Another 3-Model iPhone 8 Rumor; Snap IPO-Could be worth $20-40 billion
Posted: November 16, 2016 Filed under: Uncategorized | Tags: 5.8 inch screen, Apple, Dual Camera, iPhone 8, IPO, OLED screen, Snap, Snapchat Leave a commentKGI securities says Apple will roll out a 4.7 inch iPhone next year with a single lens camera, plus a dual lens 5.5 inch model with an LCD display like the smaller model, and one with an OLED screen. According to macrumors.com, some sources think that third, even more premium model will have a larger screen, maybe 5.8 inches. KGI didn’t speculate on that size, however. There are already grumblings from people who don’t want a larger phone, but would like the dual camera setup…which is predicted to be on 65-70% of iPhones by next year. It’s too early to get all that exercised…several sources said there would be 3 iPhone 7 models, and that didn’t happen!
Businessinsider.com is reporting that Snapchat’s parent company Snap Inc. has quietly filed paperwork for an IPO. It could happen as early as March, but could also occur in the second quarter of next year. The company is seeking a valuation of $20 billion to $25 billion. Bloomberg has reported that Snap’s IPO valuation could go as high as $40 billion.
Apple AirPods to Launch Next Week; Snapchat’s Spectacles Will Sell From Pop Up Vending Machines
Posted: November 10, 2016 Filed under: Uncategorized | Tags: AirPods, Apple, Pop up vending machines, Snapbot, Snapchat, Spectacles Leave a commentApple delayed the rollout of its AirPods wireless earphones last month, and some had said we wouldn’t see them until the 1st of the year. Now, macrumors.com says a source at European online retailer Conrad claims they will be available next week. The Conrad website still says 6-8 weeks, but there’s hope they might be in customers’ hands sooner, not later.
Snapchat will apparently sell its Spectacles camera glasses through pop up vending machines. That’s according to businessinsider.com. The camera glasses will run $130 and be available at ‘surprising’ pop up locations for one day only. Snapchat will show the locations on a map on their website 24 hours ahead of time. The first is expected to appear in Venice Beach, CA…snapchat’s home. The Snapbot vending machines will have motion sensors that turn on its circular screen when someone steps into view. The screen will show footage of video recordings from the eyewear, which can record 10-second clips that sync with the Snapchat app. The machines have 3 buttons for the three color selections (coral, black, and teal). They claim the screen lets you virtually try on each color (on the screen) before you pay.
Folding Samsung Smartphone Due Next Year; MacBook Pro Touch Bar out Nov. 17th at Third Party Stores; MacBook Outsold All Competition in 5 Days
Posted: November 9, 2016 Filed under: Uncategorized | Tags: ' Folding smartphone, Apple, Dell, Galaxy 'X, Macbook Pro, Samsung Leave a commentSamsung has a trick up its sleeve…or maybe in its pocket…for an upcoming Galaxy model. According to 9to5google.com, they will roll out a foldable smartphone! Some are calling it the ‘Galaxy X’ right now. It sports an accordion hinge much like Microsoft’s Surface Book laptop, so when folded, it’s not completely flat. The display is much larger than usual, and has a different aspect ratio that the 16:9 most phones have. It will retain a home button and capacitive buttons along the bottom, and a camera at the top back. The bottom of the phone will still have a charging port, headphone jack, and speaker. The total screen size hasn’t leaked out yet.
The hot new MacBook Pro with the Touch Bar will be in third party stores November 17th. 9to5mac.com says there’s still a 4-5 week wait time if you order from Apple right now. The non-Touch Bar model is available from Apple, Amazon, and others with no delay. According to Slice Intelligence, the MacBook Pro not only set an online sales record, it outsold every competing laptop in 5 days….including the Dell XPS 13 and 15. In that 5 day period, Apple also hit 80% of 2015 and ’16 year to date MacBook Pro sales.
Peeking Ahead at Apple; Samsung’s Amazing Coming AI Assistant; Future Tesla Buyers & Superchargers; New Old Sega Genesis Goes into Production
Posted: November 8, 2016 Filed under: Uncategorized | Tags: AI assistant, Apple, AR, Augmented reality mapping, Energous, Find My iPhone, Galaxy S8, Genesis, iPhone, Jet White, Samsung, Sega, Sonic, Sonic the Hedgehog, Viv, Wireless charging Leave a commentApple has a few things up its tree, including something fresh for the present iPhone 7. Thenextweb.com says they may be readying a ‘Jet White’ shiny new color to the 7 and 7 Plus to bookend the Jet Black color.
