Today during Apple’s keynote event at the Bill Graham Civic Auditorium in San Francisco, the Cupertino company announced the latest iteration on their most successful product. Despite rumors of a mostly laid back upgrade year, the iPhone 7 did not disappoint. While only minor changes have been made to the enclosure, there are significant upgrades to almost every other aspect of Apple’s flagship iPhone.
Posts in iPhone
iPhone 7: Our Complete Overview
How Apple’s Smart Battery Case Recharges Your iPhone→
Good point by iLounge’s Jesse Hollington, writing on Quora, about the difference between third-party battery cases and the way Apple’s new battery case has been designed to recharge an iPhone (via Zac Cichy):
Notice the missing step? You’re only recharging your iPhone battery once instead of twice. The fact that Apple’s case doesn’t have a switch means that you don’t really have an option to turn it on when you need it or off when you don’t — if your iPhone is inside the case, it’s being powered by the case. If you do this at the beginning of the day, as soon as you disconnect from the charger, that means that the iPhone remains at 100% until the case battery is depleted, then the iPhone gets powered from its internal battery. The fact that the case is integrated into iOS to provide power status is an added bonus as you get a clearer view as to what your overall battery capacity is.
If you remember to have a fully charged iPhone before putting it into Apple’s case, then it’ll run off the case’s battery instead of draining its own. Thus, if you always keep it on and charge both overnight, the iPhone will always start using the case’s battery first in the morning. That’s smart indeed – too bad I can’t try it on the iPhone 6s Plus.
iPhone 6s and iPhone 6s Plus Opening Weekend Sales Hit a Record 13 Million
Apple announced this morning that the iPhone 6s and iPhone 6s Plus has sold more than 13 million units over its opening weekend. The new iPhone went on sale last Friday in the United States, Australia, Canada, China, France, Germany, Hong Kong, Japan, New Zealand, Puerto Rico, Singapore, and the UK.
“Sales for iPhone 6s and iPhone 6s Plus have been phenomenal, blowing past any previous first weekend sales results in Apple’s history,” said Tim Cook, Apple’s CEO. “Customers’ feedback is incredible and they are loving 3D Touch and Live Photos, and we can’t wait to bring iPhone 6s and iPhone 6s Plus to customers in even more countries on October 9.”
13 million units sold over the opening weekend is a new record for iPhone sales. Last year Apple sold 10 million units of the iPhone 6 and iPhone 6 Plus, whilst in 2013 Apple sold 9 million units of the iPhone 5s and iPhone 5c. In fact, Apple has consistently beaten their opening weekend iPhone sales every single year.
Second Wave of iPhone 6s Launch Countries Announced
Apple also announced today that the second wave of iPhone 6s and iPhone 6s Plus launch countries will get the device on October 9 and 10. Over those two days, the new iPhones will launch in 42 countries in this second wave, including Italy, Mexico, Russia, Spain and Taiwan.
The full list of countries:
iPhone 6s and iPhone 6s Plus will roll out worldwide to more than 40 additional countries and territories beginning October 9 including Andorra, Austria, Belgium, Bosnia, Bulgaria, Croatia, Czech Republic, Denmark, Estonia, Finland, Greece, Greenland, Hungary, Iceland, Ireland, Isle of Man, Italy, Latvia, Liechtenstein, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Maldives, Mexico, Monaco, Netherlands, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Romania, Russia, Slovakia, Slovenia, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland and Taiwan. On October 10, countries include Bahrain, Jordan, Kuwait, Qatar, Saudi Arabia and United Arab Emirates.
iPhone 6S and 6S Plus: Our Complete Overview
This morning Apple announced the iPhone 6S and the iPhone 6S Plus at their September Special Event Keynote. Despite it being just an “S” year, the new iPhone lineup was packed with interesting new features and improvements.
Tracking TV Shows with iShows 2: Welding Great Design with Extensive Customization
I watch a lot of TV – almost certainly too much TV. Years ago I used to keep track of the TV shows I watched mentally and through a TV guide from the Saturday newspaper. But as I started to watch more TV it became harder to keep track of when shows air. Fortunately, I started to use iPhone TV tracker apps, which make it effortless to keep track of your favorite TV shows. I’ve probably used 4 or 5 different apps for a solid period of time, and this February I switched to what I think is the latest and greatest TV tracker app: iShows 2, which officially launches today in the App Store.
I had briefly used the original iShows app, but I never permanently switched to it. Whilst the design was quite good, it had this very odd layout that left a gap on the side of the screen which (as petty as it sounds) I couldn’t get over. Somewhat embarrassingly the other issue I encountered was that I never discovered some of the gestures, without which the app was a lot harder to use. Some of those gestures persist in iShows 2, and I’ll discuss them shortly.
