in every day.

You can check out more photos of Lego creativity over here.

Lastly, if you just can't get enough of the 1-2 punch that is the Apple Store + Lego combination, recall that we previously posted on a...

Technology writer Nilay Patel of The Verge takes a close look at Apple’s 13-inch MacBook Air, which he calls “the best overall laptop on the market.” He notes that “the backlit keyboard is solid-feeling and comfortable, and Apple’s multitouch glass trackpad remains leaps and bounds ahead of the Windows competition.” But it’s the long-lasting battery that he appreciates most. Patel describes getting over 12 hours of battery life during his tests, “the record for a laptop running our test without an external battery.” Patel concludes, “The new Air is the first of a dramatic new breed of computer — it lets you set up a mobile office for a full day without concern for power.”

The iOS 7 beta currently creates "ghost" apps on an iOS device when restoring from an iCloud backup, a report notes. When restoring from iCloud in iOS 6, a device will normally start re-downloading every app automatically once core data is back in place. iOS7, by contrast, will recreate folders but leave grayed-out icons in place of apps; only tapping on one will get an app to download....
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