As for the future, they may add a feature to Find My iPhone that would surreptitiously turn the phone on for you with the proper authentication, so you could find a stolen phone without alerting the thief, according to bgr.com. What about the iPhone 8? We reported earlier that they were working with Energous on wireless charging. Now, again according to bgr, this is moving forward with Energous getting an infusion from a power management chip maker. You would be able to charge your phone from a source 15 feet away…no charging pad…and it would draw current whether you were at home, work, or wherever!
Appleinsider.com has discovered that Apple was just granted a patent detailing an augmented reality mapping system that harnesses iPhone hardware to overlay visual enhancements onto live video, lending credence to recent rumors suggesting the company plans to implement an iOS-based AR strategy in the near future. Tim Cook has strongly hinted about this.
Meanwhile, over at Samsung, a sea change in digital assistants. The Galaxy S8 will have a digital assistant that takes ‘smart’ to a new level. Samsung will add Viv, from San Jose’s Viv Labs (which they bought last month). Reuters.com says Viv not only can answer questions and look things up, but can effectively write software on the fly to accomplish tasks that you ask it to! This is beyond Star Trek, folks!
A huge change for future Tesla buyers. According to theverge.com, anyone getting a Tesla after January 1st, 2017 will have to pay a small fee to use Tesla Superchargers. Previous owners will still get to use them for free. Tesla says the fee will be much less than the cost of filling a car with gas.
For hardcore Sonic fans, here’s something cool from the dailydot.com: The Sega Genesis is officially back in production. TecToy is making the machines, with Sega’s blessing. Aside from the SD card slot, it’s pretty well a duplicate of the original. It comes with 22 games on the SD card. Preorders are $125 for the box. Are you hearing the Sonic the Hedgehog theme?
Panned MacBook Pro Best Selling MacBook Ever; Amazon Black Friday Pre Sales; China’s Alibaba Dwarfs Black Friday and Cyber Monday
Posted: November 2, 2016 Filed under: Uncategorized | Tags: Amazon, Apple, Black Friday, China, Cyber Monday, iOS, Macbook Pro, Phil Schiller, Singles' Day, Touch Screens Leave a commentDespite all the complaints about the new MacBook Pro models losing ports, and all the rest, macrumors.com says Apple has gotten more online pre-orders for the new generation than any previous MacBook Pros. Marketing chief Phil Schiller said the volume even surprised him. He underscored that Macs and iOS devices are fundamentally different…saying they tried touch screens, but that the ‘L’ shape with a screen facing you, keyboard & trackpad or mouse just work better for productivity. Schiller says they experimented with touch screens on Macs, and decided it wasn’t a great experience.
Black Friday 2016 is almost here, but Amazon has again kicked off the savings a little early, with deals every day until the big day. It looks like the biggest deals on large electronics like TVs will wait ‘till actual Black Friday. Meanwhile, in China, Alibaba is expected to generate $20 billion in sales on Singles’ Day this year, according to the research firm Fung Global Retail and Technology. By comparison, Americans spent $5.8 billion online last year on Black Friday and Cyber Monday combined, the largest sales days in the US!
Next MacBook Pros May Be the Real Deal; Apple Patents Foldable Smartphone; Amazon Rules the Cloud; Mobile Web Passes Desktops; Facebook Extends Longevity
Posted: November 1, 2016 Filed under: Uncategorized | Tags: Amazon, Amazon Web Services, Apple, Carbon nanotubes, Ceramic, Cloud, Facebook, Foldable smartphone, Fox Mulder, Google, IBM, Intel, Longevity, Macbook Pro, Microsoft, Mobile internet, X Files Leave a commentWith the continued griping that the new MacBook Pros aren’t all that ‘pro,’ here’s an interesting tidbit…9to5mac.com reports that KGI Securities says Apple was constrained by a late release of new Intel chips that are more powerful but use less juice. If the next Intel chips are more timely, 2017 may see faster, more powerful MacBook Pros with 32 gigs of ram!