Prior to switching to iShows 2 whilst it was in beta, I had been using iTV Shows for around a year. It never looked quite as good as iShows or TeeVee 3 (another popular and very pretty app), but I preferred the way iTV Shows worked. I’m still a fan of iTV Shows, but I’ve been convinced (after months of use) that iShows 2 is the better option for me.
Apple Posts New iPhone Advert: “Amazing Apps”
Apple’s third advert featuring the new “If it’s not an iPhone, it’s not an iPhone” tagline was today posted online. The new advert, “Amazing Apps”, focuses on highlighting the huge amount of apps (“over one and a half million”) available on the App Store, and the notion that apps on the iPhone are “hand-picked” and “awe-inspiring”.
This is an iPhone, and it comes with something amazing. An App Store with over one and a half million of the best apps available. That’s over one and a half million, hand-picked, awe-inspiring, just plain surprising, who knew a phone could do that, apps. If it’s not an iPhone, it’s not an iPhone.
You can watch the new advert below the break, or on YouTube.
Olloclip 4-in-1 Lens for iPhone 6 Review
olloclip 4-in-1 Pocket-Sized Lens Kit for iPhone 6
For convenience and high-quality results, it was hard to beat the Olloclip accessory lenses for the iPhones 4 through 5s. The 4-in–1 model was especially good, cleaning up a lot of the optical aberrations of the earlier models.
Then came the iPhone 6, in regular and plus sizes, and your old Olloclip was suddenly useless.
The Olloclip is a widget that slides over the corner of the phone and places a wide-angle, fisheye or close-up macro lens over the iPhone’s camera. The new iPhones’ design meant that the old Olloclips wouldn’t fit. But did the folks from Olloclip just pull out a Dremel and cut a groove to let the old model slip over the new iPhone’s sticky-out lens?
Of course not. They came up with a whole new design, a design that’s bigger, but which adds support for the front selfie camera. So how does it compare?
Apple: iPhone 6 & iPhone 6 Plus Arrive in 36 More Countries and Territories This Month
Apple today issued a press release, noting that the iPhone 6 and iPhone 6 Plus will launch in another 36 countries this month. That will make the iPhone available in 69 countries by the end of the month, with 115 countries expected to get the new iPhones by the end of the year. According to Apple this will be the fastest iPhone rollout ever.
The countries getting the iPhone 6 and iPhone 6 Plus this month are as follows:
- Friday, October 17: China, India and Monaco
- Thursday, October 23: Israel
- Friday, October 24: Czech Republic, French West Indies, Greenland, Malta, Poland, Reunion Island and South Africa
- Thursday, October 30: Bahrain and Kuwait
- Friday, October 31: Albania, Bosnia, Croatia, Estonia, Greece, Guam, Hungary, Iceland, Kosovo, Latvia, Lithuania, Macau, Macedonia, Mexico, Moldova, Montenegro, Serbia, South Korea, Romania, Slovakia, Slovenia, Ukraine and Thailand
As you can see from the below chart, the claim that this is the “fastest iPhone rollout ever” depends on which point you judge it. As of today (day 34) it is not the fastest rollout, but by the end of this month (day 52) and end of this year, it is.
iPhone 6 and iPhone 6 Plus Launching in China on October 17
Apple issued a press release today noting that the new iPhone 6 and iPhone 6 Plus will launch in China on Friday, October 17. Preorders will begin a week earlier on October 10 and they will be available on all three of China’s major mobile networks; China Mobile, China Telecom and China Unicom.
“We are thrilled to bring iPhone 6 and iPhone 6 Plus to our customers in China on all three carriers at launch,” said Apple’s CEO Tim Cook. “With support for TD-LTE and FDD-LTE, iPhone 6 and iPhone 6 Plus customers will have access to high-speed mobile networks from China Mobile, China Telecom and China Unicom for an incredible experience.”
Prices for the iPhone 6 will start at 5,288 (RMB) for the 16GB model, 6,088 (RMB) for the 64GB model and 6,888 (RMB) for the 128GB model. The iPhone 6 Plus will start at 6,088 (RMB) for the 16GB model, 6,888 (RMB) for the 64GB model and 7,788 (RMB) for the 128GB model.
The iPhone 6 and iPhone 6 Plus first went on sale on September 19 in the US and nine other countries where 10 million units were sold in the opening weekend. The second launch round took place last Friday when it went on sale in 20 countries.