Meanwhile, Apple has patented a bendable or foldable smartphone. Patentlyapple.com says this is different than Samsung’s designs…it uses advanced carbon nanotube structures. This could be done with a ceramic case…something the top Apple Watch uses, and rumored for the iPhone 8. the iPhone 9 or 10 could fold up and slip into a shirt pocket if this is put into use.
Synergy Research Group has crunched numbers, and Amazon Web Services is truly the 800 lb. gorilla of public cloud infrastructure…at 45%, they have more than Microsoft, Google, and IBM combined. According to Geekwire.com, this remains true even though Microsoft and Google are growing cloud revenue at over 100% per year. IBM does lead in managed private clouds, however.
Mobile internet use has passed desktop use for the first time, according to techcrunch.com. Mobile is now at 51.2%, with 48.7% of use still on desktops. Mobile is a whopping 75% in emerging markets like India!
Shades of ‘I want to believe’ from “X Files,” thenextweb.com has picked up a report that moderate Facebook use can lead to longer lives. It has been long known that people with strong social networks live longer, but what about online friends? A study of 12 million Facebook users by UC San Diego says yes. One of the researchers has ties to Facebook, but they claim the social media giant didn’t have a hand in determining the results. The average Facebook user is allegedly 12% less likely to die than non-users. Fox Mulder is using Facebook to look for aliens, and thinks you’re one.
New Tesla Powerwall Has Twice the Power; More on New MacBooks
Posted: October 31, 2016 Filed under: Uncategorized | Tags: Apple, Dongles, F# chord, Macbook Pro, Powerwall 2, SSD drive, Tesla Leave a commentA pleasant surprise from Tesla…the upcoming Powerwall 2 will hold twice the charge as the present model’s 14 kW hours. Elon Musk says that’s enough to run lights, sockets, and fridge in a standard 4 bedroom home for an entire day! According to tech crunch.com, production will start in the next few weeks, and the rig will run $5500. Of course, you will need to add a few thousand to have it installed along with a power converter. Along with solar cells, you could do some serious cord-cutting….or at least unplugging for a good part of the day!
With lots of people up in arms about the new MacBooks losing ports, and the thoughts of buying a bag full of dongles, and other issues…like no physical escape button many programmers use, Apple has apparently thrown a bone to business and power users. 9to5mac.com reports that the SSD drive is replaceable and upgradable, at least in the low end model sans Touch Bar. In the prior models, it was soldered in. We’ll have to wait until some of the Touch Bar models are delivered to see if this is true across the line…if so, it would be welcomed. A couple of other notes…or lack of notes…the F sharp chord at startup is gone. The new Pros start when you open the lid, and it’s almost no difference from the wake when you open the lid of a machine that has already been booted up…except that it obviously takes a little longer. A moment of silence for the venerable Apple chord.
Microsoft Surface Studio; New Size for iPhone 8
Posted: October 27, 2016 Filed under: Uncategorized | Tags: Apple, iPhone 8, Microsoft, Microsoft Dial, Surface Studio Leave a commentMicrosoft has rolled out its Surface Studio all-in-one PC. They claim the thinnest display ever built. According to techcrunch.com, it features what they call TrueColor, which allows creative types to change color on the fly…say a filmmaker is working in DCI-P3, but wanted to know how it will look on a TV that doesn’t support P3 color…it can instantly show RGB color. The display also has True Scale…and inch of screen is an inch in real life. The touchscreen can lay down flat, and besides the usual keyboard and mouse, it supports the Surface Pen and a new device called the Surface Dial. The dial can be used on the desktop, or laid right on the display, and has varying functions. The dial works with the Surface Book, Pro 3, and Pro 4. The Surface Studio is on pre-order now, will ship by the holidays, and starts at $2999.
While dueling rumors have the iPhone 8 either all glass or just front and back glass with a bezel, 9to5mac.com reports that Apple will add a new size…a 5 inch model. Apparently, they haven’t decided if it will replace the 4.7 inch size, or be produced as a third size, along with the 5.5 inch iPhone. Some reports point to a curved screen like the Samsung Galaxy Edge, while others see a flat all-glass front coming. It may be that Apple is experimenting with a couple different designs, and we may have a better idea by spring.
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